New Poll Shows Democratic Candidates Have Been Living in a Fantasy World

[Celerity]

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/11/poll-trump-beats-democrats-swing-state-biden-warren-sanders.html

In 2018, Democratic candidates waded into hostile territory and flipped 40 House districts, many of them moderate or conservative in their makeup. In almost every instance, their formula centered on narrowing their target profile by avoiding controversial positions, and focusing obsessively on Republican weaknesses, primarily Donald Trump’s abuses of power and attempts to eliminate health insurance for millions of Americans. The Democratic presidential field has largely abandoned that model. Working from the premise that the country largely agrees with them on everything, or that agreeing with the majority of voters on issues is not necessary to win, the campaign has proceeded in blissful unawareness of the extremely high chance that Trump will win again.

A new batch of swing state polls from the New York Times ought to deliver a bracing shock to Democrats. The polls find that, in six swing states — Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Florida, North Carolina, and Arizona — Trump is highly competitive. He trails Joe Biden there by the narrowest of margins, and leads Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.

Normally, it is a mistake to overreact to the findings of a single poll. In general, an outlier result should only marginally nudge our preexisting understanding of where public opinion stands. This case is different. To see why, you need to understand two interrelated flaws in the 2016 polling. First, they tended to under-sample white voters without college degrees. And this made them especially vulnerable to polling misses in a handful of states with disproportionately large numbers of white non-college voters. The Times found several months ago that Trump might well win 270 Electoral College votes even in the face of a larger national vote defeat than he suffered in 2016.

All this is to say that, if you’ve been relying on national polls for your picture of the race, you’re probably living in la-la land. However broadly unpopular Trump may be, at the moment he is right on the cusp of victory. What about the fact Democrats crushed Trump’s party in the midterms? The new Times polling finds many of those voters are swinging back. Almost two-thirds of the people who supported Trump in 2016, and then a Democrat in the 2018 midterms, plan to vote for Trump again in 2020.

snip

[Turin_C3PO]

1. Scary.

We’re going to need to get out the vote like our lives depend on it...because they do.

On edit: I still have hope that impeachment will drive his numbers down. We’ll know soon enough.

[boomer_wv]

2. Why?

Do we need to be shocked that swing states are close? Isnt that just what we should expect?

[Celerity]

4. the articles goes into the reasons, but you have to read it from the link, as we cannot post

the whole thing.

[boomer_wv]

21. Yeah

Thata the point. It's just a clickbait article on a handful of polls.

We should expect swing states to be close....otherwise they wouldnt be swing states would they?

[Celerity]

24. New York Magazine is hardly clickbait

[boomer_wv]

25. Yet

There it is.

We shouldn't expect that states where Trump won in 2016 are suddenly going to be democratic landslides or that each candidate is equal in each other those places.

This was just another "democrats are going to blow it article."

[Celerity]

28. non sequitur

that is not the point of the article

[boomer_wv]

33. yes it is

The entire point the article leads you to is that the democratic primary is leading candidates too far to the left to compete with Trump in these states, but overlooks the points that the most moderate candidate in the field, Biden, is leading and hasn't moved left at all. Arguing instead that his presence has only served to block other moderate candidates.

It also argues a flawed position that 2016 polling was fundamentally flawed in some way. It wasn't. The bias present in 2016 polling was smaller than that of most other cycles. We also shouldn't assume that the bias that will exist in polling this cycle will match 2016 in either magnitude of direction. We can't know that until after the election.


There's no reason to react more to this set of polls than any other polls we see right now.

[Joe941]

3. I'm not buying it. I've said a wet paper bag can beat tRump and still believe it.

[Celerity]

5. not if we are seen (fairly or not) as too radical nt

[Joe941]

6. And so we need to frame the narrative.

[Celerity]

9. well, we can start by disavowing all this MFA talk, it is electoral suicide nt

[Joe941]

11. Wrong. Mfa is really needed.

[Celerity]

16. 'needed' NEVER automatically equals actual manifestation into law nt

[Joe941]

17. That is a defeatist attitude.

[Celerity]

19. actually it is the opposite. The surest way to win, to defeat Rump is to NOT adopt

Last edited Mon Nov 4, 2019, 10:57 PM - Edit history (1)

an electoral loser like MFA.

Purist hard left politics is electoral poison in the RW-spun up, artificially skewed (via decades long gamesmanship of RW gerrymandering at state and Federal district level, plus systemic voter suppression, and the insane level of RW born-again thug xianism involved in the zeitgeist) United States of America.

Come over here to the Nordics in the EU, you will love our political systems, and almost of Bernie's platform stances and long term visions (and far beyond) are already law (and actually supported by even the centre-right parties to most degree.) The farthest to the centre of the US Democratic reps and Senators (probably around 40 to 50% of the Caucus) would be in the centre right parties here, and the most right of the Dems (say a Manchin or a Cuellar or a Sinema or a Collin Peterson type) would be on the farthest RIGHT side of the centre right parties (or not even let in, due to bigoted beliefs against LGBTQ such as Cuellar and a few others unfortunately hold.) That is how skewed the US is to the right.

I go back and forth between multiple countries all the time. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to instantly see the difference.

[vsrazdem]

30. I don't understand where this idea that everyone hates MFA comes from. Not from surveys

The vast majority of Americans, 70 percent, now support Medicare-for-all, otherwise known as single-payer health care, according to a new Reuters survey. That includes 85 percent of Democrats and 52 percent of Republicans. Only 20 percent of Americans say they outright oppose the idea.

“Medicare is a very popular program, so the idea of expanding it to everyone is popular as well,” Larry Levitt, senior vice president for health reform at the Kaiser Family Foundation, tells CNBC Make It. “The advantage of Medicare-for-all, which is much closer to how the rest of the world provides health care to their residents, is that you can achieve universal coverage at a lower cost.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/28/most-americans-now-support-medicare-for-all-and-free-college-tuition.html

[Celerity]

31. check back with me after half a billion USD is spent to mash it to dust in every conceivable way

and another full billion spent to destroy the Democrat nominee pushing it

[stopdiggin]

34. that link is over 14 months old

and the idea that M4A is just ducky with 70% of the electorate was pixie dust and fairy tails even back then. And the assertion that 85% of Democrats support it now is .. ludicrous, bordering on criminally negligent.

[empedocles]

8. Dems have the characters to - blow it, and somehow lose

[Dem4Life1102]

39. Those who fail to learn from history

are doomed to repeat it.

[Joe941]

43. Which is why this time we need to not make the mistake of not electing bernie!

[Dem4Life1102]

44. Lol!

[IronLionZion]

7. Experts and polls said Trump was too extreme to win in 2016

yet here we are

[Celerity]

13. greed will latch onto hate, and hate onto greed, fairness and socio-economic betterment? not so much

[dewsgirl]

35. The Russians hacked into 22 different states. The polls

were irrelevant.

[Andy823]

10. A single poll?

polls don't mean a damned thing right now, and ONE poll is even more meaningless. Who did the poll? Not that trump would pull anything unethical, but...!

[ritapria]

12. It's one damn poll

Good Luck on Trump getting re-elected with an approval rating hovering around 40% ……..The Dems won 40 seats for one reason : the Dems hated- and still hate - Trump and turned out in droves to administer a humiliation upon him …………..Had Trump behaved like a normal President , GOP House losses would have been in the 15 seat range …….2018 was a referendum on Trump ...The Dems won the House popular vote by 8.5%- despite a strong economy ….Now NYT/ Siena would have us believe these same voters are ready to jump back in bed with Trump - with a weakening economy …….Bullshit …….

[Celerity]

15. if we nominate a far left candidate, and if the economy stays fairly solid, and IF we bollocks up

impeachment, then Rump's chances skyrocket. I am not willing to play a far, radical (radical for the US, it is utterly bland and middle of the road here in the EU where I am at atm) left gambit on ditching Rump. I sympathise with the Sanderite agenda, I am FAR more left in my EU/UK politics than my American ones. The US system is far too right-shifted for a Sanderite agenda to get elected, let alone passed into law. It will take at least 2 decades (assuming that we do not win a majority of State legislative chambers on 2020, and then the Rethugs will do further massive RW gerrymandering (and voter suppression laws and systemic hi-jacking) based off of the 2020 census.) to undo the artificial RW gerrymandering. I took them almost around 40 to 50 years to fully build it out.

[ritapria]

18. We don't need 2 Republican parties - one is more than enough

We live in a new era ….Economic Populism is the winning ticket ……..Let the Republicans be the party of and by and for the rich ………..If we return to the tradition of FDR and do so proudly - without hesitation and equivocation - we'll win in a landslide ….. Think anew my friend ……….

[Celerity]

20. Sorry, the US is too right-shifted to get elected on (let alone pass

into law) a hard left (hard left in the US sense of the word, it is quite milquetoast to a core EU nation voter) platform and agenda.

The votes are simply not there. Do not worry, it is highly doubtful even the Public Option (which so many progs trash all the time) will probably pass, even if we get a 52-48 or so majority in the Senate. I can think of at least 5 or 6, and probably more, Dem Senators who will never vote for it.

[Dem4Life1102]

40. The tradition of FDR

Turning a blind eye to segregation? Illegally interning Japanese Americans without trial? Creating the military industrial complex? Setting the retirement age of Social Security at 65 when the average life expectancy was 62? Abandoning the health insurance component of Social Security? That tradition?

[dawg day]

14. I think once we settle on one candidate, most voters who are against Trump will vote for the Dem

Right now they can kind of pick and choose-- "Yes, I'd vote for Biden, but not some other guy." But at some point it will be "This Person vs. Trump," and more will go for This Person.

Also, some GOPers have become Not-Trumpers, and will vote their usual straight ticket but refrain from voting for president. (A couple have told me that. We'll see.)

All we can do is get out the vote (esp in the bg states) and see what happens.

Or... possibly Trump will be out. If McConnell dumps him... he might resign out of pique -- "You won't have Trump to kick around anymore!" and run third-party against Pence and tear him apart and split the GOP votes. That's my dream scenario, because it would be fun to see Trump go after someone worthy of trashing (Pence).

[0rganism]

22. i've been afraid of this for months

when we start getting the state-by-state polls back, including a bunch of tough states we need to win
imho, it's clear now that M4A is NOT a winning issue, and its importance pales in comparison to beating Trump by enough to overcome Russian impact on our elections. candidates who continue pushing pet projects instead of attacking Trump at every opportunity will be less likely to receive my support in the primaries.

[SKKY]

23. And this time in 2012, Herman Cain was leading for the...

Last edited Mon Nov 4, 2019, 11:29 PM - Edit history (1)

...Republicans, with all his 999 nonsense. We have 90 days until Iowa. In this age of the 24-Hour news cycle, that is almost a lifetime.

[Tiggeroshii]

27. It's crazy how much of a deal people are making this.

[Tiggeroshii]

26. I'm sorry but this is kinda a bullshit meme.

The Nytimes poll was ONE poll. Others have shown Democratic candidates (especially Biden) far ahead of Trump in the key states. We are one year out, and whoever the Democratic nominee is will be a lot more well known by the convention than they are now. Right now, polling is based on pure speculation and people who are not engaged. I'm all for playing it safe, and making sure we don't take anything for granted like we did last time, but this whole thing that "Democrats are in trouble because of ONE poll" is total crap to me.

[John Fante]

29. "Normally, it is a mistake to overreact to... a single poll."

But see if that stops us!!!

[Downtown Hound]

32. LOL. It's one poll and so far it's an outlier.

Other polls have been done in swing states with much larger samples (this poll had only 501 respondents) and showed Biden leading by a much larger amount.

Michigan (notice that polls that had a larger amount of respondents showed greater support for Biden):

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/michigan/
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/mi/michigan_trump_vs_biden-6761.html#polls

Wisconsin (Fox News had more than 1500 respondents and showed Biden with a 9 point lead):

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/mi/michigan_trump_vs_biden-6761.html#polls

Pennsylvania:

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2020/president/mi/michigan_trump_vs_biden-6761.html#polls

Don't freak out over one poll. Look at the big picture.

[OKNancy]

36. I think that the analysis of the poll is off

The new Times polling finds many of those voters are swinging back. Almost two-thirds of the people who supported Trump in 2016, and then a Democrat in the 2018 midterms, plan to vote for Trump again in 2020.


If only two-thirds plan to switch back to Trump, then one-third aren't. Sounds bad but isn't really. Trump's margin of victory was so slim that one-third not voting for Trump seems like good news to me.

[chiefsanders]

37. a lot can happen

Still a very long time to go, but still troubling for democrats.

[MFM008]

38. no.

Not at all.
Just a few weeks ago maggot was losing Michigan by 8 points AND losing to 5
of our democrats.
A year is a lifetime.
Who says what will happen.

[cwydro]

41. Interesting to read the responses to your OP.

So many here simply refuse to believe that the ass in chief will win again.

For the most part, they’re the same people who said he could never win the first time.

Good article. Rec.

[unblock]

42. time after time, the media tells us that issues don't actually matter... for republicans.

over and over, democrats are have majority support for virtually every policy matter. republicans claim to be fiscally responsible, but the record shows the only thing they're fiscally responsible for is roughly 5/6th of the national debt. republicans claim to be big on national security, but they out our covert operatives and give away secrets to russians and saudis and who knows who else.

on essentially all domestic policy matters, people agree more with democrats than with republicans.

this is why republicans spend basically all their time smearing democrats and talking about scandals and trying to tie emotionally negative words to democrats. because that's all they've got.


but then, somehow, when democrats talk about actual issues and actual policy, the media runs stories complaining about how out of line we're getting.

notice how, when republicans talk blatant propaganda, the media thinks their "journalistic" duty is to simply be scribes and report whatever republicans want to say. but when democrats talk about things that might actually help americans, suddenly their "journalistic" duty is to smack us down and tell us we're living in a "fantasy world".

when was the last time the media told the very unpopular, overtly corrupt, dictator wannabe republicans that they're living in a "fantasy world"?

[Amimnoch]

45. This isn't at all shocking to me.

For me, it's all been about that 270 to win map since the beginning of this year.

I even keep trying to raise awareness of it here each moth with battleground state breakdowns, this one is the latest I'd posted this week:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/1287334724

It doesn't matter if they are nation-wide popular or not.
These ridiculous "issues" that's being fought over, all the ones that require a congress to make real are unnecessary and divisive diversions.

All of our candidates really need to focus on Trump, on what they will do to improve our national image, take children out of cages, repair the damage to our judiciary, repair the damage to our education system, repair the damage done to us internationally with our allies.. things that the is actually in the power of the POTUS.

For all of these other issues that many are so focused on, all we need out of our candidates is a commitment that they WILL sign, not veto any Democratic Party congress legislation that makes improvements to our healthcare system that makes it to their desk, or makes improvements on our tax system, or any of the other things that requires legislation to make happen.

Despite the national polls, IT'S ALL ABOUT THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE. It' s about the battleground states that WILL decide who sits in the oval office come January 2021!!! The way the primary is going right now.. we are losing ground each month while Trumps money warchest is getting huge.

It's an incumbent year - this is not in our favor, with few exceptions, incumbents tend to win.
Thanks to President Obama, the Economy has so far survived the damage Trump has done - this is not in our favor.

Focus on repairing Trump damage, focus on improvements that POTUS' can make, and focus on getting those polls raised in the battleground states.

For my part, my money, volunteer time, and social media support goes to whomever polls strongest in those swing states. Right now that's Biden, but all 3 of the main candidates are continuing to trend downward over the last 3 months that I've been charting it.