US Politics November 2017

Is there even a way to keep track of who's tweeting anymore?

New Alabama poll: Doug Jones 46%, Roy Moore 42%. First poll to show Jones in the lead. https://t.co/HVJlVUjucf

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) November 12, 2017

I still don’t think Jones has a shot but I’m all for it

Its crazy that there is *any* poll showing him ahead

First he came for the Muslims, and I was silent. Then he came for the gays and lesbians, and I was silent. Then he came for the teenage white girls, and I was like, well, I don't know about that.

Heh

Its crazy that there is *any* poll showing him ahead

You forget that Roy Moore is not a generic Republican; he's a uniquely hateable piece of shit who's been bringing negative attention to Alabama for something like 30 years. There are plenty of people down there who hate his guts. The maniacs got him past the finish line in the primary, because it's a Republican primary in Alabama, but he's actually a really bad general election candidate. He got blown out in the primaries in two gubernatorial elections, was removed from the Alabama Supreme Court because of the whole "Ten Commandments monument" thing, and was removed again for continuing to enforce a ban on same-sex marriage. Also, he's in trouble for stealing from his charity.

I know his history. The fact is even w all that, until last weekend he was comfortably ahead.

have we taken a look at realclearpolitics aggregate polls

https://realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/trump_favorableunfavorable-5493.html

https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2017/nov/08/whats-happened-to-trumps-popularity-since-the-election-not-much

These polls are all fucking stupid. They couldn't even predict last week's groundswell VA elections right. Fuck Trump support, who gives a shit.

Perhaps the most disturbing story I have ever reported in ~15 years of covering national security is coming your way this evening.

— Spencer Ackerman (@attackerman) November 12, 2017

pretty high bar

coming your way this evening

15 second promo

re: polling averages: 538 I believe takes the stance that comparing a candidate's favorability to an in-office president's job approval ratings is not an apples-to-apples comparison. so their charts, unlike RCP's, start from inauguration and show a slightly different story: a quick early loss of net approval, a slower erosion into the summer (up to and including the health care debacle) and then essentially stasis since that point - up a point, down a point, never really gaining back any of that loss ground or losing any of those who stuck with him through the above.

just picking the numbers from the 23rd of each month, approval followed by disapproval:

Jan 45.5 / 41.3
Feb 43.0 / 49.8
Mar 42.3 / 51.8
Apr 41.6 / 52.9
May 39.1 / 51.4
Jun 39.8 / 55.1
Jul 38.5 / 55.6
Aug 36.9 / 56.8
Sep 39.0 / 54.0
Oct 37.5 / 56.4

note that the very first set, the best here, is already historically bad. he's deeply unpopular and has not rectified that in any way or discovered new blocs of support or anything. and along the way he's definitely shed some support - around eight out of a hundred americans who said they approved in january don't say that now. and of course these numbers don't get into the "strongly approve" vs. "approve" numbers but those have also been bad for him.

and, if it wasn't clear, fourteen or fifteen out of a hundred americans who didn't disapprove of him in january disapprove of him now. even if you say january was an outlier, okay, well, five or so out of a hundred who didn't disapprove of him in february disapprove of him now. that's terrible. it only looks weird because he is a fascist maniac and it is profoundly disturbing to us that the numbers are not 0 / 100 from the word go.

I literally cannot remember what terrible things he did in August for it to mark his nadir

Was it the Nazi rally?

God this past year has been a fucking nightmare

this past year has lasted 28 months iirc

That's why I'm so sick of the stupid "Trump lovers still love Trump" stories that still, somehow, get the go-ahead from national news editors. I want to see some newspaper put the research budget into finding one, never mind a half-dozen, just one Clinton voter who has subsequently joined the Trump cult. But they can't. So they keep sucking up to his white trash diehards and saying, "Hey, racist idiot, got a minute to spew some racist idiocy into this recording device?"

i'm not sure but i think the lowest point so far - just eyeballing for the gap between the numbers - is august 2nd: 37.0% approve, 57.5% disapprove. that was just after mccain torpedoed "skinny repeal" and more generally the long grind of the health care period. i feel comfortable saying that did more to hurt his numbers with the general public than anything since the first rush of terrible news. but there's so much shit that it's impossible to really tease it apart - scaramucci also had his moment the same week!

he seemed to be recovering just a bit after that but then charlottesville happened a week later and he went right back to basically those numbers in the second half of august. the sad thing is that for all we know some of that disapproval was from outraged fans of bannon, who was let go august 18th.

That's why I'm so sick of the stupid "Trump lovers still love Trump" stories

And note that it's not "Trump voters still love Trump" -- they always find the people who already believed Hillary murdered Vince Foster. Yes! I knew those guys were crazy already! Show me the people who voted Obama twice and then Trump. There are plenty of them and they're the ones whose votes matter. Are they still on board?

Saw two of those specimens on telly last week. Mostly used it to be able to say they couldn't be racist... Still backed Trump. Actual convo w/ interviewer:

"He's done more in 8 months than Obama did in 8 years!"
"Like what?"
"Well look sir, I'm no expert on politics y'know.."
"What good thing has he done since he's in office?"
"Well that's the thing! It's other people keeping him from doing anything!"

etc etc

No, I don't even care about Obama voters who voted Trump. I want them to find a Hillary voter who now believes Trump is a competent leader.

"What good thing has he done since he's in office?"

It's not what he does nearly as much as his performative aspect. He put the kibosh on the Paris Accords. He trash-talked at the NFL players. He kept trying to ban Muslims. He tweets things his voters respond to.

I want them to find a Hillary voter who now believes Trump is a competent leader.

I mean I get that you want that but ... they won't. Or if they did, they'd be finding someone representative of so-small-as-to-be-irrelevant slice of the electorate. So why would a newspaper do this?

kinda want to never hear about anything related to the 2016 election ever again tbh

https://filmgrimoire.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/seventh-seal-360.jpg

It's not what he does nearly as much as his performative aspect

Right. He has the right enemies, he makes libs apoplectic, he brings the fight to the dems and the media, he makes political incorrectness mainstream, he "says what I think."

Oh, and the hated Hillary will never be president. So if that was your only goal, he's achieved all you could ask. Anything else is gravy.

This may be what Ackerman was referring to, idk:

https://www.csoonline.com/article/3236721/security/homeland-security-team-remotely-hacked-a-boeing-757.amp.html

if it is, then that's lame

It can’t be - I have just seen a story from 48 hours ago mentioning the same thing.

I mean car hacking vs plane hacking is a difference of degree, not kind

sometimes i think i'm goin' insane, i swear i might car-hack a plane

Hey Spencer Ackerman, if it was such a big fucking deal you wouldn't have teased it like some shitty "tune in tomorrow" promo.

Ackerman broke the Valerie Plame story iirc so...

remember that giant dump i was preparing to unload back during the campaign? well, it continued to grow and then had a baby of its own, and the whole family is dropping in tonight

Ackerman broke the Valerie Plame story iirc so...

So why play coy, Ackerman?

https://www.thedailybeast.com/green-beret-discovered-seals-illicit-cash-then-he-was-killed

meh

this is good

http://pressthink.org/2017/11/pricing-access-trump-white-house-strange-case-times-social-media-policy/

thing is his popularity since jan hasnt changed much (3 pts?)

he has to act strategically (pander to the same people who voted him in), which might be difficult for trump to do, in order to ensure he gets the same voters and turnout in 2020

bc loads of lefties will come out to vote against him

shld be interesting

he is massively, historically unpopular for a first-year president

he has little room to fall, considering perennial levels of base support in a two-party system and the toxic media environment, so his percentage drops slowly, but it’s done so in a fairly consistent manner

the seal story does seem to be the one ackerman was hyping fwiw

oops sorry misread the link above, guess that’s not in question

"3 pts?"

again:

Jan 45.5 / 41.3
Feb 43.0 / 49.8
Mar 42.3 / 51.8
Apr 41.6 / 52.9
May 39.1 / 51.4
Jun 39.8 / 55.1
Jul 38.5 / 55.6
Aug 36.9 / 56.8
Sep 39.0 / 54.0
Oct 37.5 / 56.4

anyone know what's happening here?

https://i.imgur.com/04hi1qV.jpg

rage shit on the world stage

dr casino

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/

yes... as I said upthread that's where I was getting those numbers....?