Politics 20/20 now with extra hindsight!

[InsaneCommander]

Look on the bright side, at least the election day was peaceful, just like the Simpsons predicted.

[Bartimaeus]

59 minutes ago, 213374U said:

I get what you're saying but... that kinda runs in the face of process standardization practices. Inefficiency and obsolescence aren't generally considered factors contributing to a system's security -- rather the opposite.

Further, and I may be wrong, it looks to me that you wouldn't need to run a massive nation-wide fraud campaign to disrupt the election anyway. Seems that targeting a few select districts would be enough.

All Democrats really needed to do was target Miami-Dade in Florida and shift the margins back to how much Clinton won them by and Biden would likely have Florida...and probably nobody would've even noticed. Amateur hour here, .

[Guard Dog]

1 hour ago, 213374U said:

 

Further, and I may be wrong, it looks to me that you wouldn't need to run a massive nation-wide fraud campaign to disrupt the election anyway. Seems that targeting a few select districts would be enough.

There is no way to know what districts will be important before the fact. That is why it's so hard to "steal" an election. If I'd said ahead of time Nevada might well decide the whole thing before Tuesday it would have sounded like a stretch.  

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

It shows how much of a clustercuss the election system is when a turnout for a county can decide an election in favor of someone who is on track to lose the popular vote by 4 million.

I do believe there is voter fraud in this election, simply by size it would be surprising if there wasn't. However if it tracks with recent cases of fraud it won't even amount to a rounding error, let alone decide the election. More relevant than maybe a few hundred cases of voter fraud (to be extremely generous) is how many mail in ballots were discarded and how it just so happened to occur to Black and Latino voters at a significantly higher frequency. Of course there is a reason folks like "The Reactionary Imperative" and other Trump stans are more concerned about the non-issue.

[Darkpriest]

Funny thing is, claims about voter supression are as valid as the ones about fraudulent votes, especially during the counts behind closed gates and done by democrat hired people. The delays do not help in calming down Trump supporters. If everything would be counted in BEFORE the close of election polls, then it would not give as much of the room to such claims. 

 

Edited November 5, 2020 by Darkpriest

[Guard Dog]

Did Biden get an edge from Libertarian vote in critical swing states?

Quote

“In this election, Libertarian voters could have swung the Electoral College by at least 22 votes by supporting Trump in battleground states Wisconsin, Michigan and Nevada. By throwing away their votes, they’ve likely become spoilers for the Trump reelection effort,” political strategist Ryan Cassin, CEO of Beast Digital, told Fox News.

Hey as---le voting for a candidate you believe in, especially when it's the ONLY candidate you believe in is not "throwing your vote away".

Quote

“The tragedy of wasting votes on hopeless candidates is that instead of getting someone who agrees with you on 80% of the issues, you risk getting someone who disagrees with you on almost everything,” Cassin conjectured. “In 2020, that means the threat of Supreme Court-packing, halting our economic recovery, reversing decades of work achieving energy independence, and putting the most liberal U.S. senator a heartbeat away from the presidency.”

I'm sorry... who are you talking about here? Who agrees with us 80%. You don't mean Republicans do you? Not even close to 80%.

Look, if you want to get Libertarian votes then BE more libertarian. We are not disaffected Republicans and Democrats. We are a separate and distinct ideology. 

[Bartimaeus]

14 minutes ago, KaineParker said:

It shows how much of a clustercuss the election system is when a turnout for a county can decide an election in favor of someone who is on track to lose the popular vote by 4 million.

I do believe there is voter fraud in this election, simply by size it would be surprising if there wasn't. However if it tracks with recent cases of fraud it won't even amount to a rounding error, let alone decide the election. More relevant than maybe a few hundred cases of voter fraud (to be extremely generous) is how many mail in ballots were discarded and how it just so happened to occur to Black and Latino voters at a significantly higher frequency. Of course there is a reason folks like "The Reactionary Imperative" and other Trump stans are more concerned about the non-issue.

It will be a great boon to our election process if/when the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact goes into effect over the next decade or two.

Edited November 5, 2020 by Bartimaeus

[Darkpriest]

10 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

It will be a great boon to our election if/when the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact goes into effect over the next decade or two.

Not sure if less populous states will be happy with this solution. Wouldn't it be a road to the end of the federation and some states going their own way? 

 

Edit: I mean, if you'd look at the map by counties, there wouldn't be many resources to go by in the blue areas and the red ones would be self sustainable. 

Edited November 5, 2020 by Darkpriest

[Hurlshort]

10 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

 

Edit: I mean, if you'd look at the map by counties, there wouldn't be many resources to go by in the blue areas and the red ones would be self sustainable. 

What map are you looking at? Some of the states that rely heaviest on federal government monies are very red.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

If you view minor party voters as disaffected Republicans or Democrats who are still invested in keeping the big other out of office, then viewing votes for Jorgenson or Hawkins as throwing the vote away is consistent. The error is in assuming that minor party voters are disaffected Rs or Ds and not people outside such parties but still devoted to electoral politics. Given how GD declares eternal loyalty to the Libertarian Party bimonthly and how ComradeMaster pines for Jesse Ventura to run as a Green this board should understand that, but videogame enthusiasts probably do better fact checking than professional pundits.

25 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

It will be a great boon to our election process if/when the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact goes into effect over the next decade or two.

I doubt it will be accepted widely enough to make a difference, Republicans will reject it because it cuts into their big advantage and Democrats will struggle to get it in places it will matter, like Florida, Texas, and Ohio.

[Bartimaeus]

Florida, Texas, and Ohio do not matter whether or not it is accepted, except that if they adopted it, it would make it take effect that much faster. I wrote a breakdown of it earlier in the thread, but once the rest of the reliably blue states join it, effectively only one swing state (such as Pennsylvania) needs to join before it is forcibly adopted and effective:

It's still going to take time and is unlikely to be in effect by 2024, but 2028 and 2032 are realistic possibilities (although I'd say Democrats not getting control of the state legislatures they expected to this year probably will put it off for longer).

Edited November 5, 2020 by Bartimaeus

[Darkpriest]

5 minutes ago, Hurlshot said:

What map are you looking at? Some of the states that rely heaviest on federal government monies are very red.

Looking at the map of counties not the states. I'm sure the 'red' counties would be fine, as they would export much more than import. 

The point I'm trying to make here is, that votes from concentrated urban areas would always overcome less populous areas. Is this a contract you want to establish? Do you believe it will bode well to the unity of the country? Will you force them to serve metropolitan areas basically and become essentially slaves? 

 

 

[LadyCrimson]

9 minutes ago, Hurlshot said:

What map are you looking at? Some of the states that rely heaviest on federal government monies are very red.

Maybe the thought is regarding oil and other natural resources needed/wanted for our current modern way of life. A great bargaining/economic chip so to speak, to have.

Which is also a prime talking point if one thinks about another civil war or splitting the US into multiple.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Florida is one of such swing states though, as are Texas and Ohio in theory. Those states are going to be an obstacle because of their tendency to flip makes it difficult for them to get the momentum needed to join the NPVIC.

[Totally not Gorgon]

So Biden won after all and they are trying to milk it a day or two more for clicks ?

[LadyCrimson]

13 minutes ago, Darkpriest said:

The point I'm trying to make here is, that votes from concentrated urban areas would always overcome less populous areas. Is this a contract you want to establish? Do you believe it will bode well to the unity of the country? Will you force them to serve metropolitan areas basically and become essentially slaves? 

I thought the point of that act was an attempt to make the popular vote mean more.  Thus regardless whether one has large or small population, it's still a measure of the general state popular vote? Maybe I have it completely wrong tho.  I've only looked over such briefly. Or I'm lost again. 

Edited November 5, 2020 by LadyCrimson

[Bartimaeus]

12 minutes ago, KaineParker said:

Florida is one of such swing states though, as are Texas and Ohio in theory. Those states are going to be an obstacle because of their tendency to flip makes it difficult for them to get the momentum needed to join the NPVIC.

There is no need for them to join. Once 270 has been breached, then the remaining states that did not join do not matter, as all the states that did join will give their 270 votes to the winner of the popular vote while completely ignoring their own individual results. That's the entire idea. So once all reliably blue states have joined, you only need just *one* swing state to join as well, such as Pennslyvania or Georgia, to breach that 270 number. It might take a strong blue wave year for it to happen (with no corresponding red wave), but it probably will sooner or later.

Edited November 5, 2020 by Bartimaeus

[Bartimaeus]

11 minutes ago, Totally not Gorgon said:

So Biden won after all and they are trying to milk it a day or two more for clicks ?

PA is the thing that seals Trump's doom, and all the analysts still believe it is likely to go to Biden, but there is still a two point gap, and networks are likely waiting for Biden to at least take the lead before they call it - for optics' sake, if nothing else. Nevada and Georgia/Arizona would do it as well, but while the strong feeling is that Nevada will stay Biden, Arizona and Georgia are both too close to strongly say one way or the other, hence the delay.

Edited November 5, 2020 by Bartimaeus

[Katphood]

I might be wrong but it seems that Nevada have stopped counting the votes. If that is true then Biden has pretty much won the race.

[Bartimaeus]

6 minutes ago, Katphood said:

I might be wrong but it seems that Nevada have stopped counting the votes. If that is true then Biden has pretty much won the race.

Last I checked, they still have about 100k outstanding ballots, but they're expected to about break even overall (maybe mildly lead one or the other way, but not enough to change anything even if it's Trump), and analysts have suggested that it is just about callable at this point. However, Fox made an error in calling Arizona so early (even if the state ultimately does still stay Biden), because now if they call Nevada for Biden, they would reach that 270 number (and be the first to do so) when there is still genuine uncertainty about where Arizona ends up.

In other news, Senator Perdue of Georgia has fallen under 50% in his re-election bid, and it's likely to stay that way, forcing a double senatorial run-off (i.e. another election) to decide the Senate majority. It is anyone's guess as to how those two races might go with Trump off the ballot while also having them deciding the Senate. The Senate is more or less officially still in play here. A double victory would prove instrumental for the Democrats, for it would allow them to decide what is or isn't voted on in the Senate, as opposed to Mitch McConnell doing his thing in not allowing anything to be voted for.

Edited November 5, 2020 by Bartimaeus

[Katphood]

Biden was leading with 8k in Nevada, now that number is closer to 12k. Chances are looking better for Biden but who knows.

[Malcador]

Surprised AP hasn't retracted their call of Arizona.

[Amentep]

1 hour ago, Guard Dog said:

Did Biden get an edge from Libertarian vote in critical swing states?

Hey as---le voting for a candidate you believe in, especially when it's the ONLY candidate you believe in is not "throwing your vote away".

I'm sorry... who are you talking about here? Who agrees with us 80%. You don't mean Republicans do you? Not even close to 80%.

Look, if you want to get Libertarian votes then BE more libertarian. We are not disaffected Republicans and Democrats. We are a separate and distinct ideology. 

This bugs me as well; I've never been fond of the attitude that you're trying to pick a winner, like we're all betting on a horse race rather than electing representatives to act on our collective behalf within the government.

The only wasted vote is the one not cast.

[Bartimaeus]

5 minutes ago, Malcador said:

Surprised AP hasn't retracted their call of Arizona.

I think they're waiting to see it get closer before they do so, because they'd prefer to avoid having to retract it and then re-call it for Biden in the event it does stay for him. Unlike Nevada, Georgia, or Pennsylvania, the analysts I'm following don't seem to have a good grip on where the remaining votes from Arizona are or by what method they were voted for, both of which would help suggest which way they'll lean towards, so there's a lot of uncertainty. Biden might easily be called safe if a big batch comes in and favors him heavily, or it could just as easily become a nail-biter. I don't think Arizona will ultimately matter - Nevada, Georgia, and Pennsylvania are likely to go Biden, rendering it moot...and Biden only needs Nevada + either of the other two to officially win it.

Edited November 5, 2020 by Bartimaeus

[Malcador]

5 minutes ago, Amentep said:

The only wasted vote is the one not cast.

Well or for Kanye.