2 More Funny Feelings About 2020

[babylonsister]

2 More Funny Feelings About 2020
With 14 days until the election, it’s time to inch even farther out on that limb.
By TIM ALBERTA
10/20/2020 04:30 AM EDT
Tim Alberta is chief political correspondent at Politico Magazine.

snip//

The problem for Trump? That holdout of college-educated white men is breaking—and not in his direction.

Twice in the past week, I’ve been given reliable polling from the ground in battleground states that suggests something that was once unthinkable: Trump is losing college-educated white men for the first time in his presidency. The margins aren’t huge, but they are consistent with a trend line that dates to 2018, when Republicans carried this demographic by just 4 points. What the numbers suggest—in both private and public polling—is that Biden is no longer just walloping Trump among white women in the suburbs, he’s pulling ahead with white men there, as well.

We shouldn’t get carried away with this just yet. Republicanism is deep in the DNA of many of these voters, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see a last-minute lurch back in the direction of their political home.

Still, the fact that Trump is sweating college-educated white men two weeks out from Election Day tells you everything you need to know about the state of the race at this moment. There has been growing speculation of late, among the sharpest minds in the political class, about a blowout in November—the sort of landslide victory for Biden that we haven’t seen in decades. There’s hardly any guarantee of that happening; Trump still clings to a stubborn path to victory, albeit a narrow one.

But if it does happen—if the floodgates open and Trump is washed out by a historic blue wave—we will look to unlikely groups of voters as the reason why. One of those groups has gotten plenty of ink: seniors. But keep an eye on college-educated white men as the other.

2. We’re overthinking this campaign

More than 219,000 Americans are dead from a global pandemic. Millions of adults are home from work and millions of kids are home from school. The streets of big cities and small towns have been convulsing with anger and protest and even sporadic violence.

All of this is politically significant. All of it has contributed to an election-year environment that is fundamentally detrimental to the incumbent.

But if Trump loses, the biggest factor won’t be Covid-19 or the economic meltdown or the social unrest. It will be his unlikability.

more...

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/10/20/alberta-two-weeks-2020-election-feelings-430238

[Wounded Bear]

1. Wait, whut?

I thought college educated white men voted Dem? Am I crazy. It was non-college educated white men that dominated the Trump coalition.

Have I gone through the looking glass?

[Silver Gaia]

3. I share your confusion. WTF?

[Turin_C3PO]

6. No, I believe college educated men

support Trump generally by a fair margin. With non college educated men, the margin Trump wins is huge.

[GusBob]

2. Regarding #2

One political science forecaster I follow claims Trump had this election lost before the pandemic.

This forecaster nailed 2018 prediction

[Wounded Bear]

4. Given how Dems have been registering and organizing since Jan 2017...

I believe this. I don't think Trump was ever in that strong of a position for re-election.

[Boogiemack]

5. If college educated white men want to find college educated white women, they had better

shape up and get their politics together. The numbers are not in their favor. Of course if they are content with Barbie Dolls then...

[DeminPennswoods]

7. Beer quote

This was my favorite paragraph:

Generations of pollsters and journalists have fixated on the question of which candidate voters would rather have a beer with—a window into how personality translates into political success. Here’s the thing: Americans have been having a beer with Trump for the past four years—every morning, every afternoon, every evening. He has made himself more accessible than any president in history, using the White House as a performance stage and Twitter as a real-time diary for all to read. Like the drunk at the bar, he won’t shut up.

[babylonsister]

9. Ain't THAT the truth! Go away already! nt

[Demsrule86]

8. +1000 Exactly what I think.