Landslide in the making?

[kiaa]

FiveThirtyEight has an outstanding track record for forecasts/predictions...

Biden Now Predicted to Win 352 Electoral Votes: FiveThirtyEight

NOTE: FiveThirtyEight rates pollsters according to their historical accuracy. For the purposes of this story, the lowest possible rating for a major poll is B-. In 2016, FiveThirtyEight correctly predicted that Hillary Clinton would win the popular vote but missed with its Electoral College forecast.

All Biden has to do is hold his own in the debates, and if it shakes out from there, he's got it in the bag.

Pretty much the only other thing that can stop him, other than a consistently disastrous debate performance, is an FBI October surprise akin to the note about Anthony Weiner's computer. Yet, given how much Barr has politicized DoJ, I'm confident any such event, in the absence of damning hard evidence, which the Weiner fiasco did not include, would be dismissed by most voters. The situation has drastically changed since fall 2016.

At this point we should be weighing the likelihood of a Biden landslide (winning two+ of four: Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia and Texas). Trump performed terribly at his ABC town hall, stumbling over basic facts and looking confused and disoriented in response to voter scrutiny. There's little evidence Trump is preparing for Tuesday night. What if Biden cleans his clock? If that happens, will voters react to it, or are minds already made up, come what may?

Given that there is no serious third party bid happening now, the only factors beyond Biden's control that could bring on an upset are massive, massive problems with mail ballots. Possible scenarios (combination?):

1) Low info, confused voters make disqualifying mistakes on large numbers of mail ballots
2) Large numbers just forget to mail their ballots on time
3) Technicalities, such as Pennsylvania's naked ballot rule, disqualify a disastrous number
4) Some kind of discouragement or intimidation happens that causes minorities to stay home

None of which bear deep thinking on, certainly not dread. If it happens, it happens. People will have to deal with it. I don't see these factors turning the election except in a closer-than-anticipated vote or a true democratic (small d) disaster.

This whole process might prove to be fairly boring, as boring as President Biden probably will be any given day. And that's fine. I'll be fine with being bored. The US badly needs some peace and quiet. If the GOP really tries to illegally cling to power, heads will have to roll... but otherwise, you guys should be ready to move on and focus on governing, not politics, at this point.

Of course we should always have one in mind. It's not over until it's over, and nobody should become overconfident, just because Biden currently has adequate voter support to win, were the election held today. That still doesn't mean anything.

Comments

[acequeenking]

It's always worth noting that Trump's chances are basically 1 in 4; down past extremely likely to win re-election, but certainly not down and out. Good polls are good, but Clinton's chances to win were also high (534 forecasted 71% likelyhood of Clinton victory versus 28% Trump in 2016.)

2016 was a terribly close election. This does not look to be shaping up to be one; Biden doesn't have a lot of the unique fragilities Clinton had, for better or worse.

But. There are only two things that I am worried about in regards to the election:

1) Voter Suppression - The ugly truth of US presidential elections is that a candidate can win by hundreds of thousands, even millions of votes, and have it not count because those votes aren't in the right places. I don't doubt that Biden will carry the popular vote, but it's all going to come down to the swing states. I would be very surprised if Texas (who is suppressing as hard as it can, currently appealing the court striking down their decision to have a single ballot drop-off for 4.5 million people) or Georgia (had a great deal of election malarky last election, then conveniently erased the back-ups so no one could examine it) go Dem. Arizona and NC are still very close in the polls. Florida is a dead heat.

Voter suppression efforts hurt democrats a lot more than republicans for a wide variety of factors, and with the high polls I think it's more likely than not that we could see democrats in key states decide "I'm not waiting outside in the cold/taking time off work/etc, Biden has it in the bag" and go home.

2) Faithless Electors/Take it to the Court - I think this one is more of a doomsday scenario, but IF there is a close election, I can see republican electors in states where dems unexpectedly win the popular vote going "Wait a darn minute, I don't HAVE to vote for the person who won my state, #voterfraud, #maga" in a key state (Texas, Georgia, Pennsylvania, etc., among others, don't forbid doing this, and don't assess any penalty) and it winds up swinging the election for trump. This will probably wind up in court, but a conservative court (and the trump administration has spend a lot of time packing courts) will probably uphold the electoral college rather than the will of the people. (And technically, the legal precident is there for this, see Ray v. Blair, which describes electors as "free agents, to exercise an independent and nonpartisan judgment as to the men best qualified for the Nation's highest offices." though obviously "nonpartisan" is a bit of a joke in this scenario.)

Honestly, though, I'm more worried about what will happen AFTER the election if Biden wins. Trump has already been plenty unhinged in the last four years: what will he do with the last two months?

I cannot wait for America to get back to boring tbqh.

[ex_flameandsong751]

I truly want to believe that 538 is right and that Biden is going to nail it. However, many of us were very certain in 2016 that Clinton was going to win, and she did not. One of the things I learned from 2016 is not to trust polls and predictions and assume we'll be "safe". And there are special issues in 2020: there are voter suppression tactics happening right now, especially with voting by mail, and some of us in high-risk groups for COVID who are demographically most likely to vote Democrat and should be voting by mail are potentially taking our lives into our hands to go out to a crowded poll to vote in-person. I also do see taking it to the court as more than just a doomsday scenario, I think Trump is exactly the kind of drama llama who would insist the Supreme Court handle any sort of close election, and since the Supreme Court has a Republican majority I don't think I need to spell out how that's going to go.

So while Biden doesn't have the same baggage Clinton does, I also think it's too soon to rest easy just yet, and the sort of overconfidence that produces not voting because "he has it nailed" is exactly what our side doesn't need. I *do* appreciate seeing this post because it helps me to panic a little less about Trump getting re-elected, it's a break from all the doomscrolling and a reminder there's still hope, but I can't completely stop panicking just yet. :P

I do hope Biden will win, I look forward to things being boring for awhile.

[oportet]

Todays news could be considered an October surprise, but it feels a little early (even if it is October, which many people say it is). Is it big enough to change minds and interesting enough to hold attention for 3 weeks? Doesnt feel like it - doesnt seem like enough for Republicans to count on.

I dont doubt he has the lead, but 352 seems a bit high for any candidate - especially Biden.

[jazzyjj]

I, too, would like to think that these polls are correct which have Biden and Harris in the lead. But I guess one never knows what could happen now. What I will say though is that I find all this most interesting. I already voted by mail, and it honestly wasn't as painful as I thought it would be. It was most certainly just as straightforward a decision, but I thought it was going to be more painful.