"Why are the polls SO CLOSE?"

[Sparker]

Both parties pay dumpsterloads of money to marketers and pollsters to tell candidates what voters want to see and hear. The parties buy the closeness.

 

[JohnDB]

I sat through a lot of the Robert Reich video below to see whether, at any point, he would stop looking outward and start looking inward. I stuck around for about half of it.

So, "why are the polls so close?" Some of the theories they cover:

• The polls are wrong
• The media is propping up Trump to keep it close and get views and clicks
• People are tuning out the news and facts because they're overwhelmed and exhausted
• The public doesn't know Harris well enough so they'll take the devil I know
• People respond to fear than to "nice messages"
• Harris has not done a good enough job of defining herself
• They don't understand what a madman Trump is
• Voters are not considering their own economic self interest
• Mysogyny
• Racism

I've watched many of these conversations, and I have yet to see a Democrat ask "could it be US, and more specifically, the way we advocate for our positions? Do we go too far? Do we overreach? Have we made ourselves unattractive in some way? If so, how? How can we change our approach (not our ideals, but the way we advocate for them) to make ourselves more attractive?"

When a party loses, the last place it looks is the mirror. Personally, I think (and I was warning about this for years here) that some of the tactics the Dems have deployed (particularly the way they've weaponized PC and Identity Politics) have played a significant role in the rise and growth and staying power of Trumpism.

These days "pollsters" are simply mathematicians. The questions are performed by a third party. Unless it's a "captured group" they are polling.

If it's the people at large then it definitely is a third party who hands off the data and then it's put through a math filter.

When fundraising is going on the pollsters will sell TWO sets of numbers. One for paid use and one for public consumption. The public consumption is published by Dem. leaning media outlets. And it's to help Democrat candidates raise money by big big donors and rally the base.

Kamala is still fundraising....not all the checks have cleared the bank.

At this point the election is almost over EXCEPT for the "get out the Vote" campaigns which involves busses and inducements to get people to the polls to vote in D or R districts depending upon their party.

 

[Mac1958]

These days "pollsters" are simply mathematicians. The questions are performed by a third party. Unless it's a "captured group" they are polling.

If it's the people at large then it definitely is a third party who hands off the data and then it's put through a math filter.

When fundraising is going on the pollsters will sell TWO sets of numbers. One for paid use and one for public consumption. The public consumption is published by Dem. leaning media outlets. And it's to help Democrat candidates raise money by big big donors and rally the base.

Kamala is still fundraising....not all the checks have cleared the bank.

At this point the election is almost over EXCEPT for the "get out the Vote" campaigns which involves busses and inducements to get people to the polls to vote in D or R districts depending upon their party.

I saw a quote in the last couple of days from a pollster (I forget who it was) who said that the major polling companies have improved their systems considerably and should be much closer this time around.

Who knows. We'll find out soon enough.

 

[JohnDB]

I saw a quote in the last couple of days from a pollster (I forget who it was) who said that the major polling companies have improved their systems considerably and should be much closer this time around.

Who knows. We'll find out soon enough.

Yeah....we shall see.

Some are still showing Harris up by 5-12% in battleground states....and most of the more accurate ones show Trump up by 2 or more.

They reformulated their math supposedly off of last election performance vx their poll numbers....let's see.

 

[Frankenstein]

It has to seem close so they can cheat, and say well it was close and look she just squeaked it out once we knew how many votes to invent.