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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 28, 2024

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It’s hard not to view this as just the latest in a long string of people lighting their credibility on fire for a tiny chance of stopping bad orange man. It seems to run contrary to every other piece of evidence: polls, registration, early voting, “vibes.”

A Trump blowout still seems like the most likely scenario to me. There is just too much going in Trump’s favor relative to the very close 2020 election.

The idea that abortion is going to cause a massive polling error in favor of Harris is just a blatant wish fulfillment fantasy. There is no evidence for it. It’s completely made up. Even in 2022 the polls underestimated Republicans slightly, they just didn’t miss as badly as they did with Trump so people misremember them as overestimating Republicans.

Odds are the polls will underestimate Trump like they always do, meaning it will be a Trump blowout. The “right leaning” pollsters haven’t changed anything about what they do, and the gap between them and the polling average is the same as ever. This strongly suggests nobody has changed anything, meaning they will be wrong in exactly the same way.

The phenomenon isn't unique to the left. Sidney Powell torched her career for no reason last time. Occasionally, people (even smart ones) just self immolate pointlessly. There but (mostly) for the grace of God go I

Most people who have blown their credibility against Trump have blown it the first or second or billionth time he's been on the brink of starting the Fourth Reich or whatever. Selzer hasn't: her results in both 2016 and 2020 were consistent with Trump's margins.

I guess she's nearing retirement, so maybe she wants to blow all her reputational capital in one go on orange man bad.

But I would not be happy if that were my only explanation for her results.

Which results? The final poll? Or the poll before the final poll? Because she showed Biden and Trump tied in September in 2020. Why do we test her against only one poll?

It’s hard not to view this as just the latest in a long string of people lighting their credibility on fire for a tiny chance of stopping bad orange man. It seems to run contrary to every other piece of evidence: polls, registration, early voting, “vibes.”

A Trump blowout still seems like the most likely scenario to me. There is just too much going in Trump’s favor relative to the very close 2020 election.

We've only got a few days to wait so we'll see. But how willing are you to consider that rather than your ideological opponents willfully blinding themselves, it is perhaps you?

I've got no horse in this race; I suppose I would prefer Harris wins but it would certainly be funnier if Trump does. Seems like this pollster has a sterling track record. I'm not sure why your initial response would be blanket denial.

She has gotten a lot of things off. You are being shown a curated list to prove she is right and only looking at the final poll.

I don’t know why after the insanity of the past 8 years, your initial reaction to something absurd like this wouldn’t be blanket denial.

This pollster also shared the results with Kamala surrogates well in advance. People tweeted rumors about it yesterday. Apparently a surrogate let it slip by accident, not realizing the poll wasn’t released yet. So a pollster colluded with Democrats and released an absurd “momentum shifting” poll 3 days before the election, but your default response is to take it at face value? I have a bridge to sell you, man.

So a pollster colluded with Democrats and released an absurd “momentum shifting” poll 3 days before the election, but your default response is to take it at face value? I have a bridge to sell you, man.

Well, we've got three days to see. I'm willing to eat crow if I'm wrong.