Five Reasons Pundits Underestimated Joe Biden

[George II]

Five Reasons Pundits Underestimated Joe Biden

The people who chatter online didn’t see his popularity coming.

8:28 AM ET

Conor Friedersdorf Staff writer at The Atlantic

Joe Biden is much more popular among voters than the left’s intelligentsia anticipated, with staggering leads in every poll of Democratic presidential candidates. Why did so many journalists and Twitter pundits fail to foresee his success?

One reason, Jonathan Chait argues, is that the social democrats who support Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and the conservatives who find them useful villains, shared an incentive to overstate the influence of leftists among Democrats and to understate the relative strength of moderates.

Writing on the same question, Michelle Goldberg declared, “Left-wing Twitter isn’t a microcosm of the Democratic Party. It’s just a small, noisy fraction of it.”

During a discussion I joined on Left, Right & Center, the Daily Beast columnist Keli Goff suggested another possibility. She shared that her African American family members are more enthusiastic about Biden’s candidacy than she would have guessed.

She theorized that their support wasn’t issue-based.

(much more....)

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/05/pundits-underestimated-joe-biden/589402/

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Excellent analysis of Joe Biden's popularity. My favorite lines in the entire article are:

“Left-wing Twitter isn’t a microcosm of the Democratic Party. It’s just a small, noisy fraction of it.”

Applies to more than just Twitter.

[NurseJackie]

1. This nails it for me.

Writing on the same question, Michelle Goldberg declared, “Left-wing Twitter isn’t a microcosm of the Democratic Party. It’s just a small, noisy fraction of it.”

This nails it for me.

One reason, Jonathan Chait argues, is that the social democrats who support Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and the conservatives who find them useful villains, shared an incentive to overstate the influence of leftists among Democrats and to understate the relative strength of moderates.

And this is a strong observation that I also agree with.

[Skya Rhen]

2. Point #3 is spot on. As a POC the crime bill (e.g.) does not animate me or most other POC I know

as much as some of the vocal left on social media.

In fact, I am not at all animated by it. One acknowledges the good and bad aspects of history and then one moves on, looking ahead to tomorrow.

The constant outrage tends to be a bit much, sometimes. But to each his own...

[George II]

8. The thing about the crime bill is that it applies primarily to Federal crimes....

....not state or local crimes. But many either choose to ignore that or aren't aware of it.

It provided aid to states and localities to fight crime, but I don't think it drastically contributed to overall incarceration in the US.

At the time it went into effect, there were 95,000 Federal prisoners. In 2004 there were 179,000 Federal prisoners. That's and increase of almost 100%, but overall its a very small percentage of all those imprisoned. What people forget is that there was a sunset provision in the law, it expired in 2004 (not sure if there were some aspects that were renewed, however)

Here's is a summary of the number of prisoners in the US from 2000 through 2013 (couldn't find one going back to 1994). Overall incarceration actually began dropping year to year around 2005.



Federal inmate statistics:

https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/population_statistics.jsp#old_pops

[stonecutter357]

3. K&R

[LibFarmer]

4. Democrats are generally calm and moderate people

and they take life in stride without anger, frothing at the mouth with steam coming out of their ears.

They want power like everyone else but not at the expense of tearing everything down to achieve it.

The churned up anger and waving of pitchforks is a very small, tiny albeit very loud and vocal minority. Because of the chase for ratings in the media business, they get a lot more exposure than they deserve.

The article in the Atlantic is spot on!

[NurseJackie]

5. Ain't THAT the truth!

Because of the chase for ratings in the media business, they get a lot more exposure than they deserve.

Ain't THAT the truth!

[NYMinute]

7. This is how Trump got more media coverage

Hillary gave a phenomenal foreign policy speech which was scholarly but was not watched by many while people gathered around the TV to watch Trump's rantings and ravings.

It is really sad when news and politics are driven by the inherent entertainment value rather than substance.

[NYMinute]

6. Angry campaigns are a turn off

[Kahuna7]

9. Joe has been leading all but one or two national polls all year..and

a lot of late 2018. They underestimated "establishment" Democrats.. People are actually using establishment as a slur???

Change "establishment" to "loyal." That's what we are. We're loyal and proud of the Democratic party. Anybody who thinks they can insult me by calling me an establishment Democrat or a centrist, insult away. I don't care.

[Demsrule86]

14. I am with you.. we are boots on the ground every election and always vote

for the Democrati!!

[Hortensis]

10. Well, many certainly ignored the messages of the midterms,

Last edited Thu May 16, 2019, 05:40 PM - Edit history (1)

and before them a whole string of special elections. No excuses. Wishful thinking that their own ideology was right all along or that their prognostications were right all along, and for too many a a desire to remain in the safety of the pack, do not equate to expert "insights" to pass on to millions.

Imo, like politicians, political analysts who've made it to elite levels like their jobs way too much to do them really well. Straying too far outside approved group-think is dangerous. Including the authors of this interesting article, I'm afraid. Any genuinely new thought must always be balanced by one foot keeping weight solidly within the group.

For all the horse-race noise about shifts in the party, the liberal-dominated Democratic Party has always stayed within an ideological range acceptable to almost all of us. Passionate railings of some aside, there simply is no major difference between believing government should help make college available to most to produce a well-functioning, overall prosperous and happy, self-realized populace and calling for it to be totally free for the same reasons. Both are within our liberal range, and a majority of liberals will always have shifted with the eras depending on the current means, need and national mood. (Not just party mood. Liberals are overall agreeable and tend to understand and accept at gut level that democracy must work for majorities, not just them. That's because democracy is a product of liberalism.)

Those who try to interpret different positions on this spectrum as "conflicts," "evidence of identity crisis," schism," "dramatic shift," etc, etc, are badly misunderstanding the vast liberal-dominated Democratic mainstream. Of course. Claiming daily crises and clashes sells articles. Every day.

The fact is that Biden could become president and move toward Elizabeth Warren's positions and not lose any significant support from those who voted for him. They're both within the range of mainstream ideology.

Similarly, that's one of the reasons Bernie Sanders did not and will not become our nominee. His socialist ideology, not adequately hidden, is outside the broad liberal range of the Democratic Party. Social Security is NOT socialist, just government regulated. Liberals, experienced in how well their liberal grandparents' New Deal programs and regulated capitalism have worked, don't find need or appeal in a dangerously unpredictable "revolution" and government seizure of private "means of production." We like the socialist VA, which arose from military socialism, and would cautiously support a couple more very limited forays into similarly limited socialized institutions, but that's all. Freedom requires a certain degree of looseness to work, and socialism, democratic version or otherwise, doesn't allow enough.

These aren't imaginings out of a crystal ball. It's obvious to any clear-eyed liberal who's lived and/or studied American liberalism, currently manifested politically through the Democratic Party, during their lives or over the full course of our nation's history. We understand ourselves.

[Demsrule86]

15. Here here ...great post....very elegant

[Kahuna7]

16. You said a mouth full..

<<Similarly, that's one of the reasons Bernie Sanders did not and will not become our nominee. His socialist ideology, not adequately hidden, is outside the broad liberal range of the Democratic Party.>>

It's not that the "centrist" wing is opposed to moving left...But you have to be stealth about it the way Obama was. That's it in a nutshell.

Now Bernie is trying to redefine his self imposed "socialist" label...while at the same time attaching himself to the hip of AOC is a proud socialist still talking about a "revolution." Good luck with that.

[Nitram]

21. Frankly, I don't find Bernie Sanders to be farther left than the Democratic Party. Instead, I find

him to be a bit egotistic with his I'm more liberal than you pitch, when he really does not have a very new agenda at all. The difference with Bernie is that he wants it ALL right now, without a thought to how to get the majority that can bring about real change. Talk of a "revolution" and a "movement" doesn't win elections, and it doesn't build the coalitions that a democratic system needs too pass long-lasting legislation. If Obama had had a solid Democratic majority in the House he would have kicked ass!

[sheshe2]

11. Hell yes!

[Cha]

12. Thank You, George!

[Nitram]

13. I've always found the self-identified "left wing" of the party a bit too "holier than thou."

They sometimes get so caught up in splitting hairs of political ideology as they try to prove they are the most "woke" that they miss the bigger picture. We all have the same basic liberal agenda, but the left wing tends to think we can win elections with ideological purity, which means we end up going it alone without including many of the Democratic Party's staunchest allies.

[Kahuna7]

17. This...

[Hortensis]

18. Umhm! :) An uber-righteousness doesn't allow them to

compromise to reach accommodation with people whose views are just somewhat different. Such as agreeing on a middle ground between totally free and some form of affordable, taxpayer-funded college. Only complete agreement is acceptable, which is why when they've formed their own parties those have always failed.

In that political scientists say they're very like their counterparts among the Republican Party's "tea-party" types, members of whom became the Freedom Caucus faction (for whom obstruction has become its reason for continued existence). Both would often rather lose everything than compromise, and almost always do, and then complain bitterly about the larger group's corruption.

Although the dissident left's goals overlap with the liberal mainstream, sometimes almost totally (their differences often adopted mostly to give them a separate identity), they're effectively il-liberal in their inability to work successfully within our liberal democracy. And in a usually defining antipathy to any larger group that doesn't recognize their leader's wisdom and fall in with them. Which really is always, of course.

Fortunately for mankind, they are never many, a small faction when some join the Democratic Party, but their passionate convictions often rope others in, for a while anyway. And of course they provide lots of material for pundits needing to meet deadlines with clickable material. Although they can't win national elections, they can lose them.

[R B Garr]

19. K&R. Love it!

[Scurrilous]

20. ...

[ucrdem]

22. The universe will be relieved to learn it doesn't revolve around AOC.