2020 Elections

[magnemite]

Well, on the one hand it is too soon, and 2020 is going to be totally stressful. But, if 2020 ends with the overthrow of Trump, it cannot start soon enough.

After the first pair of debates, my own view that Biden and Sanders need to go (away from this campaign) was solidified. My hopes ride with Warren, Harris, and Tulsi Gabbard, with Harris being my current preference (and a Harris-Gabbard ticket would be super great). Some of the others would be just fine (and compared to who we have now, would be most excellent).

[Puget]

In case anyone on this thread doesn't already read 538*, they have an interesting panel poll they sponsored tracking how preferences moved around after each debate, with a data visualization that some apparently find confusing but I find pretty cool: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/democratic-debate-poll/

Long story short, Harris gained a bunch of voters (doubled her support to 17%), mostly from Biden but some from Warren. Biden lost a bunch of voters but is still in the lead. Warren gained some voters after the first debate but then lost a bunch of them back to Harris after the second debate. People liked Castro (largest increase in favorables) but didn't move their votes to him. Everyone else stayed about the same. There is a supper sharp drop off in support after the top 5 (Biden, Bernie, Harris, Warren, Buttigieg)-- everyone else is <3% after the second debate.

*No they didn't "get the 2016 election wrong". Their model said Trump had a 30% of winning. Things with a 30% chance of happening should happen. . . 30% of the time, which is really pretty often. Not that I'm accusing any of you, dear forumites, of being probability illiterate, but inability/refusal of some otherwise seemingly intelligent people to understand the basics of how probabilistic models work  just drives me nuts as someone in a stats heavy field.

(and a Harris-Gabbard ticket would be super great).

Sad to say, I think an all-woman ticket is extremely unlikely. Personally, I'd currently pick Harris-Castro as my top ticket, but that's not very likely either. Conventional wisdom is that if the nominee is a woman, person of color, or both, she/he will pick a seemingly safe white dude as running mate. Presumably that's what a lot of the "Who's he again?" white dudes currently running are actually running for, though historically the VP pick has often been a non-candidate.

[mahagonny]

In case anyone on this thread doesn't already read 538*, they have an interesting panel poll they sponsored tracking how preferences moved around after each debate, with a data visualization that some apparently find confusing but I find pretty cool: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/democratic-debate-poll/

Long story short, Harris gained a bunch of voters (doubled her support to 17%), mostly from Biden but some from Warren. Biden lost a bunch of voters but is still in the lead. Warren gained some voters after the first debate but then lost a bunch of them back to Harris after the second debate. People liked Castro (largest increase in favorables) but didn't move their votes to him. Everyone else stayed about the same. There is a supper sharp drop off in support after the top 5 (Biden, Bernie, Harris, Warren, Buttigieg)-- everyone else is <3% after the second debate.

*No they didn't "get the 2016 election wrong". Their model said Trump had a 30% of winning. Things with a 30% chance of happening should happen. . . 30% of the time, which is really pretty often. Not that I'm accusing any of you, dear forumites, of being probability illiterate, but inability/refusal of some otherwise seemingly intelligent people to understand the basics of how probabilistic models work  just drives me nuts as someone in a stats heavy field.

(and a Harris-Gabbard ticket would be super great).

Sad to say, I think an all-woman ticket is extremely unlikely. Personally, I'd currently pick Harris-Castro as my top ticket, but that's not very likely either. Conventional wisdom is that if the nominee is a woman, person of color, or both, she/he will pick a seemingly safe white dude as running mate. Presumably that's what a lot of the "Who's he again?" white dudes currently running are actually running for, though historically the VP pick has often been a non-candidate.

Too early for predictions? Trump will dispose of Harris.
I wonder whether, although Harris's flair in the first debate takes polling numbers away from Biden and gives them to her, what does she do to swing voters. How many who might have voted for Biden will vote for Trump if she is the nominee.
Consider:
"Every day in the life of a Dreamer who fears deportation is a long day," Harris said in a statement. "Dreamers cannot afford to sit around and wait for Congress to get its act together. Their lives are on the line."
She added: "As president, while I fight for Congress to pass 21st Century immigration reform, I won't wait. I'll take action to lift barriers Dreamers face to pursuing legal status and put them on a meaningful path to citizenship. These young people are just as American as I am, and they deserve a president who will fight for them from day one."
Wins points for human rights I guess, but also gives Trump the opportunity to say 'Kamala wants to be the kind of president that best serves people that our law says shouldn't be here.' Which is a ways from how Biden would appear.

[bioteacher]

I fully expect Trump to win again and democracy will be dead in our borders. I hope I am wrong. I pray I am wrong. I will vote to keep it from happening. There are real and practical limits to what I can legally do against this administration. My vote doesn't matter nearly as much as it should since lobbyists own our representatives.

[bioteacher]

Combining all of this, I am posting a few questions that I ruminate over.
1.  Assuming we had unlimited money available to spend on scientific research and unlimited money and trained personnel with which to treat all health concerns for all people, would the the life expectancy of human beings continue to increase indefinitely?

Nope. Basic biology says it ain't gonna happen.

2. Is that what we should try to do?

Nope. It won't work; there is no sense trying to nail jell-o to the wall. Google determinate vs indeterminate growth.

3. What role does religion play?

Related to questions 1 & 2? None. It's science, plain and simple.

[mahagonny]

I fully expect Trump to win again and democracy will be dead in our borders. I hope I am wrong. I pray I am wrong. I will vote to keep it from happening. There are real and practical limits to what I can legally do against this administration. My vote doesn't matter nearly as much as it should since lobbyists own our representatives.

Tyranny of the majority. If Trump wins, you and I will be unhappy, but that doesn't mean democracy is not functioning. Is it lobbyists who help Trump, or voters we consider ignorant?
I think Trump, his bombast, and the festering issues of illegal immigration and health insurance costs are an explosive mix that have changed the landscape for the near future. So Biden should not leave the race. He should just be a poised, trustworthy, experienced alternative and go for left of center. He should find the many instances of Trump misstatements of fact and hammer away at them with disbelief. Which he can do. He's considered more likable than Hillary, and he could grab one of the other candidates for a running mate to broaden the appeal.

[spork]

Interesting (to me, at least) editorial on the Kamala Harris/Joe Biden exchange durinng the televised "see candidates together on a stage" event: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/01/opinion/harris-biden-busing-debate.html. Anti-Harris comments fail to recognize that 1) elections are competitive and Harris succeeded in diminishing a major primary opponent at least temporarily (i.e., her tactic probably worked even better than she and her campaign thought it might), and 2) many Americans don't think that good governance in 2019 means being able to engage with racists in a civil manner.

[ciao_yall]

Tyranny of the majority. If Trump wins, you and I will be unhappy, but that doesn't mean democracy is not functioning. Is it lobbyists who help Trump, or voters we consider ignorant?
I think Trump, his bombast, and the festering issues of illegal immigration and health insurance costs are an explosive mix that have changed the landscape for the near future. So Biden should not leave the race. He should just be a poised, trustworthy, experienced alternative and go for left of center. He should find the many instances of Trump misstatements of fact and hammer away at them with disbelief. Which he can do. He's considered more likable than Hillary, and he could grab one of the other candidates for a running mate to broaden the appeal.

In what universe is Biden considered poised, trustworthy or experienced?

When I come back, I want to be a distinguished looking old white guy because no matter how many dated jokes or tone-deaf comments I make, I'm still considered poised, trustworthy and experienced.

[octoprof]

In what universe is Biden considered poised, trustworthy or experienced?

Excellent question. He doesn't talk policy well, he doesn't have any fresh ideas that I can see, and he has a boatload of baggage that make some people (lots of people of color and lots of women and lots of young people) have no interest in voting for him. I can't even...

[waterboy]

I want someone that can stand toe-to-toe with Trump when those debates happen and make him out to be who he really is. That might be Biden (?), could be Harris. I don't see Warren being able to do that. I like Buttigieg, but I can't see him doing that. And that's sad - an intelligent man not being a viable candidate (IMHO) because he doesn't want to sling crap back and forth.

[marshwiggle]

My perspective, as a Canadian:

I saw part of the 2nd debate while staying in a very small rural community where I have vacation property. On reflection, I was wondering if any of the candidates come across as at all relevant to rural voters. Consider  a few issues;

• Diversity: Many rural communities are shrinking, and have not grown for decades. Not surprisingly, they are made up mainly of descendants of the original settlers, who were white and often came from the same European country of origin. (For instance, lots of Scottish settlers lived in one area.) If you're honest, would you advise anyone, even white people, to consider moving to such a community given the lack of economic future? Probably not. However, many progressives will rant about how "white" such an area is, implying that it's somehow due to racism. Furthermore, pushing for requirements for diversity in hiring are completely ridiculous in such communites. (To be honest, they would probably be equally ridiculous in many city neighbourhoods that are virtually entirely non-white.) These communities are often struggling with the fact that their own adult children wind up leaving and not returning.
• Government services: At my property, there is no electricity, water, sewage, or garbage collection. The road itself is not even maintained by the municipality. And yet I pay property taxes every year. Urban people expect all of those services, plus public transit and more, which will never EVER be an option for rural people. Is it a surprise that lower taxes is more apealling than "services" for other people which they themselves will never receive?
• Healthcare: This is pretty self-evident, but I'll point out one basic point; emergency response times are (and will always be) vastly longer in rural areas, and yet urban people complain about times of minutes versus potentially hours for rural areas.
  (In fact, in rural areas, many people can't even be sure that EMS will find their properties in an emergency.)
  

I could go on, and I'm sure others could as well. My parents both grew up on farms, and I grew up in the country, so this is very familiar to me. I dislike Trump very much, and I truly would be glad to see him gone, but I'm afraid as I see all that comes out of the media (and an this thread) about how awful his "base" is, when in fact many rural people are going to be hard pressed to see anything that even recognizes, let alone addresses, the realities that they face.

[octoprof]

I want someone that can stand toe-to-toe with Trump when those debates happen and make him out to be who he really is. That might be Biden (?), could be Harris. I don't see Warren being able to do that. I like Buttigieg, but I can't see him doing that. And that's sad - an intelligent man not being a viable candidate (IMHO) because he doesn't want to sling crap back and forth.

I can see Warren and/or Harris doing that.

I can't see Joe doing that. It would be a good drinking game for old guys making gaffs.

[Hegemony]

Marshwiggle, I am not aware of any place in which property taxes pay for electricity, water, sewage, or garbage collection.  I am living in a very rural place right now, and we pay separate bills for all of those things — based on our household usage, which makes sense.  Is there any place in the country, or even the world, where property taxes mean you don't have to pay an electric bill?  Sometimes electricity is included in rent, but not as a property tax, just as part of the rent bill. 

Property taxes are a form of tax that supports local schools, police, the fire department, road construction and maintenance, and local government.  They're more or less keyed to how much your property is worth and therefore more or less proportionate to wealth, which also makes sense.  Even if one road in your area is not constructed by the municipality, I'd bet there is more than one road in the area covered by your property tax, and I'd bet those others are paid for by property tax. 

In my area, the local school building was old and crumbling and would cost untold millions to fix. The options seemed to be to build a new school, and pass a mandate to increase property taxes by a huge amount to fund it, or to give up on having a school in this rural part of the county, and have the kids go 40 minutes to the nearby town to school.  The county voted overwhelmingly to raise taxes and keep the school.  So in certain circumstances, rural areas will certainly pay more taxes.  No question that they have an independent streak.  But I think it's more complicated than saying their taxes don't pay for much so they don't want any.

[mahagonny]

I want someone that can stand toe-to-toe with Trump when those debates happen and make him out to be who he really is. That might be Biden (?), could be Harris. I don't see Warren being able to do that. I like Buttigieg, but I can't see him doing that. And that's sad - an intelligent man not being a viable candidate (IMHO) because he doesn't want to sling crap back and forth.

I can see Warren and/or Harris doing that.

I can't see Joe doing that. It would be a good drinking game for old guys making gaffs.

Does Trump have to debate?

Another prediction: https://www.aol.com/article/news/2019/07/02/is-trump-toast-data-model-that-predicted-2018-midterms-says-hell-lose-in-2020/23761415/

In what universe is Biden considered poised, trustworthy or experienced?

Excellent question. He doesn't talk policy well, he doesn't have any fresh ideas that I can see, and he has a boatload of baggage that make some people (lots of people of color and lots of women and lots of young people) have no interest in voting for him. I can't even...

Pretty much all long serving senators have votes that can show them to be hypocritical or inconsistent, yes.

Interesting (to me, at least) editorial on the Kamala Harris/Joe Biden exchange durinng the televised "see candidates together on a stage" event: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/01/opinion/harris-biden-busing-debate.html. Anti-Harris comments fail to recognize that 1) elections are competitive and Harris succeeded in diminishing a major primary opponent at least temporarily (i.e., her tactic probably worked even better than she and her campaign thought it might), and 2) many Americans don't think that good governance in 2019 means being able to engage with racists in a civil manner.

Harris and the others missed his point about contrasting the civility of normal politicians with Trump and his ilk. It was a  chance for them to make a good point.
I don't love Biden. I just think he might be able to get it done.

[nebo113]

democracy is not functioning.

https://www.newsweek.com/fake-biden-campaign-website-being-run-secretly-trump-campaign-operative-report-1446693