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Cake day: January 13th, 2024

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  • There were certainly votes lost in Michigan over Gaza, but even if every single Jill Stein vote was a protest vote (they weren’t), it wouldn’t have been enough for Harris to carry the state.

    The tougher thing to parse is the reason why so many voters seemingly stayed home this cycle. I think there is a very reasonable argument that not enough people were excited about her message, even the base.

    It’s a lot easier for door knockers, phone bankers, and everyday democrats to talk proudly about their candidate if they can rattle off a list of great things their candidate will do. It’s even easier if those great things hit people where they’re hurting the hardest or is the moral thing to do (healthcare for the uninsured, ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, etc.). It’s a lot tougher to get low propensity voters to show up on the harm reduction argument alone, especially if you brush past where they’re hurting or concede too much ground on your moral positions.

    The biggest issue for most voters appears to have been inflation and the economy, and while democrats were technically correct to say the rate of inflation has come down and American economic indicators outperformed most other countries in this post-pandemic period, that’s all pretty meaningless to someone whose real wage growth didn’t keep up with inflation these past few years. The “opportunity economy” and targeted small business tax cuts is a much tougher sell to someone working two+ jobs to get by.

    The other issue that dominated the media was immigration. Democrats forfeited their moral position when they offered the republican wishlist border bill earlier this year. The argument that republicans weren’t serious on the border because they didn’t support the bill fell flat, and instead democrats were (rightly) criticized for abandoning their framing of the issue as a choice between deportation and amnesty, and their previous claims the border wall was racist.

    All of that to say, democrats failed to connect with their own base on the issues that make them the party’s best messengers. Add Gaza to the list of issues where Harris could have pivoted away from Biden, instead of running into the arms of the Cheneys to chase the mythical moderate republican voter.



  • We all have our anecdotal experiences. If you’re a college student or graduate, going to school or working in an urban environment or coastal state, the data may not reflect your lived experience. But this has been the growing trend in national polls for some time now.

    There’s also an increasing generational component to this, as millennials age out of the 18-29 demographic. If you’re a millennial, this shift may feel even more incomprehensible as millennials appear resistant to the typical conservative shift as they’ve aged.


  • try to court “moderate republicans”, which we very obviously just learned don’t actually exist.

    Exactly. For all their effort, all the campaigning with Liz Cheney, all the promises of Republicans in the cabinet, and all the war hawk endorsements, Harris lost votes with Republicans compared to Biden.

    Republicans don’t vote Democrat, stop running to the right to appease them. Democrats don’t want to hear that shit either and you need them to show up to win, so how about courting their vote instead.




  • If Biden was so unelectable that he needed to be replaced immediately before the convention, and if 60%+ of the country thought things were on the wrong track, why would you run a Biden 2.0 campaign?

    There was unique opportunity for Harris to thank Biden for his service and pivot. She should have had an answer for what she would have done differently than Biden, how she would have delivered more for Americans (regardless of if that was even possible).

    Americans needed to hear Hope and Change, and she tried to sell them the status quo, but with Liz Cheney in her cabinet. Americans chose chaos, because the status quo ain’t working for them.


  • folks that voted third party because “my state will be blue”

    Admittedly not all the votes are in, but…

    • Pennsylvania - Trump up by 130k votes, Jill Stein got 33k votes
    • Michigan - Trump up by 84k votes, Jill Stein got 45k votes
    • Wisconsin - Trump up by 28k votes, Jill Stein got 12k votes

    Are all Jill Stein votes from protest voters? Nah, there are diehard Green supporters out there.

    Are there other 3rd party candidates? Of course, but how many RFK (more votes than Stein in WI) voters could she have converted? Almost none.

    This was her blue wall road to victory, show me the electoral path to victory ruined by third party voters who would have otherwise voted Democrat.

    This election was lost by people not showing up to vote. Trump is sitting at almost 72M votes right now compared to 74M in 2020. Harris is only at 67M now, compared to Biden’s 81M in 2020. While there are still votes to count, there aren’t 15M votes left to count.

    Whether it was lack of interest, protest, or whatever reason, 10% of voters stayed home this year.





  • Energize the fucking progressives.

    Yes. She could be capitalizing on popular progressive ideas, like healthcare or lowering grocery prices. These ideas have traction with groups beyond just leftists. She could have run an Obama style campaign, rather than be Biden 2.0. Instead we get Cheneys and “opportunity economy” for small business owners.

    There are far more progressives than there are conservatives.

    Doubt. Gallup has 48% of Americans identifying has Republican or Republican leaning. Unless you’re telling me that self identifying Republicans are not conservative, but are in fact made up of mostly “moderates” or secret progressives, I don’t know how else you came to this conclusion.

    There might even be more progressives than there are moderates.

    Also doubt. Where’s the data on this?



  • That’s a comfortable lead no matter how you spin it.

    My brother in anti-Trumpism, the only spin here is yours in saying her lead is comfortable.

    Your original OpEd focused on national polling, so that’s what I responded to. But yes, ignore the national polling, focus on the swing states, the electoral college is what counts.

    From the same WaPo article as your picture is this swing state focused chart:

    It shows the 2020 polling error, which was largely in Trump’s favor in swing states (other than GA). If the same polling error still exists now in 2024, all that comfort disappears. The polling error was even greater in Trump’s favor in 2016, however was in Obama’s favor in 2012.

    The point not being that Trump will outperform the polls this time, but that margins of error matter, and the reality could swing either way. With polling in so many states being within the margins, we’re likely seeing the closest election of our lifetimes.

    And all this isn’t meant to be doom and gloom, but I ain’t going into this election with Clinton levels of comfort, again. You’re absolutely right on the game plan though. If you live in any of these states, your vote this time will likely be more consequential than it ever will be.