Election 2024 Part III: Out with the old!

[Strong Reaction]

It's not what it's being made to seem like. He was just complaining about the crew not setting up his microphone properly, so that he has to bend down toward it, and that makes him look slumping and tired. Since he always has to pantomime everything when he tells his stories, this is him pantomiming what it's like to speak into a microphone set too low.

I watched the whole clip, its basically a grumpy old guy complaining and droning on about nonsense then the mimicking of well decide for yourself, at any rate it was weird.

 

[Gori the Grey]

ts basically a grumpy old guy complaining and droning on about nonsense

Oh, this is absolutely true.

 

[choxorn]

It's not what it's being made to seem like. He was just complaining about the crew not setting up his microphone properly, so that he has to bend down toward it, and that makes him look slumping and tired. Since he always has to pantomime everything when he tells his stories, this is him pantomiming what it's like to speak into a microphone set too low.

It's obviously not what it looks like, but what it looks like is what people are joking about, because that's funny, and also it's a bit of "Trump, dude, you didn't really think this gesture through very well, did you"

 

[Gori the Grey]

He doesn't think anything through.

 

[Strong Reaction]

Joe Biden mimicking biting a baby was funny too. Dude what are you doing? I get it, but just not really the right time for that kinda stuff Joe. Go in the bunker and don't come out till Wednesday.

 

[CKS]

We got a call tonight on our land line urging us to vote for Ted Cruz. They left a long message telling me how important it is that I vote for him.

I live in Illinois.

Apparently his campaign has been calling us fairly regularly, and this is just the first time I've been home to hear it.

 

[Strong Reaction]

Proposition 36 ​

Allows Felony Charges and Increases Sentences for Certain Drug and Theft Crimes. Initiative Statute.​

Mostly the election talk is about the president, but since I am in a state where its not really close who CA will vote for I noticed that I am more concerned with the various propositions. The above being the most consequential and could have a noticeable effect on my every day life. Shoplifting is rampant where I live, not as bad as the flash mob thefts seen on the news but at the grocery store its a problem. In an attempt to lower the prison population, and the ensuing cost of housing inmates for non violent crime prop 47 was passed in 2014 which made some felonies misdemeanors. The unfortunate side effect has been people have taken advantage of the law and lack of enforcement as a signal to shoplift with near impunity. A clerk at the local store claims that company policy is to not pursue such individuals for fear of being sued and fear of the thief being armed and harming the employee which further emboldens thieves. They don't even have security guards, at least at my store. Many stores do have security guards. Essentially some have given up on measures to curtail theft and people are taking advantage it.
Prop 47 background

Proposition 47's Impact on California's Criminal Justice System | KQED

For the last decade, most Democrats have defended Proposition 47, the state’s criminal justice reform measure. But recently, more state leaders are pushing some sort of overhaul of the 2014 ballot measure.

www.kqed.org

 

[Kaitzilla]

The last? 538 update.

Kamala 50% odds, Trump 49%!

ABC News – Breaking News, Latest News and Videos

ABC News is your trusted source on political news stories and videos. Get the latest coverage and analysis on everything from the Trump presidency, Senate, House and Supreme Court.

projects.fivethirtyeight.com

Silver must have seen something

 

[EvaDK]

It's pretty disturbing that a nation that lost hundreds of thousands of young men fighting Fascism in Europe and Japan in the 1940s, is this close to electing a Fascist into the White House.

 

[Yeekim]

He's winning because the opponent is incredibly crappy, as before.

I'm trying to imagine what would make Harris crappier than Trump. Has she been slaughtering puppies en masse and raping their corpses in public?

 

[choxorn]

Well, we're close to finding out one way or the other.

If I had to make a prediction: I think Harris will win and the map will look pretty similar to 2020. I think that, much like then, the dominating factor in the race is that Trump is extremely polarizing and unpopular, and I think basically nothing he's done since then has changed anyone's opinion on him- and the things that maybe have changed people's minds, like J6 or his criminal cases or his general seeming like he's losing his mind, have been changing people's views on him for the worse. I similarly think Harris is, much like Biden 4 years ago, kinda unpopular but not nearly as polarizing or unpopular as Trump. I certainly think some things are working against the Democrats now that weren't 4 years ago (the inflation of the post-COVID economy, mainly) but there's also things working in their favor (the Republicans' deeply unpopular stances on abortion). Gaza honestly probably won't matter much- most Americans just don't care all that much about it, and for those of us that it would matter, either they're (rightfully) concluding that Harris is bad for Gaza but Trump would likely be worse, or they were never going to vote for Harris (or any major party candidate) in the first place.

As to the theories of the polls, I don't think they're horribly off, but I agree with the theory of "the pollsters are afraid of missing on Trump again and overcorrected and now they're too high on him and they're herding to a tie race because they think that's the result they should get and they're afraid of taking a bold stance and disagreeing." If I had to make a guess as to what exactly the map will look like, I'd go with the same as Biden's, minus Arizona, but plus North Carolina (purely because I think the Republicans' horrible governor candidate will drag them down a bit across the board, just enough for Harris to win there), but a bunch of the states could really go either way.

As to Congress, if I had to bet, it would be on the Democrats narrowly winning the House while the Republicans narrowly win the Senate (thanks in large part to the map heavily favoring them) with either 51 or 52 seats- I think they'll very likely win Montana (and hold Texas and Florida) but Ohio's a toss-up, and I doubt they'll get anything beyond that because of their continued propensity for nominating really flawed and unpopular candidates like Kari Lake in Arizona.

 

[Sommerswerd]

The last? 538 update.

Kamala 50% odds, Trump 49%!

ABC News – Breaking News, Latest News and Videos

ABC News is your trusted source on political news stories and videos. Get the latest coverage and analysis on everything from the Trump presidency, Senate, House and Supreme Court.

projects.fivethirtyeight.com

Silver must have seen something

As of right now (6AM Tuesday morning EST)

RCP - Harris +0.1%
538 - Harris + 1.2%
SB - Harris +1.0%

 

[Akka]

If I had to make a prediction: I think Harris will win and the map will look pretty similar to 2020. I think that, much like then, the dominating factor in the race is that Trump is extremely polarizing and unpopular, and I think basically nothing he's done since then has changed anyone's opinion on him- and the things that maybe have changed people's minds, like J6 or his criminal cases or his general seeming like he's losing his mind, have been changing people's views on him for the worse.

And yet he's neck-to-neck with Harris in the race, while all that should make him a joke that nobody would want to vote for.
There is really some deep search to do here to understand how it has come to this point.

 

[choxorn]

And yet he's neck-to-neck with Harris in the race, while all that should make him a joke that nobody would want to vote for.
There is really some deep search to do here to understand how it has come to this point.

He was neck-to-neck the last two times, too

 

[Samson]

He was neck-to-neck the last two times, too

And between each time we have learned more about how awful he is, and how the climate crisis is real and making our lives worse (and sometimes shorter). None of that has changed anything much. I do not understand it.

 

[Akka]

He was neck-to-neck the last two times, too

Yes, the soulsearching should have happened a long time ago.
The 2016 election at least had some measure of "protest vote", the new outrageous provocateur coming in and getting vote if only to shake things up or whatever. Already unbelievable, yes, but the next two elections are far more worrying because people keep voting for him despite his now-recorded incompetence and the accumulation of gaffes, horrible decisions, treason, inability and insurrection. There is some underlying grave problem that is not just tied to Trump, and doesn't seem to have been actually addressed.

And between each time we have learned more about how awful he is, and how the climate crisis is real and making our lives worse (and sometimes shorter). None of that has changed anything much. I do not understand it.

Pretty much. And understanding it is becoming a do-or-die necessity for democracy.

 

[Voidwalkin]

Besides appealing to the usual traditionalists that always vote R, it's immigration and trade policy. Little sense in the interior that either have worked out to the benefit of the population from what I can tell.

 

[choxorn]

And between each time we have learned more about how awful he is, and how the climate crisis is real and making our lives worse (and sometimes shorter). None of that has changed anything much. I do not understand it.

There is some underlying grave problem that is not just tied to Trump, and doesn't seem to have been actually addressed.

I mean it's not rally mysterious at all, the problem is "a lot of people are really racist"

And since I can already hear all the complaints about me saying that is pushing people away and being divisive and mean or whatever: First, I didn't say that all of his voters are (but certainly the vast majority are), but his tapping into hate and fear that a huge swath of people have towards others who are different is a big part of his success and why so many of his supporters seem completely unwilling to ever abandon him, ever.

 

[Akka]

I mean it's not rally mysterious at all, the problem is "a lot of people are really racist"

I guess when all you have is a hammer, all problems look like nails. Guess we're not going to advance a lot on the "actually trying to understand what is happening" front.

 

[Gorbles]

And since I can already hear all the complaints about me saying that is pushing people away and being divisive and mean or whatever: First, I didn't say that all of his voters are (but certainly the vast majority are), but his tapping into hate and fear that a huge swath of people have towards others who are different is a big part of his success and why so many of his supporters seem completely unwilling to ever abandon him, ever.

If they even bother reading your post completely