2020 U.S. Presidential elections

[Salome]

In 2016, it was, how likely is Trump to be elected, and, if God forbid, he wins, how bad can he be?"

Something that often gets lost in this discussion is that it is historically very difficult for any party in the US to hold onto the executive for three consecutive elections. All the grievances of eight years — fair or not — create unique obstacles. In my lifetime Dems have lost that critical battle twice. Both times only because the GOP cheated and we still carried the popular vote.

Also there were a lot of people who foolishly thought Trump would be a secular president as opposed to a wanna be autocrat. That can no longer be argued.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Positive Trump polls spark polling circle debate

Most pollsters show Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden with a sturdy and stable lead over President Trump at a time when tens of millions of people have already voted and there is almost no …

thehill.com

TLDR; polls could be skewed by a series of rather suspicious outliers, all of which were commissioned by a particular Republican organisation.

 

[Salome]

TLDR; polls could be skewed by a series of rather suspicious outliers, all of which were commissioned by a particular Republican organisation.

Specifically, this guy (who remains one of the pollsters that doesn’t provide a transparent methodology):

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Specifically, this guy (who remains one of the pollsters that doesn’t provide a transparent methodology):

Don't judge a book by its cover, and There is no art/To find the mind's construction in the face, and all that, but while the poor man can't help the way he looks, I guess, he can certainly help that apology for a beard AND THE BOW TIE!!!!

HIs appearance doesn't fill me with confidence, is all I can say.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

He should hope his methodology is not as sloppy as that knot.

 

[Salome]

I guess, he can certainly help that apology for a beard AND THE BOW TIE!!!!

HIs appearance doesn't fill me with confidence, is all I can say.

And that’s when he’s all spiffy and cleaned up for TV.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

He should hope his methodology is not as sloppy as that knot.

The only men I've known who can tie bow ties properly are old Etonians, since that's part of the school uniform.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

I learned to tie one as part of the uniform for the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

 

[danielravennest]

So, this is what 538 says the map would look like if the polls right now were as wrong as they were in 2016. Keep in mind, we have no indications that any of the race-tightening factors following the Comey announcement in 2016 are being repeated now.

It's too late for any late news to have much of an effect. As of this moment 96.7 million votes have already been received, plus whatever is in transit in the mail or arrived at election offices but not tallied yet. That's an astonishing 71% of the 2016 total. The White House has gone into lockdown, and they are putting up fences again like they had in the summer. All of their attempts at Biden scandals have blown up or failed. The pandemic is at record levels, and that's the top issue in people's minds. Stuff like trying to disenfranchise 127,000 voters in Texas (failed in state and federal court) or trying to stop a campaign bus by force are not going to gain them any new voters.

 

[Sid]

It is November 3 in most parts of the world already!! Finally the day has come.

 

[danielravennest]

Again, Pennsylvania will take another 2 days at least after the election. But a blowout in Florida would be a very good sign.

Pennsylvania Attorney General has tweeted "The election is over when the last vote is counted". That's to push back on Trump saying they should stop at midnight on election day. And truly, Donnie has no say in this. The election is done when the respective states certify the results. That can take a couple of weeks, while they double check things. The news media calls a state when there are fewer votes left to count than the difference between the candidates. That's typically when 90+% of the precincts have reported in.

 

[Salome]

I learned to tie one as part of the uniform for the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

 

[danielravennest]

I wonder how (local) taxes are collected, if people don't have to officially register the place where they live.

Property tax bills are sent to the property owner in the county tax records. Income taxes are mostly collected by employers. Sales taxes are collected at checkout for the purchase. I get two property tax bills, from the county and from the city within the county.

 

[danielravennest]

No, it’s not.

The only reason we’re sweating this election at all is because of what we may not know about vote tampering and suppression efforts. There is nothing else that indicates this race is close.

Comparing it to 2016 is faulty for many reasons, but the main ones are:

7) A huge percentage of people have already voted, and a number of states report party affiliation in their statistics. So we already have some actual data from those states to compare to polls.

 

[danielravennest]

This is a whole other thing that I don’t think a lot of people are prepared for, yes.

Plywood sales for boarding up windows are through the roof, and some state national guards and city police forces are on standby. So some people are prepared.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

I wonder how (local) taxes are collected, if people don't have to officially register the place where they live.

In the UK, we are required to register our address with the local council to pay council tax, just as we need register with the utility companies, ISP, insurance company, bank and so on.

That's separate registrations for different purposes, and it's the person responsible for paying the particular bill or tax who has to register. Other members of the household don't, or not for most purposes.

We don't have one single central mandatory registration for everyone, and there would be great public hostility, which I would share, to the idea of introducing one.

 

[Sid]

We don't have one single central mandatory registration for everyone, and there would be great public hostility, which I would share, to the idea of introducing one.

I personal find the mandatory registration very convenient.
- automatic voter registration for all 4 different elections we have.
- automatic address changes for health insurance, pension funds, all taxes, banks.
Basically every institution that is allowed to use our BSN numbers for their administration (Every Dutch citizen has an unique BSN number) gets your new adress information automatically.

And let's face it, government knows were you live in the UK as well.
We only have a more direct centralized approach.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

As I've said before, stop being sensible. Unfortunately, elections are run by states and according to the Federal Constitution, various State Constitutions, Federal law, State law, and county Boards of Elections. There is no central registry, or even a consistent registration system. The only strong Federal law on registration requires all Motor Vehicle offices (run by states and counties) to offer voter registration. And they only manage that by threatening to withhold federal transportation funds for states that don't. State registration systems don't communicate, so unless you live in the state you were born in, your state does not have birth or citizenship records to use for automatic registration.

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

 

[Innula Zenovka]

I personal find the mandatory registration very convenient.
- automatic voter registration for all 4 different elections we have.
- automatic address changes for health insurance, pension funds, all taxes, banks.
Basically every institution that is allowed to use our BSN numbers for their administration (Every Dutch citizen has an unique BSN number) gets your new adress information automatically.

And let's face it, government knows were you live in the UK as well.
We only have a more direct centralized approach.

You have an existing system that works.

We don't, and based on HMG's track record with major IT projects over the last 20 years I have absolutely no confidence whatsoever in their ability to commision or run a project of anything like that size, nor I do I trust them to keep it secure, thus jeopardizing all the other data linked to it.

We're getting a live demonstration right now of how good HMG are at large IT projects with the world beating (TM) track and trace app that we've been saddled with.