Hard to say how much of this is due to covid and how much is simply more motivated voters, but mail-in voting is currently up by orders of magnitude compared to last election.

Obviously too early to tell how debates effected things, but lets look at some recent polls.

Rasmussen has a new poll showing Biden up by 8. This was one of the only pollsters that have showed Trump as competitive in the national race. This is a 7 point swing from their last poll, so either they were wrong before or wrong now.

Speaking of right leaning polls, Trafalgar, who's claim to fame is predicting a Trump win in Michigan in 2016, is not predicting a repeat. They have Biden up by 2 in Michigan. If they are as accurate as they were in 2016 (they were in Michigan, but not in most states) then Biden would win by about 3.5 points.

Two polls, neither that great, show Trump up by 12 and 10 in Kansas. Not great for a state he won by 21, but the polls there are unreliable, since it doesn't get polled often.

But for those looking for an election day shocker Quinnipac has Trump up by 1 in South Carolina. This is an outlier, but polls have showed a pretty close presidential race in SC. Not like I expect Biden to win there, but it's not outside the realm of possibility.

Lastly, University of New Hampshire has Biden up by 9 in the state. This was a state that might have been vulnerable to flip to Trump, but seems less likely. Seems all but certain Trump will not be expanding his 2016 total.

I really wondered how he would answer it as well when asked. I was pretty sure he wouldn't flat out condemn white supremacists directly again, because no politician likes to condemn anything directly, not even Biden, like him walking the line with Antifa and simply condemning violence in general. Which would never be seen as an acceptable response from Trump himself by some. On top of that, Trumps already condemned them in the past, and even then the media either ignored or spun it, and yet they still continue to come after him for it. Trump knows darn well most people who think he's a racist won't change their minds no matter what he says or does to their approval. He also knows he's already tackled this question and that his base will spread that information to those open enough, who had a problem with his debate response.

While he could have just given a similar past response, that would be giving the media the go ahead to simply dig up everything Trumps ever been questioned about that's seen as negative, and ask him again. Trump want's to make sure he makes it clear it's unlikely that will be tolerated. Not only that, but Trump is a businessman, and in his typical world, time is money. In his Presidential world, wasting his time is wasting the people's time. If you're seemingly wasting his time by asking the same questions over and over, especially if he's given a more than acceptable response in the past, he's going to get irritated. When Trump get's irritated, he punches back or flat out acts like a dick to let you know you're wasting his time. It's obviously not the most politically correct way to deal with the situation, but neither is asking the same negative gotcha questions after you've been warned plenty of times by Trump in the past, and yet both continue.

People are going to see and hear what they want to see and hear, and both Trump and Biden know this for the most part. Both should have a pretty good idea of where they may potentially be able to sway people, and that's where they need to be extra strategic in what they say. On the other hand, times like when Trump was pointing out Biden was 'losing the left', was mostly useless because those individuals aren't so much voting for Biden, they're voting against Trump. Sure, that may have slightly helped to solidify his base but I doubt it weakened Biden's base at all. Same with going after Trump for white supremacy. His base will just get strengthened by the irritation and victimhood of this coming up again after Trump already legitimately covered it prior.

Hopefully the next debate is reasonably professional. I get the feeling it will be.

The first surveys of debate viewers are in and you'll be shocked -- shocked -- to learn what public thinks of this "presidential debate" as we're calling it (and I use the term lightly because I don't think most people would call whatever the hell it was we saw last night either presidential or a debate):

CBS/YouGov poll: 48% of viewers say Biden "won", while 41% say Trump "won". This was Trump's best poll.

CNN poll: 60% of viewers say Biden "won" in their minds. 28% say Trump "won".

FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos polling: Between 56 and 60% described Biden's performance and policy ideas as "good", while between 33 and 39% described Trump's performance and policy ideas the same way.

There are other polls on the subject too, but you get the idea. People generally disliked this debate. According to the CBS/YouGov poll linked above, for example, 69% of viewers said they were "annoyed" by it. I share this sentiment. Strongly. It's obvious at this point that neither of these men is qualified to be president, but these are the options the people have saddled us with. YaY America. Nevertheless, the sheer insanity of President Trump proved adequate for Biden to emerge strengthened on balance anyway despite his inability to complete a sentence.

The "debate" went over so well, almost entirely thanks to President Trump, that the Commission on Presidential Debates has decided to change the rules of future debates going forward in order to ensure "a more orderly debate". Debate moderators henceforth will have the power to shut off the mics of the candidates when they break the rules, as by trying to invade the other's allotted time or by speaking over their rival. That's the single best political development I've heard of all year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_0nUCzpNes

To add to this here's a look at the people who put their money where their mouth is. Those in the betting market clearly felt Biden was the "victor" of the debate, in the sense that he had a better chance of winning after than before.

I think this is mainly because the Trump campaign needed to change the race and Biden needed just to maintain the status quo. And nobody was really going to change their mind based on this. Also, whatever you want to say about Biden, he didn't look confused or diminished, and honestly, not being able to speak much might have helped him cause there were no major gaffes to my knowledge.

That's great, and really needed considering how last debate went.

I just fear MAGAs will cry foul and that they are (literally) getting silenced. But depending on how it goes, it might not be the case.

Funny thing is that if you go to Trump internet places they think trump stomped Biden which is not truth at all, some people are just delusional. Shutting the mic is a great idea and a big blow to trump, but after this ridiculous debate he just deserved it, he went just too far. The only problem is that if you leave the decision of cutting the mic to the mediator we might have situations where the bias of the moderator might come in place and shift the weight to one side or another, most likely to Biden side especially after watching the mediator yesterday. They also should find a way to check for hidden wires in the candidates.

That move will not work.  What I mean is that Trump isn't trying to convince his base or even get more votes from White Supremacy groups and so forth because he already have them.  The President is looking to get the votes of the undecided and people who are neither Dem or GOP.  In order to get them trying to play games with the media only benefits the media because not being able to answer that question in a concise way still makes him look bad.  Those games are stupid now and using the same stragety as he did in 2016 will cost him the election.  Neither candidate is trying to sway or should be doing anything to play to their base, they are not going anywhere.  They both want those undecided voters and Trump use of words on this issue came across as bad.  No body cares what you said in the past, they only care what you say now, when asked on national TV.  All news outlets are going with that story and only conservative media isn't but he already have those people and the polls have him far behind.  Really it was a very easy question for him to answer without worrying about any blowback.  Trump could have called all those groups the devil and they would not change their vote because they are never going to vote for Biden anyway.  He lost his chance on that point and he will be constantly hammered for it as well he should.

There is a reason, that I am not so sure as some here, that Biden wins, and we have another news to further my suspicions: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/28/us-election-observers-europe-latin-america

Also, with increased number of mail-in-votes there is the strong possibility, that these votes will be attacked afterwards as invalid, if it helpsTrump. In my opinion there is the clear possibility, that no clear winner can be declared or the result is strongly challenged. That is something the model of 538 isn't calculating: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/

And this is why it is so important to make clear the rules about mail voting and try to make sure those rules applies to ALL states, which is pretty difficult considering how independent the states are. But this ship has sailed I guess.

If I could choose I would say that all votes should be counted up to a few days after the election, not weeks.