ThatOneKrazyKaptain @ ThatOneKrazyKaptain @lemmy.world

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TL:DR The lower number of undecideds also means that less of them need to break for Trump to give a win, even with the gap between Popular Vote and Electoral College predicted to shrink significantly. Polls have been very accurate at predicting the baseline support, it's the undecideds they suck at guessing.

Trump's baseline just hit 46.1%, 2016 final levels(not 2016 baseline that was barely 40%, big difference) and at the rate it's slowly creeping up could be at or close to 2020 final levels, 46.8%. Harris has been stuck at 48 and a half points for a bit. Assuming this trend holds another 4 weeks we're looking at something like 48.8 to 46.8 baseline nationally or in that general area. Some of those undecideds are going for third parties, likely more left leaning ones.

All that accounting for if Trump wins just half the undecideds the final result gap would be around 2 points, similar to 2016 if not slightly smaller, which is probably a Trump win. He's converted enough to diehards he's gone from needing 2/3+ to just half. And Trump won with the undecideds both prior elections. Harris is improving, absolutely, but the changing third party situation is a braking factor absorbing and neutralizing it to a degree(in 2020 and especially 2016 Trump was bleeding more votes to guys like Gary Johnson, Jo Jorgenson, Rocky De Le Fuente, and Evan McMullin. This year the third party composition has shifted left thanks to the rise of the PSL, strengthing of the Greens, RFK Jr killing the small right wing bloc, and Libertarian infighting.). So this change was a net negative and Harris's growth has been somewhat absorbed in neutralizing this. That's also probably why Trump's raw base total is up, among other things a lot of hardliner Hoppean or Rothbardian LIbertarians jumped ship to him when Chase Oliver and the moderates won the party.

Take a swing state for example. Less accurate overall, but just a hypothetical, and it's a clean "get the most votes and it's yours" so no need to guess ratios. According to 538, There's 4 and a half points not locked in, Harris is leading by 0.4-0.7 and it's fluctuating day to day. Pennsylvania isn't a super 3rd party happy state compared to some of the sunbelt, and PSL and Cornel didn't get on, so that's a bit more favorable. Let's say 1 point goes to third party, a bit more Harris thanks to the internal shifts, but not by much. Of of the remaining 3.5, if 63% were to go to Trump, that's it, even with the best case 0.8 point base lead Harris loses. If it's more like 0.4 Trump just needs around 55% of the undecideds. That's it. And this state is better in the third party spread than some others. Trump won more than those numbers from them the last two elections.

538 has Trump's support at his 2016 final levels. This is relevant to note because, in both prior elections, the polls were extremely good at predicting the baseline margins from diehards and registered, and the error came from badly guessing the undecideds wrong.

Unless this is the first election in a long long time to actually get the baseline wrong or literally 100% of the undecideds go to Harris, Trump's got above 2016 in raw percentage totals basically locked in(in 2016 a ton of people went third party so neither he or Hillary actually crossed 50 percent, Hillary was 48.2 and Trump 46.1). In 2020 it was 46.8 for Trump and 51.3% for Biden. If things continue to trend that way Trump will be close to his 2020 total percentage locked in and thus will almost certainly be higher in the final count. The people genuinely leaving Trump will mostly be former undecideds, not the people locked in, so this number isn't being shifted as much. That does suggest that, even with his general ceiling region not shifting a ton, he's probably set to break 47% in the final number if not more (Trump was polling sub-45 in both 2016 and 2020 so 48 is also plausible).

This matters mostly because not every undecided is going to break for Harris or Trump, there will be people sticking third party who most polls lump in with them or at least contribute to the 'Not Harris or Trump' number, and this is one of the few areas where the general trend is not in Harris's favor. Just broadly speaking this is the most left-wing Third Party batch we've had since 2000.

As much as people love to say voting third party helps Republicans, that hasn't been the case in a while, the Libertarians have been the strongest for a long while and they usually siphon off more Republicans, especially Anti-Trump Ron Paul types. They probably cost Trump Georgia in 2020. But the Libertarian party has been in a state of collapse since 2022, there was an attempted takeover by a hard right clique, which lead to a nasty party schism that left the party not cooperating, then a ton of Hardliners defected to Trump when the Moderates got control of the primaries, and then to make matters worse RFK joined in around that time taking most of the right wing moderates and leaving the Left Libertarians to put Chase Oliver on the ticket. So a ton of Libertarian voters either left with the hardliners for Trump a year ago or left for RFK who in turn endorsed Trump likely redirecting some more of them to him, and what's left is the most Left-Wing Libertarian the party has run since the 1970s.

Then there's the fact the Constitution Party has been steadily weakening for years, they lost their status as the Number 3 Third Party in 2020 to the PSL, and this year they had a schism between the Mormon and Protestant factions. They also mostly take Republican Votes. Or the fact the usual coalition of small right wing parties all working together to back one candidate(Rocky De Le Fuente last time) are all gone. Why? They all hitched to RFK Jr, and he dropped out too late for any of them to pick new guys. (That I honestly suspect was the real goal of his candiacy. Wipe out the small right wing third parties and weaken the Libertarians).

On the other foot, the Greens are proportionally stronger as Jill Stein has better name recognition than Howie, the Party for Socialism and Liberation is surging with youth support and is set to break their all time record again, and Cornel West...exists.

It could be far worse, lawsuits kept most of them off of most Swing States, Nevada kept the Green Party off and has the Constitution Party, and Pennsylvania and Arizona only have the Greens and Libertarians. Wisconsin and Michigan also still have RFK Jr on them despite Cornel West and Claudia being there. But it's still way more left leaning than normal just from the Libertarian crisis and lack of small right parties even without those new guys.

Let's say around 1.5% of the undecideds go Third Party. Lower than 2020, way way lower than 2016, about on parr with previous years. It's going to be mostly people who would otherwise vote democrat. The Popular Vote to Electoral College margin is supposed to be quite a bit less this year, but sub-Hillary margins nationally are probably a loss. So Harris wants a 2 point lead and there's around 98.5% available. It's gonna be tight.

Minor Vance win overall since he had lower expectations going in and Walz got that one unfortunate extremely clippable misspeak. Vance refusing to admit Trump lost in 2020 and his Springfield...thing though cost him any chance of a rout, which is basically required for a VP debate to have significant upballot effects. Still the Republicans probably appreciate getting Vance above Sarah Parin and Aaron Burr and getting the media distracted for another day or two.

Fuck that "I've become friends with school shooters" misspeak is gonna be clipped to hell isn't it

I will say this debate is inherently riskier than the last one simply because JD Vance is already at his floor. He's the most unpopular VP or VP candidate in history. Worse than Sarah Palin, worse than Spiro Agnew, worse than Aaron Burr.
He loses, nothing changes, he cannot go lower barring Mark Robinson tier revelations and even then I have doubts. He wins, Walz slips a point or two, Harris by extension maybe 1/4th of a point.

Really anything that can stop the bleed for the Republicans is a win for them, October is critical. Harris rode a 6 week high after getting in at the end of July, spent the first two weeks undoing the pit Biden had dug, then got boosts from the VP pick and convention that lasted until early September. Trump finally had trends on his side and the debate utterly wrecked that. That's finally fading again so they really are seeking a win, a screw up here could be too late to wait out and Vance getting some good press could bury stuff like the Uncle Robinson(no relation) disaster.

The other problem is that he's young, really young, Teddy young. JD Vance is young enough he can fake it for a little bit in a way Trump is just too old to do these days. He's baitable, but not to the level of Trump or even Biden in this environment. Young Narcissists can put on a face for a while in a controlled space like this, 80s Trump did it all the time and I'd argue Vance might be sharper than him.

I don't think it's a bad matchup, Walz is very wholesome and more experienced(and the reverse would be very unideal for the Democrats. Vance would be better at avoiding the massive tangents Harris baited Trump into, meanwhile Walz isn't as high energy or effective on the pursuit against Trump as Harris is) , but he definitely 'looks' and 'sounds' older than he is, especially compared to Harris. So Walz is walking in with that already there.

Still got the 5th most votes of any presidential candidate ever. (1st is Biden 2020 and 2nd is Trump 2020, 3rd is 08 Obama, 4th is 2012 Obama)

Also that second to last point isn't 100%, but there's a lot of rumor and evidence to suggest the plan at the end of Clinton's term was to bring in Gore, and then either when he lost or ran out his terms JFK Jr. was to be the next guy in line. Him dying and Al Gore losing put them in a tough spot in 2004.

I will note the idea Harris was picked at the 2020 primaries is bunk, people don't vote on a President/VP ticket then(though that would be an interesting system). Harris was picked by Biden, and while she was on the 2020 ticket in the national election it's impossible to say how many people she swayed.

I don't think she's perfect, but unlike Hillary at least Harris was picked by circumstance, even if unfortunate circumstance, not appointed years in advance like Hillary was. (Hillary had been intending to go for it after she gained some political experience and Bill's scandal faded. Al Gore was supposed to carry the democrats, but that didn't work out, and JFK Jr who was being courted for a 2004 run died in a plane crash in 1999, so they had to work with John Kerry which didn't go well. Then Hillary was ready and initially had party favor, but Obama came in like a locomotive without brakes: All the DNC's horses and all the RNCs men couldn't stop Obama in 08, no my friend)

Today is an all time high on slightly right leaning RCP, and a slight rebound on 538(But not to 12th/13th/15th levels). More like 16th or 11th evening. RCP tends to lag a bit on D rises and vice versa for 538 so we'll see. Still suggests the overall strong growth trend passed and we're nearing a ceiling. Not a bad ceiling, a winning ceiling, but it's there.

Canadian, not my fight. Our liberals ain't doing so good

Before anyone starts getting a bit too high off their own supply Harris's polling averages peaked on August 12th. They were stagnant or declining on the 13th and 14th, briefly spiked on the 15th, and that spike was completely undone on the 16th. Today is dropping again. Not big drops, like 1/10th of a point every other day(which day depends on which conglomerates you use), but the growth trend is over.

Decided to check since people said Trump was scrambling for endorsements. No former president or former vice president alive supports him. Most of the failed candidates for both don't either(Romney, Ryan). Sarah Palin is the only VP Candidate willing to back him.

That's literally what I said, hence I feel like this poll was off-there. Might have been too red in Nevada tho.
\ If Georgia is a toss up North Carolina is lean red. Nevada probably isn't that red though

Ehhhh. Where does CPR lean? The fact that Nevada is 3 points red and North Carolina is more blue than Georgia is...odd. Right leaning polls tend to show Nevada as really close, centrist polls too, I get it has a small sample size, but that's odd. Also NC turning while Georgia holds is weird, the trends are similar in both states, but Georgia was blue-er last time.

In terms of the averages Georgia is still red, and this solidifies Nevada. NC has too many other red polls for this to change that. Does push Arizona into dead even or lean blue average and Pennsylvania solidly into lean blue.

That really only effects the question if Georgia is the last state to matter which is highly unlikely in most scenarios (If it goes Blue it's a 2020 repeat and if it goes Red there's tight races elsewhere to focus on like Arizona and Pennsylvania). Not the question.

If I recall correctly Gore (probably) won with a full state wide recount, but in the counties he asked for he ironically (probably) would have ended up losing. I say probably because both of these are tight enough to be within the margin of error. Or fix the butterfly ballot issue. Of course Gore also only won New Mexico by a 366 votes so who knows what that would have ended up with if either side actually cared(not enough EC to matter if they lost Florida, but still dead close and recounts probably favored Bush).

That doesn't really answer the final question though. Is it going to be called Election Day like 7 of the 11? The day after(or really the morning after) like 2004 or 2016? Is it going to last days like 2020? Or weeks like in 2000?

Off topic, but looking for an active thread.

How long do you think counting will take this year?

Out of the 11 elections in the current (6th) party system, 7 of them were called before midnight on election day. (1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2008, and just barely 2012 although that only just barely got called before midnight). Out of the other 4: 2016 was called about 2 hours after midnight and 2004 was called about 10 hours after midnight(so both the next morning). 2020 took about 3 days to call, albeit there was no concession here so the exact end-time isn't clear. 2000 took over a month infamously.

Also the Ohio thing makes sense when you look at the Senate map. There are exactly two remotely competitive races, Montana and Ohio. Ohio is leaning blue and Montana is leaning red. Picking JD boosts Ohio and Trump is campaigning in Montana right now. Those choices were both made when Biden was still in so seemingly the idea was to secure the Senate and grab an extra seat or two so it's not razor tight and vulnerable to RINOs.

I just heard her speak for the first time today.

Better than Joe, but I don't think she's Obama tier. That man was king of the mic.

If an exact average between 2016 and 2020 were to happen the final score would be 272-268 narrow Republican victory. Though both Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are razor thin on average leaning less than 1/4 a percent either way. Nothing shown here had an average trend of above 10% margins(Nothing 60-40 or greater).

I also note the states considered 'swing states' are the 5 FULL states in the middle, plus the closest one on each side. That wasn't intentional on my part, it's sorted by margins, but that's evidence enough to me it's not completely broken.

New Hampshire and Minnesota are the weakest 'solid blue' states while Florida and Texas are the weakest 'solid red' states(Albeit due to raw numbers the latter are stronger). I also note the 4 'Old' Swing states used from 2000-2016 to predict elections (Iowa, Ohio, Florida, and Virginia) are all still here and are still closer than average. Ohio and Florida especially, though Iowa and Virginia are both trending a bit more left and right than average recently.

Off-scale the next tightest Blue States are Oregon and New Jersey, the next tightest Red States are South Carolina and Alaska. Again, doesn't account for trends (Alaska is probably blue-er than South Carolina without the green party, and New Jersey is absolutely redder than Oregon atm)