I suppose it’s too much to hope that the Republican crypto-fascists have just become monks who have taken a vow of silence. Too bad. And it’s too bad Perry doesn’t represent NE Pa. Then I could vote against him
Don't be silly. Crypto bros are too egotistical to become humble monks. The AI softwares they tout and develop are likelier to be more human than they ever will be.
Yeah, the one article I read mentioned there was a citation but in the footnotes or something. Girl, bye. But it was stupid bc it took a few paragraphs to say that as if to try to cause a controversy. What the article should’ve said is, Harris and her co-author don’t know AMLA format or something.
Incidents like the townhall may pass the media as "Trump being Trump" but I think there is a substantial part of the under-70 electorate that is reminded of their incompetent racist uncle/grandfather who blames everyone else in the family for everything that can be the decisive factor in this election that is repulsed by stuff like this.
One issue nobody is talking about, but I'm hearing a lot is insurance cost and availability. One by one I'm hearing HOAs that provide master policies getting dropped and policies that cost $40 k are getting replaced with policies that are $300k. People getting hit with these increases are blaming Democrats because they are in charge of all top CA positions.
A friend of mine on an HOA board in North SD county (CA 49) has been unable to get coverage, and they tried to get just liability and were unable to get a stand alone policy. They are currently completely naked on insurance in violation of their CCRs. Several units up for sale have been pulled from the market, and if this doesn't get corrected, real estate prices will collapse. Peter indicated that several of his surrounding communities are experiencing the same.
People in my own subdivision in Irvine, in a very low fire risk area, have been dropped and have gone on the state last resort insurance at 5X the price, it doesn't cover liability, and they are having trouble getting standalone liability. 2 liberal retired UCI professors are considering voting Baugh and Trump on this issue. Yes, total nonsense, but....
When California had this problem with earthquake coverage it formed a state program, California Earthquake Authority, that the state reinsures. Could homeowners insurance be next?
While I consider part of the insurance problem state self inflicted wounds, it seems part is insurance companies extorting the state.
How is it self-inflicted by the state? Could you clarify... And what, concretely, are the insurance companies attempting to extort from state authorities?
California has not allowed insurance companies to price individual units, but by zip code. If someone builds in a high risk area, they are effectively subsidized by surrounding low risk houses. Increased rates have also historically been limited by the state.
California also has a highly regulated insurance market that insurance companies have never liked, and many feel insurance companies withholding coverage is partly to try to get rid of regulations they don't like.
It's not just high fire risk people getting dropped, but people living in very urban areas.
Where I lived in CA as a kid, a few rich people fought tooth-and-nail to be permitted to build on the flood plane of the local river. And then, after the inevitable flood damaged their house, they tried to sue local authorities for giving them the permit and failing to protect them!
I don't consider it redlining. California is dealing with the same problem most other states are. We've allowed for relatively unregulated construction in areas where people shouldn't build. Climate change is quickly showing the problem with that. Building a log cabin in a quickly drying forest isn't a good idea.
But, isn't your point that one of the reasons rates are so high for low risk homes is that California forces insurance companies to set rates by zip codes?
Hearing about HOA insurance premiums skyrocketing everywhere. My building managed to secure "only" a 40% increase this past year, which was considered pretty good. Being told other buildings that use our management company are accepting 200 to 500% increases. We're in Colorado, pretty sure this is a national thing, though there may be state-specific things that exacerbate it.
The state has the FAIR plan for people who can't get private insurance. A big problem here is that up until very recently insurers' rate increases were strictly limited under state law due to voter initiatives passed decades ago. So insurers were losing money because we have a lot of construction in fire-prone areas (partly due to stupidity, but partly because it's too hard to build in more livable areas) and many have pulled out or threatened to pull out, which would put more people on the FAIR plan with much higher premiums.
The problems are largely self-inflicted, but no one who's in office now had anything to do with it. The state is trying to loosen the rules on rate hikes to the extent they can, to try to convince the insurers to stay in the market.
Dumb legislation is dumb whether or not it's passed by the legislature or at the ballot box. The CA Lege voted for electric utility deregulation (which resulted in 100's of billions of cumulative economic damage to the state) unanimously. Clearly we just need a benevolent dictator because lawmaking by state legislators is a terrible idea.
I’m glad MN doesn’t have a ballot initiative process. Red states need them bc GOP legislators don’t do basic stuff for their citizens. But, it is extremely unnecessary for blue states to have them bc intelligent people who follow facts and science are in charge. There’s a reason why I don’t send my neighbors to the Capitol to debate legislation. Instead, I send Fue and Bobby Joe to get the shit done for us.
The biggest part of California's residential property insurance problem is the insane price of housing here. If the housing market weren't broken, pressure on the insurance market would be much less.
I have no doubt that it's competitive but I also think the modeling of polls in Nebraska has to be nearly impossible given that it's been so long since they've had a competitive race. I hope to be wrong but my fear is that this race will track like both of the last two Oklahoma Governor races, where "tied" polls quickly yielded to double-digit Republican wins.
Why are you choosing those races to compare it to? Aside from them being red states they really don’t have much in common. Not to mention you’re comparing a federal election to a state election, and a race with no Dem to a traditional two party race.
I mean, if you’re going to do that, then why wouldn’t you compare it to a neighboring state, KS? The last two Governor races in KS showed competitive races which weren’t too far off from the final result, with the Dem winning of course. Yes, in 2022 the final result was closer than the final polls showed, but not so much that it pointed to a polling failure.
Editing to add that the Osborne campaign has also released polls showing Presidential and Sen Special numbers that are right where one would expect. If there is a fundamental polling error, which I don’t deny is possible, then it is specific to this race and the most likely explanation would be the presence of an Independent instead of a Dem, not any modeling issue due to a lack of recent competitive races.
You did dance around one good point in that Oklahoma and Nebraska might not be the best comparisons in terms of poll modeling because there are so many more former Democrats in Oklahoma compared to Nebraska whose current partisan allegiance would probably be harder for pollsters to pin down.
Kansas seems like a more natural comparison on the surface but since there have been multiple close races in the state in the last decade, pollsters' modeling is undoubtedly more refined. Kansas polling was way off in 2014 for the same reason I have my doubts as Nebraska polling in 2024....it'd been forever since the last close race there and the modeling was out of date. Since then, there have been two close gubernatorial races and a Senate seat on the periphery of competitiveness in 2020. Pollsters have been in the field there and have been able to update their models. When was the last time the same thing happened in Nebraska? Maybe 2012 when they dusted off Bob Kerrey and ran him again. And as you said, the polling of an independent candidate throws up even more ambiguity.
All speculation of course. I could be wrong. I hope I am. I'm not even plugged onto what I assume is a nagging question of who Osborn intends to caucus with. If it's the Democrats, I gotta figure that will cost him in the end.
NE-2 has been competitive for a decade and the polling has been reasonably close there. Sure, it’s much less rural than the rest of state, but data and experience from there can still be extrapolated. There’s always the possibility that the polls are off, but considering the response from the Fisher team and the numbers from other races that easily pass the sniff test and it seems like you’re having to dig pretty hard to support pre conceived notions in spite of all the data.
I’d be inclined to agree were it not for available polling showing Ricketts winning by about the margin you’d expect a GOP Senator to, on same tests as Osborn beating Fischer. So something specific to Osborn is happening where he’s winning over Ricketts voters.
I have said for decades now that Democrats can win almost any state federally (except in the Deep South) if:
They pull their candidate/s, have an independent run and secretly (not the whole DSCC is investing in x race or ActBlue donation links that would activate partisanship) support them with an innocent sounding or state centric pac. This is exactly what’s happening in NE-Sen.
Why we haven’t started doing this when we know Democrats can’t win these very red states federally drives me absolutely insane. It’s such a simple formula and it works! Get a Democrat or left/centrist indie to run as an Independent, not a Democrat. Boost behind the scenes. Makes it a way closer race than any D running and who knows, maybe they even win!
The only argument against doing so is that there’s a party loyalty so even if they know they’ll lose, they still run as Democrats because that’s their party. Or that Dem voters want to vote for a Democrat. Which, I mean, great, but I’d rather an Indie come within 5-10 then a Democrat guaranteed to lose by 20.
They can run completely on the Dem platform and have an I next to their name and still gets votes they couldn’t as a Democrat. I’d even go as far to say a more progressive I than Democrats are as a whole, would do better than a Democrat. It’s the I that gets the votes. That’s all that’s needed.
Or Kentucky, West Virginia or the Dakota's at this point. But it could work in Kansas and Nebraska, and in states like Utah, Iowa, Missouri, Montana, and Alaska. I think Tester might be doing better had he made a big deal of switching to independent, maybe piggybacking Sinema, and concern trolled about the Democratic party to signal to low education older ex Dem voters that he was still worth backing over a corporatist out of state hack like Sheehy. Democrats could create a whole, small caucus of these "Common Sense American Party" types.
A polling company created by two Suburban Philadelphia high school students in 2022. Seriously. Their claim to fame is that they released a poll showing Kathy Hochul only up 5 against Lee Zeldin in NY when Hochul only won by about 7.5%.
I found Patriot Polling at #249 on the 538 Pollster Rankings list(some of the pollsters they rank below we routinely make fun of here; if anything, I'd rate this a good poll for the Democrats)
Finally got around to mailing in my ballot today. I'll check my voter portal in a week or so to confirm delivery. As an overseas voter without plans to return to America, I can only vote in Pennsylvania's federal elections, but that's another vote banked for Harris and Bob Casey (and Dwight Evans, for what that's worth, though he's running unopposed). My colleague registered in Chester County will also vote for Harris.
Was very impressed with the Dems Abroad turnout operation this cycle. I received phone calls/text messages every few weeks, and when I emailed a question about voting instructions specific to Pennsylvania, I received a very detailed reply within hours. Essentially all of their resources have gone toward voters from the seven battlegrounds, which could very well tilt the election if the tipping point states come down to several thousand votes.
No. I don't know if this is standard for all states, but Pennsylvania distinguishes between two types of overseas voters: 1) military personnel and others temporarily residing abroad (i.e. those with immediate plans to return to America), and 2) those living abroad indefinitely without plans to move back. Class 1 voters can vote in federal, state, and local elections, while Class 2 voters can only vote in federal elections. When I voted in 2022, my ballot only included House and Senate elections.
BC’s election is Saturday. It looks like the NDP and the resuscitated Conservatives will likely roughly tie in PV but with Canada being Canada it’s hard to say how the actual seat distribution shakes out in such a case. May be looking at another confidence government with Greens. Canadians on another site I frequent think the Cons need much better than a PV tie in the mid-40s to form a minority gov let alone a majority but it’s a tight race. I was in Vancouver over the weekend and tons of ads on TV trying to portray BC Premier Dave Eby as a Trudeau clone, though Eby seems way more competent than JT. Con leader Rustad is a nut job who wouldn’t be out of place in the Idaho GOP so he may be a tough sell to the Lower Mainland’s electorate
And to think that until recently the BC Conservative Party was the BC Liberal Party, although like the Australian Liberal Party they were and are right wing. The question is should the BC NDP lose government would they suddenly rebrand themselves as the BC Liberal Party or would that be counterproductive given the Liberal Party of Canada will lose government next year, barring sudden changes in federal politics?
To make a united from of the Canadian left. Canada like the UK and unlike Australia and New Zealand retains their First Past The Post electoral system at both the federal and provincial levels of government. The big test is will the Liberal Party fall into 3rd party status as it did in 2011 or just a weak second?
Dan Osborn should basically attack the 2-party system and call his hypothetical upset a warning shot to its power. Both parties screwed up on the border etc would be a great resonating message!!
He's gone all-in on the confounding colors: giving Fischer blue in the poll tweet, tweeting images of his campaign's red shirts, press releases in red letterhead, etc.
He uses red because the state religion is Nebraska Cornhuskers football. His last name also probably helps a lot on a subconscious level because the Huskers' all-time most successful and popular coach (who later represented the western part of the state in Congress) was Tom Osborne. Nebraskans are primed to like a guy named Osborn who uses that shade of red.
Regardless of whether it's a happy coincidence or a convenient excuse, it's solidly on the path I'd prescribe if I were advising him. He only actively started tying Fischer to blue in mid-August, and this is the most explicitly he's done it; the last few weeks are also the most actively he's promoted his red. He needs a ton of Ricketts voters, and this is one of the key ways to get them.
Imagine if he alone ends up determining who controls the Senate. Angus King tried to avoid picking a side and learned immediately that you don't get to actually do much if you aren't part of a caucus. If he's elected, I think he probably caucuses with the majority party of his state but maintains a moderate image, just like King.
Not hard to imagine as right now it looks it’s come down to him and Brown winning. If Harris wins and we win the House, he’d be better off caucusing with Dems with the easy expiration of, “I’d rather work with the people in power so I can get bills passed.”
I’d be extremely disappointed if he won and chose to caucus with Republicans. If he was going to do that, then why bother running against a real Republican? Does the Senate have discharge petitions where he could caucus with the GOP but then helps us get bills or nominations to the floor? He could also switch caucuses all willy nilly whenever he wanted a certain piece of legislation to the floor but that would be so irritating procedurally.
I think this is a much more likely GOP incumbent defeat that Florida. As much as DM-P is doing well, winning over all the antivax baby boomers who've moved there since 2020 seems unlikely, even with polls.
500k is going to be tough. The current request advantage is D+528.3k & increasing by a couple hundred per day. The return rate for Democrats would have to be over 90% with Republicans having an equal or lower return rate. Not impossible but we won't know if that # will be hit until the week before the election.
The 2020 spread was 88%-79% favoring Democrats. Assuming both parties add 50,000 requests and replicate 2020 return rates, you'd get a firewall of ~513,000. Lots of uncertainty for sure, but Democrats are outpacing Republicans by nearly nine percentage points, so 500,000 definitely seems possible.
Depending on how you define Democratic "firewall", it’s worth considering that Independents account for a significant part of the Early Vote – and Independents are trending Blue. We may think of those extra votes as a "hidden firewall".
This 1st day of early voting is a blowout. As of noon, we are at 122,049 voters so far today. The record 1st day was 2020, with 136,000 votes cast. We will be blowing past the previous First Day record. Great job counties, avg check in time is 55 seconds. #gapol
At most one day. The 12th was Columbus / Indigenous People’s Day back in 2020 so suspect some early voting places may not have actually opened until the Tuesday just like this year. But if folks could actually vote on the Monday last time, that makes this years numbers even more impressive since the holiday would actually be easier for a lot of people to vote on if they were off work.
The event was moderated by Kristi Noem and featured pre-screened questions. He cut
The event short saying “We could do another question or two if you’d like,” Trump said, eliciting cheers from the crowd, before changing his mind. “How about this? We’ll play ‘YMCA,’ and we’ll go home.”
Two people passed out in a short period of time and Trump (my guess out of frustration) decided to turn it into a dance party.
The rally was held at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center. That building looks & feels like a giant airplane hangar that can get really humid really quickly based on personal experience.
Much as I'd want to agree, it seems that Trafalgar is both inaccurate and imprecise (if a pollster were bad just by being inaccurate while still being precise, it could be successfully unskewed - but a smart person on their staff would have adjusted for this to improve their accuracy anyway.)
Just outta curiosity but Trafalgar isn't related to the Trafalgar travel agency are they? I still remember using their cheap bags when I first traveled to the UK and France as a kid in the 90s.
I'm sending mine in soon. Still grappling with whether or not I want to vote for Schiff in the two Senate races or just leave it blank. He's not gonna need my vote to win and it would be a small way to show my dissatisfaction with the party. I'm also leaving my Congressional Seat blank for Brad Schneider.
The topic that shall not be named. I'm obviously voting Harris/Walz even if it is California but this is a small way to show dissatisfaction with the way the administration is carrying out the policy even though I know it's incredibly complicated and complex.
Well, it makes sense since he said he won’t be voting in those races. And, I completely agree and have also made the decision to not vote in CA-Sen and IL-10 this year.
There are plenty of hills and mountains in California, and the mountains are taller out West than in the Appalachians. Have you ever been to San Francisco?
It's October 15th. Does that mean Harris and the DNC finally have to release their official Q3/September numbers? They've been pretty coy about them the last couple weeks.
Mark Robinson is suing CNN and a former porn store clerk; I love this guy and hope he keeps the words, Robinson and porn store in as many headlines and online clickbait story's as possible
For Mark Robinson to keep himself top-of-the-news is surely the best strategy to depress NC Republican vote for Trump as well as their candidates down-ballot. Thank you!
The suit was not filed for the purpose of winning a judgment but as something he can point to in his campaign.
To win a suit against CNN, Robinson must prove, with evidence, that the story was actually false and that CNN either knew it was false and published it anyway or published it "with reckless disregard for the truth," (that is, it should have known it was false). As you say, let's hope he keeps bringing it up.
I just care about the words 'Robinson' and 'porn store' connected as much as possible for 21 more days; and with the lawsuit, press will lead every single question in that direction(if he actually campaigns; apparently dude is incredibly lazy)
I suppose it’s too much to hope that the Republican crypto-fascists have just become monks who have taken a vow of silence. Too bad. And it’s too bad Perry doesn’t represent NE Pa. Then I could vote against him
Don't be silly. Crypto bros are too egotistical to become humble monks. The AI softwares they tout and develop are likelier to be more human than they ever will be.
Trump town hall disaster: https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/15/politics/video/trump-dancing-pennylsvania-ldn-digvid
Harris plagiarism controversy, although this sounds like a CNN attempt to redefine plagiarism to attack Harris more than anything: https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/14/politics/kamala-harris-plagiarism-allegation/index.html?Date=20241015&Profile=cnnpolitics&utm_content=1728977966&utm_medium=social&utm_source=threads
The “plagiarism” accusation isn’t on the main page website of any news organization. Total nothing burger.
There apparently were a few places in her 2009 book where she cited sources but didn’t format quotes correctly. I doubt anyone will care.
Yeah, this sounds like something to simply correct in any new edition, and obviously unintentional.
Yeah, the one article I read mentioned there was a citation but in the footnotes or something. Girl, bye. But it was stupid bc it took a few paragraphs to say that as if to try to cause a controversy. What the article should’ve said is, Harris and her co-author don’t know AMLA format or something.
Nah, the other quotes were cited properly. It was just an oversight. Mistakes happen.
Incidents like the townhall may pass the media as "Trump being Trump" but I think there is a substantial part of the under-70 electorate that is reminded of their incompetent racist uncle/grandfather who blames everyone else in the family for everything that can be the decisive factor in this election that is repulsed by stuff like this.
One issue nobody is talking about, but I'm hearing a lot is insurance cost and availability. One by one I'm hearing HOAs that provide master policies getting dropped and policies that cost $40 k are getting replaced with policies that are $300k. People getting hit with these increases are blaming Democrats because they are in charge of all top CA positions.
A friend of mine on an HOA board in North SD county (CA 49) has been unable to get coverage, and they tried to get just liability and were unable to get a stand alone policy. They are currently completely naked on insurance in violation of their CCRs. Several units up for sale have been pulled from the market, and if this doesn't get corrected, real estate prices will collapse. Peter indicated that several of his surrounding communities are experiencing the same.
People in my own subdivision in Irvine, in a very low fire risk area, have been dropped and have gone on the state last resort insurance at 5X the price, it doesn't cover liability, and they are having trouble getting standalone liability. 2 liberal retired UCI professors are considering voting Baugh and Trump on this issue. Yes, total nonsense, but....
When California had this problem with earthquake coverage it formed a state program, California Earthquake Authority, that the state reinsures. Could homeowners insurance be next?
While I consider part of the insurance problem state self inflicted wounds, it seems part is insurance companies extorting the state.
How is it self-inflicted by the state? Could you clarify... And what, concretely, are the insurance companies attempting to extort from state authorities?
California has not allowed insurance companies to price individual units, but by zip code. If someone builds in a high risk area, they are effectively subsidized by surrounding low risk houses. Increased rates have also historically been limited by the state.
California also has a highly regulated insurance market that insurance companies have never liked, and many feel insurance companies withholding coverage is partly to try to get rid of regulations they don't like.
It's not just high fire risk people getting dropped, but people living in very urban areas.
Interesting and thank you for clarifying.
Where I lived in CA as a kid, a few rich people fought tooth-and-nail to be permitted to build on the flood plane of the local river. And then, after the inevitable flood damaged their house, they tried to sue local authorities for giving them the permit and failing to protect them!
Peak CA moment right there
That sounds like California is imposing redlining. Maybe I haven't had enough coffee.
I don't consider it redlining. California is dealing with the same problem most other states are. We've allowed for relatively unregulated construction in areas where people shouldn't build. Climate change is quickly showing the problem with that. Building a log cabin in a quickly drying forest isn't a good idea.
But, isn't your point that one of the reasons rates are so high for low risk homes is that California forces insurance companies to set rates by zip codes?
Yeah but that’s not redlining.
Hearing about HOA insurance premiums skyrocketing everywhere. My building managed to secure "only" a 40% increase this past year, which was considered pretty good. Being told other buildings that use our management company are accepting 200 to 500% increases. We're in Colorado, pretty sure this is a national thing, though there may be state-specific things that exacerbate it.
If it’s a state issue, then what do these liberal professors expect Scott or Baugh to do about it, exactly?
Also, the issues of home insurance is not really specific to condos.
Reality and perception unfortunately don't always align in voters minds. I agree it's not rational.
The state has the FAIR plan for people who can't get private insurance. A big problem here is that up until very recently insurers' rate increases were strictly limited under state law due to voter initiatives passed decades ago. So insurers were losing money because we have a lot of construction in fire-prone areas (partly due to stupidity, but partly because it's too hard to build in more livable areas) and many have pulled out or threatened to pull out, which would put more people on the FAIR plan with much higher premiums.
The problems are largely self-inflicted, but no one who's in office now had anything to do with it. The state is trying to loosen the rules on rate hikes to the extent they can, to try to convince the insurers to stay in the market.
Another reason why policy making by initiative is a terrible idea
Dumb legislation is dumb whether or not it's passed by the legislature or at the ballot box. The CA Lege voted for electric utility deregulation (which resulted in 100's of billions of cumulative economic damage to the state) unanimously. Clearly we just need a benevolent dictator because lawmaking by state legislators is a terrible idea.
I’m glad MN doesn’t have a ballot initiative process. Red states need them bc GOP legislators don’t do basic stuff for their citizens. But, it is extremely unnecessary for blue states to have them bc intelligent people who follow facts and science are in charge. There’s a reason why I don’t send my neighbors to the Capitol to debate legislation. Instead, I send Fue and Bobby Joe to get the shit done for us.
Same issue in SC, but no one is blaming Democrats that I've heard.
In Florida also; an underlying issue that may help Murcasel-Powell a great deal
The biggest part of California's residential property insurance problem is the insane price of housing here. If the housing market weren't broken, pressure on the insurance market would be much less.
TX University of Houston poll:
Trump 51-46
Cruz 50-46
https://uh.edu/hobby/texas2024/
Looks reasonable
Cruz and Allred debate tonight at 8 eastern.
NE Senate. Osborn internal has him up 50-44.
https://x.com/NenoNicolosio/status/1846164591237029916
And even if that 6% undecided all went to Fischer, which seems unlikely, that would make it a tied race.
Interesting if true.
Don’t believe it.
It's clearly a competitive race(the Republicans would not be spending money if it weren't)
I have no doubt that it's competitive but I also think the modeling of polls in Nebraska has to be nearly impossible given that it's been so long since they've had a competitive race. I hope to be wrong but my fear is that this race will track like both of the last two Oklahoma Governor races, where "tied" polls quickly yielded to double-digit Republican wins.
Why are you choosing those races to compare it to? Aside from them being red states they really don’t have much in common. Not to mention you’re comparing a federal election to a state election, and a race with no Dem to a traditional two party race.
I mean, if you’re going to do that, then why wouldn’t you compare it to a neighboring state, KS? The last two Governor races in KS showed competitive races which weren’t too far off from the final result, with the Dem winning of course. Yes, in 2022 the final result was closer than the final polls showed, but not so much that it pointed to a polling failure.
Editing to add that the Osborne campaign has also released polls showing Presidential and Sen Special numbers that are right where one would expect. If there is a fundamental polling error, which I don’t deny is possible, then it is specific to this race and the most likely explanation would be the presence of an Independent instead of a Dem, not any modeling issue due to a lack of recent competitive races.
You did dance around one good point in that Oklahoma and Nebraska might not be the best comparisons in terms of poll modeling because there are so many more former Democrats in Oklahoma compared to Nebraska whose current partisan allegiance would probably be harder for pollsters to pin down.
Kansas seems like a more natural comparison on the surface but since there have been multiple close races in the state in the last decade, pollsters' modeling is undoubtedly more refined. Kansas polling was way off in 2014 for the same reason I have my doubts as Nebraska polling in 2024....it'd been forever since the last close race there and the modeling was out of date. Since then, there have been two close gubernatorial races and a Senate seat on the periphery of competitiveness in 2020. Pollsters have been in the field there and have been able to update their models. When was the last time the same thing happened in Nebraska? Maybe 2012 when they dusted off Bob Kerrey and ran him again. And as you said, the polling of an independent candidate throws up even more ambiguity.
All speculation of course. I could be wrong. I hope I am. I'm not even plugged onto what I assume is a nagging question of who Osborn intends to caucus with. If it's the Democrats, I gotta figure that will cost him in the end.
FWIW, Nebraska's tied for the third-longest active streak of one party hitting at least 55% in every partisan statewide presidential-year race:
1) NY 1992 pres+sen
2) ID 1996 pres
3) NE 2000 sen, TN 2000 pres
NE-2 has been competitive for a decade and the polling has been reasonably close there. Sure, it’s much less rural than the rest of state, but data and experience from there can still be extrapolated. There’s always the possibility that the polls are off, but considering the response from the Fisher team and the numbers from other races that easily pass the sniff test and it seems like you’re having to dig pretty hard to support pre conceived notions in spite of all the data.
I’d be inclined to agree were it not for available polling showing Ricketts winning by about the margin you’d expect a GOP Senator to, on same tests as Osborn beating Fischer. So something specific to Osborn is happening where he’s winning over Ricketts voters.
Not that I think Osborn is going to win, mind
Misogyny might be good for a few critical percent in play here
If Deb Fischer's re-election is actually competitive, that implies that with the right candidate and strategy we could put any Senate race on the map.
I have said for decades now that Democrats can win almost any state federally (except in the Deep South) if:
They pull their candidate/s, have an independent run and secretly (not the whole DSCC is investing in x race or ActBlue donation links that would activate partisanship) support them with an innocent sounding or state centric pac. This is exactly what’s happening in NE-Sen.
Why we haven’t started doing this when we know Democrats can’t win these very red states federally drives me absolutely insane. It’s such a simple formula and it works! Get a Democrat or left/centrist indie to run as an Independent, not a Democrat. Boost behind the scenes. Makes it a way closer race than any D running and who knows, maybe they even win!
The only argument against doing so is that there’s a party loyalty so even if they know they’ll lose, they still run as Democrats because that’s their party. Or that Dem voters want to vote for a Democrat. Which, I mean, great, but I’d rather an Indie come within 5-10 then a Democrat guaranteed to lose by 20.
They can run completely on the Dem platform and have an I next to their name and still gets votes they couldn’t as a Democrat. I’d even go as far to say a more progressive I than Democrats are as a whole, would do better than a Democrat. It’s the I that gets the votes. That’s all that’s needed.
Not Wyoming, Idaho, Oklahoma, Arkansas...
Or Kentucky, West Virginia or the Dakota's at this point. But it could work in Kansas and Nebraska, and in states like Utah, Iowa, Missouri, Montana, and Alaska. I think Tester might be doing better had he made a big deal of switching to independent, maybe piggybacking Sinema, and concern trolled about the Democratic party to signal to low education older ex Dem voters that he was still worth backing over a corporatist out of state hack like Sheehy. Democrats could create a whole, small caucus of these "Common Sense American Party" types.
Missouri seems about on the edge of conceivable, but yes.
NEW Wisconsin poll: 'Patriot Polling'.
President: Trump 50%, Harris 49%.
U.S. Senate: Baldwin 50%, Hovde 49%.
Anyone familiar with this pollster?! 😢🇺🇲
Right-wing spam pollster with one of the worst ratings on 538. They're best ignored.
Republican, of course.
A polling company created by two Suburban Philadelphia high school students in 2022. Seriously. Their claim to fame is that they released a poll showing Kathy Hochul only up 5 against Lee Zeldin in NY when Hochul only won by about 7.5%.
Made up numbers; trash is being nice
I feel like if a company called "patriot polling" finds us down only 1 point, that's a pretty good sign for us.
My thinking exactly
I found Patriot Polling at #249 on the 538 Pollster Rankings list(some of the pollsters they rank below we routinely make fun of here; if anything, I'd rate this a good poll for the Democrats)
Troll poll.
Finally got around to mailing in my ballot today. I'll check my voter portal in a week or so to confirm delivery. As an overseas voter without plans to return to America, I can only vote in Pennsylvania's federal elections, but that's another vote banked for Harris and Bob Casey (and Dwight Evans, for what that's worth, though he's running unopposed). My colleague registered in Chester County will also vote for Harris.
Was very impressed with the Dems Abroad turnout operation this cycle. I received phone calls/text messages every few weeks, and when I emailed a question about voting instructions specific to Pennsylvania, I received a very detailed reply within hours. Essentially all of their resources have gone toward voters from the seven battlegrounds, which could very well tilt the election if the tipping point states come down to several thousand votes.
As opposed to outsourcing your GOTV to musk and Kirk; which apparently isn't going so well
Are you not allowed to vote in state elections, such as for Governor?
No. I don't know if this is standard for all states, but Pennsylvania distinguishes between two types of overseas voters: 1) military personnel and others temporarily residing abroad (i.e. those with immediate plans to return to America), and 2) those living abroad indefinitely without plans to move back. Class 1 voters can vote in federal, state, and local elections, while Class 2 voters can only vote in federal elections. When I voted in 2022, my ballot only included House and Senate elections.
My vote in Indiana was the same
BC’s election is Saturday. It looks like the NDP and the resuscitated Conservatives will likely roughly tie in PV but with Canada being Canada it’s hard to say how the actual seat distribution shakes out in such a case. May be looking at another confidence government with Greens. Canadians on another site I frequent think the Cons need much better than a PV tie in the mid-40s to form a minority gov let alone a majority but it’s a tight race. I was in Vancouver over the weekend and tons of ads on TV trying to portray BC Premier Dave Eby as a Trudeau clone, though Eby seems way more competent than JT. Con leader Rustad is a nut job who wouldn’t be out of place in the Idaho GOP so he may be a tough sell to the Lower Mainland’s electorate
And to think that until recently the BC Conservative Party was the BC Liberal Party, although like the Australian Liberal Party they were and are right wing. The question is should the BC NDP lose government would they suddenly rebrand themselves as the BC Liberal Party or would that be counterproductive given the Liberal Party of Canada will lose government next year, barring sudden changes in federal politics?
The latter. Why would they want to do anything except keep the NDP label?
To make a united from of the Canadian left. Canada like the UK and unlike Australia and New Zealand retains their First Past The Post electoral system at both the federal and provincial levels of government. The big test is will the Liberal Party fall into 3rd party status as it did in 2011 or just a weak second?
Did you mean "united front"?
yes I do.
Don't they still have the option to agree on an electoral alliance with the Liberals if that makes political sense?
Technically yes. The question is who would be the senior partner though?
Or whether the Liberals would agree to that. But the same thing would effectively be true for a merger.
New internal poll of Nebraska Senate-A by SurveyUSA on behalf of the Dan Osborn campaign:
Osborn (I) 50%, Fischer (R-inc) 44%.
Would love him to pull it off. If I was him, I'd play it like, "I'll wait to see whichever party is in the majority to see who I'll caucus with".
💙🇺🇲
Survey USA is #15 on the 538 Pollster ratings; legitimate
Dan Osborn should basically attack the 2-party system and call his hypothetical upset a warning shot to its power. Both parties screwed up on the border etc would be a great resonating message!!
I'm not sure any changes in messaging is a smart strategy; I think the Fischer campaign will go nuclear now; bordering on unhinged
He's gone all-in on the confounding colors: giving Fischer blue in the poll tweet, tweeting images of his campaign's red shirts, press releases in red letterhead, etc.
https://x.com/OsbornForSenate/status/1846186684137841021
He uses red because the state religion is Nebraska Cornhuskers football. His last name also probably helps a lot on a subconscious level because the Huskers' all-time most successful and popular coach (who later represented the western part of the state in Congress) was Tom Osborne. Nebraskans are primed to like a guy named Osborn who uses that shade of red.
When I first heard his name as a candidate for a Senate race in Nebraska, I assumed he was related to Tom Osborne.
Same lol
Regardless of whether it's a happy coincidence or a convenient excuse, it's solidly on the path I'd prescribe if I were advising him. He only actively started tying Fischer to blue in mid-August, and this is the most explicitly he's done it; the last few weeks are also the most actively he's promoted his red. He needs a ton of Ricketts voters, and this is one of the key ways to get them.
Imagine if he alone ends up determining who controls the Senate. Angus King tried to avoid picking a side and learned immediately that you don't get to actually do much if you aren't part of a caucus. If he's elected, I think he probably caucuses with the majority party of his state but maintains a moderate image, just like King.
Getting a Lisa Murkowski clone from Nebraska would be a win in my book.
Not hard to imagine as right now it looks it’s come down to him and Brown winning. If Harris wins and we win the House, he’d be better off caucusing with Dems with the easy expiration of, “I’d rather work with the people in power so I can get bills passed.”
I’d be extremely disappointed if he won and chose to caucus with Republicans. If he was going to do that, then why bother running against a real Republican? Does the Senate have discharge petitions where he could caucus with the GOP but then helps us get bills or nominations to the floor? He could also switch caucuses all willy nilly whenever he wanted a certain piece of legislation to the floor but that would be so irritating procedurally.
Cue the every increasingly desperate and xenophobic ads from the Fischer campaign
I think this is a much more likely GOP incumbent defeat that Florida. As much as DM-P is doing well, winning over all the antivax baby boomers who've moved there since 2020 seems unlikely, even with polls.
We’re doing exactly how I’d expect for FL-Sen 2024. Better than 2022 but worse than 2018.
2024>2022 AND Rubio>Scott
🦅 Pennsylvania - 2024 General Election - Day 6
📥 536,212 votes cast
🔵 DEM: 358,703 - 35.4% returned
🔴 GOP: 130,076 - 26.8% returned
🟡 IND: 47,433 - 23.5% returned
VBM Splits: 🔵 66.9% / 🔴 24.3% / 🟡 8.8%
🔷 DEM firewall: +228,627
📈 Return Edge: D+8.6
https://x.com/blockedfreq/status/1846197211647947140?s=61&t=_oLmDamLuLVUMclqY2xEGw
The request advantage is now D+528,355. 9% of registered PA Democrats have now voted.
The Democratic firewall needs to be at roughly 500k; is that correct?
Depends who you ask. General sentiment is at least 400k, but higher is better
390k is being thrown around but I personally am looking for 450k.
So 450-500k should be our 'goal' so to speak
500k is going to be tough. The current request advantage is D+528.3k & increasing by a couple hundred per day. The return rate for Democrats would have to be over 90% with Republicans having an equal or lower return rate. Not impossible but we won't know if that # will be hit until the week before the election.
The 2020 spread was 88%-79% favoring Democrats. Assuming both parties add 50,000 requests and replicate 2020 return rates, you'd get a firewall of ~513,000. Lots of uncertainty for sure, but Democrats are outpacing Republicans by nearly nine percentage points, so 500,000 definitely seems possible.
Depending on how you define Democratic "firewall", it’s worth considering that Independents account for a significant part of the Early Vote – and Independents are trending Blue. We may think of those extra votes as a "hidden firewall".
From my canvassing experience, LOTS of Dems are voting early by mail.
This 1st day of early voting is a blowout. As of noon, we are at 122,049 voters so far today. The record 1st day was 2020, with 136,000 votes cast. We will be blowing past the previous First Day record. Great job counties, avg check in time is 55 seconds. #gapol
https://x.com/gabrielsterling/status/1846220523283317172?s=61&t=_oLmDamLuLVUMclqY2xEGw
Georgia early voting 👆
What date was the first day of early voting in 2020?
October 12
Ok, so not that big a difference.
At most one day. The 12th was Columbus / Indigenous People’s Day back in 2020 so suspect some early voting places may not have actually opened until the Tuesday just like this year. But if folks could actually vote on the Monday last time, that makes this years numbers even more impressive since the holiday would actually be easier for a lot of people to vote on if they were off work.
From the AJC: "As of 2:30 p.m., more than 204,000 voters had cast ballots Tuesday." https://www.ajc.com/politics/live-coverage-georgia-on-track-for-record-first-day-of-voting-as-state-preps-for-swing-state-scrutiny/UUQDZN6LPFG5DL5DTO54LO3GZE/?utm_source=Iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=AJCPolitics&utm_content=11381386
As of 4:30 p.m., there were 251,899 votes--an all-time record. (Of course, that's just 3% of RVs.)
just 3% but 20 more days to go...so many early votes we have no idea what the final total will be.
Over 300,000!
https://x.com/GabrielSterling/status/1846331029176402178
Trump's townhall last night was a disaster.
The event was moderated by Kristi Noem and featured pre-screened questions. He cut
The event short saying “We could do another question or two if you’d like,” Trump said, eliciting cheers from the crowd, before changing his mind. “How about this? We’ll play ‘YMCA,’ and we’ll go home.”
event was apparently halted due to a medical issue in the audience
Two people passed out in a short period of time and Trump (my guess out of frustration) decided to turn it into a dance party.
The rally was held at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center. That building looks & feels like a giant airplane hangar that can get really humid really quickly based on personal experience.
WaPo’s headline is quality-assured by a stopwatch:
. "Trump sways and bops to music for 39 minutes in bizarre town hall episode"
Pretty devastating, detailed description. Enjoy!
https://wapo.st/4dK01kt
I guess none of those rally-goers had "Watch Trump dance and sway for 39 minutes" on their Bingo cards. Who woulda thunk!
the more you watch that video the crazier he looks and Kristi couldn't wait to get the hell out of there
and he has apparently chickened out of a CNBC interview
Apparently Trump was acting bizarre again today; bordering on incoherent
as was his Bloomberg interview today where he turned on the WSJ saying they know nothing.
#President - North Carolina
🔴 Trump 47% (+2)
🔵 Harris 45%
Trafalgar #C - 1085 LV - 10/13 *** If Trafalagar is saying +2 its probably even ****
T+2 @ 47%? Even for Trafalagar this is bad news...for Obama.
(Bad for Trump, of course, but I can't pass up the meme from 2012...)
Good news for John McCain!
You almost cost me a keyboard.
Much as I'd want to agree, it seems that Trafalgar is both inaccurate and imprecise (if a pollster were bad just by being inaccurate while still being precise, it could be successfully unskewed - but a smart person on their staff would have adjusted for this to improve their accuracy anyway.)
Just outta curiosity but Trafalgar isn't related to the Trafalgar travel agency are they? I still remember using their cheap bags when I first traveled to the UK and France as a kid in the 90s.
No, they are a Republican polling organization based in Atlanta.
Aren't they the ones who stopped polling in 2012 because they "didn't see any way Obama can win"?
I am thinking that was another right-wing pollster..??
That would be Mason-Dixon.
That's right - had forgotten the name
Waking up to an email from CA Sec. of State office notifying me my ballot has been counted and accepted. Is this the first one on this board?
Mine was counted last week.
no
I'm sending mine in soon. Still grappling with whether or not I want to vote for Schiff in the two Senate races or just leave it blank. He's not gonna need my vote to win and it would be a small way to show my dissatisfaction with the party. I'm also leaving my Congressional Seat blank for Brad Schneider.
what is the dissatisfaction over?
The topic that shall not be named. I'm obviously voting Harris/Walz even if it is California but this is a small way to show dissatisfaction with the way the administration is carrying out the policy even though I know it's incredibly complicated and complex.
??? how are you voting for the Senate race in California and a House race in IL?
ETA: I am going to assume the person meant Brad Sherman
Whoops. Yup. Brad Sherman.
Well, it makes sense since he said he won’t be voting in those races. And, I completely agree and have also made the decision to not vote in CA-Sen and IL-10 this year.
Still waiting for my local voter info guide to arrive. Lots of local candidates and propositions.
What state?Kentucky?
California
??? 'Hilltopper' ???
There are plenty of hills and mountains in California, and the mountains are taller out West than in the Appalachians. Have you ever been to San Francisco?
I voted last Weds and I got the SoS email on Friday. Might be the earliest I ever voted.
It's October 15th. Does that mean Harris and the DNC finally have to release their official Q3/September numbers? They've been pretty coy about them the last couple weeks.
Reports are due by today, so they’ll be filed at the latest by the end of today. We’ll probably know by tomorrow for sure in all the races.
Or at least all that are in compliance.
Mark Robinson is suing CNN and a former porn store clerk; I love this guy and hope he keeps the words, Robinson and porn store in as many headlines and online clickbait story's as possible
For Mark Robinson to keep himself top-of-the-news is surely the best strategy to depress NC Republican vote for Trump as well as their candidates down-ballot. Thank you!
The suit was not filed for the purpose of winning a judgment but as something he can point to in his campaign.
To win a suit against CNN, Robinson must prove, with evidence, that the story was actually false and that CNN either knew it was false and published it anyway or published it "with reckless disregard for the truth," (that is, it should have known it was false). As you say, let's hope he keeps bringing it up.
I just care about the words 'Robinson' and 'porn store' connected as much as possible for 21 more days; and with the lawsuit, press will lead every single question in that direction(if he actually campaigns; apparently dude is incredibly lazy)
I might add that dude is clearly trying to be mini-Trump