Jul 2024
10:23am, 16 Jul 2024
32,785 posts
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Johnny Blaze
You are probably right Chris, but there’s a lot of moving parts at the moment. I still can’t see how Biden turns it around: he’s got increasingly less leeway given his general frailty and the fact that, for now at least, he can’t punch Trump as hard as he needs to be punched. We should also recall that if the whole race boils down to close Biden wins in swing states, the attempts to overturn the results will crank up again.
Chaos is coming; it follows *him* the way fleas follow a dog, but *he* doesn’t care how much he wrecks.
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Jul 2024
10:40am, 16 Jul 2024
21,946 posts
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Chrisull
Yeah totally agree JB, my argument is mainly that it's no worse than before, and if people were going to vote Biden before they probably still are. But it's not comfortable, and at best it's really tight, Biden winning relies on him winning all three of PA, WI and MI.
And yes of course the attempts to overturn will be more sophisticated this time. At least Biden would be in control of the levers of state. At the moment though it doesn't hurt the Democrats to be panicked and getting serious about things. Let's just hope they don't do a Sunak and give up entirely.
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Jul 2024
10:49am, 16 Jul 2024
25,149 posts
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larkim
At least the Dems go into the election with a prospect of victory, unlike Sunak et al.
What I can't get my head around is that the population at large, even if only the "moderate" Reps and the Dems haven't swelled in numbers just at the prospect of Trump 2.0 and can call on voters who would normally abstain etc. Even the press, I know the usual suspects just double down on the support for him but surely there are some "waverers"? The US electorate just baffles me.
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Jul 2024
10:59am, 16 Jul 2024
32,786 posts
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Johnny Blaze
Here’s a prediction you can take to the bank: by the end of Trump’s next term US schoolrooms will be supplying books that say Jan 6th was a popular revolt against a corrupt elite who rigged and stole an election from Orange Jesus. Nailed on.
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Jul 2024
11:04am, 16 Jul 2024
21,949 posts
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Chrisull
I think they possibly will, it has been happening in governors elections and some district by-elections and hasn't been picked up by the polls.
The person who commented on the polls being split in this unusual way is a sports stats guy and he endlessly argues polls are not prediction mechanisms and should not be used in this way, they are snapshots of a moment in time, and there are large amounts of undecided/won't says or simply not polled people in the figures and that should be highlighted.These figures tend to decrease as election day nears, but don't always.
Also a pollster asking someone after the "vice president Trump" gaffe whether they will vote Biden will get a hell no, but that same person in November looking at a Trump/Vance hellscape may well have a different opinion.
I'm not optimistic, it seems like it comes down to if Trump wins any single state of MI, PA and WI, he is president. BUT also it makes the Dems defence easier. Focus there, because NY and CA are safe blue states.
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Jul 2024
11:51am, 16 Jul 2024
5,470 posts
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J2R
I wish I could share larkim's cautious optimism about how little damage Trump could do to democracy, but sadly I don't. He is power-obsessed, completely without principle and, most importantly, has the Supreme Court in his back pocket. With that he can basically do anything. If he wins power in November, he can simply declare the results of the next election null and void, because it's rigged or something, and the Supreme Court will back him. 3rd term is a bit of a problem, but this is a special emergency so Supreme Court will OK that, too.
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Jul 2024
11:53am, 16 Jul 2024
5,471 posts
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J2R
And don't forget, he will spend the next 4 years completely removing any non-partisan people in positions of power, replacing them with Trump cult members.
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Jul 2024
11:58am, 16 Jul 2024
25,153 posts
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larkim
On policy issues, I can see that SCOTUS will follow Trump / Rep ideology. But I still struggle to see that these actually intelligent, well qualified lawyers would back him to the hilt on attacks on the democratic fundamentals of the USA.
I don't mind the "war gaming" of what he might do in a worst case scenario though - complacency is an enemy, no doubt at all.
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Jul 2024
12:03pm, 16 Jul 2024
20,681 posts
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Dave W
He put them there for a reason. They will do his bidding.
Otherwise what’s to stop a president who can do anything he wants and it’s deemed legal from removing them and placing some even more unbalanced people in their place. Remember. They said that anything he does as the president is legal.
Idiots.
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Jul 2024
12:23pm, 16 Jul 2024
28,062 posts
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TROSaracen
The difference in polls between Senate races and Trump vs Biden is that the populations supporting Trump and the republicans is different. There is a large rump of MAGA support that will not vote republican downticket. Hates them in fact, same old Washington swamp creatures.
That’s why polls underestimated Trump in 2016 and 2020 but then overestimated Trump in the mid terms (Trump had not even declared his candidacy then).
The fact that such disparity has not occurred before is irrelevant here, these are different circumstances given the cult of personality Trump has increasingly built.
Trump ahead presidentially but republicans behind in Senate races is entirely plausible.
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