Texas is in play

[Buffacuse]

Biden up 3 pts in latest poll. This is starting to look like 1980, where millions of voters went Republican for the first time in their lives...a generational shift due in large part to the perception the incumbent is a failed president. Joe Biden is no Ronald Reagan...but Covid is every bit the national humiliation that the Iran hostage crisis was--with the added angle that unlike 1980, this year's election crisis has killed a couple of hundred thousand people.

If Texas, Florida, Ohio and North Carolina go blue, my electoral map has Biden at 406...hopefully, enough to tamp down any notion of a stolen election.

[Spock]

Biden up 3 pts in latest poll. This is starting to look like 1980, where millions of voters went Republican for the first time in their lives...a generational shift due in large part to the perception the incumbent is a failed president. Joe Biden is no Ronald Reagan...but Covid is every bit the national humiliation that the Iran hostage crisis was--with the added angle that unlike 1980, this year's election crisis has killed a couple of hundred thousand people.

If Texas, Florida, Ohio and North Carolina go blue, my electoral map has Biden at 406...hopefully, enough to tamp down any notion of a stolen election.

IDK, if 1980 was as much of a generational shift as you say. The 1972 Nixon landslide votes had to come from somewhere. That was possibly the generational shift-"Silent Majority" and all that. With Carter's 1976 win as an aberration due to Watergate and 1980 reverting back to the shift evident in 1972.

[silverscreenselect]

The 1972 Nixon landslide votes had to come from somewhere.

The votes for Nixon were largely a rejection of George McGovern as a "peace" candidate. They didn't translate into massive down-ticket wins. The Democrats gained two Senate seats. The Republicans did gain 12 House seats, but the Democrats held a 75-seat majority going into the election, so they wound up with 242 afterward (still a bigger majority than the Democrats have had the last two years). In addition, Harry Byrd formally left the Democratic party but still caucused with them as an "Independent Democrat," much like Bernie Sanders and Angus King, so the Democrats effectively held 243 seats. The total Congressional vote for Democrats in the 1972 election was 52-47%.

By contrast, when Reagan was elected, the Republicans gained 12 Senate seats and 35 House seats. There is no way that the Democrats match that turnaround this year, especially since they already control the House, but a pickup of another dozen seats or so in the House and 6 or 7 Senate seats is possible. A good rule of thumb in elections is that close elections generally tend to break the same way, so a win for, say, Jamie Harrison, could portend wins in states like KS, MT, and AK. Plus, one or both of the Georgia Senate seats won't be decided until January, and a good election night may give the Democrats momentum there (typically, Democrats don't fare well in Georgia runoff elections, but interest will be sky high for this one.

[Buffacuse]

I call it generational for a couple of reasons...three days before the election, Democratic pollster Patrick Cadell called Carter in a panic and told him that he was going to be blown out. Believe his exact words (as reported by Hamilton Jordan in his bio) were "Millions of Americans are going to wake up Tuesday and vote Republican for the first time in their lives." Indeed, this is exactly what happened.

Also, the shift in the south was profound and sweeping--the traditional pro-segregationist but Democratic south was transformed to a GOP stronghold...the only outlier being Carter's Georgia stayed loyal in 1980 but joined the red tide in 1984.

I was laughed out of my poly sci class at Syracuse when I said I thought Reagan was going to win--the kids from NYC who dominated the campus could not conceive it would happen. I had no magic methodology, just a belief that Americans were tired of being humiliated in Iran and would go with the candidate who promised strength.

[Spock]

The 1972 Nixon landslide votes had to come from somewhere.

The votes for Nixon were largely a rejection of George McGovern as a "peace" candidate. They didn't translate into massive down-ticket wins. The Democrats gained two Senate seats. The Republicans did gain 12 House seats, but the Democrats held a 75-seat majority going into the election, so they wound up with 242 afterward (still a bigger majority than the Democrats have had the last two years).

One thing about the House in 1972 is that you still had a lot of conservative "Yellow-Dog" Democrats in rural or semi-rural districts, across the country (Not only in the south). Tom Foley in eastern Washington comes to mind.

It took until 1994 for those to be largely swept away. I am in Collin Peterson's district (MN 7) who may be the only one of that type left and IIRC, his narrowly won in 1994 and has won handily since.

There is a huge ideological difference between the Democrat House majorities in the 1970's and 1980's VS that of today with today's being much farther to the left.

[Spock]

I don't do polls so I will add nothing to the OP-except to say that Texas is largely a suburban state now and affluent, suburban women supposedly don't like Trump's tweets. That is a battle that I accept that my side has lost, but a thought struck me one day when I was reading an article in a conservation magazine that mentioned one of Trump's tweets and it was simply good policy stuff that I think most everybody would have agreed with.

The thought struck me that those who supposedly "Hate" Trump's tweets the most have never read them, they just have heard about a few of those that are over the top. They don't know about the plain-jane "Fireside Chat" type tweets. Hell, I don't read them either.

[silverscreenselect]

There is a huge ideological difference between the Democrat House majorities in the 1970's and 1980's VS that of today with today's being much farther to the left.

And there is a huge difference between the Republican Congressional delegations of those eras and today, with the Republicans being much farther to the right today.

Reagan's "revolution" lasted three Presidential elections. Since 1992, Democrats have received a majority of the two-party popular vote in six out of seven presidential elections. Due to gerrymandering and the built-in bias in the Electoral college towards small rural states that tend to vote Republican, that hasn't always translated into Congressional majorities.

[Spock]

Biden up 3 pts in latest poll. This is starting to look like 1980, where millions of voters went Republican for the first time in their lives...a generational shift due in large part to the perception the incumbent is a failed president. Joe Biden is no Ronald Reagan...but Covid is every bit the national humiliation that the Iran hostage crisis was--with the added angle that unlike 1980, this year's election crisis has killed a couple of hundred thousand people.

If Texas, Florida, Ohio and North Carolina go blue, my electoral map has Biden at 406...hopefully, enough to tamp down any notion of a stolen election.

We shall see what we shall see, but I am trying to decide if the original post is from 2016 or 2020. IIRC, a week out from 2016, you guys were drawing some pretty overwhelming Hillary electoral vote maps. I have noticed that with the benefit of hindsight you guys pretend that your overwhelming confidence in a Hillary victory didn't exist and you explain it away as if you were not surprised at all.

As I said, we shall see what we shall see. But one can certainly see strong parallels in your overwhelming confidence in a Biden victory and your past overwhelming confidence in a Hillary win.

[Bob78164]

Biden up 3 pts in latest poll. This is starting to look like 1980, where millions of voters went Republican for the first time in their lives...a generational shift due in large part to the perception the incumbent is a failed president. Joe Biden is no Ronald Reagan...but Covid is every bit the national humiliation that the Iran hostage crisis was--with the added angle that unlike 1980, this year's election crisis has killed a couple of hundred thousand people.

If Texas, Florida, Ohio and North Carolina go blue, my electoral map has Biden at 406...hopefully, enough to tamp down any notion of a stolen election.

In Nate I trust. For now, Nate has all four of those states too close to call. This isn't remotely close to over.

There's not much I can do here to affect matters in California, so I've signed up to be a poll observer and I'll be driving to Arizona for Election Day. --Bob

[Buffacuse]

We shall see what we shall see, but I am trying to decide if the original post is from 2016 or 2020. IIRC, a week out from 2016, you guys were drawing some pretty overwhelming Hillary electoral vote maps. I have noticed that with the benefit of hindsight you guys pretend that your overwhelming confidence in a Hillary victory didn't exist and you explain it away as if you were not surprised at all.

As I said, we shall see what we shall see. But one can certainly see strong parallels in your overwhelming confidence in a Biden victory and your past overwhelming confidence in a Hillary win.
[/quote]

You know, here we were, having what I thought was a rare but welcome civil political discussion, and you had to lace it with chiding references and utterly invalid assumptions. For the record, I did not have any preconceived notions about 2016 and frankly always believed Trump had a chance. The difference between then and now is Trump is the incumbent and we have his record as the basis for our analysis. We have over 200,000 dead from Covid on his watch. We have payoffs to porn stars. We have tear gas used on peaceful protesters so Trump could have a photo op. We have a national and international sense of disgust and shame that this man is our President.

We are not analytic hypocrites--surprise at 2016 result has nothing to do with assessing the realty of 2020. If Trump loses big it will be because he has been the worst President in American history--and our analysis is America is going to hold him accountable for same.

[Spock]

>>>"We have over 200,000 dead from Covid on his watch."<<<

I get that you are a big Covid guy-but I wish you would take a good look at the demographic profile of the 200,000 dead when you consider the whole lockdown thing. Protect the elderly, but note that CDC numbers indicate (for example) we have 383 dead from age 15-24-most likely many of those have several co-mobidities-cancer, obesity etc

Resources are not infinite-concentrating the fear and restrictions on the high school and college kids with a handful of dead when we should be concentrating on the elderly in this is a total waste of resources.

Look where the deaths are.

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covi ... /index.htm

55,000 from age 75-84 -(many likely above age 80)

and 63,000 above 85.
..............................................
The unnecessary (in my view) Covid restrictions on college campuses are just killing social lives on Campus (especially for non-drinkers)-Nobody does anything. But college TPTB are gonna CYA for however long. Regardless of how bad such restrictions are for mental health.

With so many classes online-you don't even get to meet fellow students in the same classes.

[silverscreenselect]

Resources are not infinite-concentrating the fear and restrictions on the high school and college kids with a handful of dead when we should be concentrating on the elderly in this is a total waste of resources.

Guess what. Students don't spend all their time associating with each other. They spread the disease to parents and grandparents and teachers and the people who work in the bars and stores and restaurants they frequent.

And because they are often asymptomatic, the disease spreads from one group to another quite quickly. The problem with classrooms is that many of them have extremely poor ventilation and students in close proximity to each other for 6-8 hours a day can spread the virus very quickly.

You never seem to refer to any scientific or medical basis for your opinions about the disease, just the down on the farm wisdom of the Sons of the Pioneers. That's how we wind up with one outbreak after another, just as all the medical experts predicted.

[Spock]

Resources are not infinite-concentrating the fear and restrictions on the high school and college kids with a handful of dead when we should be concentrating on the elderly in this is a total waste of resources.

You never seem to refer to any scientific or medical basis for your opinions about the disease, just the down on the farm wisdom of the Sons of the Pioneers. That's how we wind up with one outbreak after another, just as all the medical experts predicted.

I guess CDC demographic profiles of the dead don't count as a scientific or medical basis-Oh, well-whatever.

Yes, by all means-let's continue with a broad-based shotgun approach where we treat all ages and health statuses as equally likely to die of the disease and, most importantly, let's treat Covid as the only health issue out there and completely ignore the lockdowns and restrictions effects on physical and mental health.

Interesting that you went with the "Sons of the Pioneers" gibe instead of calling me a racist. I guess even you couldn't quite shoehorn racism into my citing of CDC stats.Although I don't see what a country singing group has to do with my citing CDC demographic profiles of the Covid deaths.

"Down on the Farm Wisdom"-Hmm, that's a new one. I have to give you credit for originality on that one. Don't wear it out though

[Bob Juch]

Biden up 3 pts in latest poll. This is starting to look like 1980, where millions of voters went Republican for the first time in their lives...a generational shift due in large part to the perception the incumbent is a failed president. Joe Biden is no Ronald Reagan...but Covid is every bit the national humiliation that the Iran hostage crisis was--with the added angle that unlike 1980, this year's election crisis has killed a couple of hundred thousand people.

If Texas, Florida, Ohio and North Carolina go blue, my electoral map has Biden at 406...hopefully, enough to tamp down any notion of a stolen election.

In Nate I trust. For now, Nate has all four of those states too close to call. This isn't remotely close to over.

There's not much I can do here to affect matters in California, so I've signed up to be a poll observer and I'll be driving to Arizona for Election Day. --Bob

Let me know if you get to Tucson and I'll buy you a beer to celebrate.

[Spock]

Resources are not infinite-concentrating the fear and restrictions on the high school and college kids with a handful of dead when we should be concentrating on the elderly in this is a total waste of resources.

You never seem to refer to any scientific or medical basis for your opinions about the disease, just the down on the farm wisdom of the Sons of the Pioneers. That's how we wind up with one outbreak after another, just as all the medical experts predicted.

I guess CDC demographic profiles of the dead don't count as a scientific or medical basis-Oh, well-whatever.

Yes, by all means-let's continue with a broad-based shotgun approach where we treat all ages and health statuses as equally likely to die of the disease and, most importantly, let's treat Covid as the only health issue out there and completely ignore the lockdowns and restrictions effects on physical and mental health.

Interesting that you went with the "Sons of the Pioneers" gibe instead of calling me a racist. I guess even you couldn't quite shoehorn racism into my citing of CDC stats.Although I don't see what a country singing group has to do with my citing CDC demographic profiles of the Covid deaths.

"Down on the Farm Wisdom"-Hmm, that's a new one. I have to give you credit for originality on that one. Don't wear it out though

Speaking of referring to sources-I don't think that you have historically done much of that here-I would have to say that your posts are more broad-brushed assertions. It is not for nothing that I have noted in the past that you lack granularity in your assertions. Broad brushed assertions and very little specificity are more your thing.

[Bob78164]

Biden up 3 pts in latest poll. This is starting to look like 1980, where millions of voters went Republican for the first time in their lives...a generational shift due in large part to the perception the incumbent is a failed president. Joe Biden is no Ronald Reagan...but Covid is every bit the national humiliation that the Iran hostage crisis was--with the added angle that unlike 1980, this year's election crisis has killed a couple of hundred thousand people.

If Texas, Florida, Ohio and North Carolina go blue, my electoral map has Biden at 406...hopefully, enough to tamp down any notion of a stolen election.

In Nate I trust. For now, Nate has all four of those states too close to call. This isn't remotely close to over.

There's not much I can do here to affect matters in California, so I've signed up to be a poll observer and I'll be driving to Arizona for Election Day. --Bob

Let me know if you get to Tucson and I'll buy you a beer to celebrate.

I will in fact be in Tucson but (a) I don't drink, and (b) Election Day will be a very long day for me. And I refuse to count chickens before they're hatched.

Maybe Monday afternoon? I'm driving in Sunday evening. --Bob

[Bob Juch]

In Nate I trust. For now, Nate has all four of those states too close to call. This isn't remotely close to over.

There's not much I can do here to affect matters in California, so I've signed up to be a poll observer and I'll be driving to Arizona for Election Day. --Bob

Let me know if you get to Tucson and I'll buy you a beer to celebrate.

I will in fact be in Tucson but (a) I don't drink, and (b) Election Day will be a very long day for me. And I refuse to count chickens before they're hatched.

Maybe Monday afternoon? I'm driving in Sunday evening. --Bob

Sounds good to me! I'm sure we can find something non-alcoholic.

Sunday will be a long day for you too; I've done that drive. I hope Tuesday will be a long day for me, watching the returns come in.

Back in the 80s, I used to have to sit around the State data center in Sacramento on Election Day just in case something went wrong with the computer used to tabulate the ballots.

[silverscreenselect]

I guess CDC demographic profiles of the dead don't count as a scientific or medical basis-Oh, well-whatever.

Yes, by all means-let's continue with a broad-based shotgun approach where we treat all ages and health statuses as equally likely to die of the disease and, most importantly, let's treat Covid as the only health issue out there and completely ignore the lockdowns and restrictions effects on physical and mental health.

Your death statistics come from the CDC. But your analysis of them isn't based on any scientific or medical theory. Just yours and Donald Trump's. I prefer to follow the advice of all the epidemiologists worldwide. They've been right; Trump has been wrong, every time.

You also don't make any attempt to quantify the "lockdowns and restrictions effects on physical and mental health" or compare that to the cost of the disease itself. But then again, it's not as snappy as Trump saying we can't let the cure be worse than the disease.

And you continue to ignore treat everyone who doesn't actually die from the disease as insignificant. Tell that to Krox's daughter. She may have to deal with the effects of the coronavirus for the rest of her life.

[Buffacuse]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/27/politics ... index.html

Lays out why this is happening and the potential impact on the electoral map into the future. Basically, if you're a Texan, it's those dang foreigners coming here from New York and Texas, settling in the big cities, starting to overwhelm the massive advantage the GOP has in rural Texas. It may not actually happen in 2020, but if it does, unless the GOP can figure out a way to put either New York or California back in play, it will be highly difficult for the GOP to win future national elections.

[Buffacuse]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/27/politics ... index.html

Lays out why this is happening and the potential impact on the electoral map into the future. Basically, if you're a Texan, it's those dang foreigners coming here from New York and Texas, settling in the big cities, starting to overwhelm the massive advantage the GOP has in rural Texas. It may not actually happen in 2020, but if it does, unless the GOP can figure out a way to put either New York or California back in play, it will be highly difficult for the GOP to win future national elections.

Meant to say coming here from New York and California. In any event, the article is spot on...Biden signs all over Austin, Trump signs on the road to Comfort and Dripping Springs.

[Spock]

SSS>>>"You also don't make any attempt to quantify the "lockdowns and restrictions effects on physical and mental health" <<<<<<<<<

Really, I have to quantify that there are negative physical and mental health effects to isolating people and basically locking them indoors. We live in a world now where 3 year-olds are scared to play with friends at pre-school. You don't think those social effects will follow through their whole lives?

But, like I said earlier-Apparently, Covid is the only health issue out there and all you Karens (male and female) would have it no other way than to live in fear of a virus with a 99.9 something survival rate and, Krox's daughter aside, has no long-term effects on the vast majority of those who get it.

I heard my favorite "Covid is gonna kill us all" story a couple of weeks ago. It was reported that we have the first known case of someone dying from Covid who had had it previously. Turned out she was an 89 year-old woman undergoing cancer treatment. OK, it sucks that she died-but, do you think her immune system might be a little more compromised than that of the average bear.

I have a cousin-in-law whose expertise is Veterinary Epidemiology. Animals in his case, but principals are the same as humans and he has specific knowledge in the field. Let's just say, he is not a fan of lockdowns and restrictions. In his expert opinion, they won't work.

[Spock]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/27/politics ... index.html

Lays out why this is happening and the potential impact on the electoral map into the future. Basically, if you're a Texan, it's those dang foreigners coming here from New York and Texas, settling in the big cities, starting to overwhelm the massive advantage the GOP has in rural Texas. It may not actually happen in 2020, but if it does, unless the GOP can figure out a way to put either New York or California back in play, it will be highly difficult for the GOP to win future national elections.

Meant to say coming here from New York and California. In any event, the article is spot on...Biden signs all over Austin, Trump signs on the road to Comfort and Dripping Springs.

It is funny that New York/California people flee the places that their voting habits created and then bring those voting habits with them to a place as far removed politically from their previous place as possible and vote to turn Texas into California/New York-I wonder where they will flee to once they are successful in "Turning Texas Blue."

[silverscreenselect]

Really, I have to quantify that there are negative physical and mental health effects to isolating people and basically locking them indoors.

Yes, you do, when you try to compare the harm or effectiveness of one course of treatment against another.

And we're not at a stage now where we are locking people indoors in most places. We are trying to prevent superspreader events like Donald Trump rallies. And of course you don't know that the coronavirus has no long-term effects since the "longest" term we can measure now is less than one year. Going by that standard, cigarette smoking has no long-term effects on the vast majority of smokers.

I wonder how you would feel if one of your loved ones wound up in the hospital gasping for every single breath. Would you just say, well the odds were ever in their favor and besides, it was worth it so I could go to the Kwikkie Mart without a mask.

If lockdowns and restrictions don't work (along with all the other preventative measures that are recommended), then why have countries like Japan, South Korea, and Australia pretty much stopped the disease? (The former two have a much higher population density than the United States.) And when there are outbreaks in these other countries, they are quick to reinstitute various lockdowns and similar measures.

[silverscreenselect]

It is funny that New York/California people flee the places that their voting habits created and then bring those voting habits with them to a place as far removed politically from their previous place as possible

Everything west of the original 13 states would still be wilderness if people hadn't "fled" the places that their voting habits created and moved to less populous areas.

[silverscreenselect]

It was reported that we have the first known case of someone dying from Covid who had had it previously. Turned out she was an 89 year-old woman undergoing cancer treatment. OK, it sucks that she died-but, do you think her immune system might be a little more compromised than that of the average bear.

UK study finds evidence of waning antibody immunity to COVID-19 over time

Their study found that antibody prevalence fell by a quarter, from 6% of the population around the end of June to just 4.4% in September. That raises the prospect of decreasing population immunity ahead of a second wave of infections in recent weeks that has forced local lockdowns and restrictions.

Those for whom COVID-19 was confirmed with a gold standard PCR test had a less pronounced decline in antibodies, compared to people who had been asymptomatic and unaware of their original infection. There was no change in the levels of antibodies seen in healthcare workers, possibly due to repeated exposure to the virus. The study backs up findings from similar surveys in Germany which found the vast majority of people didn’t have COVID-19 antibodies, even in hotspots for the disease, and that antibodies might fade in those who do.

World Health Organisation spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said that uncertainty over how long immunity would last and the fact most people had never had antibodies against the coronavirus in the first place showed the need to break transmission chains. “Acquiring this collective immunity just by letting virus run through the population is not really an option,” he told a U.N. briefing in Geneva

But what do those scientists know in comparison to you and your country vet buddy who heard about an 89-year-old woman.