Interesting if anyone's got six minutes to spare. Seems to have been watched by over 4 million people but about as subtle as Borat. My feeling is they've misjudged their target market?
Yes, I agree - too long and will really only work for people who are already convinced.
I think the Democrats and their Lincoln allies have two main strategies to choose from - focus on Biden the calm, reliable alternative (reinforcing their strong point) or focus on the disastrous economic impact of Trumpism (attacking Trump's least negative point). They're overwhelmingly going for number 1, and it seems to be working.
It is long. It is probably targeted at people already half-convinced, in other words wavering non-Trump Republicans, which explains the preaching to the choir.
The ending is ill-judged, though, with the patient's suicide. The doctor leaving the room would have made a better conclusion.
This is rather an old ad, mid July. Would it not be better to look at their current adverts?
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
You will find no-one more fulsome and total in my praise for Trump's ability to manipulate to credulous American media into giving him near unlimited free coverage (his Birther "press conference" in 2016 was a masterpiece so beautifully executed a single tear rolled down my cheek in awe).
However, the current free coverage he is getting is about how he is a disease ridden corpse too ill to participate in the debates,
As I said to @edmundintokyo it is easy to look with hindsight and say Trump was getting a lot of great free coverage in 2016. He actually wasn't.
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
1. He is right - Biden is massively outraising Trump at the moment when it comes to donations;
2. However, David is wrong to focus on just TV ad spending. There has been a fundamental difference between the two campaigns when it comes to where they spend and always have been. Trump's campaign has been digital-focused, Biden has been the traditional TV route. Bear in mind, TV viewership is going down in the States. If you look at digital, Trump has been outspending Biden significantly. There is a difference in strategy.
3. There are three main reasons you pull spending. One you don't have the money (political parties get the lowest rate in an election year so you have to be desperate to do so); two, you think you have lost the state; three, you think you have won the state and do not need to spend more. There is an assumption on David's part, this is one and two and he might be right. Another scenario, is that it is 3. Also, if this is a concern that his base is collapsing, then you would have expected money to go to PA and NC.
4. This article from nearly a month ago sums up the approaches pretty well (https://www.npr.org/2020/09/15/912663101/biden-is-outspending-trump-on-tv-and-just-6-states-are-the-focus-of-the-campaign). Note given the nature of US TV, you want to have your ads schedule pretty much booked in advance. There re some changes here (e.g. Minnesota) but the strategies looked to have played out as expected. Note their comment about Texas - people were excited about Biden spending in Texas but that was on the cards nearly a month ago.
5. The sums involved actually aren't that big. $12m is peanuts in the race (total spend is expected to be $11bn) and that is across 5 states.
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
2. Correction: Trump has not been outspending Biden significantly on digital expenditure. The gap between Biden and Trump has shrank dramatically in recent weeks and Trump is spending a significant proportion of his digital spending in California and New York looking for fundraising from wealthy donors - expenditure in New York and California will not swing the election. In the swing states they're spending similar amounts. See this article from yesterday which is more up to date than the one from a month ago.
In the states that matter for the Electoral College — Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin — the two campaigns have been running about even in Facebook spending over the past month.
Your first sentence is only true if you consider recent weeks. Trump's campaign has been outspending Biden's on digital for a long, long time. Yes, Biden has caught up in recent weeks but they are also starting from two fundamentally different approaches - Trump took a long-term view to use digital advertising to retain his subscribers. In effect, he is taking the view (which, ironically, is what you see in the pay tv industry) that the best way to success is to retain as many voters as you can. Biden's campaign went for the more traditional route of TV, which is what Hillary Clinton did. It's spend on digital appears to be more from the view of "we have cash, let's spend it and we're slightly worried about where Trump is spending" but there appears to be no fundamental strategy. This is why I mention the Google ad spend being wasted - Google is not a brand building advertising medium, it's the modern Yellow Pages
The irony is that, for all the talk that Trump's campaign methods are chaotic and wrong, the Democrats are now switching tactics to mirror the Republicans in two areas - more digital advertising and on the ground, door to door knocking.
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
You will find no-one more fulsome and total in my praise for Trump's ability to manipulate to credulous American media into giving him near unlimited free coverage (his Birther "press conference" in 2016 was a masterpiece so beautifully executed a single tear rolled down my cheek in awe).
However, the current free coverage he is getting is about how he is a disease ridden corpse too ill to participate in the debates,
As I said to @edmundintokyo it is easy to look with hindsight and say Trump was getting a lot of great free coverage in 2016. He actually wasn't.
He got a lot of coverage. Mostly the tone suggested he was a bit of a clown, not to be taken seriously and in the end the GoP would nominate a proper politician.
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
You will find no-one more fulsome and total in my praise for Trump's ability to manipulate to credulous American media into giving him near unlimited free coverage (his Birther "press conference" in 2016 was a masterpiece so beautifully executed a single tear rolled down my cheek in awe).
However, the current free coverage he is getting is about how he is a disease ridden corpse too ill to participate in the debates,
As I said to @edmundintokyo it is easy to look with hindsight and say Trump was getting a lot of great free coverage in 2016. He actually wasn't.
He got a lot of coverage. Mostly the tone suggested he was a bit of a clown, not to be taken seriously and in the end the GoP would nominate a proper politician.
That's what I mean. He won so people have assumed that free coverage in 2016 must have been great. It wasn't.
The question (whether or not Trump wins) is what happens long term to the Never Trumpers? Douthat, Lincoln Project, assorted neo--cons, McMullen, the Bushes, etc. They are quite a varied group. Do they stay and fight? Or leave, and re-align the Parties into an openly QAnon Party and an in touch with reality Party? Which Party does a non-prejudiced, small state, low tax, traditional Republican support?
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Would it? There have been 4 really big landslides since WW2 in the US (and FDR won a few before) ie the winner won over 55% of the vote and/or over 450 EC votes, 1964, 1972 and 1980 and 1984.
After Goldwater was trounced in 1964 the Republicans picked Nixon in 1968, after McGovern was trounced in 1972 the Democrats picked Carter in 1980 and after Carter was trounced in 1980 the Democrats picked Mondale in 1984 and after Mondale was trounced they picked Dukakis in 1988.
Nixon, Carter and Dukakis were slight moves to the centre but not vastly so and Mondale was just an old school New Deal Democrat.
Plus Starmer while more centrist than Corbyn is still no Blairite either.
In any case Sanders is the US Corbyn, Farage was the UK Trump
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
1. He is right - Biden is massively outraising Trump at the moment when it comes to donations;
2. However, David is wrong to focus on just TV ad spending. There has been a fundamental difference between the two campaigns when it comes to where they spend and always have been. Trump's campaign has been digital-focused, Biden has been the traditional TV route. Bear in mind, TV viewership is going down in the States. If you look at digital, Trump has been outspending Biden significantly. There is a difference in strategy.
3. There are three main reasons you pull spending. One you don't have the money (political parties get the lowest rate in an election year so you have to be desperate to do so); two, you think you have lost the state; three, you think you have won the state and do not need to spend more. There is an assumption on David's part, this is one and two and he might be right. Another scenario, is that it is 3. Also, if this is a concern that his base is collapsing, then you would have expected money to go to PA and NC.
4. This article from nearly a month ago sums up the approaches pretty well (https://www.npr.org/2020/09/15/912663101/biden-is-outspending-trump-on-tv-and-just-6-states-are-the-focus-of-the-campaign). Note given the nature of US TV, you want to have your ads schedule pretty much booked in advance. There re some changes here (e.g. Minnesota) but the strategies looked to have played out as expected. Note their comment about Texas - people were excited about Biden spending in Texas but that was on the cards nearly a month ago.
5. The sums involved actually aren't that big. $12m is peanuts in the race (total spend is expected to be $11bn) and that is across 5 states.
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
2. Correction: Trump has not been outspending Biden significantly on digital expenditure. The gap between Biden and Trump has shrank dramatically in recent weeks and Trump is spending a significant proportion of his digital spending in California and New York looking for fundraising from wealthy donors - expenditure in New York and California will not swing the election. In the swing states they're spending similar amounts. See this article from yesterday which is more up to date than the one from a month ago.
In the states that matter for the Electoral College — Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin — the two campaigns have been running about even in Facebook spending over the past month.
Your first sentence is only true if you consider recent weeks. Trump's campaign has been outspending Biden's on digital for a long, long time. Yes, Biden has caught up in recent weeks but they are also starting from two fundamentally different approaches - Trump took a long-term view to use digital advertising to retain his subscribers. In effect, he is taking the view (which, ironically, is what you see in the pay tv industry) that the best way to success is to retain as many voters as you can. Biden's campaign went for the more traditional route of TV, which is what Hillary Clinton did. It's spend on digital appears to be more from the view of "we have cash, let's spend it and we're slightly worried about where Trump is spending" but there appears to be no fundamental strategy. This is why I mention the Google ad spend being wasted - Google is not a brand building advertising medium, it's the modern Yellow Pages
The irony is that, for all the talk that Trump's campaign methods are chaotic and wrong, the Democrats are now switching tactics to mirror the Republicans in two areas - more digital advertising and on the ground, door to door knocking.
Considering recent weeks is what matters. A lot of digital targetting is about Get Out The Vote (GOTV) which is critical especially in US elections. So Trump having targetted digital ads months or a year ago, especially to New Yorkers and Californians fundraising, is not going to have any effect whatsoever on GOTV efforts. GOTV is very, very time sensitive.
Traditional advertising like TV advertising - and Google falls within this too - is about building up support, whereas GOTV is about getting the support you have built up out to vote. As such there's no irony that the Democrats spent traditionally earlier and are now increasing their online presence because that is a smart strategy - build up support then get it out to vote.
You're right that Trump is trying to keep as many of his voters as he can but quite frankly that is not enough. Trump won an extremely narrow ballot last time with three key states within a fraction of one percent - and with his opponents turnout down on normal. He simply has no slack to play with, without gaining new voters. If he only keeps some of his voters he still loses. Even if he holds all his voters he still loses if his opponents turnout is up. He needs to do more than that and there is no sign of that happening.
On current trends it would not surprise me if we find that by the end of the month the Democrats are outspending the Republicans online, since they have a bigger warchest and are clearly seeking to improve their presence online.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Would it? There have been 4 really big landslides since WW2 in the US (and FDR won a few before) ie the winner won over 55% of the vote and/or over 450 EC votes, 1964, 1972 and 1980 and 1984.
After Goldwater was trounced in 1964 the Republicans picked Nixon in 1968, after McGovern was trounced in 1972 the Democrats picked Carter in 1980 and after Carter was trounced in 1980 the Democrats picked Mondale in 1984 and after Mondale was trounced they picked Dukakis in 1988.
Nixon, Carter and Dukakis were slight moves to the centre but not vastly so and Mondale was just an old school New Deal Democrat.
Plus Starmer while more centrist than Corbyn is still no Blairite either.
In any case Sanders is the US Corbyn, Farage was the UK Trump
FDR also trounced Hoover in 1932 and Landon in 1936 and Wilkie in 1940, neither Landon nor Wilkie offered much improvement, only once the GOP picked Dewey in 1944 did they start to contain the size of the FDR victories and even then Truman still beat Dewey in 1948 and the GOP had to wait to Eisenhower in 1952 and 1956 to get the White House again
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
Sanders isn't really anything like Corbyn, I'd say Starmer is closer to Sanders in terms of policy platform
Sanders is more bash the rich than Corbyn but yes Starmer's platform is in between Sanders and Biden's platform (and Biden's platform is left of Hillary's which was more Blairite).
Corbyn was left of Sanders but in US terms Sanders is as far left as you can go
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
You will find no-one more fulsome and total in my praise for Trump's ability to manipulate to credulous American media into giving him near unlimited free coverage (his Birther "press conference" in 2016 was a masterpiece so beautifully executed a single tear rolled down my cheek in awe).
However, the current free coverage he is getting is about how he is a disease ridden corpse too ill to participate in the debates,
As I said to @edmundintokyo it is easy to look with hindsight and say Trump was getting a lot of great free coverage in 2016. He actually wasn't.
He got a lot of coverage. Mostly the tone suggested he was a bit of a clown, not to be taken seriously and in the end the GoP would nominate a proper politician.
The tone of the coverage is dramatically different from last time round though, when much of the mainstream media was still locked in their both sides approach (see for example the endless coverage given to the Clinton emails).
That has changed. This time round, most coverage acknowledges there’s only one corrupt flaming asshole in the race.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Would it? There have been 4 really big landslides since WW2 in the US (and FDR won a few before) ie the winner won over 55% of the vote and/or over 450 EC votes, 1964, 1972 and 1980 and 1984.
After Goldwater was trounced in 1964 the Republicans picked Nixon in 1968, after McGovern was trounced in 1972 the Democrats picked Carter in 1980 and after Carter was trounced in 1980 the Democrats picked Mondale in 1984 and after Mondale was trounced they picked Dukakis in 1988.
Nixon, Carter and Dukakis were slight moves to the centre but not vastly so and Mondale was just an old school New Deal Democrat.
Plus Starmer while more centrist than Corbyn is still no Blairite either.
In any case Sanders is the US Corbyn, Farage was the UK Trump
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Would it? There have been 4 really big landslides since WW2 in the US (and FDR won a few before) ie the winner won over 55% of the vote and/or over 450 EC votes, 1964, 1972 and 1980 and 1984.
After Goldwater was trounced in 1964 the Republicans picked Nixon in 1968, after McGovern was trounced in 1972 the Democrats picked Carter in 1980 and after Carter was trounced in 1980 the Democrats picked Mondale in 1984 and after Mondale was trounced they picked Dukakis in 1988.
Nixon, Carter and Dukakis were slight moves to the centre but not vastly so and Mondale was just an old school New Deal Democrat.
Plus Starmer while more centrist than Corbyn is still no Blairite either.
In any case Sanders is the US Corbyn, Farage was the UK Trump
In 1968 Nixon was frontrunner as former Veep and very popular but the conservative challenger for the GOP Primary was Reagan not Nixon.
The 1976 Democratic Primariy did not come in the aftermath of the 1972 landslide, it came in the aftermath of Watergate. The 1972 landslide was ancient history and irrelevant post-Watergate.
After Dukakis was hammered the Democrats went for Clinton.
"I know it’s tempting fate to mention the idea, foolish to entertain it, mad to expect it, but the possibility of a landslide is now real.
And all this changes a huge amount. A Biden win would be a reprieve for the country; a Biden landslide would be an American miracle.
Unlike anything else, it would cauterize the wound of Trump, preventing further infection. It would say to posterity: we made this hideous mistake, for understandable reasons, but after four years, we saw what we did and decisively changed course. It would turn the Trump era of nihilism, tribalism and cruelty into a cautionary tale of extremism, illiberalism and, above all, failure."
Spot on from Sullivan. A clear rejection of the man and everything about him is what is needed for America to regain its self-respect.
From that extract it seems it is rooted in the notion that Trump is the problem rather than the Republican party as a whole.
The GOP is sick, Trump is only a symptom not the cause.
This I agree with. It's the GOP that needs to be routed, in all electoral domains, not just Trump and the Presidency.
Take the Senate for example. If the GOP are really routed this time and lose races up to, and including, SC, then the GOP are down to 45. If the GOP can be kicked when they are down in the 2022 midterms then there are potential pickups for the Dems in PA, WI, NC, FL, maybe even OH and IA.
That's the sort of rout of the GOP that is needed to drive out the Mitch McConnells. And the same in the state legislatures.
Even if Biden wins a landslide you would expect the GOP to pick up House seats in 2022, the only time the opposing party to the President has not gained House seats in the midterms in a President's first term since World War 2 was 2002 and that was only due to 9/11 and the rallying behind Bush
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
White supremacy. White Nationalism. Xenophobia. Hatred.
Interesting if anyone's got six minutes to spare. Seems to have been watched by over 4 million people but about as subtle as Borat. My feeling is they've misjudged their target market?
Yes, I agree - too long and will really only work for people who are already convinced.
I think the Democrats and their Lincoln allies have two main strategies to choose from - focus on Biden the calm, reliable alternative (reinforcing their strong point) or focus on the disastrous economic impact of Trumpism (attacking Trump's least negative point). They're overwhelmingly going for number 1, and it seems to be working.
The advertising equivalent of painting by numbers and a good performance by the the father!
What on earth is Mr Galloway on about? As far as I can make out he demanded that Scotland stays in the UK to provide Labour voting fodder to outweigh the Tory English - in other words neither country gets what they want, very undemocratic. How has his position changed, if he is cosying up to the Tories like Better Together Mark 2 (yet he was so critical of the original 2014 combination ...).
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Would it? There have been 4 really big landslides since WW2 in the US (and FDR won a few before) ie the winner won over 55% of the vote and/or over 450 EC votes, 1964, 1972 and 1980 and 1984.
After Goldwater was trounced in 1964 the Republicans picked Nixon in 1968, after McGovern was trounced in 1972 the Democrats picked Carter in 1980 and after Carter was trounced in 1980 the Democrats picked Mondale in 1984 and after Mondale was trounced they picked Dukakis in 1988.
Nixon, Carter and Dukakis were slight moves to the centre but not vastly so and Mondale was just an old school New Deal Democrat.
Plus Starmer while more centrist than Corbyn is still no Blairite either.
In any case Sanders is the US Corbyn, Farage was the UK Trump
In 1968 Nixon was frontrunner as former Veep and very popular but the conservative challenger for the GOP Primary was Reagan not Nixon.
The 1976 Democratic Primariy did not come in the aftermath of the 1972 landslide, it came in the aftermath of Watergate. The 1972 landslide was ancient history and irrelevant post-Watergate.
After Dukakis was hammered the Democrats went for Clinton.
Rockefeller was the moderate candidate in the 1968 Republican primaries not Nixon, Nixon was more in the centre of the party with Reagan on the right of the party.
It took landslide defeats for Carter and Mondale in 1980 and 1984 and a heavy defeat for Dukakis in 1988 before the Democrats decided to pick Bill Clinton in 1992
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
White supremacy. White Nationalism. Xenophobia. Hatred.
There is sadly an element of the US for that.
Yep - but they were there already. Trumpism is solely about Trump. There is nothing else there.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
You’re right that Trump is about nothing but Trump. Which is why he won’t change all that much by going. He’ll leave behind the grass roots movements which he co-opted. He merely stoked a fire that was already burning.
Wow, I thought pretty much anyone but a Literal Democrat could register these days.
Just change it to the Scottish Unionist Party or something similar, they can't reject that if they allow the Scottish National Party
Have you forgotten there is already a (Conservative and) Unionist Party?
Galloway's Party will only be standing on the list and will not be adding Conservative to its name
I think the point is that there is a risk of confusion with the SCUP - not that Mr G wants to stand under the C- word. Mind, neither did the Ruth Davidson Says No to Independence Party.
On which matter, I got a SCUP leaflet through my door a couple of days ago, and on the way to the recycling bin was quite taken aback to observe that it actually said "Conservatives" in legible, indeed quite large, lettering. So Mr Ross has made some changes in the spare time from his linesperson's duties.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
You’re right that Trump is about nothing but Trump. Which is why he won’t change all that much by going. He’ll leave behind the grass roots movements which he co-opted. He merely stoked a fire that was already burning.
The root cause will still very much remain, namely much of America feels as though it has gotten a raw deal from free trade as employers have shifted jobs and factories to low wage economies, and encourage immigration to provide an abundant and cheap source of labour. Trump is the vehicle for those sentiments. It will manifest itself elsewhere if he is defeated.
Wow, I thought pretty much anyone but a Literal Democrat could register these days.
Just change it to the Scottish Unionist Party or something similar, they can't reject that if they allow the Scottish National Party
Have you forgotten there is already a (Conservative and) Unionist Party?
Galloway's Party will only be standing on the list and will not be adding Conservative to its name
I think the point is that there is a risk of confusion with the SCUP - not that Mr G wants to stand under the C- word. Mind, neither did the Ruth Davidson Says No to Independence Party.
On which matter, I got a SCUP leaflet through my door a couple of days ago, and on the way to the recycling bin was quite taken aback to observe that it actually said "Conservatives" in legible, indeed quite large, lettering. So Mr Ross has made some changes in the spare time from his linesperson's duties.
What about the new 'Independence for Scotland' party also standing on the list?
Sanders vs Starmer vs Corbyn is a bit more complicated than just left vs right, IMHO.
Sanders is pro medicare for all which even in its fully realised form, doesn't match the NHS. Corbyn and Starmer are obviously fully pro public healthcare/NHS for all.
Corbyn was pretty anti-defence, is Sanders anti-defence? Starmer is pro.
In my view Starmer is Attlee-Labour, Corbyn was Bennite-Labour and Sanders would be?
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
You’re right that Trump is about nothing but Trump. Which is why he won’t change all that much by going. He’ll leave behind the grass roots movements which he co-opted. He merely stoked a fire that was already burning.
The root cause will still very much remain, namely much of America feels as though it has gotten a raw deal from free trade as employers have shifted jobs and factories to low wage economies, and encourage immigration to provide an abundant and cheap source of labour. Trump is the vehicle for those sentiments. It will manifest itself elsewhere if he is defeated.
If you are correct, there is no certainty it will manifest on the Right.
That's quite a rogue's gallery. Lord Ridley - Chairman of Northern Rock when it experienced the first run on a British bank in over a century; Lord Lamont - Chancellor who presided over the ERM debacle and thinks unemployment is a "price worth paying"; Lord Lilley who famously had a "little list"... Of course they're mostly ardent Brexiteers too. The chance of this crowd being wrong on any topic is probably close to a dead certainty.
Wow, I thought pretty much anyone but a Literal Democrat could register these days.
Just change it to the Scottish Unionist Party or something similar, they can't reject that if they allow the Scottish National Party
Have you forgotten there is already a (Conservative and) Unionist Party?
Galloway's Party will only be standing on the list and will not be adding Conservative to its name
I think the point is that there is a risk of confusion with the SCUP - not that Mr G wants to stand under the C- word. Mind, neither did the Ruth Davidson Says No to Independence Party.
On which matter, I got a SCUP leaflet through my door a couple of days ago, and on the way to the recycling bin was quite taken aback to observe that it actually said "Conservatives" in legible, indeed quite large, lettering. So Mr Ross has made some changes in the spare time from his linesperson's duties.
What about the new 'Independence for Scotland' party also standing on the list?
So? It's a free world. At least they will be issuing leaflets which don't put the legal name of their party in very small print. Or (as Labouyr did) make it specially legal for an otherwise impermissible party name to be used on ballots (clue: there is no such thing as the Scottish Labour Party).
Sanders isn't really anything like Corbyn, I'd say Starmer is closer to Sanders in terms of policy platform
And unlike Corbyn, Sanders is something of a pragmatist.
Though otherwise, I think HYUFD might be slightly closer than Philip on where the Republicans head next if Trump is defeated.
If Trump loses indeed I would expect a staunch conservative like Pence or Cruz to be their candidate in 2024, if Philip thinks they would pick a moderate like Nikki Haley to be their candidate in 2024 after a Biden landslide he has more confidence in the GOP base than me.
In fact I suspect some Republicans would say Trump lost because he was not conservative enough
What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
What does Brexit leave behind once BoZo is no longer there?
Brexit is owned by the Conservative party, not just Boris Johnson. I guess the GOP owns Trump in the same way, though. It has moved a long way from George Bush, let alone Ronald Reagan, that is for sure! But I suppose you could say the same about the Tories, given that in the space of just a few years they have abandoned business, farmers, the rule of law, the Union and most of what else they used to claim to stand for.
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
1. He is right - Biden is massively outraising Trump at the moment when it comes to donations;
2. However, David is wrong to focus on just TV ad spending. There has been a fundamental difference between the two campaigns when it comes to where they spend and always have been. Trump's campaign has been digital-focused, Biden has been the traditional TV route. Bear in mind, TV viewership is going down in the States. If you look at digital, Trump has been outspending Biden significantly. There is a difference in strategy.
3. There are three main reasons you pull spending. One you don't have the money (political parties get the lowest rate in an election year so you have to be desperate to do so); two, you think you have lost the state; three, you think you have won the state and do not need to spend more. There is an assumption on David's part, this is one and two and he might be right. Another scenario, is that it is 3. Also, if this is a concern that his base is collapsing, then you would have expected money to go to PA and NC.
4. This article from nearly a month ago sums up the approaches pretty well (https://www.npr.org/2020/09/15/912663101/biden-is-outspending-trump-on-tv-and-just-6-states-are-the-focus-of-the-campaign). Note given the nature of US TV, you want to have your ads schedule pretty much booked in advance. There re some changes here (e.g. Minnesota) but the strategies looked to have played out as expected. Note their comment about Texas - people were excited about Biden spending in Texas but that was on the cards nearly a month ago.
5. The sums involved actually aren't that big. $12m is peanuts in the race (total spend is expected to be $11bn) and that is across 5 states.
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
2. Correction: Trump has not been outspending Biden significantly on digital expenditure. The gap between Biden and Trump has shrank dramatically in recent weeks and Trump is spending a significant proportion of his digital spending in California and New York looking for fundraising from wealthy donors - expenditure in New York and California will not swing the election. In the swing states they're spending similar amounts. See this article from yesterday which is more up to date than the one from a month ago.
In the states that matter for the Electoral College — Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin — the two campaigns have been running about even in Facebook spending over the past month.
Your first sentence is only true if you consider recent weeks. Trump's campaign has been outspending Biden's on digital for a long, long time. Yes, Biden has caught up in recent weeks but they are also starting from two fundamentally different approaches - Trump took a long-term view to use digital advertising to retain his subscribers. In effect, he is taking the view (which, ironically, is what you see in the pay tv industry) that the best way to success is to retain as many voters as you can. Biden's campaign went for the more traditional route of TV, which is what Hillary Clinton did. It's spend on digital appears to be more from the view of "we have cash, let's spend it and we're slightly worried about where Trump is spending" but there appears to be no fundamental strategy. This is why I mention the Google ad spend being wasted - Google is not a brand building advertising medium, it's the modern Yellow Pages
The irony is that, for all the talk that Trump's campaign methods are chaotic and wrong, the Democrats are now switching tactics to mirror the Republicans in two areas - more digital advertising and on the ground, door to door knocking.
Considering recent weeks is what matters. A lot of digital targetting is about Get Out The Vote (GOTV) which is critical especially in US elections. So Trump having targetted digital ads months or a year ago, especially to New Yorkers and Californians fundraising, is not going to have any effect whatsoever on GOTV efforts. GOTV is very, very time sensitive.
Traditional advertising like TV advertising - and Google falls within this too - is about building up support, whereas GOTV is about getting the support you have built up out to vote. As such there's no irony that the Democrats spent traditionally earlier and are now increasing their online presence because that is a smart strategy - build up support then get it out to vote.
You're right that Trump is trying to keep as many of his voters as he can but quite frankly that is not enough. Trump won an extremely narrow ballot last time with three key states within a fraction of one percent - and with his opponents turnout down on normal. He simply has no slack to play with, without gaining new voters. If he only keeps some of his voters he still loses. Even if he holds all his voters he still loses if his opponents turnout is up. He needs to do more than that and there is no sign of that happening.
On current trends it would not surprise me if we find that by the end of the month the Democrats are outspending the Republicans online, since they have a bigger warchest and are clearly seeking to improve their presence online.
That might be the case re spending online in the run up to the election although it depends on how much the PACs chuck in as well.
Obama was excellent at the GOTV stuff not only because of digital but mainly because of the community volunteers on the ground who got people to vote. In that, he had the crucial infrastructure of the African-American churches and also of the Hispanic organisation. He also retained enough of the support of blue-collar traditional Democrats to get him over the line, helped by the fact that Romney was seen as a wealthy plutocrat (and his comments, to me, were the equivalent of the Deplorables comment by Hillary).
I think it is wrong to assume he won't add new blocks and his strategy makes sense. First, he recognised that many of his voters in 2016 were not traditional voters and / or switchers. He therefore needed to keep them locked in as they were prone to switching. Hence the constant rallies, digital adverts, stoking up the "us versus them". Second, to get some of the conservatives back on board who didn't vote for him, which is where the SC nominations came in (and, for all the Lincoln Project adverts, a lot of conservatives were disgusted with the Democrats' tactics during the Kavanaugh hearings where Harris was involved). Third, to have the economy doing well enough where people who are not really political but think their lives are doing fine will vote for him or at least not come out. That has been upended by the pandemic but there is still an argument to say people realise this is an one-off and who do they trust more / are they more well off (which was why I cited the Gallup poll).
There is a fourth, which is to undermine the Democrats' traditional strength in Black / Hispanic votes. A prediction I will make now is one of the major shocks to the Democrats will be how their Black voting base fell significantly from 2016 due to abstention and with a small but vital shift to the Republicans. I will also predict that Trump will make gains amongst the Hispanics.
If those things line up, he will get re-elected. I think they will.
Brexit is owned by the Conservative party, not just Boris Johnson. I guess the GOP owns Trump in the same way, though. It has moved a long way from George Bush, let alone Ronald Reagan, that is for sure! But I suppose you could say the same about the Tories, given that in the space of just a few years they have abandoned business, farmers, the rule of law, the Union and most of what else they used to claim to stand for.
The current Government benches have very few Conservatives (after the great purge) and even fewer Unionists.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
You’re right that Trump is about nothing but Trump. Which is why he won’t change all that much by going. He’ll leave behind the grass roots movements which he co-opted. He merely stoked a fire that was already burning.
The root cause will still very much remain, namely much of America feels as though it has gotten a raw deal from free trade as employers have shifted jobs and factories to low wage economies, and encourage immigration to provide an abundant and cheap source of labour. Trump is the vehicle for those sentiments. It will manifest itself elsewhere if he is defeated.
If you are correct, there is no certainty it will manifest on the Right.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
You’re right that Trump is about nothing but Trump. Which is why he won’t change all that much by going. He’ll leave behind the grass roots movements which he co-opted. He merely stoked a fire that was already burning.
The root cause will still very much remain, namely much of America feels as though it has gotten a raw deal from free trade as employers have shifted jobs and factories to low wage economies, and encourage immigration to provide an abundant and cheap source of labour. Trump is the vehicle for those sentiments. It will manifest itself elsewhere if he is defeated.
If you are correct, there is no certainty it will manifest on the Right.
That's right, which is why I always thought in 2016 that Bernie Sanders would have been a much more dangerous opponent for Trump than Clinton.
Wow, I thought pretty much anyone but a Literal Democrat could register these days.
Just change it to the Scottish Unionist Party or something similar, they can't reject that if they allow the Scottish National Party
Have you forgotten there is already a (Conservative and) Unionist Party?
Galloway's Party will only be standing on the list and will not be adding Conservative to its name
I think the point is that there is a risk of confusion with the SCUP - not that Mr G wants to stand under the C- word. Mind, neither did the Ruth Davidson Says No to Independence Party.
On which matter, I got a SCUP leaflet through my door a couple of days ago, and on the way to the recycling bin was quite taken aback to observe that it actually said "Conservatives" in legible, indeed quite large, lettering. So Mr Ross has made some changes in the spare time from his linesperson's duties.
What about the new 'Independence for Scotland' party also standing on the list?
My apologies - I missed the point you are making (I think). There is no specific term common to the SIP and the SNP toher than the usual Scottish and Party (as seen in most other parties, indeed). But Mr Galloway's use of the Unionist term - hypothetical as it is - would clash directlu with the SCUP, however theoreticval their Conservatism and Unionism seem to some of us on PB today. So not comparable.
Mr. Boy, if they're wrong, I'd suggest pointing out flaws in their argument.
Even fools can be right sometimes, and the wise can err.
We should weigh up the disadvantages of lockdown as well as the obvious motivation to stop recent rises in cases becoming a runaway surge.
Well their first line, that lockdown failed to bring the virus under control, is patently false. On Sweden, it's a completely different society from us (and its approach has led to both a worse economic outcome and more deaths when compared to its Nordic peers). And it is wealthy titled libertarians like this parcel of rogues who have done the most to make sure we are nothing like Sweden, of course. They're wrong on this, like they're wrong on everything else.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
White supremacy. White Nationalism. Xenophobia. Hatred.
There is sadly an element of the US for that.
Yep - but they were there already. Trumpism is solely about Trump. There is nothing else there.
They were there but they were not in charge of the GOP. The GOP had done increasing nudges to them but Trump removed the nudge and went fully htere.
By removing Trumpism I mean removing everything Trump has co-opted which includes the white supremacy etc.
Second. Good morning all, and thanks to Mr H for cheering me up. The prospect of Trump losing, and losing badly is one of the few bright spots on the horizon at the moment.
That is such a sunny side up analysis it can't possibly be true. Most left of centre people will agree with me. Our disappointment has been borne out by recent history.
Yep. Totally. But this is different. This is about America reaffirming sanity and ending something unconscionable. It's about ejecting Donald Trump from the Oval Office. The flip side is that when it happens it will have no greater meaning than that. It will not necessarily indicate a turning of the tide against right wing populism.
About a quarter to a third of Americans have gone completely loopy through targeted fake news. They are not going to suddenly rejoin mainstream society just because of a RIGGED VOTE.
You say that but many are still simply extreme partisans and you forget the American love of success and dislike of failures. There's a reason Trump likes to portray himself as a big, hard, successful man. Many of that third will continue to hate the Democrats (just like many Labour voters hate the Tories) but the support for Trump himself will evaporate to a tiny core just like the support for Corbyn himself evaporated.
If Trumpism is shown to lead to Democrat landslides then continuity Trumpism will be as popular as continuity Corbynism and Rebecca Long Bailey.
Is there any such thing as Trumpism beyond the promotion and entichment of Trump? For all his manifest faults, Corbyn represents a strand of thinking on the left that has deep roots. Aspects of it - especially the bits Corbyn himself was most keen on - may not be particularly popular, even oin the left, but there will be a far-left there long after Corbyn has gone. What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
Trumpism is the exploitation by Donald Trump of simple-minded, sometimes nasty folk for his own personal gratification. It dies with Trump if he is hammered at the polls. But the more general phenomenon - Strongman populist attempts to use white working class grievance to foster division and hatred against minorities and ride to power on the back of it - will always be with us.
A curious feature of our current populist leaders is just how inept they are.
"Say what you like about Hitler, at least the trains ran on time..."
Under Trump, and BoZo, not even the trains run on time. They have both spectacularly failed the single biggest challenge facing them, and they have also failed on their own terms.
The trade war with China has not helped America
Brexit has not been Great for Britain. We really are concreting over Kent (and Warrington)
So we are going to have another weekend of people going for yet another one last bender before Boris imposes harsher restrictions.
If you are going to do it, you decide, you annouce it, you don't brief the media and the wait a week.
The thing is we are not (thankfully) a dictatorship. Leaks happen, especially when the Government is in regular conversation about these measures with the Mayors of the North who all happen to be Labour and are speaking to the media.
It sounds like the decision hasn't been finalised but its not really possible to keep that something is coming a secret.
I think Lewis & Harris have been Covid free for a few months, presumably the basis for it going ahead.
Which raises the question. How do you get 3% of the vote on a 37% turnout where everyone knows each other and virtually nobody lives? There is an O'Donnell feeling unloved this morning.
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
1. He is right - Biden is massively outraising Trump at the moment when it comes to donations;
2. However, David is wrong to focus on just TV ad spending. There has been a fundamental difference between the two campaigns when it comes to where they spend and always have been. Trump's campaign has been digital-focused, Biden has been the traditional TV route. Bear in mind, TV viewership is going down in the States. If you look at digital, Trump has been outspending Biden significantly. There is a difference in strategy.
3. There are three main reasons you pull spending. One you don't have the money (political parties get the lowest rate in an election year so you have to be desperate to do so); two, you think you have lost the state; three, you think you have won the state and do not need to spend more. There is an assumption on David's part, this is one and two and he might be right. Another scenario, is that it is 3. Also, if this is a concern that his base is collapsing, then you would have expected money to go to PA and NC.
4. This article from nearly a month ago sums up the approaches pretty well (https://www.npr.org/2020/09/15/912663101/biden-is-outspending-trump-on-tv-and-just-6-states-are-the-focus-of-the-campaign). Note given the nature of US TV, you want to have your ads schedule pretty much booked in advance. There re some changes here (e.g. Minnesota) but the strategies looked to have played out as expected. Note their comment about Texas - people were excited about Biden spending in Texas but that was on the cards nearly a month ago.
5. The sums involved actually aren't that big. $12m is peanuts in the race (total spend is expected to be $11bn) and that is across 5 states.
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
2. Correction: Trump has not been outspending Biden significantly on digital expenditure. The gap between Biden and Trump has shrank dramatically in recent weeks and Trump is spending a significant proportion of his digital spending in California and New York looking for fundraising from wealthy donors - expenditure in New York and California will not swing the election. In the swing states they're spending similar amounts. See this article from yesterday which is more up to date than the one from a month ago.
In the states that matter for the Electoral College — Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin — the two campaigns have been running about even in Facebook spending over the past month.
Your first sentence is only true if you consider recent weeks. Trump's campaign has been outspending Biden's on digital for a long, long time. Yes, Biden has caught up in recent weeks but they are also starting from two fundamentally different approaches - Trump took a long-term view to use digital advertising to retain his subscribers. In effect, he is taking the view (which, ironically, is what you see in the pay tv industry) that the best way to success is to retain as many voters as you can. Biden's campaign went for the more traditional route of TV, which is what Hillary Clinton did. It's spend on digital appears to be more from the view of "we have cash, let's spend it and we're slightly worried about where Trump is spending" but there appears to be no fundamental strategy. This is why I mention the Google ad spend being wasted - Google is not a brand building advertising medium, it's the modern Yellow Pages
The irony is that, for all the talk that Trump's campaign methods are chaotic and wrong, the Democrats are now switching tactics to mirror the Republicans in two areas - more digital advertising and on the ground, door to door knocking.
Considering recent weeks is what matters. A lot of digital targetting is about Get Out The Vote (GOTV) which is critical especially in US elections. So Trump having targetted digital ads months or a year ago, especially to New Yorkers and Californians fundraising, is not going to have any effect whatsoever on GOTV efforts. GOTV is very, very time sensitive.
Traditional advertising like TV advertising - and Google falls within this too - is about building up support, whereas GOTV is about getting the support you have built up out to vote. As such there's no irony that the Democrats spent traditionally earlier and are now increasing their online presence because that is a smart strategy - build up support then get it out to vote.
You're right that Trump is trying to keep as many of his voters as he can but quite frankly that is not enough. Trump won an extremely narrow ballot last time with three key states within a fraction of one percent - and with his opponents turnout down on normal. He simply has no slack to play with, without gaining new voters. If he only keeps some of his voters he still loses. Even if he holds all his voters he still loses if his opponents turnout is up. He needs to do more than that and there is no sign of that happening.
On current trends it would not surprise me if we find that by the end of the month the Democrats are outspending the Republicans online, since they have a bigger warchest and are clearly seeking to improve their presence online.
That might be the case re spending online in the run up to the election although it depends on how much the PACs chuck in as well.
Obama was excellent at the GOTV stuff not only because of digital but mainly because of the community volunteers on the ground who got people to vote. In that, he had the crucial infrastructure of the African-American churches and also of the Hispanic organisation. He also retained enough of the support of blue-collar traditional Democrats to get him over the line, helped by the fact that Romney was seen as a wealthy plutocrat (and his comments, to me, were the equivalent of the Deplorables comment by Hillary).
I think it is wrong to assume he won't add new blocks and his strategy makes sense. First, he recognised that many of his voters in 2016 were not traditional voters and / or switchers. He therefore needed to keep them locked in as they were prone to switching. Hence the constant rallies, digital adverts, stoking up the "us versus them". Second, to get some of the conservatives back on board who didn't vote for him, which is where the SC nominations came in (and, for all the Lincoln Project adverts, a lot of conservatives were disgusted with the Democrats' tactics during the Kavanaugh hearings where Harris was involved). Third, to have the economy doing well enough where people who are not really political but think their lives are doing fine will vote for him or at least not come out. That has been upended by the pandemic but there is still an argument to say people realise this is an one-off and who do they trust more / are they more well off (which was why I cited the Gallup poll).
There is a fourth, which is to undermine the Democrats' traditional strength in Black / Hispanic votes. A prediction I will make now is one of the major shocks to the Democrats will be how their Black voting base fell significantly from 2016 due to abstention and with a small but vital shift to the Republicans. I will also predict that Trump will make gains amongst the Hispanics.
If those things line up, he will get re-elected. I think they will.
What % chance do you give him - right now as we speak - of being reelected?
Context being, Betfair is 33%, 538 is 15%, I am 10%.
So we are going to have another weekend of people going for yet another one last bender before Boris imposes harsher restrictions.
If you are going to do it, you decide, you annouce it, you don't brief the media and the wait a week.
The thing is we are not (thankfully) a dictatorship. Leaks happen, especially when the Government is in regular conversation about these measures with the Mayors of the North who all happen to be Labour and are speaking to the media. It sounds like the decision hasn't been finalised but its not really possible to keep that something is coming a secret.
I assume that this decision is timed to allow for it to go through the HOC hence the delay
And of course for labour mayors and politicians the money is never enough
That's quite a rogue's gallery. Lord Ridley - Chairman of Northern Rock when it experienced the first run on a British bank in over a century; Lord Lamont - Chancellor who presided over the ERM debacle and thinks unemployment is a "price worth paying"; Lord Lilley who famously had a "little list"... Of course they're mostly ardent Brexiteers too. The chance of this crowd being wrong on any topic is probably close to a dead certainty.
Love the bit about taking the risk in contracting the virus is their choice, sod anyone who they give it too. Also still using Sweden as an example, they really don't bother to check anything so they.
Wow, I thought pretty much anyone but a Literal Democrat could register these days.
Just change it to the Scottish Unionist Party or something similar, they can't reject that if they allow the Scottish National Party
Have you forgotten there is already a (Conservative and) Unionist Party?
Galloway's Party will only be standing on the list and will not be adding Conservative to its name
I think the point is that there is a risk of confusion with the SCUP - not that Mr G wants to stand under the C- word. Mind, neither did the Ruth Davidson Says No to Independence Party.
On which matter, I got a SCUP leaflet through my door a couple of days ago, and on the way to the recycling bin was quite taken aback to observe that it actually said "Conservatives" in legible, indeed quite large, lettering. So Mr Ross has made some changes in the spare time from his linesperson's duties.
What about the new 'Independence for Scotland' party also standing on the list?
My apologies - I missed the point you are making (I think). There is no specific term common to the SIP and the SNP toher than the usual Scottish and Party (as seen in most other parties, indeed). But Mr Galloway's use of the Unionist term - hypothetical as it is - would clash directlu with the SCUP, however theoreticval their Conservatism and Unionism seem to some of us on PB today. So not comparable.
Allliance for Unity however has no such clash, there is no term 'Unionist' there or Conservative which begs the question why the commission rejected it in the first place if it allowed the SIP?
What does Trumpism leave behind once Trump is no longer there?
What does Brexit leave behind once BoZo is no longer there?
Brexit is owned by the Conservative party, not just Boris Johnson. I guess the GOP owns Trump in the same way, though. It has moved a long way from George Bush, let alone Ronald Reagan, that is for sure! But I suppose you could say the same about the Tories, given that in the space of just a few years they have abandoned business, farmers, the rule of law, the Union and most of what else they used to claim to stand for.
The Tories still win farmers and rural areas (even in Scotland) ad since their foundation the Tories have always been the party of the landed gentry and rural areas in terms of core support.
Indeed the Tories emerged in the 17th century even before the Act of Union as the most pro Monarchy and pro Anglican Church party with its core support amongst the landed gentry, the Whigs (the descendants of today's LDs) were the party of trade and the merchant classes and nonconformist and Presbyterian Protestants.
The Tories only emerged as the party of business in the 20th century as the socialist and trade union dominated Labour Party overtook the Liberals as their main opponents once the working class got the vote.
Today most, though not all, Anglicans still vote Tory and the largest proportion of monarchists are also Tory
So we are going to have another weekend of people going for yet another one last bender before Boris imposes harsher restrictions.
If you are going to do it, you decide, you annouce it, you don't brief the media and the wait a week.
The thing is we are not (thankfully) a dictatorship. Leaks happen, especially when the Government is in regular conversation about these measures with the Mayors of the North who all happen to be Labour and are speaking to the media.
It sounds like the decision hasn't been finalised but its not really possible to keep that something is coming a secret.
Unless I'm reading it wrong, what the Mayors are saying to the media is that the Government ISN'T in regular (or any other) conversation with them.
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
1. He is right - Biden is massively outraising Trump at the moment when it comes to donations;
2. However, David is wrong to focus on just TV ad spending. There has been a fundamental difference between the two campaigns when it comes to where they spend and always have been. Trump's campaign has been digital-focused, Biden has been the traditional TV route. Bear in mind, TV viewership is going down in the States. If you look at digital, Trump has been outspending Biden significantly. There is a difference in strategy.
3. There are three main reasons you pull spending. One you don't have the money (political parties get the lowest rate in an election year so you have to be desperate to do so); two, you think you have lost the state; three, you think you have won the state and do not need to spend more. There is an assumption on David's part, this is one and two and he might be right. Another scenario, is that it is 3. Also, if this is a concern that his base is collapsing, then you would have expected money to go to PA and NC.
4. This article from nearly a month ago sums up the approaches pretty well (https://www.npr.org/2020/09/15/912663101/biden-is-outspending-trump-on-tv-and-just-6-states-are-the-focus-of-the-campaign). Note given the nature of US TV, you want to have your ads schedule pretty much booked in advance. There re some changes here (e.g. Minnesota) but the strategies looked to have played out as expected. Note their comment about Texas - people were excited about Biden spending in Texas but that was on the cards nearly a month ago.
5. The sums involved actually aren't that big. $12m is peanuts in the race (total spend is expected to be $11bn) and that is across 5 states.
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
2. Correction: Trump has not been outspending Biden significantly on digital expenditure. The gap between Biden and Trump has shrank dramatically in recent weeks and Trump is spending a significant proportion of his digital spending in California and New York looking for fundraising from wealthy donors - expenditure in New York and California will not swing the election. In the swing states they're spending similar amounts. See this article from yesterday which is more up to date than the one from a month ago.
In the states that matter for the Electoral College — Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin — the two campaigns have been running about even in Facebook spending over the past month.
Your first sentence is only true if you consider recent weeks. Trump's campaign has been outspending Biden's on digital for a long, long time. Yes, Biden has caught up in recent weeks but they are also starting from two fundamentally different approaches - Trump took a long-term view to use digital advertising to retain his subscribers. In effect, he is taking the view (which, ironically, is what you see in the pay tv industry) that the best way to success is to retain as many voters as you can. Biden's campaign went for the more traditional route of TV, which is what Hillary Clinton did. It's spend on digital appears to be more from the view of "we have cash, let's spend it and we're slightly worried about where Trump is spending" but there appears to be no fundamental strategy. This is why I mention the Google ad spend being wasted - Google is not a brand building advertising medium, it's the modern Yellow Pages
The irony is that, for all the talk that Trump's campaign methods are chaotic and wrong, the Democrats are now switching tactics to mirror the Republicans in two areas - more digital advertising and on the ground, door to door knocking.
Considering recent weeks is what matters. A lot of digital targetting is about Get Out The Vote (GOTV) which is critical especially in US elections. So Trump having targetted digital ads months or a year ago, especially to New Yorkers and Californians fundraising, is not going to have any effect whatsoever on GOTV efforts. GOTV is very, very time sensitive.
Traditional advertising like TV advertising - and Google falls within this too - is about building up support, whereas GOTV is about getting the support you have built up out to vote. As such there's no irony that the Democrats spent traditionally earlier and are now increasing their online presence because that is a smart strategy - build up support then get it out to vote.
You're right that Trump is trying to keep as many of his voters as he can but quite frankly that is not enough. Trump won an extremely narrow ballot last time with three key states within a fraction of one percent - and with his opponents turnout down on normal. He simply has no slack to play with, without gaining new voters. If he only keeps some of his voters he still loses. Even if he holds all his voters he still loses if his opponents turnout is up. He needs to do more than that and there is no sign of that happening.
On current trends it would not surprise me if we find that by the end of the month the Democrats are outspending the Republicans online, since they have a bigger warchest and are clearly seeking to improve their presence online.
That might be the case re spending online in the run up to the election although it depends on how much the PACs chuck in as well.
Obama was excellent at the GOTV stuff not only because of digital but mainly because of the community volunteers on the ground who got people to vote. In that, he had the crucial infrastructure of the African-American churches and also of the Hispanic organisation. He also retained enough of the support of blue-collar traditional Democrats to get him over the line, helped by the fact that Romney was seen as a wealthy plutocrat (and his comments, to me, were the equivalent of the Deplorables comment by Hillary).
I think it is wrong to assume he won't add new blocks and his strategy makes sense. First, he recognised that many of his voters in 2016 were not traditional voters and / or switchers. He therefore needed to keep them locked in as they were prone to switching. Hence the constant rallies, digital adverts, stoking up the "us versus them". Second, to get some of the conservatives back on board who didn't vote for him, which is where the SC nominations came in (and, for all the Lincoln Project adverts, a lot of conservatives were disgusted with the Democrats' tactics during the Kavanaugh hearings where Harris was involved). Third, to have the economy doing well enough where people who are not really political but think their lives are doing fine will vote for him or at least not come out. That has been upended by the pandemic but there is still an argument to say people realise this is an one-off and who do they trust more / are they more well off (which was why I cited the Gallup poll).
There is a fourth, which is to undermine the Democrats' traditional strength in Black / Hispanic votes. A prediction I will make now is one of the major shocks to the Democrats will be how their Black voting base fell significantly from 2016 due to abstention and with a small but vital shift to the Republicans. I will also predict that Trump will make gains amongst the Hispanics.
If those things line up, he will get re-elected. I think they will.
What % chance do you give him - right now as we speak - of being reelected?
Context being, Betfair is 33%, 538 is 15%, I am 10%.
Where are you?
I know that wasn't aimed at me but I'd say 538 is about right.
The only thing is that I've played enough dice games to know that for a critical die roll, rolling a 1 when you only need a 2+ is entirely possible. So nothing is certain yet.
So we are going to have another weekend of people going for yet another one last bender before Boris imposes harsher restrictions.
If you are going to do it, you decide, you annouce it, you don't brief the media and the wait a week.
The thing is we are not (thankfully) a dictatorship. Leaks happen, especially when the Government is in regular conversation about these measures with the Mayors of the North who all happen to be Labour and are speaking to the media.
It sounds like the decision hasn't been finalised but its not really possible to keep that something is coming a secret.
Unless I'm reading it wrong, what the Mayors are saying to the media is that the Government ISN'T in regular (or any other) conversation with them.
The Mayors had a briefing yesterday, which was not the first of the week.
Interesting to read 'MD's article in the notorious right wing rag, Private Eye this week. Focused on the secondary health effects of lockdown, and generally suggesting that the ongoing restrictions are counter productive.
Now we've reached October and it's becoming increasingly apparent that the vaccine cavalry isn't around the corner, I'm increasingly coming round to the Toby Young pov (yes, I know he's a narcissistic prick, but even a stopped clock...)
Does advertising actually make that much difference?
Half of the money spent is wasted; trouble is, you don't know which half! More seriously, isn't it a Get our the Vote effort........ surprising low turnouts in US elections, even Presidential ones.
And we get played a lot of TV ads - but surely US viewing habits are as fragmented as in the UK? More so, with the partisan dimension to so many channels.
I’d have thought, with the election ads completely pervasive and mostly negative attack ads, most sensible Americans will be exclusively watching Netflix and Hulu, and avoiding broadcast television like the plague in the weeks before Election Day.
.Just on the article, a few things to point out (and David is right, money is not everything, ask Mike Bloomberg and how much he spent for the Primaries) re David's premise:
1. He is right - Biden is massively outraising Trump at the moment when it comes to donations;
2. However, David is wrong to focus on just TV ad spending. There has been a fundamental difference between the two campaigns when it comes to where they spend and always have been. Trump's campaign has been digital-focused, Biden has been the traditional TV route. Bear in mind, TV viewership is going down in the States. If you look at digital, Trump has been outspending Biden significantly. There is a difference in strategy.
3. There are three main reasons you pull spending. One you don't have the money (political parties get the lowest rate in an election year so you have to be desperate to do so); two, you think you have lost the state; three, you think you have won the state and do not need to spend more. There is an assumption on David's part, this is one and two and he might be right. Another scenario, is that it is 3. Also, if this is a concern that his base is collapsing, then you would have expected money to go to PA and NC.
4. This article from nearly a month ago sums up the approaches pretty well (https://www.npr.org/2020/09/15/912663101/biden-is-outspending-trump-on-tv-and-just-6-states-are-the-focus-of-the-campaign). Note given the nature of US TV, you want to have your ads schedule pretty much booked in advance. There re some changes here (e.g. Minnesota) but the strategies looked to have played out as expected. Note their comment about Texas - people were excited about Biden spending in Texas but that was on the cards nearly a month ago.
5. The sums involved actually aren't that big. $12m is peanuts in the race (total spend is expected to be $11bn) and that is across 5 states.
6. Finally, take a look at this which have posted before: https://www.mediaelection.com/#timeline Their premise is that looking at which candidate is dominating the news cycle is a better way of predicting the result than polling. I have yet to be convinced but there is no doubt Trump is generating a lot of free or earned advertising
2. Correction: Trump has not been outspending Biden significantly on digital expenditure. The gap between Biden and Trump has shrank dramatically in recent weeks and Trump is spending a significant proportion of his digital spending in California and New York looking for fundraising from wealthy donors - expenditure in New York and California will not swing the election. In the swing states they're spending similar amounts. See this article from yesterday which is more up to date than the one from a month ago.
In the states that matter for the Electoral College — Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin — the two campaigns have been running about even in Facebook spending over the past month.
Your first sentence is only true if you consider recent weeks. Trump's campaign has been outspending Biden's on digital for a long, long time. Yes, Biden has caught up in recent weeks but they are also starting from two fundamentally different approaches - Trump took a long-term view to use digital advertising to retain his subscribers. In effect, he is taking the view (which, ironically, is what you see in the pay tv industry) that the best way to success is to retain as many voters as you can. Biden's campaign went for the more traditional route of TV, which is what Hillary Clinton did. It's spend on digital appears to be more from the view of "we have cash, let's spend it and we're slightly worried about where Trump is spending" but there appears to be no fundamental strategy. This is why I mention the Google ad spend being wasted - Google is not a brand building advertising medium, it's the modern Yellow Pages
The irony is that, for all the talk that Trump's campaign methods are chaotic and wrong, the Democrats are now switching tactics to mirror the Republicans in two areas - more digital advertising and on the ground, door to door knocking.
Considering recent weeks is what matters. A lot of digital targetting is about Get Out The Vote (GOTV) which is critical especially in US elections. So Trump having targetted digital ads months or a year ago, especially to New Yorkers and Californians fundraising, is not going to have any effect whatsoever on GOTV efforts. GOTV is very, very time sensitive.
Traditional advertising like TV advertising - and Google falls within this too - is about building up support, whereas GOTV is about getting the support you have built up out to vote. As such there's no irony that the Democrats spent traditionally earlier and are now increasing their online presence because that is a smart strategy - build up support then get it out to vote.
You're right that Trump is trying to keep as many of his voters as he can but quite frankly that is not enough. Trump won an extremely narrow ballot last time with three key states within a fraction of one percent - and with his opponents turnout down on normal. He simply has no slack to play with, without gaining new voters. If he only keeps some of his voters he still loses. Even if he holds all his voters he still loses if his opponents turnout is up. He needs to do more than that and there is no sign of that happening.
On current trends it would not surprise me if we find that by the end of the month the Democrats are outspending the Republicans online, since they have a bigger warchest and are clearly seeking to improve their presence online.
That might be the case re spending online in the run up to the election although it depends on how much the PACs chuck in as well.
Obama was excellent at the GOTV stuff not only because of digital but mainly because of the community volunteers on the ground who got people to vote. In that, he had the crucial infrastructure of the African-American churches and also of the Hispanic organisation. He also retained enough of the support of blue-collar traditional Democrats to get him over the line, helped by the fact that Romney was seen as a wealthy plutocrat (and his comments, to me, were the equivalent of the Deplorables comment by Hillary).
I think it is wrong to assume he won't add new blocks and his strategy makes sense. First, he recognised that many of his voters in 2016 were not traditional voters and / or switchers. He therefore needed to keep them locked in as they were prone to switching. Hence the constant rallies, digital adverts, stoking up the "us versus them". Second, to get some of the conservatives back on board who didn't vote for him, which is where the SC nominations came in (and, for all the Lincoln Project adverts, a lot of conservatives were disgusted with the Democrats' tactics during the Kavanaugh hearings where Harris was involved). Third, to have the economy doing well enough where people who are not really political but think their lives are doing fine will vote for him or at least not come out. That has been upended by the pandemic but there is still an argument to say people realise this is an one-off and who do they trust more / are they more well off (which was why I cited the Gallup poll).
There is a fourth, which is to undermine the Democrats' traditional strength in Black / Hispanic votes. A prediction I will make now is one of the major shocks to the Democrats will be how their Black voting base fell significantly from 2016 due to abstention and with a small but vital shift to the Republicans. I will also predict that Trump will make gains amongst the Hispanics.
If those things line up, he will get re-elected. I think they will.
What % chance do you give him - right now as we speak - of being reelected?
Context being, Betfair is 33%, 538 is 15%, I am 10%.
Where are you?
I sensed you`ve been resisting a reposte to Mr Ed all morning. Couldn`t help it in the end could you?
Interesting to read 'MD's article in the notorious right wing rag, Private Eye this week. Focused on the secondary health effects of lockdown, and generally suggesting that the ongoing restrictions are counter productive.
Now we've reached October and it's becoming increasingly apparent that the vaccine cavalry isn't around the corner, I'm increasingly coming round to the Toby Young pov (yes, I know he's a narcissistic prick, but even a stopped clock...)
What makes you think that the vaccine isn't around the corner. For months now we've been told November is the likely time to have the trials end (and they're double-blinded until then so we can't get premature info) and that is still what we're being told. Ie by this time next month we could have a working vaccine.
Some of the vaccine is already produced and ready to be rolled out. We are simply waiting on the double-blind trial to end.
And to one extent 'no news is good news' on the vaccine front, since if the trial had clearly failed or had bad side effects the trial would have been brought to a premature halt already.
That's quite a rogue's gallery. Lord Ridley - Chairman of Northern Rock when it experienced the first run on a British bank in over a century; Lord Lamont - Chancellor who presided over the ERM debacle and thinks unemployment is a "price worth paying"; Lord Lilley who famously had a "little list"... Of course they're mostly ardent Brexiteers too. The chance of this crowd being wrong on any topic is probably close to a dead certainty.
I spy with my little eye a bunch of raddled old 'revolving bow tie' climate change deniers!
It's enough to make a person go out and buy an EYE LOVE LOCKDOWN tee shirt.
"I know it’s tempting fate to mention the idea, foolish to entertain it, mad to expect it, but the possibility of a landslide is now real.
And all this changes a huge amount. A Biden win would be a reprieve for the country; a Biden landslide would be an American miracle.
Unlike anything else, it would cauterize the wound of Trump, preventing further infection. It would say to posterity: we made this hideous mistake, for understandable reasons, but after four years, we saw what we did and decisively changed course. It would turn the Trump era of nihilism, tribalism and cruelty into a cautionary tale of extremism, illiberalism and, above all, failure."
Spot on from Sullivan. A clear rejection of the man and everything about him is what is needed for America to regain its self-respect.
From that extract it seems it is rooted in the notion that Trump is the problem rather than the Republican party as a whole.
The GOP is sick, Trump is only a symptom not the cause.
Lets be realistic, it is not even the GOP, it is a large chunk of the electorate and their beliefs. Trump mostly moved the GOP to where its voters are and were. His vulgar style will be replaced if he loses bigly, but the fake news and extreme division will continue.
Exactly, a huge chunk of GOP supporters would like segregation back on the statute books.
The GOP senior politicians, rather than trying to lead the people away from that view instead nudge and wink and coddle the racists.
Trump won the Nom by getting rid of the nudge and wink part. And my pick for 2024 Tom Cotton is primed and ready to repeat.
So we are going to have another weekend of people going for yet another one last bender before Boris imposes harsher restrictions.
If you are going to do it, you decide, you annouce it, you don't brief the media and the wait a week.
The thing is we are not (thankfully) a dictatorship. Leaks happen, especially when the Government is in regular conversation about these measures with the Mayors of the North who all happen to be Labour and are speaking to the media.
It sounds like the decision hasn't been finalised but its not really possible to keep that something is coming a secret.
Unless I'm reading it wrong, what the Mayors are saying to the media is that the Government ISN'T in regular (or any other) conversation with them.
The Mayors had a briefing yesterday, which was not the first of the week.
Which was, according to them, to hear a list of local statistics they already knew. And no questions. And they aren't all Labour either.
Interesting to read 'MD's article in the notorious right wing rag, Private Eye this week. Focused on the secondary health effects of lockdown, and generally suggesting that the ongoing restrictions are counter productive.
Now we've reached October and it's becoming increasingly apparent that the vaccine cavalry isn't around the corner, I'm increasingly coming round to the Toby Young pov (yes, I know he's a narcissistic prick, but even a stopped clock...)
Whatever one thinks of Toby, his lockdown website provides an excellent and daily updated set of links on virus related stuff, especially alternative science views such as Levitt and the Barrington Declaration.
Comments
The irony is that, for all the talk that Trump's campaign methods are chaotic and wrong, the Democrats are now switching tactics to mirror the Republicans in two areas - more digital advertising and on the ground, door to door knocking.
They are quite a varied group. Do they stay and fight? Or leave, and re-align the Parties into an openly QAnon Party and an in touch with reality Party?
Which Party does a non-prejudiced, small state, low tax, traditional Republican support?
After Goldwater was trounced in 1964 the Republicans picked Nixon in 1968, after McGovern was trounced in 1972 the Democrats picked Carter in 1980 and after Carter was trounced in 1980 the Democrats picked Mondale in 1984 and after Mondale was trounced they picked Dukakis in 1988.
Nixon, Carter and Dukakis were slight moves to the centre but not vastly so and Mondale was just an old school New Deal Democrat.
Plus Starmer while more centrist than Corbyn is still no Blairite either.
In any case Sanders is the US Corbyn, Farage was the UK Trump
Traditional advertising like TV advertising - and Google falls within this too - is about building up support, whereas GOTV is about getting the support you have built up out to vote. As such there's no irony that the Democrats spent traditionally earlier and are now increasing their online presence because that is a smart strategy - build up support then get it out to vote.
You're right that Trump is trying to keep as many of his voters as he can but quite frankly that is not enough. Trump won an extremely narrow ballot last time with three key states within a fraction of one percent - and with his opponents turnout down on normal. He simply has no slack to play with, without gaining new voters. If he only keeps some of his voters he still loses. Even if he holds all his voters he still loses if his opponents turnout is up. He needs to do more than that and there is no sign of that happening.
On current trends it would not surprise me if we find that by the end of the month the Democrats are outspending the Republicans online, since they have a bigger warchest and are clearly seeking to improve their presence online.
https://twitter.com/georgegalloway/status/1314672357034860546?s=21
Corbyn was left of Sanders but in US terms Sanders is as far left as you can go
WTF
That has changed. This time round, most coverage acknowledges there’s only one corrupt flaming asshole in the race.
The 1976 Democratic Primariy did not come in the aftermath of the 1972 landslide, it came in the aftermath of Watergate. The 1972 landslide was ancient history and irrelevant post-Watergate.
After Dukakis was hammered the Democrats went for Clinton.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/10/09/dominic-cummings-wont-walk-away-power-can-least-pushed-one-side/
There is sadly an element of the US for that.
Though otherwise, I think HYUFD might be slightly closer than Philip on where the Republicans head next if Trump is defeated.
It took landslide defeats for Carter and Mondale in 1980 and 1984 and a heavy defeat for Dukakis in 1988 before the Democrats decided to pick Bill Clinton in 1992
And @HYUFD follows the Party Line.
Which is why he won’t change all that much by going. He’ll leave behind the grass roots movements which he co-opted.
He merely stoked a fire that was already burning.
Some good news for a change.
On which matter, I got a SCUP leaflet through my door a couple of days ago, and on the way to the recycling bin was quite taken aback to observe that it actually said "Conservatives" in legible, indeed quite large, lettering. So Mr Ross has made some changes in the spare time from his linesperson's duties.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/18614447.new-scottish-independence-party-explains-game-plan-logos-officially-approved/
Sanders is pro medicare for all which even in its fully realised form, doesn't match the NHS. Corbyn and Starmer are obviously fully pro public healthcare/NHS for all.
Corbyn was pretty anti-defence, is Sanders anti-defence? Starmer is pro.
In my view Starmer is Attlee-Labour, Corbyn was Bennite-Labour and Sanders would be?
In fact I suspect some Republicans would say Trump lost because he was not conservative enough
Even fools can be right sometimes, and the wise can err.
We should weigh up the disadvantages of lockdown as well as the obvious motivation to stop recent rises in cases becoming a runaway surge.
It shows how utterly useless Brexit is going to be when this is worthy of an announcement.
https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1314883757711798272
Case rests.
Obama was excellent at the GOTV stuff not only because of digital but mainly because of the community volunteers on the ground who got people to vote. In that, he had the crucial infrastructure of the African-American churches and also of the Hispanic organisation. He also retained enough of the support of blue-collar traditional Democrats to get him over the line, helped by the fact that Romney was seen as a wealthy plutocrat (and his comments, to me, were the equivalent of the Deplorables comment by Hillary).
I think it is wrong to assume he won't add new blocks and his strategy makes sense. First, he recognised that many of his voters in 2016 were not traditional voters and / or switchers. He therefore needed to keep them locked in as they were prone to switching. Hence the constant rallies, digital adverts, stoking up the "us versus them". Second, to get some of the conservatives back on board who didn't vote for him, which is where the SC nominations came in (and, for all the Lincoln Project adverts, a lot of conservatives were disgusted with the Democrats' tactics during the Kavanaugh hearings where Harris was involved). Third, to have the economy doing well enough where people who are not really political but think their lives are doing fine will vote for him or at least not come out. That has been upended by the pandemic but there is still an argument to say people realise this is an one-off and who do they trust more / are they more well off (which was why I cited the Gallup poll).
There is a fourth, which is to undermine the Democrats' traditional strength in Black / Hispanic votes. A prediction I will make now is one of the major shocks to the Democrats will be how their Black voting base fell significantly from 2016 due to abstention and with a small but vital shift to the Republicans. I will also predict that Trump will make gains amongst the Hispanics.
If those things line up, he will get re-elected. I think they will.
If you are going to do it, you decide, you annouce it, you don't brief the media and the wait a week.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1346055/Donald-Trump-news-US-president-sociopath-November-presidential-election-Joe-Biden-1346055#ICID=Android_ExpressNewApp_AppShare
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/home-secretary-announces-new-uk-points-based-immigration-system
Then you just do it as routine.
By removing Trumpism I mean removing everything Trump has co-opted which includes the white supremacy etc.
"Say what you like about Hitler, at least the trains ran on time..."
Under Trump, and BoZo, not even the trains run on time. They have both spectacularly failed the single biggest challenge facing them, and they have also failed on their own terms.
The trade war with China has not helped America
Brexit has not been Great for Britain. We really are concreting over Kent (and Warrington)
It's tragic, in every sense.
It sounds like the decision hasn't been finalised but its not really possible to keep that something is coming a secret.
You don't need points to travel. You really ought to learn the difference.
There is an O'Donnell feeling unloved this morning.
Context being, Betfair is 33%, 538 is 15%, I am 10%.
Where are you?
And of course for labour mayors and politicians the money is never enough
Indeed the Tories emerged in the 17th century even before the Act of Union as the most pro Monarchy and pro Anglican Church party with its core support amongst the landed gentry, the Whigs (the descendants of today's LDs) were the party of trade and the merchant classes and nonconformist and Presbyterian Protestants.
The Tories only emerged as the party of business in the 20th century as the socialist and trade union dominated Labour Party overtook the Liberals as their main opponents once the working class got the vote.
Today most, though not all, Anglicans still vote Tory and the largest proportion of monarchists are also Tory
http://www.brin.ac.uk/religious-affiliation-and-party-choice-at-the-2017-general-election/
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2018/05/18/who-are-monarchists
The only thing is that I've played enough dice games to know that for a critical die roll, rolling a 1 when you only need a 2+ is entirely possible. So nothing is certain yet.
Now we've reached October and it's becoming increasingly apparent that the vaccine cavalry isn't around the corner, I'm increasingly coming round to the Toby Young pov (yes, I know he's a narcissistic prick, but even a stopped clock...)
Some of the vaccine is already produced and ready to be rolled out. We are simply waiting on the double-blind trial to end.
And to one extent 'no news is good news' on the vaccine front, since if the trial had clearly failed or had bad side effects the trial would have been brought to a premature halt already.
It's enough to make a person go out and buy an EYE LOVE LOCKDOWN tee shirt.
Coming into the UK is never planned to be restricted, that would destroy tourism.
https://enormo-haddock.blogspot.com/2020/10/germany-pre-qualifying-2020.html
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_California_Proposition_16
And they aren't all Labour either.