I hope the irony is not lost that the so-called moderate Republicans (unofficial motto: "you just think everyone who disagrees with you is racist") are the group with the most egg on their face this election cycle after the guy who cut out the middleman of discussing policy and went straight to the dog whistling beat out 16 candidates (most of whom had presumably more conservative bonafides) to win the party's nomination.

Non-bold prediction: we are about to witness the ugliest week in the history of American politics.

Many (?) will run again in 2020, so yes the irony will be lost on them.

sadly I think you are probably right.

Donald J. Trump Verified account ‏@realDonaldTrump We are now leading in many polls, and many of these were taken before the criminal investigation announcement on Friday - great in states!


So wait a minute, I thought the polls were rigged? (and you are still losing in most polls)

I'll take the under.

We had a civil war after all.

I think the week after the election will be worse.

What the Early Vote in North Carolina Means: A Daily Tracker

An analysis of North Carolina voting based on info from early voting.


Early voting looks very favorable so far for Clinton in North Carolina and Nevada, two states essential for Trump's already narrow path to 270.

Well, moderate Republicans didn't support this guy, so yeah, I think they have a right to be upset if the left lumps them in with racists.

Ehhhh...probably a semantics argument over what I meant there. That's not part of what I was talking about.

Assuming HRC wins, absolutely. But this week holds the title for a week. :D

Well there is certainly an unbiased source.

I wouldn't trust that bunch of clowns to define the word dictionary.

Left-wing lunatics with too much time on their hands and not much indication of the damned fraction of the sense to do anything useful with it.

Google alt-right and you can find a Breitbart article where Milo says the same thing, but with waaaay more words.

So I stupidly allowed myself to be dragged into a Facebook political argument with...a Trump supporter.

(not what y'all expected huh...)

:banghead:

What's important to note about NV is that Dems are pounding Republicans in early voting in Washoe County, where Reno is. And if the Republicans are losing in Reno, there's no chance Trump wins NV, and the Senate seat probably goes Dem, too.

Basic thumbnail sketch of NV - It's Las Vegas, which is heavily (D) against the rest of the state, which is (R).

Wait, not all Consevatives are the same?

Have a friend who is having a nice series of exchanges with Trump supporters. I shake my head and ignore it.

Regardless of politics and policies, and having a daughter, I just cannot vote for a serial misogynist. I can believe his stance on the wall, immigrants etc. is "flexible" but his past on women is pretty damning.

Not that they need it but the SPLC should get a lifetime pass from every freedom-loving American in this country.

"In 1987, SPLC won a case against the United Klans of America for the lynching of Michael Donald, a black teenager in Mobile, Alabama. The SPLC used an unprecedented legal strategy of holding an organization responsible for the crimes of individual members to help produce a $7 million judgment for the victim's mother. The verdict forced United Klans of America into bankruptcy. Its national headquarters was sold for approximately $52,000 to help satisfy the judgment. In 1987, five members of a Klan offshoot, the White Patriot Party, were indicted for stealing military weaponry and plotting to kill Dees."

How the fuck can anybody be AGAINST the Southern Poverty Law Center?

It's JIMG... are you really surprised?

If this late game FBI thing costs Clinton the election, it's gotta rank high among the all time greatest flops.

First rule I've learned about FB, don't get into FB debates over politics, with both Trump supporters/conservative and Hillary supporters/liberals. That's all FB has become it seems.

It would be absolutely shocking if it somehow could, so I suppose on the remote chance it happens, sure. ;)

My wife, as well, is going to vote in her first election since becoming a citizen.

That's fantastic for both your wives. Out of curiousity, what countries did they come from, what do they think of the political process/election season here, and if you don't mind saying, who are they voting for and why?

I expected the race to widen into a 10+ point lead, not tighten back to a 3-4 pt lead. I was wrong.

:withstupid:

Yeah, I was expecting that this would be the week that the "rats" (mainly nose-holders who were voting for him because Supreme Court/abortion) would see 6-12 point lead and start abandoning the sinking ship and turn it into a blowout. ("Well, if it's a sure thing he's gonna lose, at least I can tell my kids I didn't vote for that jerk!")

I still think the electoral college path looks really bad for Trump and his weak ground game is already hurting him with early votes, but I'm certainly less confident than I was a week ago.

Oh, I still think he's a long shot, but I think it might be close enough for the die-hards to decide it was rigged.

Sorry wrong place

The various shares of Trump/GOP/nonwoman/Pence have been creeping upward...now in the 31-33c range.

How has this not been posted yet? Clinton knew at least two of the questions posed to her at a debate thanks to the moderator from CNN.

Donna Brazile out at CNN amid leaks to Clinton campaign - Oct. 31, 2016

It's the week that folks like my aunt hold their nose and vote for Trump because things like these e-mails popping up show just how horrible Clinton is and that she must be stopped (and that maybe Trump isn't so bad after all?)

I think it was a couple of weeks ago. The article is vague but it was a Clinton-Sanders debate. It is probably the most damning thing in all of the wiki leaks.

And President Trump will just make his fraud and rape cases go away.

I am perfectly willing to go after the low-hanging fruit. :D

Democrat leaders rigged primary debates to influence nomination. Republican leaders be like "WHY DIDN'T WE THINK OF THAT?"

— Ben Lewis (@benelou) October 31, 2016

If Trump wins a lot of the reason will be the GOP elected officials playing a game similar to the suing foreign governments debacle. You can see in the reaction to Comey's letter that a lot of them don't want Trump to win, but they're hoping they can count on others to save the country while they play to their base.

FBI's Comey opposed naming Russians, citing election timing

Jesus will pardon him.

Less confident that Trump will not win ALL of the battleground states and a blue state?

I'm sympathetic to Comey. I think it was a damned if you do or don't.

Overall, I'm okay with Comey disclosing however I do feel that he should have been more definitive in saying "nothing has been found, don't draw any conclusions, it could well be nothing, it may not have anything on Hillary" etc. and "I am just giving you a FYI".

It has been an fascinating experience to say the least. We have been married for almost twenty years so she has viewed the process from the outside. She did predict both candidates correctly around the first Republican debate (in August?) last year. She has not let me hear the end of her being right about Trump's nomination.

I think the biggest takeaways for her looking at this as a voter have been the length of the election season (too fucking long) and the fragility of the "coalitions" under the guise of one party on both sides of the aisle. One comment she made that stood out early during this process was how most people were more aligned with with the "Democratic But" or the "Republican But" parties than anything else. As in "I am a Democrat but I am against these significant Democratic positions" or "I am a Republican but I am against these significant Republican positions." It has been a fun thought experiment to try to match different American politicians and/or policies with one of the 10+ German (her native land) party affiliations currently in the Bundestag

Has she tried the questions/positions thing on
isidewith.com

Even this late in the process (and having already voted), that might be interesting for her. See if there was a candidate that she matched better than she guessed, worse than she guessed, etc etc.

Just a thought.

Not directed at me, but ...

The thing with this is, what constitutes a battleground state is largely a function of the national spread. If it narrows only a little more, he doesn't have to win any blue states. A bit more than that, and he only needs most of the battlegrounds, and then weather/turnout plays a part in key areas, etc.

I'm still pretty confident Clinton will win but if -- and it's a big if -- the trend continues the same the next week as it has the last week. On election day it would be a 2-point gap, maybe 3 at most. That's still enough to say Clinton wins most of the time ... but not enough to make it a sure thing. That's really the worry I think. And at that point a few battleground states are leaning Trump, and states like Colorado become battleground or slightly leaning Hillary ... the landscape is just different than being +7 like it was not long ago. .

Yup, way too long.

That's the two things I am still not grasping. Not winning any blue (dark or light) and only winning most of the battlegrounds still will not get to 270.

Also, I still don't see the correlation between national numbers and percentages in battleground states. It would make sense if the pollings were only in those states but a majority of the population lives in CA, NY, IL and TX and those are not going to flip under any reasonable circumstances. Bush43 said it best when asked about winning percentage (vs. Kerry) - if it mattered, than he would have spent much more time getting the vote out in Texas.

Of the states he's not currently ahead on 538 (who has a cautious polling model, but still is not pro-Trump in any way shape or form) he needs to carry FL, NC, NV and then either PA or NH & CO.

I think with the trend and the early polling figures out of FL he's going to win that one. NV is a toss up, and the numbers in NC look decent for Hilary but with African-American early turnout down from what Obama did, I don't think she can be comfortable there either. I can easily see him carrying the first three.

The second part is where it gets difficult and she has a bit of a firewall but I agree with Brian that if the current trend keeps up into next week this thing is going to be way, way closer than anyone thought it would be. And another Hilary bombshell or some bad polling in a key state could be worst case scenario for the Dems.

538 has a 25% chance and until they are majorly wrong I still trust their methodology. At this rate it could be as high as 35 or 40% chance by election day.

Intriguing.

Was a server registered to the Trump Organization communicating with Russia’s Alfa Bank?

Trump has the bestest diplomacy, the greatest diplomacy blah blah blah

By my count, Trump gets to 266 if he wins every state that 538 either has him ahead, and all the states they have him losing by 1.4% or less. That's pretty close. So one more push from here and he's got a great shot at 266 (and 538 probably doesn't have all the data from the recent email stuff).

2016 Presidential Election Interactive Map

But then as Bucc said, he needs one more state that is pretty solid blue right now, with a week to go. But there's a group of 5 states that 538 has Clinton up between 4.6% and 5.5% (Colorado, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, New Hampshire). It wouldn't take a huge swing from to put one of those in play.

But you can see why Clinton is still the big favorite. If Clinton gets a swing her way, she wins by a ton, if Trump gets another swing his way, it's just close. But if we believe 538's overall number at the moment, 25%ish shot for Trump, that is too close for comfort to me. That is not a huge longshot, that is an ordinary NFL comeback, maybe down 10 points in the 4th quarter.