With The Conversation keeping this site’s regular US correspondent busy, a quick post of my own on the US election campaign, and a forum for the discussion thereof. The big news from my perspective is that, after all the noteworthy forecasters closed for refurbishment following Joe Biden’s withdrawal, Nate Silver has lifted the lid on his Harris-versus-Trump model.
The model launches with a 61.3% win probability for Trump and 38.1% for Harris, the balance presumably reflecting the possibility that one candidate or the other doesn’t survive until November. These numbers suggest a model with a judiciously wide zone of uncertainty around projections that superficially look very encouraging for Trump. Silver’s model records an essentially dead head on the national popular vote, and doesn’t credit Harris with a better than even chance unless she lands at least two points clear. State-level projections find Trump more likely than not to flip Wisconsin (just), Michigan and Pennsylvania (a little further ahead), Nevada (a little further again) and Arizona and Georgia (both about as strong for Trump as North Carolina, which he carried in 2020).
The Economist’s model is still on ice, but its page explaining its methodology is well worth reading. Its charts comparing the predictiveness of its poll-based and “fundamentals” models going back to 1948 are particularly interesting in finding that the latter have the superior record – certainly at predicting the result 150 days out, but even unto election day itself. However, one of its parameters does not seem to me to be quite as fundamental as all that, being a poll-based measure of presidential approval.
The question of polls-versus-fundamentals was the focus of a critique by Nate Silver of the new model developed by FiveThirtyEight, the enterprise formerly synonymous with Silver but now bought out, LucasFilm style, by Disney. Its new incarnation is overseen by G. Elliott Morris, of whom Silver says he is “not a fan”. This was producing remarkably bullish results for Biden up until it was put on ice, which evidently wasn’t persuading too many senior Democrats. As well as criticising a lack of transparency, Silver observes that the model seems to be overwhelmingly favouring fundamentals, despite its supporting data suggesting that fundamentals should in fact be viewed as less predictive than polls. Its thesis, Silver argues, is that – as of July 21 – “Joe Biden is a reasonably clear favorite to win the popular vote because he’s an incumbent, and it’s too early to really update that assumption based on the polling or anything else”.
Asha,
To be fair I think Boerwar was referring to the American Greens, but yeah, criss-crossing themes from one thread to the other is a little tiresome.
Looks like Trump holds his VP in some contempt as well as just about everyone else.
Well, he did pick the equivalent of a department store dummy for his last VP. 😉
I’m not hugely worried about where the polling is at right now. It’s about what I would have expected. Harris has come in very late in the day and has a big fight ahead of her, but so far she certainly seems up for it, and I’m cautiously but increasingly optimistic that she’ll be able to eke out a victory come November – which is certainly more than I could have said about Biden post-debate.
C@t:
Maybe, but the US Greens are a complete nonentity who will have close to zero impact on the election. Nobody in the US cares what any of the deluded perennials running under their banner have to say, so why should we? Just by posting this, I have given them more attention than they deserve.
Trump’s VP was chosen by his sons and Tucker Carlson – says it all really. Whether it is Shapiro or Kelly or Waltz or even Buttigieg, any of them will wipe the floor with JD Vance.
Trump today basically lost the small percentage of the African American vote he had somehow picked up before Biden handed the baton to Harris. Sure, the MAGA base will stick with him, but he needs more than that to win in November.
Asha,
Putting your two posts together, do you believe it’s possible that the votes of Cornell West, Jill Stein and Robert Kennedy Jr would be enough to swing a tight contest? It’s definitely something I worry about.
Notwithstanding Trump’s comments, has Harris ever actually claimed to be “black” or “African-American”? I have seen her emphasise several times that she is not in any way descended from US slaves.
The term most commonly associated with her is “person of colour”, which seems fair enough, although I continue to despair the intense focus in the US on the ethnic backgrounds of public figures. This comes both from the racist right and the diversity-obssessed left.
Britain, Scotland and Ireland have all recently elevated political leaders with sub-continental ethnic backgrounds with relatively minimal fuss. Let’s hope that one day the US can reach the same point, but I suspect that it will be many decades into the future, for a whole lot of historical reasons that I hope I don’t need to spell out.
Ven says Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 11:01 am
Trump has a large base, but that’s virtually all who will vote for him. Defeating him is all about having a credible candidate so everyone else will vote. That wasn’t Biden, but it appears increasingly likely it will be Harris.
Badthinker says Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 11:24 am
I’m not sure how losing the popular vote in 2016 could equate to winning the “silent majority”.
“Looks like Trump holds his VP in some contempt as well as just about everyone else.”
Strong leaders see their deputies as only a means to an end. Only the most loyal get to take up their mantle when their boss retires or ascends to Heaven. Mao was great at disposing of his deputies as soon as they disagreed. (OK, he was from the Left, but the analogy still applies.)
Vance has been pretty smart and fortunate that Trump doesn’t have an inordinately long remaining life expectancy, genetics aside.
“Trump’s VP was chosen by his sons and Tucker Carlson – says it all really. Whether it is Shapiro or Kelly or Waltz or even Buttigieg, any of them will wipe the floor with JD Vance.”
Ask any politically neutral professor of English with a PhD to judge a debate, and any half-educated working mom or dad would wipe the floor against Vance (or Trump for that matter). In reality, there are enough foolable people in America who can’t see beyond their well shafts for the reverse to be their lot.
MelbourneMammoth @ #260 Thursday, August 1st, 2024 – 11:51 am
I see you’re having fun with this. Keep it up the lols are a nice break in my day.
Mao was from the left like Pluto is a planet, i.e. not really.
C@t:
Maybe, though I suspect Kennedy, at least, will be drawing votes from rather different sources than Stein and West are, which may well balance things out a bit. Kennedy *will* probably have a significant spoiler effect in the states where he’s on the ballot, though it’s pretty difficult to gauge *who* he will spoil. Stein will probably struggle to poll high enough in most states to even make up the difference between Harris and Trump. West… I don’t even know. (I’m assuming you mean Cornell and not Kanye.)
The spoiler effect is always going to be a concern in FPTP systems, but it should be remembered too that the US does not have compulsory voting, and many who choose to vote for third party candidates would probably just stay at home if those candidates were not running… effectively having the exact same impact on the election anyway.
I dunno, I don’t really see the point in fretting about it. There’s always going to be a subset of the population who don’t want to go with the main parties for whatever reason, and I would argue that the tiny percentage of people choosing to do so in the US – where it is usually near impossible for third party candidates to get elected – are not the sort of voters who can typically be persuaded to do otherwise.
Also, Cornell West is only on the ballot in about nine or ten states right now, few of which seem in play this election:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornel_West_2024_presidential_campaign
…Nader was a spoiler.
Trump could not bring himself to say that Vance is ready to be President.
Just.Could.Not.Do.It.
BW:
Yes, he was. In one state. Over twenty years ago. On account of polling 2-3x higher than any US Green candidate had previously or has since then. Jill Stein is no Ralph Nader.
Seriously, scroll down to the electoral results section to get a rough idea of how Stein is likely to do in November:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Party_of_the_United_States
(And there still is no way of knowing whether the 2.7% of Americans who chose to vote for Nader in 2000 would have voted for Gore if the former wasn’t in the ballot. Maybe they would have stayed home. Maybe their votes would have been dispersed about a bunch of other third party candidates. Maybe they would have lodged a vote for your Informal Party. Maybe, maybe, maybe…)
A different take… a fair bit closer to my original position.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/31/nabj-trump-panel-black-journalists-respond
The Greens hate being outed for being spoilers.
They assisted the Coalition for ten years.
They are busy helping Dutton right now.
Not to worry.
If you are always right then anything else must always be wrong.
This is the US thread, Boerwar.
Australia has preferential voting. Spoiler candidates don’t really exist in preferential systems.
This may reflect an observation I made about the crowd response to Trump’s RNC speech: bored.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/31/trump-truth-social-audience
‘Asha says:
Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 12:30 pm
This is the US thread, Boerwar.
Australia has preferential voting. Spoiler candidates don’t really exist in preferential systems.’
—————————–
Funniest comment for the week. Total reality denial.
The Australian Greens and the US Greens share a name and some ideological beliefs. Otherwise, they aren’t really comparable, mainly on account of how different our political systems are.
In the US, basically any person with serious political ambitions – regardless of their political leanings – runs for office as a Democrat or a Republican. Third parties are almost exclusively the reserve of perennials and narcissists and crackpots. In Australia, it is quite possibly to be elected as an independent or as a minor party candidate, and so people who actually have talent and electoral prospects will do so. A minor party in Australia is a very different beast to a minor party in the US, and likewise major parties in both countries are also quite different entities.
If the US had a system like ours, people like Bernie Sanders and the Squad would likely be members of a smaller party akin to the Aus Greens rather than on the left flank of the democrats. (As would probably the likes of Manchin, and who even knows how the GOP might have split post-Trump.) If we had a system like the United States’, the Greens (well, most of them) would probably be a faction of the ALP. I’ll leave it to others to decide which of those situations are preferable.
Boerwar @ #268 Thursday, August 1st, 2024 – 12:29 pm
Boerwar,
Don’t be willfully obtuse about which thread this is.
Democracy Sausage says Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 11:38 am
Given some of the things Carlson has privately said about Trump in the past, I wonder if he was trying to sabotage the campaign.
“We’re all pretending we’ve got a lot to show for it, because admitting what a disaster it’s been is too tough to digest. But come on. There really isn’t an upside to Trump.”
“He’s a demonic force, a destroyer. But he’s not going to destroy us. I’ve been thinking about this every day for four years.”
“We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait.”
“I hate him passionately. … I can’t handle much more of this,”
Sources:
https://apnews.com/article/tucker-carlson-fox-news-dominion-lawsuit-trump-5d6aed4bc7eb1f7a01702ebea86f37a1
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tucker-carlson-endorses-donald-trump-2024/
I dunno, I don’t really see the point in fretting about it.
Asha, I still have PTSD from the Ralph Nader effect and believe that RFK Jr may influence the results of the race to the same extent in a close race. Because not every voter in the US is logical or rational.
BW:
You do understand how preferential voting works, right?
I mean, yeah, certain candidates or parties can indeed screw things up for their side of politics through their rhetoric or tactical blunders or the relevant major party being negatively associated with your comparatively extreme views or whatever, but that’s not being a spoiler candidate, thats just, well, screwing things up for your side of politics through your rhetoric or tactical blunders or the relevant major party being negatively associated with your comparatively extreme views.
Spoiling / splitting the vote is a specific phenomena that happens in first-past-the-post systems (and certain proportional systems) where a candidate wins despite a majority of voters not wanting them to win, on account of those votes being dispersed between their opponents. That doesn’t happen here.
Asha says Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 12:42 pm
There have been a few independents in the US system, but it’s rare. Bernie Sanders is actually an independent, the longest serving in US congressional history. But I think your argument is correct, despite Sanders.
C@tmomma says Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 12:47 pm
Given RFK Jr’s vaccination stance I think he’s just as likely to steal votes from Trump. In a Ven diagram, the cookers probably overlap with JFK Jr and Trump far more than they do with the Democrats. His voters might be more of a concern down ticket.
Internal dissent on the SCOTUS has resulted in a rebuff for Alito, second only for corruptness, partisanship, and unethical conduct to Thomas, both of whom should be impeached even though it would be an academic exercise:
[‘The hardline approach Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito takes usually gets him what he wants.
This year it backfired.
Behind the scenes, the conservative justice sought to put a thumb on the scale for states trying to restrict how social media companies filter content. His tactics could have led to a major change in how platforms operate.
CNN has learned, however, that Alito went too far for two justices – Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson – who abandoned the precarious 5-4 majority and left Alito on the losing side.
As a result, the final 6-3 ruling led by Justice Elena Kagan backed the First Amendment rights of social media companies
It is rare that a justice tapped to write the majority opinion loses it in ensuing weeks, but sources tell CNN that it happened twice this year to Alito. He also lost the majority as he was writing the decision in the case of a Texas councilwoman who said she was arrested in retaliation for criticizing the city manager.
Alito has long given off an air of vexation, even as he is regularly in the majority with his conservative ideology. But the frustration of the 74-year-old justice has grown increasingly palpable in the courtroom. He has seldom faced this level of internal opposition.
Overall, Alito wrote the fewest leading opinions for the court this term, only four, while other justices close to his 18-year seniority had been assigned (and kept majorities for) seven opinions each.
His unique year in chambers was matched by the extraordinary public scrutiny for his off-bench activities, including lingering ethics controversies and a newly reported episode regarding an upside-down flag that had flown at this home in January 2021, after the pro-Donald Trump attack on the US Capitol. Some of the rioters waved inverted flags that became a symbol of Trump’s protest of the election results giving Joe Biden the presidency.’]
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/07/31/politics/samuel-alito-supreme-court-netchoice-social-media-biskupic/index.html
That Leger poll is a bit curios. The Hill (Decision Desk) are treating it as a tie. RCP not showing it at all. The headline on 538 is 48-41 (in Harris’ favour) which is with all candidates (Kennedy etc) as an option.
The poll itself shows 47-47 for All Voters with all undecideds distributed ( I am unclear how Harris can go backwards in this). For Likely Voters this distributed value becomes 49-46 in Harris’ favour.
https://leger360.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Leger_U.S-Politics-July-29th-2024.pdf
Mavis says Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 12:57 pm
Amy Coney Barrett has started showing a bit of independence of thought from the rest of the right wing of the court. She’s still way over on that side, but it might be worth watching her over the comings years.
C@t:
Kennedy almost certainly will have an impact on the election result, but what that impact will be is frankly beyond my ability to guess. He is likely going to attract a mix of disaffected Democrats, disaffected Republicans, various independent voters, and a good portion of the “fuck the major parties” crowd. What the percentages of those demographics will be, however… God only knows.
The last time any third party candidate polled as highly as Kennedy did was during Perot’s two runs: Clinton won both those elections handsomely, though I believe analysis of the results has suggested Perot drew votes pretty equally from both Clinton and Bush/Dole. However, Perot managed to get onto the ballot in every state (at least, he did in 1992, not so sure about ’96), while. Kennedy so far has not. Perot also quite deliberately branded himself as a centrist, while Kennedy’s positions seem to be a weird mix of old-school Democrat, modern GOP culture war stuff, and cooker conspiracies, with a general “fuck the Man and fuck the System” vibe.
All that the Harris team can do about the threat posed by Kennedy or any other third party candidate is to have an attractive electoral platform, campaign their arses off, win as many votes as possible, and get as many Democrat-leaning voters to turn out on election day as possible, and hope that that’s enough. The upside is that they probably don’t have to worry so much about those voters who would have been thinking “well, I hate Trump, but Biden is losing it, so I’m going to stay home / vote for a third party candidate.”
Socrates:
Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 9:45 am
Thanks for the map of where the Indian vote lies. While it’s not significant, Trump can hardly afford to get another minority
offside.
Nice to hear the Farnsey voice in Harris ad 🙂
I am starting to get a bit of a vibe that we may see some friction in the Trump campaign if Trump starts to think his VP pick is actually a liability.
I read earlier today that Team Trump believe the source is Kellyanne Conway.
Reasoning is that this info, though false, must be leaking from the campaign, Mike Pence was Conway’s pick in 2016, she opposed Vance.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/jul/31/bitcoin-2024-conference-donald-trump
Losers convention.
bc:
Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 1:03 pm
[‘Amy Coney Barrett has started showing a bit of independence of thought from the rest of the right wing of the court. She’s still way over on that side, but it might be worth watching her over the comings years.’]
I closely followed her 2017 Senate confirmation hearing and thought she was evasive about how she would separate her Catholicism from social issues such as abortion, gay & black rights. Asked about the importance of precedent she replied: that these cases are “binding precedents” that she intended to “faithfully follow if confirmed.” Well, that was a porky after siding with the majority in Dobbs. That
said I, like you, detect a little more independence in her judgments. And given she appears to have found her feet, let’s hope for less textualism and more of the spirit of the law – aka judicial activism.
Hard to tell what’s working better for Harris at the moment, the momentum from her energy and positivity or Trump imploding and shooting himself in the foot again and again. Seems like the more he speaks, the more he loses. Momentum is a vital thing. Trump’s momentum from the assassination attempt and RNP lasted just days and was killed once Biden stepped down. He almost needs another assassination attempt or ‘children overboard’ event to wrestle back some momentum.
Hard to tell what’s working better for Harris at the moment, the momentum from her energy and positivity or Trump imploding and shooting himself in the foot again and again. Seems like the more he speaks, the more he loses. Momentum is a vital thing. Trump’s momentum from the assassination attempt and RNP lasted just days and was killed once Biden stepped down. He almost needs another assassination attempt or ‘children overboard’ event to wrestle back some momentum.
To be fair there is a very slight spoiler effect in a preferential voting system like ours. If a third party overtakes a moderate party in a close TPP contest then the weaker preference flows to them can give the party from the other side of the win. But it’s a fractional effect and the window is very small
In FPTP it’s everywhere, all the time, all of the votes and not subtle at all
Media Knives are Out for Trump Over His Harris ‘Happened to Turn Black’ Slur; and Trump Doubles Down
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/7/31/2259641/-Media-Knives-are-Out-for-Trump-Over-His-Harris-Happened-to-Turn-Black-Slur?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web
“Update 2:40 PM Pacific: Trump is reacting to the media onslaught by doubling down on his racist insult: Trump Insists Kamala Harris Is Not Black. I’m not going to post his Truth Social post, but here is what he said:
Crazy Kamala is saying she’s Indian, not Black. This is a big deal. Stone cold phony. She uses everybody, including her racial identity!”
“Start with WaPo, top story, front left, the prime webpage real estate:
“Trump says Harris ‘became a Black person’ as NABJ event turns hostile, chaotic
Donald Trump on Wednesday berated a Black reporter who pressed him about past offensive comments and accused his opponent, Vice President Harris, of downplaying Black heritage she routinely highlights as a sit-down meant to showcase Trump’s outreach to voters of color immediately turned hostile. . . .
“Why should Black voters trust you after you have used language like that?” Scott said.
“Well first of all, I don’t think I’ve ever been asked a question in such a horrible manner,” Trump said, calling the interview “disgraceful” and criticizing a “rude introduction.” He alleged he was invited under a “false pretense” because he had expected his opponent to be there as well and criticized the organizers for starting late.”
The NYT was a bit more nuanced, but still took pokes at Trump. Election Live Updates: Trump Questions Harris’s Black Identity in Combative Interview
“Mr. Trump was questioned immediately on his rhetoric about race and complained that he was getting a “very rude introduction.” He was pressed about his fellow Republicans describing Ms. Harris as a “D.E.I. hire” and he peddled several falsehoods about his policy record relating to Black communities. . . .
Mr. Trump’s appearance in Chicago began more than an hour late and immediately turned confrontational. He complained about the audio equipment and mispronounced Ms. Harris’s first name, prompting a correction from the crowd. The audience gasped and scoffed at times as he repeated falsehoods about his record and court cases. . . . [emphases added]
About that so-called audio delay, the Times adds that:
About 45 minutes before Trump took the stage, the former president pushed back on NABJ staffers who wanted to live fact check the event, according to a person familiar with the planning. The board pushed back against the last minute demand. When Trump took the stage, he said the delay was due to NABJ’s audio issues.”
Politico: Hostile Trump takes the stage at Black journalists’ conference
Yahoo News: Donald Trump, At NABJ Convention, Claims Kamala Harris “Made A Turn And Became Black,” Politifact Quickly Deems Comment False; White House Slams – Update
CBS News: Trump falsely attacks Kamala Harris over race, saying she “happened to turn Black”
CNN: Donald Trump falsely suggests Kamala Harris ‘happened to turn Black’
NBC News: Trump accuses Harris of deciding to ‘turn Black’ during a combative panel with Black journalists
USA Today: Gasps and groans: Trump at NABJ says Harris ‘became’ Black, and he’s not familiar with Sonya Massey
APNews: Donald Trump falsely questions Kamala Harris’ race as he appears at gathering of Black journalists
Chicago Sun-Times: Trump insults moderator, questions if Harris is Black in contentious Q&A with Black journalists in Chicago
ABC News: Donald Trump falsely questions Kamala Harris’ race as he appears at gathering of Black journalists
Austin-American Statesman: Trump questions Kamala Harris’ racial identity at NABJ, says she ‘happened to turn Black’
LA Times: Trump, in contentious interview with Black journalists, questions Kamala Harris’ Black identity
New York magazine: Trump Questions Harris’s Blackness in Train-Wreck Interview
New York Times (new front page second-to-top story): Trump Questions Harris’s Racial Identity, Saying She Only ‘Became Black’ Recently
Sky:
True! But, as you say, it’s a very minor effect that typically only happens in a few edge cases, rather than being the norm as in the US and – even moreso – the UK.
Trump big on increased H-1B migrants from India.
Harris playing down her Indian side in favor of her Black side [13% of USA] sounds like a sellout of the Indians.
Played Identity Politics, got wedged.
Still time to swap her out for Tim Walz, who looks like a balder Scotty Morrison with a mean streak, and might be good for 1 Win too?
On Kennedy, his support seems to have continued to slide since Biden dropped out. He’s polling now at an average of 5-6%, well below the +10% he was at not long ago.
DeSantis’s “Stop Woke Act” quashed by a conservative court:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODnAYsfcynM
MSNBC reports: Trump and Vnce mention/accuse Harris use “Southern accent” while addressing Georgia rally. 🙂
From memory, I have reported betting moves for the US election on two previous occasions.
As soon as Kamala became the nominee for the Democrats, she firmed in the betting. The converted odds (the way I read the betting market) to probabilities read as follows:
Trump 55%
Harris 35%
The second time I reported there was a SUBSTANTIAL move in the betting for Kamala. The converted probabilities read as follows:
Trump 51%
Harris 39%
I went on to say that if Kamala can get to 42%, Trump will get the hippy, hippy shakes. If Kamala can get to 44% it’s game on, and if Kamala can get to 47% she wins the election.
Trump then said the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard a candidate for an election say “will only have to vote once then never again”. WTF.
Trump to me, looked worried. I said you are allowed to switch, and threw something on Kamala to win the election at $2.40.
I can now officially report that Kamala has firmed yet again in the betting. The converted probabilities now read as follows:
Trump 56%
Harris 44%
Give her strength, I think she can get the cash 🙂
Ven @ #297 Thursday, August 1st, 2024 – 2:16 pm
Well it was a thing. it sent me off hunting for a Veep episode where Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s character did exactly the same thing.
Some interesting social media stats in this one:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/31/trump-truth-social-audience