And that’s exactly why the polls are fixable because people that hear about the poles go oh they’re right, people can’t be thinking that hard about it and organizing to throw the numbers off. You know like it happened in 2012. How are the poles so far off but the voting so close?
Most people don’t understand probability, they must never have spent any time grinding low % drop rates. Things that have a 28.6% chance are not mind-blowing when they happen.
But, nonetheless it’s a very good reminder that hopefully people will learn from. But people en masse learning a lesson beyond a single 4 year period, let alone two, well now that would be mind-blowing.
The fact things are this close is amazingly disappointing in humanity as a whole.
On the one side, you have Trump who wants to be a dictator, actively hates anyone who isn’t white and conervative, said he wants to kill his political opponents, tried to overthrow the government, had a 4 year presidency that was basically an episode of Jersey Shore everyday, and idolizes Putin/Hitler/etc.
And then there is Biden, who isn’t super “exciting”, old AF, and supports Israel too much for political reasons, but otherwise has done an alright job as president for 4 years.
How are the polls and the race even remotely this close? It’s no wonder we can’t do something like fix climate change as a society when people are this fracking stupid.
“Unexciting” is a paraphrasing of “Sleepy Joe”, the Republican pet name for Biden that seems to highlight his absolute worst attribute.
Aside from his expected support of Israel which every single POTUS before him has upheld since the creation of Israel, what ways is Joe Biden the new devil?
Now c’mon, does this statement really embrace reality? Aside from it’s toxic passivity, it’s not even true. Biden’s brand of support for Israel has been absolutely toxic politically. He supports Israel because it is the hub of US power projection in the Middle East.
Exactly, it’s not that he, personally, wants to slaughter millions of Arabs, it’s just that that’s the price we have to pay to preserve the American ability to slaughter millions of other Arabs in the future.
We regular people don’t see allot of whats going on in the background.
No we just see israel committing Genocide after Genocide and destabilizing the entire middle east.
Exactly. We don’t see all the behind the scenes stuff for security reasons.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think any military/country is allowed to kill civilians to get to their enemies, ever. A country doesn’t get to use an ‘our enemies are in that population zone so we can destroy the population zone to get to them’ excuse.
But there’s a lot of history, security wise, going on between America and Israel, that is not so easily dismissed.
There’s plenty of videos of the AIPAC lobby bribing American politicians. As for the rest, even folks like Kissinger said that israel just exists to protect israel. Not American interests in the middle east.
They’re the most friendly nation in that area to us, even more so than the oil producing countries, and we rely on them for security for access to that oil.
They’re the most friendly nation in that area to us, even more so than the oil producing countries, and we rely on them for security for access to that oil.
Saudi and Egypt are already American dogs.
There’s a huge difference, security wise, between Israel, and Saudi Arabia / Egypt.
Do you know how many American bases are in Saudi Arabia?
I do. It’s not a matter of quantity of bases. It’s a matter of a friendship relationship, versus just a working relationship, and the amount of access and cooperation that each gives.
Are you aware of how much work and cooperation the CIA and the Mossad do together, and the access to the region through Israeli that the CIA has, to maintain access to oil rich fields in the region? No, you don’t, and neither do I, which is my point.
You’re not going to hand wave away Israeli infrastructure cooperation with the US.
You’re absolutely not wrong with the fact that Israel has one hell of a lobbying effort inside of the US government, and then many if not most politicians are afraid of it, I’ll definitely give you that.
Though having just said that, I just watched on CNN Senator Schumer calling publicly for Netanyahu to be replaced and for new elections to happen in Israel, that Netanyahu no longer fits the needs of Israel. So that Israeli lobby is not all powerful, apparently.
But I still can’t really agree with you on the other point. I believe the US is involved with Israel infrastructure-to-infrastructure wise, for security reasons, and because of that we can’t really just dismiss Israel out of hand (and they know it).
I will wrap up our conversation by saying this. I really do wish that, as a citizen, we didn’t have all these dependencies in other parts of the world, where there’s moral/ethical problematic issues that we have to hold our nose for, to keep those dependencies working.
I do personally believe in doing the right thing, and would want the country in which I belong to to be the same way.
It’s politics in the sense that war is politics by another means, but that’s not really what people associate with the word. If you want to take it that far, there isn’t much that couldn’t be called politics.
“Biden supports Israel because it gets the first lady horny”. Well, that’s just marriage politics!
What enemy does the US need Israel to help us face? Israel’s strategic value to the US is largely as a base for US operations. Not that Israel doesn’t have a strong military, but it’s not that important for the US.
Yes, I agree that any other president would do the same. Biden, in fact, has pushed Israel harder than any other US president since WWII. Of course Israel is being more psychotic in this moment than it has ever been before, so I would expect us to be applying more pressure.
I have a sister-in-law that thinks I’m crazy every time I say that the systematic sabotage of education is part of the plan to dumb down America and turn people into uneducated Republican voters.
Useless votes. Unless we change how our votes are counted, those votes are no better than not voting, especially if the main goal is to protest to top 2 nominees.
For the record, I oppose their choice of candidate. I think we’re better off encouraging voting as a whole, than encouraging people to fully give in to the two party system - even if I’m convinced by those arguments and plan to vote for Biden, I know other people have other perspectives and priorities.
On the other hand, we KNOW for sure that people who oppose voting as a whole are Russian bots or completely reprehensible bastards, and that is a very easy sentiment to stand by. We also know that there is one party that wins more often when more people decide to vote. I’ll let you guess which one.
I’d also say for future elections, putting more and more votes on third parties can warn the two parties that a pure message of “At least I’m not HITLER” is not viable enough.
I realise the US uses FPTP, but can someone explain to me why this comment is being downvoted? I’d think participating in the democratic process would be considered a good thing regardless.
It’s not as bad as refusing to participate, or voting for the downfall of democracy, but I don’t think it crosses into the threshold of “good”. Just “useless”.
Voting for 3rd party means tacitly supporting the candidate leading in the polls. Trump leads in the polls. A vote for RFK is a vote that Biden could use to beat Trump. Also, calling Biden and Trump “garbage candidates” is reductive and just plain wrong. We saw what Trump did for 4 years, and we’ve read Project 2025. Biden is the only ethical vote. But go off, king.
Voting for Biden is not ethical. He’s actively supporting genocide. I’m still going to vote for him because he’s better than the other bastard, but don’t fool yourself into thinking he’s innocent.
Nobody wants Biden? I want Biden. He’s done a good job. This whole he’s old shit just shows again how good Republican propaganda is, that even on here people are parroting the same shit.
If he’s doing such a “good job”, as you say, then where is UBI? Free healthcare? A wealth tax? Income caps? $20/hr minimum wage? Manditory gun registration? Most importantly: Why is life still shitty for anyone who isn’t in the top 1%? Dude isn’t even trying.
People who think it’s simple to solve problems that are as intractable as those listed above singlehandedly almost deserve politicians like Trump that promise to fix it alone and never deliver anything but tax breaks for billionaires.
i didn't say it's a good thing. i wish we had a society of independent, compassionate people and communities, but like i said, we get the government we deserve.
I don’t think “deserve” actually has much to do with what people get. I think you get the government you get unless you’re willing to organize with others and actually push for something better.
But you probably think talking trash about Biden on lemmy threads is somehow doing those things. It isn’t.
I actually thought you were making that joke and I was pointing it out. So were you serious then with that quoting and response? Cuz if so…oh buddy how could you not see that joke coming?
>I don’t think “deserve” actually has much to do with it. I think you get the government you get unless you’re willing to organize with others and actually push for something better.
... and if you're not willing to seize your fate, you deserve what you get.
nah you’re just telling people to get on their revolution grindset or something…actually I don’t know what you’re advocating for besides whining that Biden hasn’t single-handedly solved systemic issues that have been worsening for decades and have more to do more with the entirety of the government than the office of the president.
Trump wants to be a dictator and to have complete immunity so he can do things like shoot protestors or kill people suspected of theft on sight.
So like…again I get that Biden ain’t great, but I’d rather vote for the one that’ll leave office versus the dude that pretty obviously wants to suspend the constitution. 🤷
I hate to be in the position of defending any politician, but we have evidence that trump will leave office: he's done it before. by contrast, we have never seen Biden give up the presidency.
we have evidence that trump will leave office: he’s done it before.
LOL, dude, he started a fucking insurrection. By contrast, we have Joe Biden leaving the vice presidency without a peep when his term ended and going back into private life.
If you think Joe Biden is a wanton dictator and Trump is the democracy guy I genuinely don’t know if you do think at all.
I’m not some formal argumentation autobot and last I checked my lemmy threads aren’t a part of Plato’s Symposium…so if you want to hunt for logical fallacies in every LOL feel free to waste your time…you appear to have a lot of it available to waste.
and your reply here is pure clueless weirdo that has no ability to comprehend what they read and has no sense of futility
given that you think that biden is trying to become a dictator and trump is a reliable steward of democracy and the constitution…I’d say that all tracks.
your inability to understand software compatibility between mastodon and lemmy is a demonstration of something. your reaction to my use of common conventions only shows a savviness you don't possess.
I don't think so. the breach of the capitol happened while he was still speaking a mile away. again, I hate being in the position of defending politicians but I am trying to deal with facts here which are in direct conflict with your accusations.
Dude, if you think that the breach of the capitol happened randomly despite the fact that he gathered the crowd, told them to fight like hell, tried to get his presidential motorcade down there, didn’t call in anyone federally to deal with the threat, and told the crowd to march down to the capitol. I don’t know what to tell you. You’re not a serious person.
He said he loved the people who broke into the capitol. They were flying his flag. The lady who was shot and killed came straight from the speech to the capitol.
>Dude, if you think that the breach of the capitol happened randomly despite the fact that he gathered the crowd, told them to fight like hell, tried to get his presidential motorcade down there, didn’t call in anyone federally to deal with the threat, and told the crowd to march down to the capitol. I don’t know what to tell you. You’re not a serious person.
Which politician do you believe would be able to solve all or any of those issues with the razor thin majority in Congress the Democrats have had during Biden’s administration?
Remember that the 2024 election will boil down the WI, MI, PA, GA and AZ. Whichever candidate wins 3 of those 5 states (minimum) will win the election. It’s mathematically impossible to get to 270 otherwise.
I’m still voting for Biden in a red state. We used to be more purple and really still are if looking just at the popular vote. He lost here by 500k votes in 2020 but it’s very possible these narratives being pushed about swing states affect turnout more than we give credit for. We’re lucky to get 50% turnout of registered voters in presidential elections. Local elections are more like 25% if we’re being generous, and those are more important.
This is going to make Republicans seethe and will remind them of the mail-in ballots. I’m sure there will be talk of fakery, no matter who collected the data.
What’s the point in starting your campaign early when it’s just a rehash of the last one? The only reason trump started campaigning so early is to stay out of jail. Biden doesn’t need to spend money now when the impact will be far greater the farther into the race we get.
Another poll of 1,350 registered voters by Emerson College put Biden ahead of the Republican by two percentage points, 51 percent to 49 percent. The survey was carried out between March 5 and 6.
Of the 6,334 registered voters surveyed by Morning Consult between March 1 and 5, 44 percent would vote for Biden and 43 percent for Trump.
And Biden would beat Trump 43 percent to 42 percent, according to TIPP polling.
1-2% points is a slimmer margin than Gore had against Bush in '00 and Hillary had against Trump in '16. Both are inside the margin of error, even.
Looks even worse when you get to the bigger battleground states - your Arizona and Georgia and Pennsylvanias - where people are seriously pilled on the Invading Hordes of Illegals narratives. Nevermind the Midwest states - Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan - with the large enclaves of Muslim voters, who aren’t super thrilled with the genocides Biden keeps funneling money and military equipment into.
with the genocides Biden keeps funneling money and military equipment into
Yaaaaa… so you can fight Putin in Ukraine or you can simply do nothing and wait till he attacks a nato country. Lots cheaper to do it while he is in Ukraine.
you can fight Putin in Ukraine or you can simply do nothing
“You” appear to be doing nothing. After that ill-fated Reddit Expeditionary Force got shelled into fine paste, none of the Keyboard Commandos on this site or any other appear to be booking tickets out to Kyiv to enlist.
This isn’t a war between Western Liberals and The Slavic Menace. Its Ukrainian conscripts press ganged into the meat grinder, while bowtie dipshits on the cable news shows clap. “You” only know how to post. “You” haven’t fired a shot in this war.
You know he was behind, right? These polls reflect trajectory, not dominance. I’d all but given up hope completely before this 🤷
I agree he needs the leftist and Muslim vote in the rust belt. But besides a reversal I’m decades of US single state policy, which he’s now done, along with investing in aid infrastructure, not sure what more can be done. People wanna get Trump elected to spite themselves, can’t get through to them- equally cultist as GOP. The 2024 Bernie Bro.
Then Biden is fucked, because he can’t do State of the Unions all the way from March to November and hope to ride the bump off each one.
But besides a reversal I’m decades of US single state policy, which he’s now done, along with investing in aid infrastructure, not sure what more can be done.
STOP. SENDING. WEAPONS. TO. ISRAEL.
Fuck, if he really wants to go balls-to-the-wall, he can pick up the phone and tell Linda Thomas-Greenfield to call a meeting of the UN Security Council for the purpose of organizing an international peacekeeping force into Gaza. Same shit we were more than happy to do during the Bosnian Genocide and the Guatemalan Civil War and the East Timorese Crisis.
People wanna get Trump elected
This has nothing to do with Trump. This is between Biden and the tens of thousands of American Muslims who are getting news of family and friends slaughtered in Palestine on a daily basis.
This is between Biden and the tens of thousands of American Muslims who are getting news of family and friends slaughtered in Palestine on a daily basis.
And those of us who have no skin in the game but just hate seeing Israel steamroll over civilians and blatantly lie about it.
I mean… you kinda lose all good will from me when you espouse nonsense like “this has nothing to do with Trump” when we’re talking about his being elected as a result of the decision to not vote against him. So your words don’t mean anything when he’s president and affects our lives. And supporting genocide in Gaza. And supporting genocide in Ukraine. The things he’s said he will do if elected. Yeah, I think you’re feigning leftism to get Trump elected. Because logic, as I’ve clearly laid it out. But feel free to talk about your feelings and hopes as if they’re the same.
But don’t you get it, the only way I can show support for Palestine is by staying home, even if it means electing a fascist who promised to promised to wholeheartedly support Israel in their genocide! /s
when you espouse nonsense like “this has nothing to do with Trump”
This is a US foreign policy that goes back to the Truman Administration and has continued uninterrupted across virtually every administration since (with some marginal credit given to Obama who had beef with Netanyahu from day one).
So your words don’t mean anything
Plugging my ears and shouting “You need to support my guy to end the genocide” but he’s been president for three years and the genocides in Ukraine and Palestine still won’t end.
You know at some point you’re going to have to consider it’s the moral obligation of Biden and the people supporting him sending weapons to Israel to change.
What’s really sad is that you think what you’re doing is going to change anyone’s mind about how they’re going to vote.
You can be angry at people like me accusing Joe Biden of supporting genocide but if you need our votes the choice in front of you is pretty simple. Keep defending Biden and risk democracy, or do everything you can to get Biden to compromise with us.
What’s really sad is that you think what you’re doing is going to change anyone’s mind about how they’re going to vote.
lol. My man, you asked a question, and I answered it (assuming you weren’t being disingenuous). All I’ve done since then is call out your BS. There was no attempt to change anyone’s vote. This is quite the projection.
My apologies, I figured that poster was the same one who asked the question.
So, to correct my post (it literally makes no difference, BTW):
lol. My man, you another poster asked a question, and I answered it (assuming you weren’t being disingenuous). All I’ve done since then is call out your BS. There was no attempt to change anyone’s vote. This is quite the projection.
Does this effectively meaningless edit make you happy now?
Wasn’t expecting you to actually reflect in the mirror, but you never know, figured it was worth the try.
Seeing you label my comment as childish though makes me realize that it was a waste of my time to point something out that you just can’t/don’t want to acknowledge.
The reason I’m here is to make sure people understand why we’re not going to vote for Biden. I’ve provided some examples of things Biden could do differently that would change my mind. I’m here to combat these completely false narratives that “progressives and leftists will never be satisfied” and “they aren’t reliable voters”
We can be reasoned with and we are reliable voters. I keep being told democracy is about compromise so here’s the opportunity for Biden and Biden’s supporters to compromise. If they’re unwilling to do that they must not think democracy is all that valuable.
No, I’m on here to defend reason, objectivity, and the facts. Which is why you find me so frustrating, as you want to pretend that you are a spokesperson for all progressives and make up facts to support your positions.
What reason, objectivity and facts? People are telling you they won’t vote for Biden in the upcoming election. If you want their vote you have to accept their reality. If you don’t want their vote you have to accept the consequences without complaint.
People are telling you they won’t vote for Biden in the upcoming election. If you want their vote you have to accept their reality.
Ive already explained to you that your projection of trying to get people to vote a certain way is your own, not mine. I simply answered a question as asked, and then called out the subsequent BS.
You are really just criticizing yourself right now.
There is no “reason, objectivity and facts” when it comes to personal decisions. You either accept what people are going to do or you find a compromise. Your engagement in these conversations seems to be “your personal decision is wrong because X,Y,Z”. That’s not useful to anybody.
You either have me mixed up with someone else, or the reason you think I don’t make sense, based on your explanation here, is that you aren’t here in reality with me.
Biden has more than half the total delegate count already pledged to him. Primaries are over, Biden has won regardless of the outcome of the remaining primaries and will be the democratic nominee in 2024.
They are more or less. It’s part of why our primary system sucks. There’s still downballot races though and you can and should vote for progressives to be the Democrat nominee in them. And you can cast a symbolic noncommitted for president to express displeasure with Biden.
Hidenberg handed Hitler the chancellorship. Hidenberg, the only check on the Nazi power, remained president until his death until 1934. After which, using the Enabling Act, Hitler was able to proclaim himself both chancellor and president.
Hitler becomes chancellor because Brünig, Hidenberg, Papen, and Schleicher all think they can control and temper Hitler all while staying in power and keeping the left wing out of power.
I was contending “Nazis lost the election to Hindenburg … and came to power anyway in 1933 regardless.” Hitler didn’t come to power for some amorphous reasons, but specific decisions by people in power. I agree that material conditions are important, but it’s so vague here that it’s meaningless and can be shifted at any point in this discussion to support your position.
The Nazis agitated support on multiple fronts including electoral politics. Hindenburg surrounded himself with other military conservative and as conditions in the streets continued to worse economically and support swung to the nsdap, they urged him to give support to Hitler. However, the Nazis had won a plurality of the vote in every Reitsrat election starting in 1930.
Electoral politics alone isn’t the answer. Never was. Garnering support on the ground is difficult work.
Your initial presentation was vague. I agree that it could be made clear, but your initial posts just hinted at it.
There are some similarities and a some important differences. If you don’t acknowledge the differences. I think you haphazardly write responses with half remembered idiomatic expressions, sensationalism, and simplistic thinking.
With that said, you land in positions I might agree with. But you do a disservice to leftists. Do better.
They had her anywhere between a 70-90% chance to win. If you predict 90% chance that something will happen, and it always happens, your prediction is wrong because you should have predicted 100%.
When I hear someone say “you can’t trust the polls because they got 2016 ‘wrong’” they are just telling me they don’t understand statistics.
I understand the point you’re making about probabilities, but we’re speaking in the context of politics. Polls accurately predicted the results in 2008 and 2012. Something fundamentally changed in 2016, and the polls were off across the board.
And in reality we are talking about an weighted error difference of about 1.3/1.5 points between 2008/2012 and 2016. It’s not like they got it massively wrong.
You said something changed, and then I showed how last election they were actually more accurate than in the past. And I already pointed out that they were “wrong” about 2016. So I’m not sure what your point is about this.
And its important to note that these predictions were for the pop vote, which she did actually win, so they were actually right.
I’m not sure this is entirely true. Many polls just look at the popular vote, but most of the polls that claim “chance of winning” take into account the EC.
538 had her going into the election with a 70% chance of winning the electoral college. Nate Silver also went on multiple shows basically doing everything he could to get people to understand that meant 3 out of 10 times she loses.
No, 538 (and RCP?) actually has a rolling projection of ‘real’ chance to win the EC. But the chances of Hillary declined from >90% to 70% in the last week or so. When she was >90% everybody would say it looked like she was going to win, and that’s what people remember.
It’s been awhile since I read anything about that, but it seems like the last time I read about it, was something along: “80% of polls have Hillary projected to win”, but the actual polls that they were using were all almost within the margin of error.
People in almost never speak about the margin of error when presenting a poll, especially one that’s favorable to them.
f you look at the fine print, and see the margin of error percentage, then you apply the maximum amount to both people in the race, you’ll see a lot of times it’s a tie.
Funny that this was in response to me and not the above poster that claimed that something happened in 2016 that made them no longer reliable.
Additionally, I suspect you don’t really know what you are talking about because the issue you point out is not a statistical issue, but that they are just not a good measurement to begin with. Which isn’t even a good point either because they do a pretty good job of consistently getting pretty close. In the last election the mean error was only about 4.3 and they didn’t seem to favor either side.
Polls would be ok if the sample was peefectly random. However it is never fully random, and in practice they always overrepresent politically active people and underrepresent the poor.
they are just telling me they don’t understand statistics.
You’re right, but in fairness to the regular person who gets their news from regular news outlets, they were being told that Clinton had a 98% chance of winning when in reality it was more like 75%. The fact is while everyone was cocky in 2016 and nervous in 2020 I was the opposite because I followed the polls and Biden in 2020 had consistently bigger leads on Trump than Clinton in 2016 with even bigger leads in swing states. His odds of winning were much greater than hers and the likely margin of victory was much higher, but they were being underestimated by a media machine that was absolutely snakebit after going all in on congratulating HRC in June for being the first woman president with a dem supermajority in both houses of congress and flipping Texas blue.
Well Hillary didnt pay off her hookers 2 weeks before the election… like that kinda means he cheated. So Id say its a lot harder to win when you play by the rules. And Im not defending Hillary cuz I know she shafted Bernie, but what she did is not even on the same scope as what donnie rapist did/does on a daily basis.
They do and they don’t. Some people see polls and say “why bother”. Some people see polls and scream “GET OUT AND VOTE”. They may not be indicative of the final outcome, but they are a motivating factor for a lot of people.
Yeah, polls are stupid and useless; only the election day poll counts…though last week some idiot on here was desperately trying to defend polling is being both dependable and correct (as long as you throw out the ones that were wrong)
The first sane take in this whole thread. Modern polling is unreliable when the margins for victory in certain elections can come down to literally a single vote in some cases.
There is less gerrymandering now than there was 4 years ago–some court cases have switched things in some states like Wisconsin–and gerrymandering doesn’t directly apply to the President. There are some indirect effects.
Eh. It affects the composition of state and local governments, which is what allows for voter disenfranchisement policies in red areas, which dramatically affects presidential elections.
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