Times/Siena Poll Trump vs Biden

[CharonY]

Following an exchange regarding swing voters in another thread and in order not move things off-topic, there is a recent poll putting Biden behind Trump in a number of swing states. It is likely paywalled, but basically in Nevada, Georgia, Arizona, Michigan and Pennsylvania Trump is leading between 4-10 points, whereas in Wisconsin Biden is up by 2. Biden lost among nonwhites (while Trump was up among whites to begin with).

Also, for some reasons folks still think that Trump be better for the economy and Israeli Palestinian conflict. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/06/us/politics/trump-biden-times-siena-poll.html

So maybe 200 voters in WI are not enough this time...? 

[StringJunky]

Now that Biden has vocally taken sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it's going to be a shit-fest all the way now. Even my opinion of him has altered. His chances of getting re-elected look worse everyday. 

[MigL]

A lot can change in a year.

D Trump can ( hopefully ) be in jail.

[toucana]

1 hour ago, CharonY said:

Following an exchange regarding swing voters in another thread and in order not move things off-topic, there is a recent poll putting Biden behind Trump in a number of swing states. It is likely paywalled, but basically in Nevada, Georgia, Arizona, Michigan and Pennsylvania Trump is leading between 4-10 points, whereas in Wisconsin Biden is up by 2. Biden lost among nonwhites (while Trump was up among whites to begin with).

Also, for some reasons folks still think that Trump be better for the economy and Israeli Palestinian conflict. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/06/us/politics/trump-biden-times-siena-poll.html

So maybe 200 voters in WI are not enough this time...? 

 

For an alternative take on the NYT/Siena poll published on Sunday, you may wish to read this article as well:

https://www.nwprogressive.org/weblog/2023/11/poll-watch-thoughts-on-the-new-york-times-siena-colleges-battleground-state-polling.html

The article becomes a little technical at times, but the nub of it that the pollsters are accused by critics of having oversampled Republican voters, undersampled opposing groups, and then fiddled with the weightings to reverse engineer a pre-chosen result that has more to do with the current editorial leanings of the NYT than the current political realities in the swing states.

Do you recall those pollsters who loudly trumpeted a coming Republican ‘Red Wave’ in the 2022 mid-term elections -  which vanished like a mirage when the elections took place and votes were counted ? In the aftermath of that debacle, the NYT published an article called “The Red Wave Washout: How Skewed Polls Fed a False Political Narrative”. Their comments then make rather ironic reading now:

“Traditional nonpartisan pollsters, after years of trial and error and tweaking of their methodologies, produced polls that largely reflected reality. But they also conducted fewer polls than in the past.

That paucity allowed their accurate findings to be overwhelmed by an onrush of partisan polls in key states that more readily suited the needs of the sprawling and voracious political content machine — one sustained by ratings and clicks, and famished for fresh data and compelling narratives.”https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/31/us/politics/polling-election-2022-red-wave.html

On balance it seem that Sunday’s NYT/Siena poll is about as credible as Trump’s claim at a public rally in Florida just the day before, that he “Won all 50 states in a blowout”

https://www.salon.com/2023/11/05/claims-he-won-all-50-states-in-the-2020/

Edited November 6, 2023 by toucana
respaced URL in final para

[iNow]

Even if every criticism they level above is valid, it’s still a 50/50 race across polls, regions, and sampling periods. 

[mistermack]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

it’s still a 50/50 race

I agree. There are two possible election outcomes, and both look equally likely. Either Trump will win it, or Biden will steal it. The Donald told me, and he wouldn't lie. 

I'm having trouble finding the betting odds on Biden stealing it though. But what do bookmakers know?

[iNow]

26 minutes ago, mistermack said:

I'm having trouble finding the betting odds on Biden stealing it though

His numbers have always been a bit soft, and they’ve been softening much more since his vocal support of Israel has alienated voters who don’t like seeing 10,000 deaths in Gaza… especially in swing state Michigan which has a sizable Palestinian population. 

[toucana]

On 11/6/2023 at 11:23 PM, iNow said:

Even if every criticism they level above is valid, it’s still a 50/50 race across polls, regions, and sampling periods. 

 

Last night the Democrats won the senate and flipped the legislature in the Virginia state elections.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/469164-democrats-flip-virginia-state-senate/

Democratic candidate Andy Beshear was re-elected in the Kentucky race for Governor so decisively that the result was called just 20m after the polls closed. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/07/kentucky-governor-election-results-andy-beshear-democrat-wins

Democrats won the Ohio constitutional amendment question on abortion in spite of Governor DeWine’s opposition.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/07/ohio-issue-1-abortion-rights-vote-result

Daniel McCaffery won a high-stakes Supreme Court election in Pennsylvania by defeating the Republican candidate Carolyn Carluccio.

https://www.spotlightpa.org/news/2023/11/pennsylvania-election-results-supreme-court-daniel-mccaffery-carolyn-carluccio/#:~:text=HARRISBURG%20—%20Democrat%20Daniel%20McCaffery%20defeated,tens%20of%20millions%20of%20dollars.

A good deal of of this happened because the GOP chose to nail its colours to the suppression of reproductive rights and the overthrow of Roe v. Wade, a highly controversial policy that is strongly opposed by up to 70% of the electorate.

Donald Trump is currently facing 91 criminal indictments (and counting), and there is an 85% to 90% chance that he will have been convicted and sent to jail following his trials in late March and April of 2024 - long before the presidential elections are due in November of that year.

People say that he will appeal any conviction - and so he probably will. But what these pundits are overlooking is that when you get convicted of serious criminal offences like racketeering, incitement, insurrection and espionage - you *don’t* get released from prison on bail while doing it. Trump will be sitting in a cell while any appeal processes play out.

The chances of the GOP choosing to go into the 2024 presidential election with a bankrupt and patently senile front-runner who is already a convicted and incarcerated felon are becoming vanishingly small - which is why prominent Republicans like Kim Reynolds the Governor of Iowa just switched their endorsement to  Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/2024-presidential-race-ron-desantis-kim-reynolds-endorsement-trump/#

Edited November 8, 2023 by toucana
typo on vanishingly

[Sensei]

On 11/6/2023 at 11:27 PM, MigL said:

A lot can change in a year. D Trump can ( hopefully ) be in jail.

I share your point of view, but more chance of being hit by lightning.. (no more golf game? )

ps. If such a mortal is hit by lightning, some will say Zeus doesn't like him..

[iNow]

1 hour ago, toucana said:

A good deal of of this happened because the GOP chose to nail its colours to the suppression of reproductive rights

Yes, and trump has already spoken against the GOP on that issue, hence my point stands. Despite a strong Democratic showing in state and school board level races, he’s still up in swing states and tied with Biden nationally. 

[CharonY]

As mentioned before, all things considered it should be astonishing that Trump is in the race at all. But then the world has turned into a dark comedy with an idiotic script.

[TheVat]

It's interesting that Unnamed Democrat polls much more strongly against Trump than Biden, ahead by 8 points.  

Any sitting president whose administration coincides with high inflation and a surge at the border will face such headwinds in polling.  A lot of voters don't sit around having informed thoughts like regional socioeconomic forces and failing regimes are chiefly responsible for surges of illegal border crossing ....or..... inflation arises from global forces over which presidents have little control.  They let themselves be pawns of media influencers who want them to react emotionally and with partisan outrage.  

23 minutes ago, CharonY said:

As mentioned before, all things considered it should be astonishing that Trump is in the race at all. But then the world has turned into a dark comedy with an idiotic script.

Trump has completely sold his base on the idea that those 90+ felony counts are all false charges concocted as part of a political witch hunt.  The power of media bubbles to block obvious facts that contradict this is staggering. 

[Janus]

2 hours ago, iNow said:

Yes, and trump has already spoken against the GOP on that issue, hence my point stands. Despite a strong Democratic showing in state and school board level races, he’s still up in swing states and tied with Biden nationally. 

The issue I have with these polls is that I doubt that hey have changed their methods since the '22 primary.  For example, they do phone polls. But these polls rely on people actually answering their phone.  

There is a generation gap in this factor.  Younger people, who tend to vote more liberal, are much less likely, in general, to answer their phone when they get a call from an unrecognized number.  Whereas people in the older age demographic, who tend to vote more conservative, in general, are more likely to do so.  As a result, phone polls tend to over sample in favor of conservatives, even if they don't intend to.  

[TheVat]

5 minutes ago, Janus said:

Younger people, who tend to vote more liberal

When they bother to.

This is why reputable polling firms try to identify likely voters (i.e. not just registered to vote) and weight results on that basis.  

[exchemist]

1 hour ago, CharonY said:

As mentioned before, all things considered it should be astonishing that Trump is in the race at all. But then the world has turned into a dark comedy with an idiotic script.

My sentiments exactly, Doctor. I hope to God @toucana is right about Trump being behind bars before the election. If the US gets taken over by an authoritarian personality cult, we get worryingly close to the power blocs of Orwell’s 1984, turbocharged by the surveillance state, internet disinformation and AI.

Edited November 8, 2023 by exchemist

[Endy0816]

I'm thinking if the one Kennedy is still running, he will pull votes away from Trump, giving Biden the EC win.

10 minutes ago, exchemist said:

My sentiments exactly, Doctor. I hope to God @toucana is right about Trump being behind bars before the election. If the US gets taken over by an authoritarian personality cult, we get worryingly close to the power blocs of Orwell’s 1984, turbocharged by the surveillance state, internet disinformation and AI.

On the plus side, we apparently finally adopt pure metric.

[iNow]

1 hour ago, Janus said:

these polls rely on people actually answering their phone.  

You’re right to highlight the challenges of polling and they are seeking to correct that, and few goldmines exist. Some polls are better than others (Ann seltzer in Des Moines is one such)

[CharonY]

I think there are generational changes happening that society is not really realizing and methodologies might not be adjusting to it yet. On the small scale we are seeing things like loss of attention and ability to read longer or more complex texts, but I suspect there are more complicated things going on (beyond the usual stuff related to getting old and complaining about the new generation).

[swansont]

9 hours ago, TheVat said:

It's interesting that Unnamed Democrat polls much more strongly against Trump than Biden, ahead by 8 points.  

Not to me. “Unnamed Democrat” has no specific weaknesses and is for whatever the person polled is for. But no real candidate would match up, or measure up, to this.

[TheVat]

1 minute ago, swansont said:

Not to me. “Unnamed Democrat” has no specific weaknesses and is for whatever the person polled is for. But no real candidate would match up, or measure up, to this.

Though my wording was ambiguous, that's what I was getting at.  The poll figure only shows support for a generic Dem platform.  And as I said, any real potus will drag the chains of inflation, border surges, personal warts, etc.  

[toucana]

On 11/8/2023 at 12:54 PM, iNow said:

Yes, and trump has already spoken against the GOP on that issue, hence my point stands. Despite a strong Democratic showing in state and school board level races, he’s still up in swing states and tied with Biden nationally. 

Location Location Location…….

Andy Beshear won re-election as Governor of Kentucky by +5 clear percentage points - in Kentucky, the home state of Mitch McConnell the Senate Republican minority leader - a deep red state which had previously voted 60/40 in favour of Donald Trump in recent presidential elections.

The Ohio constitutional amendment on abortion rights passed by +12 percentage points - in Ohio the home state of ‘Gym’ Jordan, the Republican loudmouth, flamethrower-in-chief, and current chair of the House Judiciary Committee in Congress.

In Virginia the Democrats took control of both houses in the General Assembly, and did so in spite of  Governor Glenn Youngkin’s high profile involvement in pushing a 15 week abortion ban, and a ’Parents Rights’ agenda in education -  thereby frustrating Youngkin’s hopes of a ‘trifecta’, and a possible late presidential run in 2024.

They do say that only one poll really matters, and Tuesday night’s election results suggest that MAGA is now largely unelectable. The people have spoken and are saying that they do not wish to live in a Christo-Fascist theocracy governed by a ramshackle coalition of screaming trolls, book burners, and brain-addled Q-Anon Karens waving assault rifles.

Edited November 9, 2023 by toucana
typo 'thereby'

[iNow]

8 minutes ago, toucana said:

The people have spoken and are saying that they do not wish to live in a Christo-Fascist theocracy governed by a ramshackle coalition of screaming trolls, book burners, and brain-addled Q-Anon Karens waving assault rifles.

Either location does matter or it doesn't, and this statement is clearly false in many important electoral locations. 

[toucana]

5 minutes ago, iNow said:

Either location does matter or it doesn't, and this statement is clearly false in many important electoral locations. 

The locations cited happen to be ones that have just had elections or ballots within the last couple of days, which means that psephologists can study the actual voting data patterns that really took place, instead of trying to interpret potentially suspect pollster predictions from elsewhere,

[iNow]

2 minutes ago, toucana said:

The locations cited happen to be ones that have just had elections or ballots within the last couple of days

Correct, and none of those are currently toss-ups

[StringJunky]

42 minutes ago, iNow said:

Correct, and none of those are currently toss-ups

Those that added the abortion question had strong support from  the pro-groups, apparently. I read today that 1 in 4 women have had one in the US. If it's that many, I can't see the antis prevailing over the long-term.