New Catallaxy

Preview and Predictions – 2022 US Mid-term election

This time next week we should have a decent idea of the results for the 2022 US mid-terms. The discussion with Baris and Barnes , above, is excellent preview of the upcoming mid-terms as the go over the polls, individual races, and the like. You can also find the latest from RCP Election Maps here. The betting markets are trending Republican, with both clear majorities firming in both House and Senate. Further, the gubernatorial races in Dem states are also tightening, particularly in NY and Oregon.

Feel free to discuss the individual races, or prospective majorities, and leave us with your predictions as well.

dover0beach

88 responses to “Preview and Predictions – 2022 US Mid-term election”

  1. Bourne1879 Avatar
    Bourne1879

    Go the GOP !

    4
  2. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    May democracy win.

    2
  3. Boambee John Avatar
    Boambee John

    m0nty-fa

    Define your version of “democracy”.

    2
  4. Davey Boy Avatar
    Davey Boy

    based on 2020, it is inevitable and unquestionable that the Democrats will win just about everything, everywhere, with the biggest popular vote evah. Accept your destiny and your fate, U.S. of A., and let the good times roll.

    2
  5. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    Davey Boy, the difference between 2020 and 2022 is that there is no huge mail-in vote this time around (numbers I’ve seen are half or less ) and the early voting is trending in favour of Rs. All the pro-D polls are tightening considerably because they need to retain credibility if they are going to be effective narrative curators in future elections. All the signs are for a huge win across the board for Republicans. Lastly, simply no post-Dobbs bounce at all for D. Their ‘good’ polling through summer was simply an artifact of their polling methodology which fails to adjust for Republicans and Independents being under-sampled because they are holidaying or out and about.

    8
  6. Cassie of Sydney Avatar
    Cassie of Sydney

    May honesty win.

    7
  7. Tom Avatar
    Tom

    May democracy win.

    Haha. Thanks Monty. Laughed out loud.

    The international fascist left has spoken.

    Thanks for the thread, Dover.

    7
  8. Rabz Avatar
    Rabz

    My prediction – the dumbocrats will engage in massive obvious cheating (again).

    17
  9. Petros Avatar
    Petros

    These scum won’t give up easily. Quite easy to lose a lot of ballots from Republican areas on the election day. Hope people are ready to video things.

    9
  10. Bear Necessities Avatar
    Bear Necessities

    GOP – 260 seats. Big pickups in Texas, Florida and the Mid-WEST.
    GOP – 54 Senate seats Pickups in NV, AZ, GA and NH.

    6
  11. Perplexed of Brisbane Avatar
    Perplexed of Brisbane

    Cassie of Sydneysays:
    November 2, 2022 at 6:47 pm
    May honesty win.

    Let’s hope so. If not, may the 2A win.

    5
  12. Perplexed of Brisbane Avatar
    Perplexed of Brisbane

    Cassie of Sydneysays:
    November 2, 2022 at 6:47 pm
    May honesty win.

    Let’s hope so. If not, may the 2A win it back.

    3
  13. Judge Dredd Avatar
    Judge Dredd

    Voting harder is not going to change a thing.
    Everyone knows the 2020 election (and likely many others) was rigged and stolen, therefore regardless of the result this time it will be because the powers that be let that occur.
    Democracy is but a chimera of goodness, and it will die in a ditch like all other forms of governing before it. I know that can be a hard message for many to swallow, but democracy is certainly not the hallmark of free and good societies as the people really never had a voice at all when the actual shots are getting called by those who blackmail and line the pockets of the leaders.

    9
  14. Shy Ted Avatar
    Shy Ted

    The Dems have to win so they can be caught cheating red-handed.

    3
  15. 132andBush Avatar
    132andBush

    GOP to control both houses.

    Biden to face a serious impeachment (not like the bullshit ones Trump faced).

    How will this affect the Rus/Ukr war? Zelenskyy will probably get told he’s had enough spent on him.

    9
  16. Leon L. Avatar
    Leon L.

    It’s not who you vote for, but who counts the vote that matters.
    It will be interesting to see what trick is pulled out of the hat to save Montifa’s democracy this time.

    11
  17. Jannie Avatar
    Jannie

    I think Davey Boy, Rabz and Judge Dredd are probably right. I am hoping Dover is right.

    The American republic is broken and the superstructure has been captured. Even if the Republicans win both houses, there are enough RINOs to prevent any real reform. When reform is not possible, there is one alternative.

    14
  18. harrys on the boat Avatar
    harrys on the boat

    m0nty knows with his pathetic comment. The dems will cheat to limit the damage. Expect counting halts, observers removed and last minute unverified boxes in all the contentious states.

    13
  19. Michael Avatar
    Michael

    Have a look at Victor Davis Hanson’s take on the mid-terms: he is very confident the Republicans will do better than the polls are indicating because of consistent bias in the polling companies. It’s quite cheering!

    4
  20. NFA Avatar
    NFA

    Through Twitter, Democrats telegraph their last-ditch plan to save their midterms

    1
  21. Maniac Avatar
    Maniac

    I’m sure the GOP will make substantial gains, but we’re so far down the rabbit hole at this point that it might not make much difference.

    8
  22. Winston Smith Avatar
    Winston Smith

    Rabz:

    My prediction – the dumbocrats will engage in massive obvious cheating (again).

    They must. They know if the Republicans under Trump are allowed anywhere near the records, they will be swinging from nooses.
    As long as they can foment a crisis they will.
    $50 on Democrats to win at 12:1

    1
  23. Winston Smith Avatar
    Winston Smith

    Petros:

    These scum won’t give up easily. Quite easy to lose a lot of ballots from Republican areas on the election day. Hope people are ready to video things.

    There will be violence – it’s the only way Pelosi and company are staying out of gaol.
    They are too relaxed to not have the game sewn up.

    7
  24. Winston Smith Avatar
    Winston Smith

    To defend your liberty, you need to understand the “four boxes”: the soap box, the ballot box, the jury box, and the ammunition box.

    4
  25. Bear Necessities Avatar
    Bear Necessities

    Things are getting serious in the NY Governor’s race. The Naked Cowboy has endorsed Lee Zeldin.

    2
  26. Bruce of Newcastle Avatar
    Bruce of Newcastle

    Not sure where things are with the Konnech and Dominion voting machines. I suspect they’re still in use.

    And as far as I know the True the Vote pair as still in jail for refusing to give names of their Konnech source. Which is worrying.

    3
  27. Davey Boy Avatar
    Davey Boy

    I’m sure there is a degree of fortification going on.
    Even I, an Australian citizen with minimal FB activity, am getting multiple “vote from abroad” posts on Facebook, from the U.S. Democrats. To which I inevitably respond, “vote early, vote often”.

    1
  28. Petros Avatar
    Petros

    Gateway Pundit has an article today about an Arizona judge banning the video taping of ballot boxes located on public streets. Another lousy Trump appointee. They are not going to allow a fair vote to take place.

    3
  29. jupes Avatar
    jupes

    It’s not who you vote for, but who counts the vote that matters.

    This.

  30. Boambee John Avatar
    Boambee John

    Odd, m0nty-fa has not been here making multiple predictions of a stunning DemonRat victory. Just a bland comment that “May democracy win.”

    But he has not yet defined “democracy”. Why do I suspect that he equates “democracy” with the Democrat Party?

    1
  31. Figures Avatar
    Figures

    Rs should make it such that no D can show up to any parliament without taking a vaccine. Each day.

    They won’t, which is extraordinary. What are the Dems going to say? That they don’t like vaccines anymore?

    2
  32. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    It will be interesting to see how the Fox News Poll does this election. Here are the numbers for some individual races:
    GA, Warnock (D) down by 1 point over Walker (R) 45% to 46% for GovSenate;
    PA, Fetterman (D) bests Oz (R) by 47%-43% for Senate while they Shapiro (D) +16 over Mastriano (R) for Gov.
    WI, Mandela Barnes (D) trails Johnson (R) by three percentage points (45%-48%) for Senate; and
    AZ, Mark Kelly (D) with a 1-point edge over Blake Masters (R) (47% vs. 46%) for Senate.

    I notice they are not even trying to poll the NY Gov race.

  33. Tom Avatar
    Tom

    Just filed from the USA by Roger Franklin on the mid-terms campaign trail: When Whatever It Takes Isn’t Working. RTWT.

    3
  34. Kneel Avatar
    Kneel

    “…it is inevitable and unquestionable that the Democrats will win just about everything…”

    D’s are spending a LOT of money in races that have previously been D+10 (55:45) or more, which they traditionally don’t bother spending money on.

    R’s are spending a lot of money (and getting a lot of grass roots support for) training poll watchers – not just “stand there and watch” but also the right statements to make and questions to ask when they start to get stymied doing what they are constitutionally allowed to do.

    It looks like places that previously were “hard” D, like Miame-Dade in Florida, may turn red – if not, they will come very close.

    Polling shows latino voting at 50-50, and black voting as much as 20% R, both of which would be catastrophic for D’s – and R’s also have Kayne West (“Ye” – who has literally billions of $ from rap music and other cultural things) on their side.

    Gubernatorial races are tightening, even in NY and Michigan, and many state houses may “flip” R.

    R’s have been campaigning on “gas” prices and inflation, which more than 50% of likely voters rate as their number one concern. D’s have been campaigning on abortion, which rates important for only about 17% (and probably most of those are in areas where D’s are already fairly entrenched, like CA).

    D’s have pissed of “momma bear” – when mothers see the kids being taught to be racist, being told they are transgender in kindergarten etc etc, they revolt, as seen in local school board meeting of late.

    Given all of the above, it’s hard to see how D’s can win – indeed, with the “lockstep” attitude of blaming the other side (who haven’t been in power since 2018!) even though D’s have both houses AND the executive, it’s hard to see how they can even minimise the damage.
    Of course, there is always the “big steal”, but as above, poll watchers may prevent some of the worst, and many R states have new laws regarding voter ID etc, so we will see.

    In my view, if the MSM were impartial, it would be a landslide of biblical proportions. That they are not might not even matter that much, with less than 1 in 4 trusting the MSM anyway (more Americans trust politicians than the trust the MSM!), and most likely the majority of those are rusted on D’s anyway.

    6
  35. Bruce of Newcastle Avatar
    Bruce of Newcastle

    GA, Warnock (D) down by 1 point over Walker (R) 45% to 46% for Gov

    Shows how off with the fairies the polls are. Herschel Walker is a highly regarded NFL running back, whereas Warnock is an actual slumlord. Yet the polls, such as they are, are basically tied. Go figure.

    OTOH the Black Panthers will probably be out checking and um, influencing voters, like they have in past elections in GA.

    1
  36. Boambee John Avatar
    Boambee John

    Bruce of N

    OTOH the Black Panthers will probably be out checking and um, influencing voters, like they have in past elections in GA.

    How DARE you. m0nty-fa has assured us that only Republicans engage in the practice of “voter suppression”.

    3
  37. Pyrmonter Avatar
    Pyrmonter

    GOP to take control of both houses and probably Oregon governorship; do better in NY than they’ve done for a generation and a half, but still fall short.

    Underperforming how they _should_ do on ‘objective criteria’ due to Trump/DNCC-endorsed fruit-loop candidates in seats that should have been easy gains – Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona – that will either be lost (Matriano) or have soaked up resources that could have made other campaigns in ‘purple’ territory like Colorado closer.

    Compare the two versions of the 538 model: the differneces largely come down to poor GOP candidate quality.

    Many of you need to get over the fact that Trump loses more votes than he wins.

    2
  38. Cassie of Sydney Avatar
    Cassie of Sydney

    “Underperforming how they _should_ do on ‘objective criteria’ due to Trump/DNCC-endorsed fruit-loop candidates in seats that should have been easy gains – Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona – that will either be lost (Matriano) or have soaked up resources that could have made other campaigns in ‘purple’ territory like Colorado closer.

    Compare the two versions of the 538 model: the differneces largely come down to poor GOP candidate quality.

    Many of you need to get over the fact that Trump loses more votes than he wins.”

    Nah, Kari Lake in Arizona is not “underperforming” and she isn’t a “fruit-loop”.

    Perhaps you need to accept the fact that Donald Trump remains popular with the GOP base or maybe you think that the likes of that miserable sow, Liz Cheney, currently running around the country endorsing Democrats, is the acceptable face of the GOP.

    9
  39. jupes Avatar
    jupes

    PA, Fetterman (D) bests Oz (R) by 47%-43% for Senate

    What. The. Fuck.

    2
  40. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    Hard to believe anyone still takes 538 seriously.

    3
  41. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    It will be interesting to see how the Fox News Poll does this election. Here are the numbers for some individual races:
    GA, Warnock (D) down by 1 point over Walker (R) 45% to 46% for Senate;
    PA, Fetterman (D) bests Oz (R) by 47%-43% for Senate while they Shapiro (D) +16 over Mastriano (R) for Gov.
    WI, Mandela Barnes (D) trails Johnson (R) by three percentage points (45%-48%) for Senate; and
    AZ, Mark Kelly (D) with a 1-point edge over Blake Masters (R) (47% vs. 46%) for Senate.

    Where is 538 on this? They don’t poll, they choose certain polls and calculate a weighted forecast:
    GA, 55/100 chance Walker over Warnock.
    PA, 55/100 chance for Fetterman to win over Oz. For Gov, Shapiro 96/100 chance over Mastriano, who has received no support IIRC from the RNC.
    WI, 79/100 Johnson over Barnes.
    Finally, AZ, Kelly 65/100 over Masters.
    If you look at the figures, Siena/ NYT poll is skewing the AZ forecast considerably.

    1
  42. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    GOP to take control of both houses and probably Oregon governorship; do better in NY than they’ve done for a generation and a half, but still fall short.

    Underperforming how they _should_ do on ‘objective criteria’ due to Trump/DNCC-endorsed fruit-loop candidates in seats that should have been easy gains – Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona – that will either be lost (Matriano) or have soaked up resources that could have made other campaigns in ‘purple’ territory like Colorado closer.

    What is underperforming in House and Senate? Is 225 seats in House underperforming? Is 235 performing well? Is 240 or above overperforming? And what of the Senate? Is 51 underperforming? 52 decent? 53+ overperforming? And if R perform well or overperform, will you finally admit that Trump or populist/ America First is the future for Republican Party in US?

    2
  43. JC Avatar
    JC

    What is underperforming in House and Senate? Is 225 seats in House underperforming? Is 235 performing well? Is 240 or above overperforming? And what of the Senate? Is 51 underperforming? 52 decent? 53+ overperforming?

    Without cheating, the GOP should pocket 100 seats in the house and every single senate seat. So yes, anything less would be underperforming.

  44. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    We don’t live in that world, JC, where Democrats don’t cheat. But it would be good to see what Pyrmonter is going to nail his colours too.

    1
  45. JC Avatar
    JC

    Many of you need to get over the fact that Trump loses more votes than he wins.

    Pyrmonter:

    Here’s what you want us to believe. Every single federal institution in the US is compromised to the point where is could be called corruption. Every single fucking one. But you want us to believe that electoral system, comprised of 50 states that can’t be audited because it has so many freaking holes is, perfection plus.

    4
  46. NFA Avatar
    NFA

    538 lied and raised cash for Democrats

    2
  47. Mother Lode Avatar
    Mother Lode

    When Monty says ‘Democracy’, he means it in the same sense as ‘The Peoples Democratic Republic of…insert name of communist shithole here’.

    1
  48. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare Avatar
    Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare

    Hairy and I are holding firm to 53 to 47 in the Senate and a majority of between 50 and 60 in the House. We find travelling the Panhandle in Florida people are not openly discussing elections, keeping things close to their chest.

    The Dr. Oz vs Stroke Fetterman in Pensylvania is traditionally Dem and now the Dems are supposed to be pulling close here again after falling back following the debate when Fetterman was almost incoherent. The Dems have been throwing a lot of support in here, saying docs say he’s a fine candidate in fine fettle.

  49. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare Avatar
    Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare

    Jupes, that was just one recent poll putting Fetterman ahead, and it’s true it might be gone in Pa, but I wouldn’t discount dirty polling here to try to get a groundswell of sympathy vote out for him. We are now in the dirty tricks stage of the election. Pointed bones are being sharpened.

    1
  50. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare Avatar
    Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare

    Fox are going gangbusters on the latest fact checks on Biden’s statements that have come out from Twitter. They’ve actually called him out for claiming he’s introduced a welfare benefit that was simply due to rise given inflation anyway. Biden’s dinky spokesgirl has had to do damage control re that.

    Twitter doing a genuine fact check? says Hairy to me, tongue in cheek. How unusual.
    I know, I say. What could possibly have happened?

    lol. Onya, Elon.

    2
  51. Louis Litt Avatar
    Louis Litt

    Pyrmonter – glad too see you back – what have you been up to?

  52. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    My predictions:

    Dems get to 52 in Senate, winning in PA and OH.

    Dems to lose House majority (around 210 seats to GOP 225 or so) but to fashion a working coalition for certain bills with Republican squishes in purple states – most notably to continue the neoliberal consensus on Ukraine. GOP to get absolutely nothing of consequence done with its majority because its caucus is hopelessly fractured.

    Early results are actually extremely positive for Democrats, pitching several points ahead of 2020 levels. I distrust them, however, as they may just reflect a further push by rustadon Dem voters to vote early, which would just take away from their election day vote totals.

    1
  53. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Thread on early mid-term voting trends.

    1
  54. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    Dems get to 52 in Senate, winning in PA and OH.

    You really think Vance will lose in OH? Vance is ahead of Ryan or tied in all polling. Emerson has him +9. Fetterman v Oz is tighter but Oz is ahead +2 or 3 in the most recent polls bar the Marist +6 for Fetterman (Marist is one of the least accurate pollsters).

    Early results are actually extremely positive for Democrats

    What early results?

  55. JC Avatar
    JC

    Here’s my prediction.

    Assuming no cheating

    GOP

    250 house seats
    53/54 senate

    Fatboy, You’re predicting a majority for the Demons with your 210 seats, you fat idiot. Reps comprises 435 seats.

  56. JC Avatar
    JC

    What early results?

    The harvested postal votes from nursing homes.

  57. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    Gotcha.

    Simon Rosenberg
    @SimonWDC
    ·
    16h
    Replying to
    @SimonWDC
    Highly respected Marist has dropped 3 Senate polls:

    Highly respected? They are 14th in terms of accuracy in 2016/18/20 elections. They are bottom mid-tier.

  58. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Vance is a terrible candidate. If there’s one thing that’s on the nose right now it’s billionaires, and he’s a billionaire’s pet poodle.

    1
  59. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    To reiterate, early voting trends can be twisted for meaning beyond all recognition depending on your point of view, so it is prudent not to trust them either way. Sean Trende of RCP has a decent take on this. But hey, we’ve got to talk about something.

    1
  60. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Oz and Vance are terrible candidates for many reasons, but the most fundamental one is that they aren’t even living in the states they are running for. Americans hate carpetbaggers. Very few such candidates tend to do well in a representative democracy.

    1
  61. JC Avatar
    JC

    Vance is a terrible candidate.

    And Fetterman is great! You enormous blob.

    1
  62. JC Avatar
    JC

    Oz and Vance are terrible candidates for many reasons,

    Hahahhahahahahahahahahaha

    Fotboy is having a sugar high at the moment.

    1
  63. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    One prediction I can make with a large degree of confidence is that mail-in votes are going to heavily favour Democrats even more, and given how that GOP stooge has white-anted US Post it’s going to take even longer to get all those votes counted, which is going to make you lot go even more ape droppings over wacky conspiracy theories of last-minute election theft. There will be grainy footage of boxes loaded from buses, there will be video of campaign workers putting things on top of other things, it will be a cavalcade of smoking gun footage which proves precisely nothing. Cats who are as dumb as a rock will have a field day, custard is going to go spare.

    1
  64. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    Vance is a great candidate and he’ll win by 5 pts or more. He’s in such a strong position Ryan is doing promos firing guns pretending to be a Republican.

    1
  65. Oh come on Avatar
    Oh come on

    Oz and Vance are terrible candidates for many reasons, but the most fundamental one is that they aren’t even living in the states they are running for. Americans hate carpetbaggers. Very few such candidates tend to do well in a representative democracy.

    Can’t stop and chat, I’m off to the bookies to bet the house on Oz and Vance romping it in in Pennsylvania and Ohio now that m0nty’s guaranteed their victories. Easy money.

    2
  66. rosie Avatar
    rosie

    Americans are being hit hard in the hip pocket, that ought to be enough to ensure a Republican win.
    On my various forays into the US, the price of gas and home heating was always a hot topic.
    The risk of freezing to death overnight seemed to focus the mind.

    1
  67. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    Even the Cook Political Report thinks the most likely result in the Senate is a slight R majority, either 51 or 52. The best case Ds can hope, they say, is to retain 50:50 and have Harris decide the vote. They have no D 52. While they think R could move to 53 best case.

  68. Oh come on Avatar
    Oh come on

    So I took the betting stubs I placed on Vance and Oz to the bank and asked if I could use them as collateral for a secured loan. The bank manager told me absolutely not, I must be crazy. Then I showed him this thread and he saw m0nty put the kybosh on Vance and Oz. Suddenly my bets were as good as gold. Thanks, m0nty!

    I will concede that Oz is a bad candidate in the sense that he will probably become a RINO once in the Senate. JD Vance is a rockstar candidate with deep ties to Ohio. Widespread public awareness of these ties long predates public awareness of his political ambitions.

    1
  69. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Can’t stop and chat, I’m off to the bookies to bet the house on Oz and Vance romping it in in Pennsylvania and Ohio now that m0nty’s guaranteed their victories. Easy money.

    IIRC the last US elections prediction thread on the Cat didn’t go so well for team Trump.

  70. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Even the Cook Political Report thinks the most likely result in the Senate is a slight R majority, either 51 or 52. The best case Ds can hope, they say, is to retain 50:50 and have Harris decide the vote. They have no D 52. While they think R could move to 53 best case.

    The poll aggregators have all been gamed this cycle. There have been a flood of Republican pollsters with B-level records pushing the needle towards red. Add in the self-confessed Republican lean from the deliberate weighting of Nate Silver and others, and you have a recipe for an over-correction from last time because everyone in the process is double-counting.

    Actual by-election results post-Dobbs have showed a massive swing to Democrats.

  71. Oh come on Avatar
    Oh come on

    IIRC the last US elections prediction thread on the Cat didn’t go so well for team Trump.

    I certainly underestimated the lengths the Dems were wiling to go to in order to steal the election for Dementia Joe.

    2
  72. Oh come on Avatar
    Oh come on

    Okay, m0nts. We’ll find out soon enough.

  73. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    I mean, it’s not hard to predict what is going to happen. The pundits all declared the red wave weeks out from the election. They were always going to go too hard, given their recent embarrassments. The actual vote will be more Democrat-leaning to some small or large extent. Concurrently, the shift of Democrats towards early voting will only get more pronounced, exacerbated by COVID concerns, which will give stupid and/or evil people more fodder to spread conspiracy theories about MASSIVE VOTE DUMPS.

    It is all pointing towards certain states crying about stolen seats as a pretext to declare the end of democracy, even when it is clear to anyone who understands the system that the elections were fair, and we get to test out American institutions against fascism once again. They managed to survive last time due to old school Republicans standing up for democratic principle, but fascists tend to keep trying until they succeed and burn the institutions down.

  74. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    The poll aggregators have all been gamed this cycle. There have been a flood of Republican pollsters with B-level records pushing the needle towards red. Add in the self-confessed Republican lean from the deliberate weighting of Nate Silver and others, and you have a recipe for an over-correction from last time because everyone in the process is double-counting.

    monty, that is extreme cope. Who are these Republican pollsters with B-grade records? Trafalgar? Insider Advantage? They are both top 5 for accuracy in last three elections.

  75. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    BTW, anyone that looks at the polls being aggregated knows that they still are tendentiously overestimating D. You see that in the Fetterman v Oz race where Marist is completely out there in left field with Fetterman +5 whereas every other poll has Oz slightly ahead, bar USA Today’s D+2, has Oz in front by +1-3. The tightening we see has more to do D pollsters trying to maintain their credibility with the public rather than overcorrecting.

  76. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Individual polls mean a lot less than pollsters like to think they do, and poll aggregates mean a lot less than they used to given spectacular recent failures.

    The poll average is most likely wrong. As to which way it is wrong, it’s a guessing game and as OCO says we’ll find out soon enough. Don’t be surprised by a big and widespread poll error when all the votes are actually counted.

  77. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    So individual polls with very good records at estimating results in the last three elections don’t mean much.

  78. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    No they don’t, db. Psephology is a macro science, like macroeconomics. Its measurements are fraught with doubt and prone to be misinterpreted due to biases during data collection. Its main utility is not prediction, but figuring out what happened after the fact.

  79. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    The only utility of polling is estimating public approval or disapproval for X or forecasting an electoral result. If it’s looking backward it’s just history.

  80. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Most of macroeconomics is history, yes. Psephologists have a puffed up opinion of themselves, but they have taken quite a few hits lately.

  81. Dot Avatar
    Dot

    spread conspiracy theories about MASSIVE VOTE DUMPS

    Which are actually true.

    My prediction is cheating on a scale which would shame Robert Mugabe.

  82. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    It’s pretty funny listening to monty argue that polling is bunk.

    But, no, if a pollster manages to repeatedly poll a sample of the electorate and gets within 2-3 pts consistently of an election result, I’m going to take them seriously when they sample the electorate in between those elections, approaching an election, or when sampling public opinion.

  83. Digger Avatar
    Digger

    m0nty knows with his pathetic comment. The dems will cheat to limit the damage. Expect counting halts, observers removed and last minute unverified boxes in all the contentious states.

    That was the last election tactic.

    They will steer clear of that this time. They will have already cast a few million illegal postal votes and that is why they are promoting the extended counting period. Postal votes all the way this time… with maybe a few obvious dummy runs at other ways to take the focus off what they are really doing.

    2
  84. Ed Case Avatar
    Ed Case

    Yep.
    With an extended Counting period, the Democrats can wait until all the Booths are counted, then they know what they’ve got to manufacture in Postal Votes to win.
    Been happening in Federal Elections here for years, Fran Bailey called for a total overhaul of the Voting System back in 2008.
    From Wiki:

    As the minister and the TA board lost confidence in Morrison, Bailey advised to Prime Minister John Howard that Morrison be sacked. Howard accepted the advice and Morrison was fired in August 2006.

    Heh.

    In 2022, following Morrison’s multi-ministerial positions controversy, Bailey revealed that Morrison showed no respect for his colleagues at Tourism Australia and he left her feeling bullied, also confirming that he “point-blank refused” to provide her or the board with any documentation or to answer questions about how the ad campaign was awarded to Saatchi.

    She said she was “gobsmacked when he became prime minister” and called for Morrison to resign from Parliament.

    She described that Morrison had “the supreme belief that only he can do a job, the lack of consultation with those closest to him – those characteristics were evident 16 years ago, and perhaps we’re seeing the end result of those now.”

    2007 election controversy and final term

    Her period as minister ended with the defeat of the Howard government at the 2007 election. Her hold on McEwen was always somewhat tenuous due to its demographics. Although classed as rural by the Australian Electoral Commission, it is actually a hybrid urban-rural seat. It includes several outer northern suburbs of Melbourne that tilt heavily to Labor, while the more rural portion votes equally heavily for the Liberals and Nationals. However, the 2007 election resulted in McEwen becoming the most marginal seat in the country. Initially, it appeared that Bailey had lost to former Labor state MP Rob Mitchell by six votes. Bailey requested and was granted a full recount, which gave her the win by 12 votes.

    The result was challenged in the High Court of Australia in its capacity as the Court of Disputed Returns, and was referred to the Federal Court of Australia. Over seven months after the election and a review of 643 individual votes, the court altered the formal status of several dozen, eventually declaring Bailey the winner by 27 votes.

    Following the resolution of the long-running dispute, Bailey called for a total overhaul of the voting system.

  85. m0nty Avatar
    m0nty

    Of course you morons don’t realise that it is entirely the fault of Republicans that postal votes are not counted before Election Day in key states, ensuring that a slew of Democrat-leaning votes come in last to deliberately fuel conspiracy theories and give fascists a fig leaf to overturn democratic results.

    You don’t care about it, or you are just pig ignorant.

  86. dover0beach Avatar
    dover0beach

    Let’s look at the states that begin processing before or on election day. AZ, FL, GA, OH, NC, TX among others all do preprocessing of ballots. MI, PA, and WI don’t but the problems in those states had nothing to do with no preprocessing but with departures from observing their own electoral laws.

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  87. Winston Smith Avatar
    Winston Smith

    This week will be one of the most momentous weeks since WW2.
    The problem is that we have a senile, incompetent, criminal pervert deciding if the nukes will fly.
    …and empty stockpiles of war equipment.
    No fuel, No subs, no missiles for our aircraft, and a nonexistent navy to keep the enemy missile submarines from our lines of communication.
    Keep a close eye on the Global Positioning System – if it suddenly degrades, the civilian sector has been locked out as well as the Russian/Chinese access and they are left with their own systems which – we hope – aren’t as accurate as the US Military.
    My indicator of US domestic trouble is the live cameras around Washington. If we see the fences go back up… it’s not a good sign.

  88. Jannie Avatar
    Jannie

    Mostly polls are bullshit, they favour the D by design and process, and serve to Gaslight and obscure their use of millions of fraudulent votes.

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