Boston Globe assesses current polling

▪ Ghosts of 2016: Pollsters still feel a visceral dismay over state-level polling misses in 2016, which overestimated Hillary Clinton’s performance in key states. Overcompensating for that mistake could lead pollsters to design samples and weighting schemes in a way that overestimate Republican support this time. For example, some pollsters are asking voters how they voted in 2020 and then weighting based on that. But The New York Times pollster Nate Cohn noted that polls that weighted by past vote have tended to be more favorable to Trump. Pollsters accounting for partisanship in other ways such as weighting the data to partisanship targets could also lean too far to the right.


https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/10/25/opinion/election-presidential-polls/

Editorial Cartoon in Today's Manila Times

I have a subscription to the Manila Times, as I live most of the year in the Philippines. I also have a subscription to the NY Times and the Boston Globe, as I'm still an American citizen.

I thought my fellow DUers would like to get a look at today's Manila Times editorial cartoon to see what some in the foreign press think of one of the candidates for President of the United States.

https://www.manilatimes.net/2024/10/25/opinion/editorial-cartoon/donald-mcdonald/1990983

Harris Up By 3 Points In TIPP Daily Tracking Poll

I know this poll leans toward Trump. And there are aspects that make me skeptical, such as one- and two-point movement per day.

Having said all that, the trend line in this poll has moved 5 points toward Harris in 4 days.

I point this out to demonstrate that all the polls are not discouraging and that this election is on a knife's edge.

https://tippinsights.com/tipp-tracking-poll-day-11-harris-extends-slim-lead-to-3-points-in-heated-race/

Can I tell you a story?

It was 1973 or 1974. It was at a little party at the home of a close friend of mine outside of Boston. Maybe 6 or 8 people. His girlfriend's mother was there. I was 21 years old at the time. The woman was about 50 years old or so. She was German with a pretty noticeable accent. At the time, I was in college and one of my studies was History and we were into WWII Germany. I remember I was reading the "Rise and Fall of the Third Riech" (which was about 1,500 pages).

Anyway, I started up a conversation with my friend's future mother-in-law and we started talking about her days as a youth in Nazi Germany. the conversation lasted about 3 or 4 hours. I was mesmerized. As a 12-year-old, she actually heard Hitler speak in person. He had visited her rural area by plane on one of his campaign stops back in 1932. "How was it that the Germans could elect such a man?" Her answer was quite astounding. The Germans had just lost WWI and were humiliated by the surrender agreement at Versailles. There were many WWI veterans in Germany, including her father and uncles. The depression was crippling. There was barely enough to eat. and here was this man, telling all of them exactly what they wanted to hear. "It's not your fault". "You were stabbed in the back by international jews."

The woman, whose last name was Schmidt, said that everyone in her family was a Nazi. That SS troopers were the equivalent of sports stars of that day's American sport. She and her family would listen to Hitler on the radio during the 30's and marveled at the improvement in the economy. Then the war and the aftermath. She claimed not to be aware of the concentration camps and Holocaust until after the war. I didn't really believe her about that part. She married an American soldier during the American occupation of Germany after the war. Her daughter, who later became my friend's wife, told me her mother hardly ever talked about those years. I think she opened up to me because of the drinking and I showed such an interest in what she had to say.

In the end, I thought, that was an amazing conversation. I know that couldn't happen in America.

I am remembering that conversation today, because for the first time in over 50 years, I'm afraid it can happen in America.

Trump doesn't mean "me"

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me

Musk's motivation to support Trump

I asked myself what Elon Musk's motivation is for his "all in" approach in his effort to elect Donald Trump? Then I remembered this article from a few months ago. I was wondering why a man who has a huge investment in Electronic Vehicles supports a guy who rails against them? Why a guy with huge government contracts, including Space X and Star link?

Musk is a sick human being who wants to punish his transgender child by being the driving force in electing a person as he is to punish her and the people who support her.

If Musk is successful, this story line is right out of a Batman or other movies that have worldwide sick villains. Trump and Musk are right out of central casting. Trump and Musk, they are bonded by hate. Hate that manifests itself in their own families, with their own flesh and blood.

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/elon-musk-transgender-daughter-vivian-wilson-interview-rcna163665

Wilson said that, for as long as she could remember, Musk hasn’t been a supportive father. She said he was rarely present in her life, leaving her and her siblings to be cared for by their mother or by nannies even though Musk had joint custody, and she said Musk berated her when he was present.

Musk, 53, is among the wealthiest people in the world through his stakes in Tesla, where he’s CEO, and in SpaceX, which he founded. He has also become a significant political figure, having endorsed former President Donald Trump this month for another term in the White House. Musk has 12 children, including Wilson.

Musk threw a spotlight on Wilson on Monday by speaking about their relationship in a video interview with psychologist and conservative commentator Jordan Peterson streamed live on X, saying he didn’t support Wilson’s gender identity. “I lost my son, essentially,” Musk said. He used Wilson’s birth name, also known as a deadname for transgender people, and said she was “dead, killed by the woke mind virus.”

In recent years, Musk has taken a hard-right turn into conservative politics and has been waging a campaign against transgender people and policies designed to support them. This month, he said he was pulling his businesses out of California to protest a new state law that bars schools from requiring that trans kids be outed to their parents.

Trump's Decline too Obvious to Ignore---Boston Globe

Where is the pertinent question about IVF?

The question that puts Trump or Vance in a no-win position on IVF is, "what do you propose to do with the unused, fertilized eggs following the procedure?"

Very few people are against the implantation of a fertilized egg into the patient. The question is if the unused, fertilized eggs are human life or not?

That's the question that puts them on the spot.

FOX News has strange poll numbers...

...that defy conventional wisdom. It finds Trump up by 2 points nationally, yet Harris leads by 6 points in the 7 swing states.

https://www.foxnews.com/official-polls/fox-news-poll-trump-ahead-harris-2-points-nationally

Former President Trump is ahead of Vice President Kamala Harris in the presidential contest 50%-48%, according to a new Fox News national survey. That’s a reversal from last month, when Harris had a narrow advantage.

Harris, however, is ahead by 6 points among voters from the seven key battleground states, and the candidates are tied at 49% each among voters in close counties (where the Biden-Trump 2020 margin was less than 10 points). Trump’s advantage comes from a larger share in counties he won by more than 10 points in 2020 (64%-35%) than Harris has in counties Biden won by more than 10 points (58%-39%).

Harris slightly widens national lead in Daily Tracking Poll

Although this poll gives Harris a 4-point lead over Trump nationally, they still give a slight edge to Adolf Trump in the electoral college. If we can win this thing nationally be 4 points, I like our chances in the EC, regardless. Also, this poll demonstrates some momentum in our direction just slightly less than 3 weeks out.

https://tippinsights.com/tipp-tracking-poll-day-3-harris-widens-popular-vote-lead-while-trump-maintains-edge-in-electoral-projections/