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Forums - Politics Discussion - Official 2020 US Presidential Election Thread

Not much going on electionwise. Fox News clearly read my post about them and put in more Hunter Biden stories to make me look bad. So, they are harping on it a little more. Take that for what you will. 

In polling news, not much going on. Trafalgar has Trump up by 1 in Michigan. I've spoken about them earlier, so take that for what you will.

In moderately good news for Trump, Yougov has Biden up by 5 in Wisconsin. Which is not a great result, but a bit better than he's been doing.

Harris X has Biden up by 5 in Pennsylvania. Again, this is better than he's been doing, but in this case it's not as good of a result. This is a bit odd, because they have him up by 11 in Michigan, and that's more of a gap than would be expected. They also have it even in Florida. 

Last semi good news for Trump is Emmerson has him tied in North Carolina. So, that's... ok news.  

The most interesting results are in a couple of very red states. New York Times has Trump up by 6 in Alaska... which is waaaaay closer than that state should be. Other less accurate polls have it even closer. Meanwhile, Times also has Biden up by 8 in South Carolina. Remmington Research, a less accurate pollster, has him up by 6 in Missouri.

These are states that should be blowouts. In states like this, which don't get polled often, it is VERY not surprising for results to fluctuate a lot. I believe a few polls in 2016 showed a competitive race in Alaska. But, there's a lot of polls that are all showing relatively close races in states where Trump should be killing it.

On the flip side, Biden is far outperforming Hillary in states like Virginia, Colorado, Maine, New Hampshire, and New Jersey. 

Again, the results can be off in certain states or regions, as we saw in 2016. But in this case we have the polls all showing the same thing, in red states, blue states, and purple states. An error that's happening at roughly the same degree in all states is incredibly unlikely.

I'm actually starting to think Biden is a bit underrated. The swings are obviously going to be larger in more red states because there is simply more ground to lose, but considering how consistent and how big those drops are in states where the methodology probably was not overhauled, compared to states where the methodology was makes me think that polls in the midwest overcorrected based on 2016 and may be underrating Biden. Just my personal guess, but considering the shift nationwide and in the states in general, I think Biden may be underrated enough in Ohio and Texas to pick up wins there, and I'm going to be bold and even say Iowa.

With that in mind, here's my prediction. I'm finally getting comfortable in predicting a big Biden win... which will only make it hurt all the worse if that isn't what happens.

Last edited by JWeinCom - on 18 October 2020

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JWeinCom said:

Meanwhile, Times also has Biden up by 8 in South Carolina. Remmington Research, a less accurate pollster, has him up by 6 in Missouri.

Is that a typo? Was that supposed to be for Trump? If not, source?



TallSilhouette said:
JWeinCom said:

Meanwhile, Times also has Biden up by 8 in South Carolina. Remmington Research, a less accurate pollster, has him up by 6 in Missouri.

Is that a typo? Was that supposed to be for Trump? If not, source?

Must be a typo, looked them up and it's Trump who's leading in those polls



TallSilhouette said:
JWeinCom said:

Meanwhile, Times also has Biden up by 8 in South Carolina. Remmington Research, a less accurate pollster, has him up by 6 in Missouri.

Is that a typo? Was that supposed to be for Trump? If not, source?

Yes, it absolutely was a typo. If they had Biden up by 8 in SC, I'd have made a much bigger deal of it, lol.



Interesting video showing how election night would unfold based on the current numbers being generally accurate. Just kind of shows what to expect as the night progresses based on when certain states close the polls. But, they seem to be assuming that mail in votes will be counted on the night of, which I don't know whether it will be the case or not.



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JWeinCom said:

With that in mind, here's my prediction. I'm finally getting comfortable in predicting a big Biden win... which will only make it hurt all the worse if that isn't what happens.

Trump's shown a comfortable and consistent enough lead in Texas and Ohio to where I could call those for him. Even though Biden COULD take them, it's something of an uphill battle, so just for argument's sake, I'd call Texas and Ohio for Trump.

However, a loss in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and all the rust belt states is not only possible, but VERY much in play according to all the data, so, barring some otherworldly rigging, I don't see any way Trump wins reelection.

Trump doesn't have the Independents, whites and elderly voters on his side QUITE like he did in 2016, or not at all in the case of Independents (who, as we all know, are very important in deciding the election), and he's getting destroyed nationally in the polls by an even bigger margin than Hillary in 2016, not to mention Democrats are destroying Republicans in early voting. Hardly surprising considering the pandemic that he helped worsen and the threat of stacking the courts and DebateGate alienating voters (on top of all the other shit he did to alienate voters, which I'd be typing until Christmas to list off every single one, lol).

tRump has so much going against him by every single metric-or just by being an all-around incompetent idiot-that I'd be genuinely shocked if he won this time around.

Last edited by KManX89 - on 19 October 2020

KManX89 said:
JWeinCom said:

With that in mind, here's my prediction. I'm finally getting comfortable in predicting a big Biden win... which will only make it hurt all the worse if that isn't what happens.

Trump's shown a comfortable and consistent enough lead in Texas and Ohio to where I could call those for him. Even though Biden COULD take them, it's something of an uphill battle, so just for argument's sake, I'd call Texas and Ohio for Trump.

However, a loss in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and all the rust belt states is not only possible, but VERY much in play according to all the data, so, barring some otherworldly rigging, I don't see any way Trump wins reelection.

Trump doesn't have the Independents, whites and elderly voters on his side QUITE like he did in 2016, or not at all in the case of Independents (who, as we all know, are very important in deciding the election), and he's getting destroyed nationally in the polls by an even bigger margin than Hillary in 2016, not to mention Democrats are destroying Republicans in early voting. Hardly surprising considering the pandemic that he helped worsen and the threat of stacking the courts and DebateGate alienating voters (on top of all the other shit he did to alienate voters, which I'd be typing until Christmas to list off every single one, lol).

tRump has so much going against him by every single metric-or just by being an all-around incompetent idiot-that I'd be genuinely shocked if he won this time around.

KManX89 said:
JWeinCom said:

With that in mind, here's my prediction. I'm finally getting comfortable in predicting a big Biden win... which will only make it hurt all the worse if that isn't what happens.

Trump's shown a comfortable and consistent enough lead in Texas and Ohio to where I could call those for him. Even though Biden COULD take them, it's something of an uphill battle, so just for argument's sake, I'd call Texas and Ohio for Trump.

However, a loss in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and all the rust belt states is not only possible, but VERY much in play according to all the data, so, barring some otherworldly rigging, I don't see any way Trump wins reelection.

Trump doesn't have the Independents, whites and elderly voters on his side QUITE like he did in 2016, or not at all in the case of Independents (who, as we all know, are very important in deciding the election), and he's getting destroyed nationally in the polls by an even bigger margin than Hillary in 2016, not to mention Democrats are destroying Republicans in early voting. Hardly surprising considering the pandemic that he helped worsen and the threat of stacking the courts and DebateGate alienating voters (on top of all the other shit he did to alienate voters, which I'd be typing until Christmas to list off every single one, lol).

tRump has so much going against him by every single metric-or just by being an all-around incompetent idiot-that I'd be genuinely shocked if he won this time around.

I was genuinely shocked the first time around. I know I shouldn't have really been based on the data, but it still seemed to defy common sense.

As for Texas and Ohio, I don't think his lead is comfortable or consistent.

In Ohio, his lead is only .4% by the fivethirtyeight average, and his odds of winning are 52. There's been surprisingly little polling in Ohio, although maybe that's not so surprising, because there's no real situation where Biden can win Ohio and lose the election. But the polling shows a very tight race. This is especially true among the better pollsters. Fox News (which actually has pretty good polls that surprisingly tend to lean a bit democratic), had Biden up by 5 in their most recent poll. NYTimes (which maybe surprisingly leans a bit Republican) has Biden up by one. Quinnipiac has Biden up by 1 as well. So in Ohio, it's a situation where most polls are showing a Trump lead, but the better polls are showing a Biden lead. It balances out to about a tossup, at least according to fivethirtyeight.

In Texas, Trump's lead has been more consistent, but still is within a polling error. Trump's lead is only about 1.4% there. What makes Texas a bit of a unique case is the changing demographics. There are 1.8 million new voters in Texas and 60% of those voters are non-white and under 25, demographics that generally favor democrats. In particular there are a lot of new Hispanic voters. Many of these are Mexicans, who compared to other Hispanic groups (for instance Cubans in Florida) are more likely to vote democrat. In 2016, 51% of Texas's population was White. The question is if the polling sampling has kept pace with the change in the voting population.

The last piece of the puzzle for me is that the state has not been polled much in the election. It's another state that really doesn't matter. It won't be the difference between a Trump win and a Biden win, but could only be the difference between a Biden win and a Biden landslide. There have only been 3 B+ or better rated polls done in Texas in the last month. This is compared to 8 conducted in Pennsylvania. The fact that there is less polling doesn't necessarily mean anything good or bad for one candidate or another, but it means that there is more of a likelyhood in general that the numbers will be off, which is what Biden would need for a win.

That's why I think that Biden has a good chance to win in Texas. We're seeing shifts of about 7-9 points in states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Iowa, if the polls are to be believed. And those are states that, to my knowledge, haven't seen big shifts in demographics. Texas on the other hand, has been shifting in demographics, and has been consistently getting more blue. In 2004, Bush won Texas by 23. In 2008 McCain won by 12. In 2012 Romney won Texas by 16 points.  In 2016 Trump won by 9. So, in a year where the national average shifted one point towards the republicans, they lost 7% in Texas. This year, it looks like there will be a 4-8 point swing in favor of the Democrats, so it seems reasonable Texas will shift more.

Considering the overall shift in Texas over the past couple of decades, I think it's reasonable to expect that the shift in the vote in Texas would be larger than that of Ohio or Iowa, in which case Biden would win. The polls right now are within the margin of error, so anything from a 5 point Trump win to a 3 point Biden win is a possibility without any abnormal kind of error. Based on the factors above, I think Trump is being slightly overrated, enough for Biden to win. I'm actually a bit more confident that he'll win in Texas compared to Ohio. 

Could all be wishful thinking, but it's like wishing that Geno will be the announced for Smash Bros, rather than wishing for Goku. Both may be unrealistic, but one is within the realm of possibility.



KManX89 said:
JWeinCom said:

With that in mind, here's my prediction. I'm finally getting comfortable in predicting a big Biden win... which will only make it hurt all the worse if that isn't what happens.

Trump's shown a comfortable and consistent enough lead in Texas and Ohio to where I could call those for him. Even though Biden COULD take them, it's something of an uphill battle, so just for argument's sake, I'd call Texas and Ohio for Trump.

However, a loss in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and all the rust belt states is not only possible, but VERY much in play according to all the data, so, barring some otherworldly rigging, I don't see any way Trump wins reelection.

Trump doesn't have the Independents, whites and elderly voters on his side QUITE like he did in 2016, or not at all in the case of Independents (who, as we all know, are very important in deciding the election), and he's getting destroyed nationally in the polls by an even bigger margin than Hillary in 2016, not to mention Democrats are destroying Republicans in early voting. Hardly surprising considering the pandemic that he helped worsen and the threat of stacking the courts and DebateGate alienating voters (on top of all the other shit he did to alienate voters, which I'd be typing until Christmas to list off every single one, lol).

tRump has so much going against him by every single metric-or just by being an all-around incompetent idiot-that I'd be genuinely shocked if he won this time around.

Trump has no consistent lead in Ohio. Case in point, Biden was leading for quite some time at RCP and 538, and Trump is only a fraction of a percent ahead right now.

As for Texas, it's true that Trump is leading there... but only by about 2%. And the thing is, but Obama and Hillary (schocking, I know) were beating their polling numbers in that state, so 2% is very narrow and not enough to guarantee a republican victory here. I'm not even sure that a winner will be declared there yet on election night.



Bofferbrauer2 said:
KManX89 said:

Trump's shown a comfortable and consistent enough lead in Texas and Ohio to where I could call those for him. Even though Biden COULD take them, it's something of an uphill battle, so just for argument's sake, I'd call Texas and Ohio for Trump.

However, a loss in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and all the rust belt states is not only possible, but VERY much in play according to all the data, so, barring some otherworldly rigging, I don't see any way Trump wins reelection.

Trump doesn't have the Independents, whites and elderly voters on his side QUITE like he did in 2016, or not at all in the case of Independents (who, as we all know, are very important in deciding the election), and he's getting destroyed nationally in the polls by an even bigger margin than Hillary in 2016, not to mention Democrats are destroying Republicans in early voting. Hardly surprising considering the pandemic that he helped worsen and the threat of stacking the courts and DebateGate alienating voters (on top of all the other shit he did to alienate voters, which I'd be typing until Christmas to list off every single one, lol).

tRump has so much going against him by every single metric-or just by being an all-around incompetent idiot-that I'd be genuinely shocked if he won this time around.

Trump has no consistent lead in Ohio. Case in point, Biden was leading for quite some time at RCP and 538, and Trump is only a fraction of a percent ahead right now.

As for Texas, it's true that Trump is leading there... but only by about 2%. And the thing is, but Obama and Hillary (schocking, I know) were beating their polling numbers in that state, so 2% is very narrow and not enough to guarantee a republican victory here. I'm not even sure that a winner will be declared there yet on election night.

In Texas, a winner might be called on election night. They start processing and tabulating ballots about 10-12 days in advance I think. Texas is big so there are logistical problems, but there's a chance it gets called.



Ohio is a tossup in the polls and Texas a lean or tilt Republican. But if anything, I'm thinking Texas is more likely to flip this year than Ohio.

Florida and North Carolina will count all votes on election night too I believe. If Trump loses both, he's 100% toast, unless somehow he takes the entire Rust Belt plus Nevada and New Hampshire. So, no waiting for Pennsylvania or whatever.