Vouch.

is it mutually exclusive for me to goad you but also think you're pretty dumb

Oh I know. Her strategy was the worst we've seen in decades. She should have steamrolled trump. Let's not pretend though that the FBI wasn't a big factor tjough, she went from a comfortable lead to dead even in a matter of a few days.

Trump voters were also clearly underrepresented in the polling data. 'Undecided' voters most likely leaning towards Trump.

Rural turnout wasn't expected to be so high. However some of that was because the fbI announcement motivated republicans and lowered turnout on democrats since it happened so close to election.

To the credit of the Trump team some of them said/knew all along what would end up happening and where.

apparently asking people if you're voting for Beyoncé's best friend or Hitler gets unreliable polling in some states



lots of things lead to lower dem turnout

People were fired up about Trump I think that's what lead to the rural increase. They've never like Hillary but they had someone that was different and as someone that has always lived rural I can say their enthusiasm to vote was mostly their excitement about Trump.

I went on at good length about the problems with their polling, things Jay likes to pretend never happened.
The chocolate monster and cinnamon monster vote exist because whether or not more people support trump or hillary, all people recognize that publicly supporting trump was more likely to get them socially ostracized or attacked. Do you think a black or latino man who plans on voting for trump would say it within earshot of his friends, family or girlfriend when a poller calls them? Its far less likely than suburban whites. The other big issue was that their polling predominately focused on population centers in cities, divided the polling between democrats and republicans and tried to weight the two for the makeup of the state, but this was inherently flawed and nonrepresentative because it doesn't account for how democrats and republicans alike in cities are further to the left. There were some supposedly debunked controversies where pollsters had pools of something like 75% democrats 25% republicans in a state thats 60% republican, but they explained it away as "but we account for that by weighting it! Its only disproportionate because its polling cities". As if the kind of person that identifies as republican in Kansas City is as far to the right as someone out in the boonies

I've never respected polling or statistics itself much. Its not that these were all biased hacks seeking to reinforce a narrative- we can at least attest one was, but I don't blame the rest. Its simply a limitation of their means, cold calling people and voluntary surveys are an unreliable and biased method of data collection and its the reason the NCVS is such a pile of junk

This cycle there were a serious lack of political signs in the different areas I travel for work and I saw on more than one occasion children chanting Trump at recess/during sport events.

People weren't going to face the attacks/vandalism or the heated political conversations but the actions of their children showed very clearly the enthusiasm his supporters had for him.

I would go to work and where I lived I would see mostly HRC signs....then I got on the highway...and got out to the rural places and see Trump everywhere. Like crowds of people on highway overpasses holding up Trump signs for people driving past on the highway to see, businesses with T R U M P banners hanging on front of them, Make America Great Again everywhere. It isn't uncommon in those areas to see a house missing part of a wall and a dozen cars in the yard to keep the one working one running.....barely fucking making it. One party was telling them everything was going as planned, one man was saying everything is fucked up. It was a no-brainer to them, even if they finally have health insurance for the first time since possibly the Clinton years stuff still really sucks for them. They voted for a guy who is not going to help them at all; however with what they were presented with and with what they knew, they could hardly be blamed.

I know they got their president and now us city-folk are feeling like putting up the walls and keeping our money here. I'm not sure what the backlash is going to look like from what is going on now...I've honestly never seen the pendulum swing like this before in my four decades. I could totally see city dwellers pushing for less redistribution now and rural America being even more cut off, isolated, and with its weak infrastructure left to rot. It would be like states rights, but city rights. A regression from federalism for sure.

I know a lot of my black and gay friends feel like they are hated by most of their neighbors as well. They are just like "how did we come to this...." like Jim Crow is back. They don't think the idea of black lives mattering is very radical.

This post was edited by Skinned on Feb 19 2017 08:52am

let the rural brown shirts be cut off and isolated, its what they voted for