The (no longer) much too early 2024 election thread

[River]

At first I was trying to figure out what kind of delicate little flowers work for politicians if that's what makes Harris a "difficult" boss. Backing myself up with data and defending my reasoning is kind of part of my job and my manager would be doing a crap job if they didn't put me through my paces. But then I remembered that, even on technical teams like mine, there are staff that don't like to explain themselves and will get all kinds of weird if they have to. Drives everyone else quietly and, sometimes, not so quietly bananas because it makes the project a lot harder when data-sharing is frowned on by team members. One of these special little flowers is senior enough in title that it's janked up how the rest of the engineers share and talk about their work. So, actually, good on Harris for getting that trash to take itself out.

[Túrin Turambar]

Trump supporter helpfully puts up a sign translated into Latin for the benefit of Latin American immigrant voters:

Trump Latin sign.png (204.37 KiB) Viewed 315 times

[N.E. Brigand]

Spent two hours canvassing door to door for Senator Sherrod Brown. The overwhelming majority of people on my list were not at home.

[Dave_LF]

Nate Silver:

If I were the Harris campaign, I’d mention: January 6, Roe, Obamacare, Project 2025, JD Vance and the words “convicted felon” — and not much else.

*Thank* you.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Spent two hours canvassing door to door for Senator Sherrod Brown. The overwhelming majority of people on my list were not at home.

Thank you for getting out and doing it.

[N.E. Brigand]

Donald Trump yesterday said that his mass deportation program will be "bloody."

As David Frum notes, what Trump is proposing, logistically, is about 100 times larger than what the U.S. did to Japanese Americans in World War II.

[N.E. Brigand]

There was so much outcry from Republicans in March about a Georgia woman who was killed by an illegal immigrant from Venezuela. "Say her name!" was a slogan thrown at President Biden at the time of the State of the Union. (He did say her name in that speech.)

I wonder how many Republicans now could even remember what her name is.

[N.E. Brigand]

The New York Times has one of the most respected polling operations. Today they released a national poll, conducted last week, that found Donald Trump leading Vice President Harris nationally by 1%-2% (the difference depended on whether third party candidates were included). That dropped Harris's lead in the 538.com average from 3.1% yesterday to 2.8% today. We need more high quality polling to know if this represents a trend or a blip.

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I missed this moment from Friday -- echoes of the 2020 Vice Presidential debate!


 
David Frum goes on to say: "Just to underscore what should be an obvious point: It's not 'censorship' for a candidate for the second-highest office in the land to refuse to do a joint media appearance with a pro-Putin crackpot who praises Holocaust deniers."

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As you can see from the clip below from Wisconsin yesterday, Donald Trump is telling ever more bizarre tales:



As this commentator says, "If Trump knows the story is a lie, he's entirely unsuited to serve in any elected office. If he actually believes this fantasy, his dementia is so advanced that he needs to be protected from himself. Either way, he cannot be President."

[N.E. Brigand]

On day 50 of Vice President Harris's presidential campaign, she has posted an Issues page to her website. There are four broad policy areas as follows. Each includes two to ten bullet points, and each of those expands to a paragraph or three of text:

--"Build an Opportunity Economy and Lower Costs for Families"

--"Safeguard Our Fundamental Freedoms"

--"Ensure Safety and Justice For All"

--"Keep America Safe, Secure, and Prosperous"

At the end of each of the four sections, there is a bullet point about how Donald Trump's Project 2025 agenda would undermine those goals.

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I think this writer is correct that Harris should be making at least five campaign appearances every week from Wednesday (following the debate) until the election (that's 54 days).

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Something I actually heard along the Appalachian Trail on April 23, 2000 and will never forget: "Easter? Well, I'll be. Happy Birthday, Jesus!"

That was both wrong and weird.

This is technically not wrong (except by choice of image), but it's still weird.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

The New York Times has one of the most respected polling operations. Today they released a national poll, conducted last week, that found Donald Trump leading Vice President Harris nationally by 1%-2% (the difference depended on whether third party candidates were included). That dropped Harris's lead in the 538.com average from 3.1% yesterday to 2.8% today. We need more high quality polling to know if this represents a trend or a blip.

If you look closer at the data from that poll, you will see that the sole reason why it is different than other recent polls is that it shows Harris barely leading among young voters, which is almost certainly a result of how the sampling was done, and not accurate. I know that the Times/Sienna poll is considered highly respected, but I think this was done semi-intentionally, in order to give the impression of a race turning back to Trump just before the debate.



Meanwhile most of the swing state polling that came out today was fairly positive for Harris, suggesting that she still is in a good position, though obviously the race is still very, very close (which reflects very poorly on the U.S electorate, and particularly on white men like me who strongly support Trump overall).





x-posted with N.E.B.!

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I've seen this from a couple of people, but I don't know if it is true or not. If it is true, I think the Sienna/Times poll should be completely disregarded.



ETA: If you click on the link and go through the comments, there is a lengthy discussion backing up the claim, which makes it sound to me like it is accurate, but I still am not sure.

[N.E. Brigand]

"Elon, Elon likes his money. He makes a lot, they say. Spends his day counting in a garage by the motorway." No wait, that's neither Elon nor Leon.

[N.E. Brigand]

"Mysterious influencer network pushed sexual smears of Harris" (Semafor). The participants were well compensated for spreading those attacks and other anti-Democratic talking points (one person got $20,000 for a month's work). One member of that network? George Santos! (Although he supposedly pushed back against the sexual content.)

Marcy Wheeler notes that one line of attack described in the article -- "In the early summer, those talking points included attacking Judge Juan Merchan during Donald Trump’s hush money trial in New York" -- is a bit more sinister.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Take a look at the 18-29 numbers from these swing state polls and tell that there is any chance that the 18-30 numbers in that NY Time poll is anywhere near correct.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Posted without comment.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Several things today for Nate Silver to ignore.

ABC/Ibsos poll showing Harris with a six point lead among likely voters nationwide.



And RCP showing for the first time Harris leading in Georgia.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Not good news.

Michigan Supreme Court reverses. Still no word from NC, where the ballots were already supposed to go out and were delayed by this ridiculous ruling.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

This is just absolutely absurd. How anyone can consider this a "high quality" poll, I don't understand.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Another one for Nate to ignore. Harris by 3 in NC.