• GuyWTriangle [none/use name]
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    4 years ago

    To be fair, far less people self identify as a republican currently then 2016, let alone 2008, so i don't think this is a good weather vane for how things are going

    • Dear_Occupant [he/him]
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      4 years ago

      As a general rule, you should mistrust polling percentages until you've looked at the crosstabs and examined the methodology. When I was doing this stuff for a living, the only numbers I relied on were raw totals from past precinct reports and I was usually able to get pretty damn close to the actual election day outcome. That's how I was able to determine months in advance what neighborhoods to canvass, how much money I'd need to raise, etc.

      A percentage just gives you a snapshot of sentiment, it doesn't tell you whether someone is going to vote, which a lot of people don't even know themselves until the day of. If they've voted in every election for 10 cycles however, that's much more reliable information. And of course the EC makes most national presidential polls pretty worthless for predicting outcomes.

      • ChudsTerkel [any]
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        4 years ago

        Sounds really interesting, that would have helped a lot when I was volunteering full time for Bernie and had to deal with campaign staff post-Iowa who were fumbling with assigning canvassing turf (mostly because of the dumbass distributed organizing the campaign decided on). Any interest in making a post in c/electoralism about this, like a 101 type thing? Or at least describe what one would need to learn to do that?

      • Vayeate [they/them]
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        4 years ago

        we saw this in 2016 too and it was suggested as the reason why trump won so unexpectedly.

        • CMEPT [any]
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          4 years ago

          Trump won because Boomers listened to Rush Limbaugh talk shit about Hillary for 25 years.

            • CMEPT [any]
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              4 years ago

              Of course she was the worst possible candidate. Even if she didn't suck, she was the only American more hated than Donald Trump. The only case for Biden is "repeat 2016 except without the >5% who wouldn't under any circumpstances vote for Hillary" .

              • Deadend [he/him]
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                4 years ago

                Hey, Biden wasn’t the worst candidate this time.

                That was Mike Boomerberg.

              • Blarglefargle [he/him]
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                4 years ago

                And that’s why the RNC is focussing on the fear of loosing the status quo and riots close to home angle. To try to lure that 5% back their way since they know suburbanites care most about that.

    • CMEPT [any]
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      4 years ago

      Aside from philosophical/Overton window shifts, think how many Republicans just died in the past 12 years.