Search options (Page 1 of 19)

a) I do not know you or anyone else's personal characteristics here.  If someone said it, I'd forget or confuse with someone else.  It's something that does not enter my mind, as I don't hold anything for or against anyone for any belief or persuasion.  My intention is never to insult or chastise anyone here directly. 

b) Post I made was to continue to complain about why and how the Democratic Party has lost its way with the majority of the voting public.  Identity politics have left the Democratic Party in a bad way.  Trump is the backlash to that, this adherence to the rules of identity.  Don't dare break them.  You'll be ostracized. Canceled.  Paralyzed from doing simple things like incarcerating violent criminals.  Oh well, enjoy four years of MAGA. 

c) My thoughts were to protect young girls and women, who remain the most frequently victimized part of society, mostly by men.  I'm not backing down on barring biological men (post-puberty ages) from women's sports.  Particularly at the high school or collegiate level.  There are competive fairness concerns as well as physical injury concerns.  Anyone born male has inherent biomechanical advantages and those can be dangerous, just as an NFL linebacker would pose a risk to someone like me, who is not a pro.  Is it right or fair for trans women to be forced to compete in men's sports?  I'm really not sure what the ideal answer is, but I DO know that competitive sports particularly contact sports for women and girls, should remain solely for biological women and girls.  Joe Biden's administration thought differently.  They lost. 

d) I bashed "Drag Queen Story Hour," again, to some an innocuous idea, to others it was another instance where "normies" felt Liberals may have lost their minds.  I myself, have no problem with it.  If parents are informed, and given the choice to opt out, fine.  The kids really don't think about or care who's reading the dumb book.  They'd probably rather it be a Russian CGI YouTube character they all love.  HOWEVER, if you all don't think parents are unnerved by this stuff, you're not listening out there.  There is a larger argument in society about how to deal with potentially transgender children, which I am not touching with a 20 foot pole.  That one is as hot button as that volcano supposedly ready to pop off the coast or Oregon. 

e) Final one about the number of transgender women in women's prisons.  I had the thought in there, which I saw a bunch of times on-line and elsewhere, that was probably attributed to a UK study.  A study that showed very high percentages of trans women in female prisons, were convicted sexual offenders.  Not in the United States, because they don't largely allow mixing of genders in a prison, there are very small numbers of trans women in women's jails.  The studies also show that people who were born male, retain the same statistical pattern regarding criminality as those who remain "male."  Don't blame me, it's the Y-chromosome.  https://committees.parliament.uk/writte … 18973/pdf/

f) I did fail to mention that trans women are at risk in men's prisons as it is, which I did know was the case prior.  https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/ … t-2016.pdf  That being said, if you put a male convict in a female prison, you'd be run out of town.  Advocates for women simply don't view violent trans women as all that much less harmful than a violent male inmate.  How is this an attack on transgender people?  How is that an attack on ireactions personally?  This is the hill to die on?  That trans women have somehow given up the (I guess you could say) negative tendencies attributed to all men?  Are gay men in general less criminally active than straight men?  Probably not. 

g) Now, SQ21 asked where I get my news, well here's New York's NBC affiliate, surely not a right wing source, reporting on a phony trans person and convicted sexual predator, who took advantage of New York liberal's foolishness, to do what he does best, rape women.  https://www.nbcnewyork.com/investigatio … s/5067904/  It's anecdotal, but goes back to my point that these wild stories are what gathers people's attention.  You see this type of story enough times, and you form an opinion I guess. 

*As moderator, ireactions could have simply responded that my stance was wrong. You have the facts twisted.  Etc., etc.  Another multi-post meltdown about how I have apparently attacked the very right to exist.  The hyperbole.  I'm not sure it's the place of a moderator to be the nanny for the rest of us?  Interpreting intent?  I have honestly never seen anyone, anywhere else, perform like ireactions does.  Maybe this is what they do in Europe (I hope not Canada) where social media posts have put people in jail for thought crimes.  He's supposed to be in the medical field of some sort, yet wants to argue against human biology.  I don't care WHO you are, how you dress, what skin color you have, statistically, if you're born male, you're far more likely to be violent than those born female.  That is a blanket statement on the whole of Earthly mammals.  Males have a biological drive to have sex, far more than female.  Often this results in violence.  End of freaking story.  I'm not talking about ireactions or anyone like him, I was talking about convicted criminals.  Who are already decided by society, to be unsafe to be in it, for at least a period of time.  If you truly believe orientation or gender choice makes someone less violent or predatory, than anyone else of the same biological gender, I really don't know what more to say.  You chose to run right over those conceptual arguments, and claim victimhood.  Was I too harsh about the left's rush to defend trans rights?  Probably yes that was too flippant.  Again, I SUPPORT those rights.  But no one has absolute rights if they may infringe on another individuals, either.  When you opt for absolutism, you lose.

In conclusion, I see no point of this politics thread.  It's basically a dumping venting ground for Trump disgust.  It's not a place for open dialogue.

George W. Bush had the absolute narrowest victory in history.  California's management of the flora is absolutely a reason for the disaster there.  The citizens out there have vocally stated that, and they're not Republicans saying it.  They had decades to improve their water management.  Nothing.  You can't do anything there due to the overload of regulations.  California is loaded with homelessness because you can't BUILD homes!!!  Good luck rebuilding in LA. 

I actually wholly disagree.  The Democratic coalition has shifted to pick up huge swaths of college educated voters.  Those voters are far more likely to vote during off-year elections.  The Democratic Party needs a new image, I don't know what it is, as I've said before.  They spent the week freaking out about some Nazi salute that Elon Musk clearly was NOT doing.  Idiots.  They've chosen to blindly defend utter bizarro policies simply out of fear of stepping on someone's "feelings."  Trump couldn't care less. Vance couldn't care less.  Wokeness has ruined the Democratic Party.  They've become paralyzed by it.  I never understood the "die on a hill" for illegal immigrants stance of that Party.  Never understood the abject refusal to allow voter ID laws. 

Trump has had, for his agenda, a massively successful first couple weeks.  His nominees, while divisive, are going to get through.  The significance of their populism cannot be underestimated.  He's also had a huge week of immigration deportation round ups.  Having the Presidents of Mexico and Colombia cave to his tariff threats to take rightly deported individuals back.  These were lay ups.  ICE raids where TV crews recorded a Haitian gangster screaming, or the bust of a nightclub and 50 Venezuelan gang members.  How couldn't the Biden admin NEVER do this?  They fought it tooth and nail.  No vetting, just a porous open border.  Meanwhile, sexual predators, drug dealers, gang members with rap sheets all deported this week.  Publicity stunt?  Partially.  But does it NOT demonstrate (even artificially) government DOING its job?

I would say the biggest problem on the Left right now, is the refusal to admit when one is wrong.  On anything.  Then there has been this absolutely over the top (largely out of nowhere) crusade to infuse "trans" sensitive everything, everywhere.  They could not understand why parents were uncomfortable with "drag queen story time"????  I'm as socially liberal as you will find.  If my niece/nephew were subjected to that, I would raise hell!!!  WTF are we doing????  Trans-women make up a large portion of women's prisons, putting actually WOMEN at risk.  So the left is fine with this, as well as having biological men in women's sports.  Very safe.  When middle of the roaders try to argue how this is insane, they are labeled viciously.  NO, you're just void of common sense.  Not female inmates fault that previously male or trans inmates committed crimes!  Again, WHAT ARE WE DOING?  Look, Ron DeSantis breezed in Florida when he went up against this crap, easily defeating supposedly all powerful Disney, because the VOTERS approved of it.

Yes, these are at times trivial issues.  However, they represent at large what people identify with politics.  It has literally fueled an entire podcast space devoted to people who simply want their heads from spinning from wokeness.  And many of these NEW listeners are men and women of color!  You turn on MSNBC, and it's completely off the rails.  Trump NAZI Trump NAZI Trump NAZI.  It didn't work!!!  Enough already.  How about start reporting and highlighting successful DEMS!!!  Have them talk about initiatives, not how to stop a Trump cabinet pick, an utter waste of time.

Stephen A. Smith rant should be watched by every Democratic party official.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/stephen-smit … 38680.html

I felt Skeleton Crew was fantastic, very enjoyable and kids should love it.  I wish they'd made a show like that 30-35 years ago, for me. 

SQ21, have to be honest, I really never think too far into canon when it comes to Star Wars.  It's not like Star Trek, where "history" has played such a crucial role.  I just want to watch something that is well acted, edited, directed, with cool effects, action, and a script full of humor and intrigue.  Skeleton Crew had that and more.  Get's an A+ from me.  Andor returns for it's second and sadly last season.  That's been a show for adults, incredibly well written and acted.  Terrific writing on those series.

I can only hope that so many of our favorite actors, actresses, directors, writers, producers, and crew members, who have brought us so many wonderful movies and television shows, will be safe through this horrendous Los Angeles area fires.  Many prominent celebrities have already lost their homes in a matter of moments.

The pilot was shot on film though, was it not?  Versus video.  Plus the blu-ray is going the way of the dinosaur.

In other news, my first President, Jimmy Carter, has died at age 100.  He was known as a "boy scout," someone who did things honestly and for the right reasons.

I didn't understand Warner Bros inability to progress with immensely popular Henry Cavill?  James Gunn, well, he makes a certain type of content.  That style will not work with this property, so we'll see how he's adapted.  Superman is kind of a dying property, it really doesn't resonate like it did years ago.

One thing I've come to realize in television, is that you can't really point to certain things and say, oh, that one is responsible for this or that.  It's a collaborative process, and unless you're in the writers' rooms, we'll never know.  Occasionally those secrets come out in commentary tracks, which rarely get done anymore, especially on a streaming show.  The war amongst Star Wars fans about WHO makes decisions over there is proof of that. 

But Kurtzman has had top EP billing the entire run.  He's the Rick Berman of this era, and Rick was significantly involved in every major decision to be made by Paramount Television on Trek during his reign.  They gave the production design, effects and makeup people a "clean slate" when the series began.  I'm not faulting them for doing so, given that was the first Trek TV series in well over a decade, and they wished to differentiate from those (initially) and the Abrams films.

I guess I'm just surprised they opted for a bombastic action film replete with a high degree of CGI, given it's only a streaming release.  The writer and director are sci-fi pro's who have worked on Discovery for years, so it's in good hands.

I have never wanted to see any attempt at "Starfleet Academy."  It's a subject which Paramount have looked into many times since the late 80's.  Never appealed to me.  You're not on a starship, which has been the premise of Star Trek.  You're not leading some grand mission.  Yes, DS9 was not "on a ship" most of the time, but that was a serialized series where they did often go on missions and fought battles, etc.  Academy screams teen misadventures.  MEHHHHHHHHHHH.  And they have a great cast with Holly Hunter and Paul Giamatti playing some kind of roles, who are both legends.  It will go (on my docket) where Prodigy has gone, unwatched.

Oh right, Academy mehhhhh.  It's also well beyond even Discovery's time period.

Hey Jerry, Mr. Rhys-Davies does not live in New Zealand!  Not in many years, he's home to the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea.  We could go all the way back to the Funny or Die video period, or further to when Bob Weiss was talking a Sliders movie.  Jerry has said this kind of thing aloud, but it's gone nowhere.  He infamously was asking fans (including me) how to get in touch with Tracy. 

https://deadline.com/2024/11/comcast-sp … 236181907/

On the subject, not sure if all are aware, but NBC like most networks has been taking a bath on its cable TV platform.  In fact, the CEO of Comcast has seriously floated splitting the company with cable channels going off, leaving NBC proper, Peacock, and Bravo with NBCU.  Wouldn't have a huge effect, but maybe the move will cause the new company to actually invest in programming again.  I mean, do USA or SyFy even broadcast new, scripted series anymore? 

What is needed, as I've said before, is a production studio or writer/producer to come forward with a pitchable concept.  This is what the team around Torme were looking to do.  Unfortunately, both Tracy and his producers were a tad "long in the tooth," and were not going to get much traction.  You need (yikes) a J.J. Abrams Bad Robot to get a script and pitch it.  Then when it's moved into pre-production, that's when the actors would be brought in.

The election was in many cases inevitable.  Incumbents lost around the world, far worse in places like Britain, due to runaway inflation.  This was somewhat "delayed" by the Dobbs decision in 2022, which converted a likely red wave into a trickle, and clearly put Dem cheerleaders into a state of false hopes.  For one, midterms, and Dems should be poised for a comeback in '26, feature high-propensity voters in a larger way.  They are more educated, and afluent.  In the general, you get the "rank and file," people who don't bother to vote otherwise.  In the case of Trump, who has solely been responsible for an unprecedented turn out with his base for three general's now.  Yes, Harris improved slightly on some Biden demos, but lost on others.  Most of those losses wound up being in blue states (more on that later), and did not affect the outcome very much.  This was the case with the "red" Latino shift.  No, what got Trump elected was what worked in 2016.  He pushed a simpler message, albeit intertwined with idiocy and intolerance, but populism DOES work, to some extent.  That resulted in large-scale growth of his base, but he also mastered independent, late-deciding, and most of all, "new voters."  I myself will take the hit for dismissing the scattershot Musk-led approach of pushing low-information, low-engagement people, particularly younger men, into voting Trump.  This was highly evident in the large number of ticket splitting and Trump-only votes cast in BG states.  Harris and Democrats deserve credit for bucking a lot of this, to ensure that numerous Democrats won razor-thin races in Congress, which she lost. 

So what did it?  Well, I have digested copious amounts of Monday morning quarterbacking the last few weeks, and the consensus doesn't move far from the mean on what I feel are these main points....

1. Joe Biden lost this election.  Trump did a lot, as I point out above, to get the numbers to win it in a more decisive fashion, and a hand-cuffed Harris did all she could, in a comically short amount of time.  In reality, she had no chance.  Joe Biden passed some significant legislation during his first two years, no question, but most of it has and will continue to take time to get going.  Still, he made several poor decisions during that time which came back to haunt him.  All of which resulted in a horrible "wrong track" and Pres approval rating which NO incumbent party or Pres has ever won on. 

  a. Inflation.  Biden insisted on the massive "American Rescue Plan," a $1.9 TRILLION dollar stimulus, which on top of what Trump had doled out, likely superheated the economy, and exacerbated inflation.  Economists of all stripes warned against this.  Biden calculated that job growth was more important than anything, and while he still might be correct, the public was hit with inflation that half or more of the population had never experienced before.  I was a wee toddler when Carter's inflation broke his administration, and allowed Reagan to breeze in. 
  *I would point out that the Federal Reserve increased inflation by purchasing debt securities as protection against pandemic economic downturn.

  b. Dysfunction.  The Afghanistan withdrawal was a complete fiasco.  Yes, Trump set that on its way with his Taliban deal, and yes, the Afghan Army had given up.  However, bipartisan Congressional panels found that the US military's recommendations were countermanded by Biden's own impatience on the subject.  In the long run, the USA is better off being out, but the perception of dysfunction was very damaging.  Biden's foreign affairs continued to take a hit, when his initial Ukraine successes have morphed into a near three-year stalemate, as he's kept Ukraine from neither advancing nor ceding the battlefield, out of concern over a wider conflict.  Biden's strategy has been a failure, because Trump is likely months away from shifting course entirely anyway.  On Gaza, Biden's hard line against the IDF's systematic destruction of the Palestinian enclave, followed by attacks in Lebanon and Iran, have all followed Biden's hollow admonishments.  He and by virtue, Harris, have shown to be largely ineffective on the world stage.  Not that strong man Trump was any better prior, but world events have not gone their way.

  There was of course, nothing more dysfunctional than Joe Biden's immigration policy.  After the health order was struck down in 2021, his administration made an absolute, buffoonish move to take America's limited, and extremely specific asylum language, and throw it out the door.  This was down without Congressional approval, and resulted in a non-stop border incursion that officials did nothing to stem.  The policy completely blew up in their faces when DeSantis and Abbott decided to bus migrants to Northern "sanctuary cities,"  which were overwhelmed, and pissed millions of people off, primarily working class voters of color.  The lack of a plan or any kind of structure made Biden again look totally inept.

  c. "Lawfare." The four-sided indictments handed Donald Trump, a weakened candidate who was unsure of his future, and trailing Ron DeSantis badly, the GOP nomination.  Now, I don't know if you can "blame" Joe Biden for this or not, directly, but he certainly could have made a call, and not allowed it to happen.  I said at the time, this was risky.  The GA and NY cases were a complete joke, and one will never see the light of day, and the other is likely to be thrown out on appeal.  Those Democratic prosecutors bowed to party pressure to move forward, buoyed by the cover given from Jack Smith's dual-prosecutions.  Even there, only one of them had a real shot, the Jan 6th case, which the Supreme Court gutted regardless.  Again, Trump was flailing away to nothing when these prosecutors, plus the idiots in Colorado who tried to toss him from the ballot, only supercharged his campaign and made him a martyr. 

  d. Not dropping out.  Joe Biden got a lot done with Democrat majorities through 2022, he should have taken the hints, and moved aside.  I've said before, I'm not sure if ANY Democrat would eventually have beaten Trump with the wrong track numbers where they were.  But they had a chance, and those chances faded when Biden pressed on.  The result were near-constant gaffes, and the White House seemingly "hiding" the President from the public during the past two years.  Say what you will about Trump's lunacy during the pandemic, but he was visible and audible throughout.  To his detriment, but when voters had the choice, they decided that Trump's pandemic response, at the time one-sided towards the economy, was something they wanted more of now.  Harris was a good campaigner, but she was hand-cuffed.  She was given Biden's campaign team, the same team that managed to see him achieve abysmal approval ratings, and who's management came to an embarrassing conclusion with the June debate, and clearly advised her NOT to attack her boss.  The result was that swing voters saw her as "more of the same," and a non-starter.  A full primary process was needed, and not in August of 2024 but in 2023!!!  Biden's refusal to move aside doomed his party's ticket.  It made their "democracy" claim worthless, given that their candidate was nominated without a single vote.

Alright, enough shitting on Joe.  Is the Democrat Party dead?  LOL, of course not.  Even bad parties in a 50/50 country are still going to compete, you never know what the next big over-reach of the ruling party will be.  They always over-reach.  For me, there are two types of voter-movement which affected Democrats this time.

2. The swing voter, he or she of low-turnout, low-information, and low-engagement politically.  He or She who apparently cannot be accurately polled.  What DO these indecisive people care about?  Well this time around, it was the cost of living primarily.  Costs which Democrats have just not done much about, at least in a meaningful way.  Has anyone wondered why there is a massive, long-term move from blue states to red ones?  Yeah, yeah, there's cultural reasons, but that's not the cause.  The cause is money.  Places like California and New York, which shed citizens at record levels, did so because they are high tax, high cost environments.  They keep raising taxes and tolls, and people are not only tired of it, they cannot afford it.  This has been happening even before COVID, and the exodus is a major problem.  States like Texas, Florida, Carolinas, Tennessee, Georgia Arizona, etc, all will gain electoral votes, and they are increasingly tough for Democrats in.  There was a time when the Democrat Party was focuses on cost of living issues primarily, in additional to environment, public health, and education.  Well, they continue to fail on the first one.  Housing construction favors the wealthy, with lower income folks increasingly priced out and forced to move, weakening their voter base.  This is a national issue.

3. The higher propensity voter shift has continued to be an issue.  This began in 2016, and aside from a massive stay-at-home vote turnout from 2020, has gotten worse.  These are voters who vote semi-regularly, watch the news, discuss politics, and leaned center to left for most of their lives.  This voter has moved, and for this election, they flat out RAN away from the Democratic party.  They are not MAGA.  They are not Republican.  They are 1000% ANTI-WOKE.  That's right, the Democratic Party's allegiance to coastal, university wokism has ruined this party.  It has promoted an agency not of equality but equity, a reverse racism which even minorities themselves have polled as being against.  Terms like DEI were publicly admonished by growing legions of moderate and center-left individuals.  The backlash to corporate DEI was devastating. 

  Then there's the criminal justice aspect, which has been been maybe the most damaging to the left.  Beginning with canonizing George Floyd, Democrats in cities began to tie the hands of law enforcement.  The result was widespread crime, both petty and violent.  Added to the violence from some freely roaming migrants, almost all individuals having been stopped by police, only to be let back on the street due to progressive Judges.  Nowhere has this been more devastating than the metropolises of Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York, where voters had massive pro-Trump shifts, and voted out a number of progressive mayors, district attorney's and others.  The cities have been turned into cesspools.  Suburban voters have been treated to non-stop coverage of the insanity for four years. 

  These voters and more are sick and tired with Wokism.  They are fed up with statues of Jefferson or Hamilton being removed and hidden from view.  They're fed up with drag queen story hour.  They're fed up with PRONOUNS.  They're fed up with being told what vaccines you must have, or masks you must wear.  Fed up with Columbus Day being converted to Indigenous Day.  Fed up with BOYS competing in GIRLS sports.  Fed up when the media does things like "hide the Hunter Biden laptop story" or cancel people for questioning public health decisions made, as it turned out, without scientific backing.  Most of all, they're fed up with the social media left calling them racists or transphobic or garbage, simply because the LEFT has invented new ways to Nanny-State people.  I was flippant to this myself, thinking well it's just MAGA whiners or libertarian martyrs.  NO, it's a significant portion of the population.  It's growing, and worse of all for Democrats, it's gaining MASSIVE ground with voters 30 and under, especially men.  When Joe Rogan laughs at some of the ridiculous nonsense the woke come out with, most of young America laughs WITH him.  Democrats will never come back significantly unless they divorce themselves from this idiotic wokism once and for all, as the future demographics are not in their favor on this.  You cannot have lousy economic conditions for young people (particularly men) AND put cultural dog collars and leashes on them.  George Orwell hath spoken.

So yeah, that was a LOT to read.  I expect Trump's Presidency to come up short on most of what he promised, as he's an awful manager of everything, and is surrounded by vultures.  He'll tire of Elon Musk quickly.  I'm most intrigued to see how long RFK Jr. lasts, as though I support a good part of his health platform, I cannot see where it goes.  Case in point, on the other night's Real Time series, while the panel, including noted health expert Dr. Casey Means, applauded Bobby Jr's initiatives, Bill Maher, the skeptic laughed.  When they all complained about America's ill health being driven by fast food, Bill stated the obvious, people eat McDonald's because it's "FUCKING DELICIOUS."  They all were incredulous, but once again, the comedian had it right.  Just like Joe Rogan or John Olliver or Dave Chappelle, always keep your ears open for the comics, because they are the first ones willing to say what the public cannot.  The woke have attacked them to no end, I wonder why?  They saw through the B.S.

Simon Rosenberg is maybe the biggest hack idiot I've ever seen.  He ignored mountains of data and strung unfortunate souls along with him.  Ignored the absolute awful poll numbers for this administration, as if they were meaningless.  Listen to this guy, VIBES???  Vibes are NOT votes.  The votes are NOT there, in any of these states.  He knows better.

The problem is, between the TV networks and Twitter accounts I'm following, the outstanding count in blue suburban/urban in states like GA and NC are in person votes, which will favor Trump, so he's going to narrow those advantages slightly.  The bell weather counties in those states and PA not good in terms of them being too close.  Trump has ballooned in many rural deep red counties.  I think she's toast.

She's getting leveled in Florida, and Georgia is going to be very tough.  North Carolina still even.  Exit polling for Harris was well behind Biden nationally with Latinos, particularly men.  Not great for the sun belt.  Nevada numbers though in range.

I have seen valid sources attribute this information from the Harris campaign....

Tuesday Night: Expect near full results from Georgia, North Carolina, Michigan, Virginia, Florida, Ohio, Colorado.  Partial Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Arizona.

Wednesday Morning: Most all Wisconsin, additional Pennsylvania, Michigan.

Later Wednesday (Thursday?): additional Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, etc.

If that were true, he wouldn't have one of the worst approval ratings in US history.  Biden's handling of the Southern border from the moment the courts ended the pandemic emergency rule keeping migrants out, has been absolutely pitiful.  He only began to "shut things down" late this summer, well over two years late.  It made no sense. 

Now you can dispute that, but you're arguing with the wrong person.  Biden's age, physical presence, and constant gaffes have literally frightened or frustrated voters away from him.  He has had a number of successes, but his inability to communicate those have rendered them and his candidacy moot.  Even Kamala gave up talking them up and switched to an anti-Trump message.  Biden is radioactive, he cannot speak without blurting out absurdities.

I've already detailed the various reasons which people will vote for Trump.  Most have valid reasons, whether we decide to give them credence or not.  Democrats have allow themselves to generate messages focused on identity politics and away from economics, healthcare, and schooling.  Joe Biden has been asleep at the wheel on a variety of policies. 

The other day I mentioned that Kansas poll.  Well Kamala is flattening Trump in the heavily white/college Omaha Nebraska district.  And even whackier poll, from the incredibly well respected Ann Selzer, in Iowa.  Kamala LEADS by three points!!!  With huge leads on women and seniors.  Selzer has been remarkably accurate in Iowa general elections, she has never been off more than 5 points. 

https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story … 354033007/

Harrison Ford endorses a candidate for the first time, speaking about the legion of Republican Generals and former Trump officials who are now against him.

https://twitter.com/CalltoActivism/stat … 2942118267

The MSG thing is awful publicity for Trump, it just is.  Will it matter?  Well again, I think there is a small sliver of low-information, low-engagement voter who just sort of accumulates an opinion about an election.  That's if those people vote.  Everyone else is baked in by now.  I think the rally in general, is just another in the line of images imprinted on voters, who are not likely to support Trump to begin with. 

The continued vulnerability for Harris is Joe Biden.  His administration has spent billions upon billions of dollars on a variety of concerns, and the evidence remains very elusive that any of it has worked.  Trump has a much easier task, he's talking about cutting various income taxes (has no power to do so), but also that he'll deport millions of people, and there's a massive ad push to vilify trans people as basically the new "dirty migrant."  People receptive to those things are full on Trump, because it's simple, it's transactional.  Biden's chip program is a flop.  The green initiatives have gotten little to nowhere.  The "Inflation reduction act" has not seen significant real-world inflationary control.  Abortion, health care, free elections, support of allies against despots.  Those are transactional subjects that sell well with Harris-leaning voters. 

To me, the real question is going to be, how many low-information voters did Joe Biden lose from 2021-2023? They are not coming back, and that, I'm afraid, may be the inevitable difference.  When I was screaming for him to quit earlier this year, I said his replacement may not win, but whoever it was, at least had a good chance.  Harris has a good chance, if it doesn't happen, you can blame Joe Biden's blunders.

As I have said for awhile now, I don't live and die by polls.  The popular vote will be in the 2.0-3.5% range most likely, which nearly all quality polls are showing, pro-KH.  The battleground states are a different story, BUT there's just not much quality polling there.  Those polls are costly.  The media (who normally sponsor them) aren't spending the money anymore, because the margin of error makes the polls effectively useless.  The remaining polls are not "wrong," they are likely biased, both politically and methodology-related.  Some are just dog droppings, there's no way around that.  You have to look beyond the 48-46, at the actually data tabs.  Those tell a different story, both in terms of demographics, intent, enthusiasm, and focus of issues.  My BEST estimation is that Harris is slightly ahead on those, but behind where Biden finished up.

My gut tells me that one or the other candidate is going to receive a 1 or 2-point (maybe more) windfall from the leaners/undecideds in the end.  I think you're going to see that across all seven states.  That may result in a split in terms of who wins them, but I feel that, it's what almost always happens.  Trump is running for a THIRD time now, a phenomenon which I do not feel has been properly accounted for.  Why?  Because public opinion on the man really has not shifted that much since 2016.  Unless you are an immigration hawk, honestly, what is he really offering that's any different than the past?  He's alienated millions of voters, they're not coming back to him. 

Harris has more going for her (in the electoral ethos) than Trump does.  As I said, he will need record turnout, often among low-propensity voters, to pull it off.  Based on the underlying numbers.  I will NOT be surprised if he wins, potentially by sweeping all but Wisconsin, Michigan, and maybe Nevada.  Not one bit.  Another concept which Rosenberg mentions, are the lack of debates.  Particularly the final late October debate which Trump was scared away from.  That has normally acted as a point in which people get serious about who they're voting for, and whether they do it at all.  What affect that will have, no one knows.  Anyway, the POINT is you'd rather be Harris than Trump right now, because Kamala will be relying on legit GOTV efforts, and a voter pool which is far more likely to actually do the deed.  Trump is relying on a Musk-funded scammy GOTV, and a voter pool which is high propensity but only until a certain.  Trump will need record numbers from people who don't normally care enough to participate.  Again, what has he done to get them out?  IS Kamala that scary to these people?  I highly doubt it.

People are self-centered.  I will say this, indicting Trump was a massive mistake, easily the worst of anything.  It took him from potentially being discarded by the GOP, in favor of DeSantis, to being a political martyr.  The delays made it worse, because it's become a case where many low-info voters view Trump as being politically persecuted.  The Colorado ballot ruling, just as utterly stupid.  The Georgia and New York cases, regardless of merit, were never very compelling to the public.  The documents case is equally mundane.  The case to try was the Jan 6th case, that was the one.  Didn't happen.  Trump has been normalized, and ppl avoid or discount the sadistic crap he's babbling. 

Now there is another school of thought, which Bill Maher, for instance, blurted out several weeks ago.  He claims Trump will lose, people are sick of him.  James Carville and other veteran Dems point to the poor results of Trump and his party beginning in 2018.

Quinnipiac stinks, their polls are all over the map.  They have been a highly reliable polling group in the past, .  One pollster (forget which) was just caught "removing" samples from the entire city of Philadelphia.  They were found out when they put a PA poll out showing KH in the lead with RV (registered) yet trailing with LV (likely) which made no sense.  The LV results were missing the Philly %, so duh. 

Simon is correct, and unfortunately RCP (who have never made themselves out to be impartial) continue to over rely on R polling, and often leave out other D leaning polling which have similar shoddy metrics.  The polling continues to show that a verifiable % of Nikki Haley voters in the BG States (Granted many were simply naughy Dems) are supporting Harris instead.  I saw a number that was maybe 9%.  That's not a ton of people, but it's people nonetheless who Trump has chased off.  And they vote.  If you got off your butt to vote in a primary that was already decided, you are 99% sure of voting in the General.  I hasten to call these folks simply "White College" voters as they are not simply white, but the traditionally strong Republican contingent of them are shaping up to move further to Harris than perhaps even Biden got in 2020. 

Yes, Trump has made gains with union members, and with men of color.  That's a concern.  But I do feel like Harris may have picked up enough (or Trump lost) with other demos.  However, here's the problem with that strategy.  THEY DON'T VOTE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  If you look at the data, Harris is as I said, in better position with highly motivated voters.  Trump is solid with those who traditionally, are not.  The RFK Jr. crowd, the bro culture podcasters (Theo Von, Rogan, Barstool, etc, etc), the bitcoin morons, and worst of all, the tech billionaire crowd.  These are heavy on men, men who are 25-45 years old, often single, often non-college, etc.  They do not vote.  Yes, Trump will do well with this group, well enough to make it closer than 2020 perhaps, maybe even squeak out the win.  But the odds are not in his favor there.  As I said, it is an ecosystem that the rest of the country's demographics simply aren't a part of.  They are ANTI-ESTABLISHMENT, and by virtue, distrust the political process.  They continue to trade conspiracies on every subject, attack proven experts, and spend way too much time on FanDuel.  Trump has spent so much time attacking early and absentee voting, vote counting, certification, he's done immense harm to his own chances.  This is why the campaign's Plan B is to challenge the vote immediately, and cause chaos.

I cannot remember where I saw the article, but the Trump campaign has outsourced most of it's "ground game" to a number of third parties.  The most prominent one is funded by Elon Musk.  Their goal is to pay volunteers and whatnot in the battleground states to canvas very specifically.  This is not unique.  However, normally you would give canvassers a list of folks who are effectively "on your team."  The point is you know they are reliable votes, and you want to be 100% sure they physically vote.  These groups though are not really doing that much.  Instead, they are sifting through the edges, to attempt to pry Trump votes out of low participation voters.  Hence the push toward black and Hispanic men, and other groups who may be audible to the Trump platform, such as the Amish in PA.  They have done this in recent elections, including 2022, and were not particularly successful.   With how tight things are, it could be vital.

Trump doesn't have politics.  Just in the last month, he has invented new policies, backtracked, zig-zagged, everything under the sun.  He is currently aligned with an absolutely ridiculous program where Tucker Carlson, RFK Jr., Tulsi, and Vivek are marching through battleground states entertaining the sheep.  Those people have incredibly divergent stances on major issues.  Moreover, Trump is increasingly backed by Crypto morons, but his main backers in Super PAC's remain the tried and true corporations.  The GOP is lobbied massively by big Ag, big Pharma, big Oil, and big Insurance, as are the Democrats.  Yet you have MAGA now boasting how RFK Jr. is going to fire and hire a litany of federal watchdog agencies.  I poke the RFK crowd on Twitter all the time, because they are just delusional and lying to themselves.  Trump will drop that guy like an old rag if he wins. 

I beat you to the "I can sleep at night" GOP candidates being incredibly more palatable than Trump.

Anywho, another former pollster who I think really "gets" the numbers and the kinds of polls being dumped out there, is Adam Carlson (@admcrlsn).  He posts a LOT, but his analysis is pretty honest.  He gets into the weeds on the crosstabs, and also points out the massive dumping of online-driven polling.  He seems to be focusing on how the polling demographics are very, very, very similar to 2020's results.  Moreover, he says what I've been saying, that the MAGA insistence on comparing same-time polls with 2020 or 2016 is pointless, as the electorate shifts and the polling methodology surely has changed big time.  They do not reveal theirs so speculating is also fruitless.  My take on his analysis remains that Trump ***could*** be slightly stronger with Black and Hispanic men, and definitely with conservatives.  That likely results in slight advantages in AZ, GA, NV, and NC for him, as well as PA.  However, as always, it's a question of who votes?  Adam even lampooned polling some because human psychology gets involved, and many people apparently forget who they voted for, and also lie about whether they voted, and would they this time.

The Sienna/NYT polls have been all over the place.  The worst one I've seen though is ActiVote, who just put out a poll of 400LV which took them a MONTH to sample.  I mean, on the one they still were doing Biden vs. Trump!  It's a total joke.  Simon makes mention of this, but no matter the poll, you NEED to pay attention to the crosstabs.  What is the sample made up of?  Gender, party affiliation, how do they feel on certain issues, etc.  However, about a month from now, I would look at where Real Clear Politics has it's averages, and check sites like 538. 

Are there really any undecided's left?  I mean, come on now.  I'm very intrigued whether the dumpster fire Robinson down in North Carolina will harm Trump?  Might happen.  The polls are snapshots.  The betting markets are often a better check these days, because they are measuring intent.  It's going to be all about the turnout.

PS: Nebraska will NOT be altering their electoral vote procedure, so the likely victory in 2nd district for Harris will net her 1 vote.  That's huge obviously in attempting to get to 270.

Nate Silver just rehashed what everyone already knows, and what I've said for a year now.  The GOP continues to lose with Trump.  Haley or Desantis would be up and cruising at this point. 

I saw Trump's comments in Michigan, they were worse they you realize.  Firstly, the drilling answer is ridiculous, and every time he goes there, it makes him look dumber on the subject.  Secondly, he specifically said he would put tariffs on imported food!!!!  This is easily this stupidest and worst tariff idea yet!  I mean, how much coffee, bananas, avocados, coconuts, etc., are grown in the United States?  Some but most of that comes from central or south America.  Meaning your Starbucks would cost $30 a cup!!!  IDIOT!!!!  Again, anti-Trump PAC's should seize on these statements and lampoon him to no end.  He also told Michigan autoworkers that the state's move towards EV's was a waste of time and money.  He said "why should you compete with the Chinese who will do it better and cheaper."  WTF.  So if the US auto industry refuses to evolve, then what?  Again, complete IDIOT!

Inflation went down a bunch recently, and the FED's 0.5% point slash today will help stimulate the economy and bring inflation down, albeit not immediately.  Trump has basically spitballed his entire platform, to the point that his surrogates cannot even keep up with the daily brain droppings. 

Dave Wasserman, from New Jersey, is a good read.  He actually works with data, unlike Silver who's goal these days are to handicap elections for gamblers.  Dave has helped publish the Cook Political "Swingometer."  It's a genius tool, because you can see how turnout by demographics impacts the results.  In fact, Dave mentioned that in say, Wisconsin, if Kamala retains the 2020 Black voter edge, she wins, but Trump could flip the state if that moves in his direction by just a few points.  Likewise, demographic shifts in North Carolina have positioned the state to where if VP Harris retains the 2020 White voter numbers Biden had, she would flip the state.  Give it a try!

https://www.cookpolitical.com/swingometer

Well, another loon, with a gun, attempted to shoot Trump down.  This time it was at his local golf course, before USSS intervened.  This man has a history of run in's with the law, and neighbors described him essentially as a complete nutjob, and probably a dangerous one.  This followed a bizarre tweet by Trump "I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT," earlier in the day.