Harris vs Trump;

[Peterkin]

4 hours ago, J.C.MacSwell said:

One that could lead to a reasonable compromise if both sides were willing to debate it..

Are you familiar with the "sides" you expect to engage in debate?

[J.C.MacSwell]

1 hour ago, Peterkin said:

Are you familiar with the "sides" you expect to engage in debate?

Enough to know they would seek political advantage to the detriment of reasonable compromise,

Hard to blame given the current political climate...but blame they will

[J.C.MacSwell]

The point is that everyone has more than just a sense that there is a substantial difference between a fetus in the third trimester, that often live even born prematurely, and one in the first, yet polls like that often totally ignore it. That in itself is leading if the implication is a more average pregnancy.

Given that, I don't think describing Canadians as a majority being completely pro-choice is accurate as the question wasn't put in that manner.

16 hours ago, CharonY said:

Just wanted to add to my post above that the poll I was thinking about was likely this one:

Majority of Canadians are completely pro-choice (52%) but a significant segment (41%) is considered in-beween and a small minority (8%) is completely pro-life.

https://angusreid.org/abortion-canada-faith-pro-choice-pro-life/

 

[Luc Turpin]

A few key statistics.

Abortion is legal in Canada through all nine months of pregnancy, nevertheless no providers except hospitals offer care beyond 23 weeks. 90% of abortions are done in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, while less than 1% beyond 21+ weeks. Reasons for late-stage abortions are: fetus gravely or fatally impaired; woman’s life or physical health at risk; abusive relationship; children or young teens unaware of pregnancy or in denial.

I contend that this statistical picture reflects the position of a majority of Canadians on abortion. Having one is acceptable in an early term pregnancy while proceeding with one for a non-medical reason afterward, much less acceptable. I also contend that there would be a more robust discussion over a late-stage termination in the case of an abusive relationship and in children or young teens as the fetus would be viable then. I am almost certain that adoption would be brought into light as a substitute for abortion.

 

Edited November 2 by Luc Turpin

[J.C.MacSwell]

4 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

A few key statistics.

Abortion is legal in Canada through all nine months of pregnancy, nevertheless no providers except hospitals offer care beyond 23 weeks. 90% of abortions are done in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, while less than 1% beyond 21+ weeks. Reasons for late-stage abortions are: fetus gravely or fatally impaired; woman’s life or physical health at risk; abusive relationship; children or young teens unaware of pregnancy or in denial.

I contend that this statistical picture reflects the position of a majority of Canadians on abortion. Having one is acceptable in an early term pregnancy while proceeding with one for a non-medical reason afterward, much less acceptable. I also contend that there would be a more robust discussion over a late-stage termination in the case of an abusive relationship and in children or young teens as the fetus would be viable then. I am almost certain that adoption would be brought into light as a substitute for abortion.

+1. We have at least a semblance of a reasonable system. Hopefully the US can get back to at least that.

[Peterkin]

9 hours ago, J.C.MacSwell said:

Enough to know they would seek political advantage to the detriment of reasonable compromise,

But who are they? Who would be debating? On what platform? According to what rules of engagement? What, exactly, is identified as the 'reasonable compromise - between what stated extremes? Is there a moderator with a fact-checker and a microphone switch?

NOTA: it's been a lot of screaming (not to mention violence) and unilateral legislation on the anti-abortion side vs lobbying, litigation and editorials on the pro side. I don't see the foundations of civil debate in the US. 

What's reasonable is to enlist the expert opinion of Obstetricians in framing a legal structure, and then trust women to do what's right for themselves and their families.

 

 

Edited November 2 by Peterkin
incomplete

[MSC]

Short aside; do y'all think it might be a too politically charged environment in the USA right now for me to burn a Guy effigy on the 5th? Normally I would, but I feel like on an election year someone might think the effigy is of some American politician and take offense? 

[J.C.MacSwell]

Let the fireworks begin!

[J.C.MacSwell]

2 hours ago, Peterkin said:

But who are they? Who would be debating? On what platform? According to what rules of engagement? What, exactly, is identified as the 'reasonable compromise - between what stated extremes? Is there a moderator with a fact-checker and a microphone switch?

NOTA: it's been a lot of screaming (not to mention violence) and unilateral legislation on the anti-abortion side vs lobbying, litigation and editorials on the pro side. I don't see the foundations of civil debate in the US. 

What's reasonable is to enlist the expert opinion of Obstetricians in framing a legal structure, and then trust women to do what's right for themselves and their families.

 

 

The sides I was referring to were the politicians and pundits of the Democrat and Republican parties, and no I don't expect any reasonable debate any time soon.

[TheVat]

1 hour ago, MSC said:

Short aside; do y'all think it might be a too politically charged environment in the USA right now for me to burn a Guy effigy on the 5th? Normally I would, but I feel like on an election year someone might think the effigy is of some American politician and take offense? 

For fawkes sake, don't do it!  

[CharonY]

5 hours ago, Luc Turpin said:

I contend that this statistical picture reflects the position of a majority of Canadians on abortion. Having one is acceptable in an early term pregnancy while proceeding with one for a non-medical reason afterward, much less acceptable. I

The polls do indicate that given the consideration of any limits, the majority are more having no rather than some (the 52-41 split). It is given in the context of established medical limits, though.

[swansont]

There’s a story out about how the phone response rate for polling is now about 1%

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/11/01/polls-accurate-nobody-answers-phones/

There’s the suggestion that people answering is skewed toward older people. More polls are going with nonrandom methods. 
 

 

[MSC]

As for the abortion debate, I really believe the majority of the debates hyperfocuses on restrictions of the act and not the issues and choices around it. 

There are modalities of Pro-choice and Pro-life that are compatible with each other that focus on the more organic influences of the economy and policy on abortion rates as a whole.

Now when I talk about abortion rates, there are two types. Medical statistics and ghost statistics. One is the rate you see because it came from a licensed provider, one is the rate you don't see because it happened underground and was unregulated and therefore dangerous. One policy that is a sure fire way for the ghost rate to balloon out of control, is banning abortions. While I'd predict that the rates of both would reduce when such effective policy is in place that it reduces the oversized burden on women and families when it comes to raising children in the first place.

Maybe, just maybe less women would be inclined to get abortions if it was affordable to raise kids, have a career and the ability to also save or buy a house, to leave something behind for their children when they are gone. Hell even just more effective housing building strategies and putting new builds on the market could have a small impact on those rates. 

3 minutes ago, swansont said:

More polls are going with nonrandom methods. 

I've got a funny feeling a fair few of those other methods being utilized have some blindspots. Especially when it comes to likely and unlikely voters. 

[CharonY]

8 minutes ago, swansont said:

There’s a story out about how the phone response rate for polling is now about 1%

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/11/01/polls-accurate-nobody-answers-phones/

There’s the suggestion that people answering is skewed toward older people. More polls are going with nonrandom methods. 
 

 

Depending on the outcome of this election, there is likely going to be an accelerated change in how polls are going to be conducted. And I think some assumptions of representative cohorts might be affected.

9 minutes ago, MSC said:

Maybe, just maybe less women would be inclined to get abortions if it was affordable to raise kids, have a career and the ability to also save or buy a house, to leave something behind for their children when they are gone. Hell even just more effective housing building strategies and putting new builds on the market could have a small impact on those rates. 

In the US, abortion rates are lower in lower economic groups, suggesting that the price of abortion limits access. In countries with socialized health care, the opposite might be true. Though there are confounding factors as folks in lower socioeconomic brackets also tend to be using fewer contraceptives and other reproductive health services.

[J.C.MacSwell]

I've heard they often factor up the younger age groups to account for their low tendency to answer polls...increasing the margin of error in the poll itself. I think they also expect these groups to vote less than they might in this one.

It may turn out that younger females voting for the first time make the difference.

So hopefully we are pleasantly surprised come Wednesday morning but right now it just seems like a coin flip.

Edited November 2 by J.C.MacSwell

[Luc Turpin]

Might the following two charts not bode well for the Harris camp?

More Republicans, less Democrats and more older people are voting early in 2024 than in 2020.

 

Source - CNN

[KJW]

As an Australian living in Australia, I watch an Australian TV program called "Planet America", which provides a somewhat humorous view of US politics, though it isn't a comedy. In that show recently, I saw an advertisement from the Democrats appealing to women with Republican husbands to secretly vote for Kamala Harris.

 

 

[swansont]

48 minutes ago, KJW said:

As an Australian living in Australia, I watch an Australian TV program called "Planet America", which provides a somewhat humorous view of US politics, though it isn't a comedy. In that show recently, I saw an advertisement from the Democrats appealing to women with Republican husbands to secretly vote for Kamala Harris.

And some in the GOP are either livid that women would have the temerity to do this or in denial that they would.

Their efforts to restrict their rights and threats of doing more (e.g. repeal the 19th amendment) make it clear they don’t think women should have agency. How dare they think for themselves!

49 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

Might the following two charts not bode well for the Harris camp?

More Republicans, less Democrats and more older people are voting early in 2024 than in 2020.

 

Source - CNN

That’s not what these graphs say. Percentages are not numbers.

From what I’ve read, numbers are up compared to earlier elections, and some early voters were election-day voters last time. Also, early-vote rules changed in some states.

By only looking at a little bit of the data this is indistinguishable from cherry-picked propaganda.

You should also link to your source, not just name it.

Do better.

[Luc Turpin]

16 minutes ago, swansont said:

That’s not what these graphs say. Percentages are not numbers.

From what I’ve read, numbers are up compared to earlier elections, and some early voters were election-day voters last time. Also, early-vote rules changed in some states.

By only looking at a little bit of the data this is indistinguishable from cherry-picked propaganda.

You should also link to your source, not just name it.

Do better.

I hope that you are right in stating that numbers would paint a different picture than percentages. I really do not want another four years of Trump, even if I am not an American citizen.

"Compared to the same point in 2020, early turnout is lower in 36 states this year, and higher in 3 states, where data are available." same source

Again, I hope that cherry picking is the case here and that Harris has a real run at it.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/23/politics/early-voting-trends-2024-2020-visuals-dg/index.html

[swansont]

CNN says Georgia early voting is down, but Georgia’s website tells a different story

https://sos.ga.gov/news/georgia-voters-break-4-million-votes-during-early-voting-period

“To date, 4,004,588 voters have cast ballots either by voting early or absentee by mail.

….

During Early Voting in 2018, there were 1,890,364 voters who cast ballots. 2,697,822 cast ballots in 2020, and 2,289,933 cast ballots in 2022.”

That’s not down 4.9%

 

edit: early voting in 2020 was probably increased by the pandemic. Fewer people seem to be motivated by that these days.

And, as I said, some states have changed their rules since 2020 (the GOP doesn’t like early voting) so a proper comparison isn’t possible with such a lazy snapshot

 

[geordief]

35 minutes ago, swansont said:

nd some in the GOP are either livid that women would have the temerity to do this or in denial that they would.

Their efforts to restrict their rights and threats of doing more (e.g. repeal the 19th amendment) make it clear they don’t think women should have agency. How dare they think for themselves

Has there been any suggestion  that   a husband should be expected to vote in accordance with his wife's preferences?

 

 

[swansont]

59 minutes ago, geordief said:

Has there been any suggestion  that   a husband should be expected to vote in accordance with his wife's preferences?

Probably not by any on the right

—-

 

“In 2012 and 2016, early votes were about 36% of all votes.

…

Fourteen states have already accounted for half of their 2020 vote count with their 2024 early vote tally.” (article date 31 Oct)

https://www.nbcnews.com/data-graphics/2024-early-vote-data-map-rcna177666

As they note, 2020 was an outlier for early/absentee voting owing to the pandemic

[J.C.MacSwell]

This seems of concern IMO that spouses can share the same voting booth in North Carolina.

https://ncnewsline.com/2024/10/25/alamance-county-married-couples-polling-booths/

[iNow]

4 hours ago, swansont said:

some in the GOP are either livid that women would have the temerity to do this or in denial that they would

It’s exactly the wives of those men to whom this ad is targeted.

 

4 hours ago, swansont said:

early voting in 2020 was probably increased by the pandemic.

Exactly. In a rather significant way. Being down this year relative to pandemic panic voting is both unsurprising and expected.

[MSC]

5 hours ago, Luc Turpin said:

Might the following two charts not bode well for the Harris camp?

More Republicans, less Democrats and more older people are voting early in 2024 than in 2020.

 

Source - CNN

Actually it may be more indicative of the sincere lack of attacks on mail in voting as that was last elections Republican Boogeyman. This time around it's illegal aliens voting as the new false cry of foul. It also doesn't take into account the support Harris has amongst those voting demographics themselves smaller than Trump it may be. Now being a registered Republican means you could fall into any one of a number of camps, for example Harris managed to secure support amongst a lot of Nikki Haley supporters.