2020 US Election (Part One)

[Archon_Wing]

To those that object to the term baggage, read it as shorthand for racially charged distraction.

You're just making it worse, tbh.

 

[metalhead]

Perhaps it's because i'm a limey, but it strikes me as weird that the article tells me precisely nothing about why people are interested in him apart from the fact that he raised a lot of money. What is his policy platform? What is his voting record like?

Lol, another person who thinks politics is about policy platforms and voting records.

Beto appears to have the ability to connect with people across a lot of racial and socio-economic lines. He appears sincere. And yes, he is young and good-looking relative to most of the people in politics.

His ability to raise money matters because he is able to raise money from small grassroots donors, rather than have to ally himself with corporations and mega-donors and SuperPACs and whatnot.

 

[rah]

I don't think it's an either or. Even Obama wasn't totally funded by small grassroots donors.

 

[El_Machinae]

Okay, my bad.

It's not benefit of the doubt, it's literally the difference in process when you are fact checking someone.

It was basically the same number of keystrokes that you used, and it wasn't difference in bias against J. It was literally just a different style of fact-checking

 

[Timsup2nothin]

It's not benefit of the doubt, it's literally the difference in process when you are fact checking someone.

It was basically the same number of keystrokes that you used, and it wasn't difference in bias against J. It was literally just a different style of fact-checking

It actually was a difference in bias against J, which I admittedly have more of. I generally don't consider fact checking with J, I just assume that he's lying. Once in a great while the assumption gets me into trouble and I have to backtrack, but usually it is just a convenient shortcut.

 

[Arakhor]

Moderator Action: Now that we've established that the headline did exist, perhaps we could stop discussing its poster. Thanks.

 

[El_Machinae]

It actually was a difference in bias against J

It literally was a difference in style in fact-checking. We were both skeptical. We both took 'lazy' efforts to fact-check.

If you blame your bias, you're missing an opportunity to improve process. As it is, it just means you'd spend more time fact-checking someone you agree with. That's not really useful.

 

[onejayhawk]

It literally was a difference in style in fact-checking. We were both skeptical. We both took 'lazy' efforts to fact-check.

If you blame your bias, you're missing an opportunity to improve process. As it is, it just means you'd spend more time fact-checking someone you agree with. That's not really useful.

That, in a sentence, is my problem with the various fact checkers such as Snopes, WP, and Politifact. They have a political ax to grind that sometimes has nothing to do with facts.

J

 

[Estebonrober]

That, in a sentence, is my problem with the various fact checkers such as Snopes, WP, and Politifact. They have a political ax to grind that sometimes has nothing to do with facts.

J

Um sure but if you can back your fact check with facts and the other side can not, well then you win in actual reality.

Not that actual reality ha anything to do with anything anymore.

 

[onejayhawk]

Um sure but if you can back your fact check with facts and the other side can not, well then you win in actual reality. Not that actual reality ha anything to do with anything anymore.

Point taken. It's just another case of a media site pretending to be unbiased when the opposite is true.

J

 

[Estebonrober]

Point taken. It's just another case of a media site pretending to be unbiased when the opposite is true.

J

I’m pretty sure that’s not what I said but ok how about I put it this way.

When statistical or scientific reality backs one side over and over again. That’s not bias, that’s just reality.

 

[Arakhor]

Everyone is biased, but some people manage to put it aside in their work.

 

[Bootstoots]

Exactly. Trump won 90% of the counties. Clinton won the 10% with the heaviest population densities. That's not exactly urban vs rural, but the flavor is similar.

By contrast, here's 2012:



(others note that the site we're using has blue for Republicans and red for Democrats)

They're fairly similar, of course, but there's a critical difference. A bunch of counties in swing states - even some rural white ones, especially in E IA and SW WI - went for Obama in 2012 but switched sides en masse in 2016. Most of the rest of the swing state counties that did go Republican voted much less heavily for Romney than for Trump - note the lighter blue in 2012 and the considerably darker shade in 2016. Even in rural/small town/small city areas, the swing totals add up. That right there is why Obama had a slight EC advantage relative to his PV share in 2012, but Clinton had a substantial EC disadvantage relative to hers. Losing a bunch of Midwesterners while winning a bunch of Californians and Texans is a bad idea in our system.

I do echo @metalhead's sentiment that Sherrod Brown would make a good presidential candidate if he can get past the primaries. The single most important thing for actually winning, after all, is being able to do well among Midwestern swing voters*. A popular senator from a GOP-leaning Rust Belt state is hard to beat from an electability perspective. I don't know enough about Klobuchar, Baldwin, or Stabenow to know how they might perform, but they're all from Midwestern swing states, all outperformed their party average in their respective states, and are of course all women, which would probably help with the primary.

*Including people who might show up for the right candidate, but not otherwise.

 

[Birdjaguar]

...I don't know enough about Klobuchar, Baldwin, or Stabenow to know how they might perform...

I don't know a single thing about any of those three, but I suspect that only Baldwin has a chance based on his name alone. The others are too hard to say for most Americans. Easy to say is the path to victory!!

 

[Perfection]

I'm gonna vote against that one orange dude

 

[Timsup2nothin]

The deplorables are still stinging about the black man. Nominating a gay woman is asking for 100% deplorable turnout.

 

[Bootstoots]

The deplorables are still stinging about the black man. Nominating a gay woman is asking for 100% deplorable turnout.

But the actual swing voters in swing states voted for the black man, and the racists didn't turn up enough to outvote them then, even after four years of Obama. And since Tammy Baldwin is from an actual swing state with real live deplorables, we can find out what they think of voting for a lesbian.

So let's check her numbers here. She won statewide with a margin of 55.4-44.6, including the same rural white counties Obama won in the SW quadrant of WI, a narrow majority in the normally Republican counties containing Green Bay and Oshkosh, landslides (>60%) in some normally Democratic small cities where Hillary Clinton underperformed (e.g. La Crosse and Eau Claire in the western part of the state, Superior in the far northwest, Kenosha* in the far southeast), and of course absolute blowouts in Madison and Milwaukee. Losses in the heavily Republican suburbs of Milwaukee and the rural areas in the east and north were kept to a minimum.

That's a very, very good result. Now keeping in mind that all it takes to win the election is Clinton's map plus WI, MI, and PA, and the first is her home state while the latter two have similar demographics, she'd seem to be a very strong contender. Being a lesbian would be even more helpful in the primaries than just being a woman, while at the same time we know from her results that more than enough voters are perfectly willing to vote for a lesbian.

I would need to hear her speak, though, before making a final judgment. Gori's right - the speaking voice matters a whole lot, easily more than any demographic feature like being gay or a woman. And yes, women are at a bit of a disadvantage in terms of having a "good" speaking voice, although most who get elected have fine voices. Hillary Clinton is a negative outlier in this regard, not the norm.

*Okay, this one was 57-43, not >60. But Trump won this county by a couple of points in 2016.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Hard to say if she'd play that well outside her home state. They know her there. Deplorables in other states are only going to know "gay woman," because you know that would be the 24/7 messaging from the GOP.

 

[onejayhawk]

I’m pretty sure that’s not what I said but ok how about I put it this way. When statistical or scientific reality backs one side over and over again. That’s not bias, that’s just reality.

Then I did misunderstand you. I'm curious as to where you think you are seeing that happen.

J

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Then I did misunderstand you. I'm curious as to where you think you are seeing that happen.

J

Oh quit with the disingenuous nonsense. Fact checkers catch Trump in a hundred whopping lies a week, not because they are biased but because he is just a totally shameless liar who doesn't even care if most people know immediately that he is lying. That's the reality being mentioned, and everyone knows it including you.