Board 8 > Politics Containment Topic 253: Scot Free

(+) Yeah! (+)

xp1337 posted...

I mean, if Trump refuses to debate I'm pretty sure the Commission on Presidential Debates (which controls the debates) still holds it, it'd just be the Democratic nominee getting two hours of nationally televised speaking time.

does literally every network still choose to air it in that case?

(lol who am I kidding, of course they do)

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trump pulling out would make it enough of a spectacle that of course they would air it just to see what happens there and how the nominee/moderators handle it.

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Why wont they be fair and assist Trump in his abject cowardice

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Trump has no reason to refuse to debate against this field. He boycotted a Fox debate to prove his independence and he refused to debate 1v1 with champion debater Ted Cruz. Both wise decisions. What does he have to gain by refusing to debate one of these dems?

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That too, of course, but I mean even from an intrigue/interest standpoint they'd have reason to air it. They had no problem airing 1237946 trump rallies during 2016 after all, even when he wasn't actually up yet, though admittedly that particular thing was more cable news.

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Like does Muffin honestly think that if the Dem refused to debate against Trump the media wouldnt air it?

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xp1337 posted...

That too, of course, but I mean even from an intrigue/interest standpoint they'd have reason to air it. They had no problem airing 1237946 trump rallies during 2016 after all, even when he wasn't actually up yet, though admittedly that particular thing was more cable news.

literally only CNN did that

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https://twitter.com/ShimonPro/status/1206633407914106881

Giuliani: "I believed that I needed Yovanovitch out of the way. She was going to make the investigations difficult for everybody."

cool cool

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how is one man this incompetent

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Polls are so all over the place right now for the presidency, I love it. Lol

USA today/suffolk Trump beating Biden, Sanders, Warren, Bloomberg, Buttgieg in the general all by +3 to + 10.

IBD yesterday has Trump beating Sanders, Warren, Bloomberg, Buttgieg. Losing to Biden.

FoxNews has Trump losing to Biden, Sanders, Warren, Buttgieg, Bloomberg.

I know they mean nothing but always funny to see how polls are all over the place lol.

Morning Consult which has polled presidential favorability all year has gone from at points -18 presidential approval (October) to -6 this week.

USA Suffolk has Trump -2 in approval. FoxNews -8. Both this week.

So have to wonder if this week with the impeachment happening and winding down if we are seeing the impeachment process hurt Dems chances or not.

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i wouldn't trust IBD at all. they really live up to their incidental acronym

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NFUN posted...

i wouldn't trust IBD at all. they really live up to their incidental acronym

Suffolk/USA Today rated A- with .5 dem bias.

IBD A/B with .8 R bias.

Fox News A- with 1.5 Dem bias.

According to Nate Silver.

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interesting. they're not a good site at all

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Impeachment is also swinging away from impeaching according to Nate silvers newest poll graph with 47.1 for and 46.5 against.

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/impeachment-polls/

So, polls for Trump this week were relatively a lot more favorable than the couple weeks before.

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Unfortunately "flood the zone with bullshit" appears to work pretty well, all things considered (despite the fact that Republicans have basically not contested the actual facts of what Trump did, instead offering a series of bizarre excuses, conspiracy theories, and what-abouts)

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Id hope 2016 would show Dems that the policy of just attacking Trump is fruitless, and instead they should focus on the issues.

He could literally murder someone on camera in cold blood, and 90% of Republicans would support him. Energize the youth or lose, there is no path to victory on collaboration right now.

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https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/474740-25m-set-aside-for-gun-violence-research-in-spending-agreement-in-win-for

Do nothing Democrats at it again
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Jakyl25 posted...

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/474740-25m-set-aside-for-gun-violence-research-in-spending-agreement-in-win-for

Do nothing Democrats at it again

Mitch? Why are you allowing this?

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Looking into the details of impeachment polling is more revealing than just going "IMPEACHMENT BACKFIRE!? RED WAVE!"

Here's a timeline. Polling averages are 538's.

September 24 - Pelosi announces the inquiry

Impeach - 38.7% (D - 70.9% / I - 34.4% / R - 8.5%)
Don't Impeach - 51.2%

November 13th - House Intel Public Hearings begin

Impeach - 48.5% (D - 82.6% / I - 45.4% / R - 11.6%)
Don't Impeach - 45.6%

December 3 - House Intel concludes and releases its report

Impeach - 48.8% (D - 83.8% / I - 44.5% / R - 11.4%)
Don't Impeach - 43.5%

December 13 - House Judiciary votes for articles of impeachment

Impeach - 47.7% (D - 84.7% / I - 42.8% / R - 9.7%)
Don't Impeach - 45.7%

So, Impeachment went from -12.5 from when the process started to +2 when the articles were adopted by Judiciary. So uh, literally impeachment is up 14.5 points hard to say it backfired lol. If you want to look at today's averages, 3 days later, because "oh no the sky is falling impeachment only +0.5 red wave red wave" yeah, the net is down 1.5 points. But look at the partisan breakdown: I's are literally exactly the same as 12/13 but Republicans dropped a point to 8.6% and Dems somehow dropped 1.6 points to 83.1%. I'd say "chill it's probably noise" or "unless you think democrats suddenly think it's totally legal and totally cool over the past 3 days, it's probably more likely it's a self-fulfilling prophecy reaction to IS THIS GOING TO BACKFIRE!?!?! that the media is playing with." but again, probs noise.

To look at specific polling outfits that released polls in the past few days... (parentheses indicate change from last poll by that outfit)

SSRS (A/B Rated): (December 12-15 against Nov 21-24)

All: -2 (-9)
D: +65 (-19)
I: Even (-2)
R: -87 (-10)

Independents basically even across polls, Democrats are the biggest drop, going from Impeach +84 to +65

Quinnipiac (B+) (December 11-15 vs. December 4-9)

All: -6 (Even)
D: +75 (+4)
I: -22 (-14)
R: -90 (+2)

Dems and Republicans actually more in support of impeachment now! Is with a big drop. No change overall. kinda weird.

Fox (A-) (Dec 8-11 v Oct 27-30; Yeah Fox has a huge gap.

All: +4 (Even)
D: +74 (-3)
I: Even (+9)
R: -73 (+6)

Fox shows that the reason overall support remains Impeach has stayed at +4 is because Independents and Republicans are mroe in favor of it now and are covering for a slight drop in Dem support lol.

Marist (A+) (Dec 9-11 v Nov 11-15)

All: -1 (-2)

No partisan breakdown. -2 is basically MoE stuff so whatever.

Ipsos (B-) (Dec 9-10 v Dec 2-3)

All: +4 (+2)

Again no partisan breakdown. Again a change of 2, this time in favor of impeachment. Again, MoE stuff.

~~~

tl;dr: Support for impeachment is significantly up from the beginning of the process with the inquiry being announced. Double-digits up. The polling average has dipped in the past three days, but looking at the partisan breakdown of these averages, the biggest dip is coming from Democrats. Independents are staying flat. Republicans have dropped a bit predictably but still not as much as Democrats. Unless you think Democrats are genuinely coming to the conclusion that Trump is innocent or something it's most likely noise or Dems reacting to hearing the narrative that it will backfire... causing them to get skittish... causing the average to dip... causing that narrative to be reinforced.

~~~

tl;dr the tl;dr: in the words of aaron rodgers: r-e-l-a-x. relax.

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ChaosTonyV4 posted...

Energize the youth or lose

never a great strategy to rely on

Also, is there even any bearing on it?

2008:
Voters 18-24: 10%
Voters 25-29: 8% (18% under 30)

2012:
Voters 18-24: 11%
Voters 25-29: 8% (19% under 30)

2016:
Voters 18-24: 10%
Voters 25-29: 9% (19% under 30)

literally better turnout for voters under 30 in 2016 than 2008. same turnout for 18-24 in 2008.

Obama's margins were higher of course, though not crazy higher in 2012 - which again same turnout under 30. And we're still talking about under 20% of the vote. And really, if anything, I'd argue if there's any takeaway from the UK election that can apply here (and I'm still thinking that's questionable) it's that relying on youth turnout not the best track record for success.

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xp1337 posted...

Looking into the details of impeachment polling is more revealing than just going "IMPEACHMENT BACKFIRE!? RED WAVE!"

Here's a timeline. Polling averages are 538's.

September 24 - Pelosi announces the inquiry

Impeach - 38.7% (D - 70.9% / I - 34.4% / R - 8.5%)
Don't Impeach - 51.2%

November 13th - House Intel Public Hearings begin

Impeach - 48.5% (D - 82.6% / I - 45.4% / R - 11.6%)
Don't Impeach - 45.6%

December 3 - House Intel concludes and releases its report

Impeach - 48.8% (D - 83.8% / I - 44.5% / R - 11.4%)
Don't Impeach - 43.5%

December 13 - House Judiciary votes for articles of impeachment

Impeach - 47.7% (D - 84.7% / I - 42.8% / R - 9.7%)
Don't Impeach - 45.7%

So, Impeachment went from -12.5 from when the process started to +2 when the articles were adopted by Judiciary. So uh, literally impeachment is up 14.5 points hard to say it backfired lol. If you want to look at today's averages, 3 days later, because "oh no the sky is falling impeachment only +0.5 red wave red wave" yeah, the net is down 1.5 points. But look at the partisan breakdown: I's are literally exactly the same as 12/13 but Republicans dropped a point to 8.6% and Dems somehow dropped 1.6 points to 83.1%. I'd say "chill it's probably noise" or "unless you think democrats suddenly think it's totally legal and totally cool over the past 3 days, it's probably more likely it's a self-fulfilling prophecy reaction to IS THIS GOING TO BACKFIRE!?!?! that the media is playing with." but again, probs noise.

To look at specific polling outfits that released polls in the past few days... (parentheses indicate change from last poll by that outfit)

SSRS (A/B Rated): (December 12-15 against Nov 21-24)

All: -2 (-9)
D: +65 (-19)
I: Even (-2)
R: -87 (-10)

Independents basically even across polls, Democrats are the biggest drop, going from Impeach +84 to +65

Quinnipiac (B+) (December 11-15 vs. December 4-9)

All: -6 (Even)
D: +75 (+4)
I: -22 (-14)
R: -90 (+2)

Dems and Republicans actually more in support of impeachment now! Is with a big drop. No change overall. kinda weird.

Fox (A-) (Dec 8-11 v Oct 27-30; Yeah Fox has a huge gap.

All: +4 (Even)
D: +74 (-3)
I: Even (+9)
R: -73 (+6)

Fox shows that the reason overall support remains Impeach has stayed at +4 is because Independents and Republicans are more in favor of it now and are covering for a slight drop in Dem support lol.

Marist (A+) (Dec 9-11 v Nov 11-15)

All: -1 (-2)

No partisan breakdown. -2 is basically MoE stuff so whatever.

Ipsos (B-) (Dec 9-10 v Dec 2-3)

All: +4 (+2)

Again no partisan breakdown. Again a change of 2, this time in favor of impeachment. Again, MoE stuff.

~~~

tl;dr: Support for impeachment is significantly up from the beginning of the process with the inquiry being announced. Double-digits up. The polling average has dipped in the past three days, but looking at the partisan breakdown of these averages, the biggest dip is coming from Democrats. Independents are staying flat. Republicans have dropped a bit predictably but still not as much as Democrats. Unless you think Democrats are genuinely coming to the conclusion that Trump is innocent or something it's most likely noise or Dems reacting to hearing the narrative that it will backfire... causing them to get skittish... causing the average to dip... causing that narrative to be reinforced.

~~~

tl;dr the tl;dr: in the words of aaron rodgers: r-e-l-a-x. relax.

I just posted the current numbers and they are not what you just said they were. So unsure where you got those ones.

And it was over 50% for last week. It is now almost 47%. That's a 3% downslide. Which means at the moment it is trending down. I also shouldn't have to even point out that democrat support went UP while the overall % went down. And independents went down. The point of impeachment was to show a majority. Now the trend could not continue to reverse with some other polls, but if it goes negative approval again, the impeachment was a major failure. Especially if the slide continues with independents.

But only you can see it go from 83.8% to 84.7% for Dems and from 44.5% Indy to 42.8% Indy and argue the drop is with Dems and not Indy.

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Corrik7 posted...

I just posted the current numbers and they are not what you just said they were. So unsure where you got those ones.

weird cuz i literally followed the link you posted: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/impeachment-polls/

I did not filter it to only count polls asking impeach or impeach+remove. Doing so does compress it to 46.9% v 46.7%. Though notably that does not dispute my point whatsoever. Under that metric the same timeline is:

Sept 24 - Inquiry Announced:
38.2% Support / 51.0% Don't (-12.8 Net)

Nov 13 - House Intel Public Hearing Begin
47.0% Support / 44.7% Don't (+2.3 Net)

Dec 3 - House Intel Concludes and Releases Report
47.7% Support / 44.2% Don't (+2.5 Net)

Dec 13 - House Judiciary Adopts Articles of Impeachment
47.4% Support / 45.8% Don't (+1.6 Net)

Which shows support up 14.4 net over the process (was 14.5 without that filter). And down 1.4 over the past 3 days (down 1.5 without the filter)

Notably, applying this filter Impeachment support was never over 50%. The highest I can find at all is 48.4 on 10/22. Last week (12/10) was 46.7% (so we're actually up .2 today!) Moving 3 days back and forward from the 10th to get a full week, the highest number there is the 12/13 number I already include. Which as I noted is only a downslide of 1.4 to today.

You can find an >50% number if you remove that filter and count all polls which my original post you're disputing did, but only on 10/12 and 10/13 where it briefly peaks above 50 to hit 50.2 and 50.3. One week ago that graph shows support at 47.7% (so we actually do go down 0.6 to today) Doing the same +/- 3 days to get a full week shows a week high of 47.9% on the 9th.

Corrik7 posted...

But only you can see it go from 83.8% to 84.7% for Dems and from 44.5% Indy to 42.8% Indy and argue the drop is with Dems and not Indy.

Miss me with this weak **** please. Obviously the numbers go down from 12/3 to 12/13 with Independents. I never argued otherwise. Obviously on the timeline I presented 12/3 was the highpoint for Impeachment support. Weird that you're cherrypicking those dates and not looking at when the impeachment process started. oNlY yOu CoUlD sEe Is 34.4% -> 42.8% aS a DrOp.

What I was ****ing arguing was that from 12/13 to 12/16 you see:

12/13
D - 84.7
I - 42.8%
R - 9.7%

12/16
D - 83.1%
I - 42.8%
R - 8.6%

Dems dropped 1.6 points over the past 3 days. 42.8 and 42.8 are the same number so Independents stayed the same.

But you somehow see 538 showing >50% support last week so I have no idea wtf you're reading. I can't even say "hit refresh it says last updated at 9 PM" because that wouldn't change the past.

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Why are you comparing a 3 day period? Lol

So you are just picking and choosing arbitrary dates to try and argue what you want to argue. Lol.

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Better off arguing an outlier poll is screwing the independent numbers up then what you are.

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So are you.

Why is the start line "last week" and not "when it actually started"

I picked the last three days because:

1. I was constructing a timeline of significant events in the impeachment process. The 13th was the last significant day IMO. Nothing of note has happened in the past 3 days we're just waiting until Wednesday for the vote.
2. You were largely discussing recent polls. Polls that ****ing covered largely that 3 days period! If you're using them to argue a trend then why the hell would I not analyze that period?
3. My larger point, if you would read my post (ironic from the "you all remove context and lack reading comprehension" complains you level at the collective "us" all the time) was that I felt it was mostly flat and we're just poking at noise in the polls. The numbers are mostly flat and have been for a while now. But if you're going to insist we look at them by pointing out drops from "last week" (Still waiting for where 538's polling average showed 50% last week for you to claim this 3% drop.) I offered an alternate explanation by looking at the weirdness of the partisan breakdown trends over that period but still listed it after "probably noise".
4. why did gamefaqs start a list i didn't ask for this

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xp1337 posted...

So are you.

Why is the start line "last week" and not "when it actually started"

I picked the last three days because:

1. I was constructing a timeline of significant events in the impeachment process. The 13th was the last significant day IMO. Nothing of note has happened in the past 3 days we're just waiting until Wednesday for the vote.
2. You were largely discussing recent polls. Polls that ****ing covered largely that 3 days period! If you're using them to argue a trend then why the hell would I not analyze that period?
3. My larger point, if you would read my post (ironic from the "you all remove context and lack reading comprehension" complains you level at the collective "us" all the time) was that I felt it was mostly flat and we're just poking at noise in the polls. The numbers are mostly flat and have been for a while now. But if you're going to insist we look at them by pointing out drops from "last week" (Still waiting for where 538's polling average showed 50% last week for you to claim this 3% drop.) I offered an alternate explanation by looking at the weirdness of the partisan breakdown trends over that period but still listed it after "probably noise".
4. why did gamefaqs start a list i didn't ask for this

There are not any polls out there that cover after the 13th. Which is why it is weird you are choosing the 13th to the 16th.

Best you have is 11th-15th polls...

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Corrik7 posted...

There are not any polls out there that cover after the 13th. Which is why it is weird you are choosing the 13th to the 16th.

Best you have is 11th-15th polls...

*thinking emoji*

Corrik7 posted...

So, polls for Trump this week were relatively a lot more favorable than the couple weeks before.

46.9 to 46.7 when adjusted to just impeach and remove.

Independents down to 42.8 support for it.

The data you are stating to argue your point comes from the December 16th 538 polling average. Why is it weird when I use it but not when you do?

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xp1337 posted...

*thinking emoji*

The data you are stating to argue your point comes from the December 16th 538 polling average. Why is it weird when I use it but not when you do?

I am arguing a polling cycle away. You are arguing mid one. It's just weird.

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can we just skip to the part where you say you don't understand how 538 works based on

• the fact that it does not show impeachment support over 50% on its polling average "last week" at all despite your claims.
• that you're simultaneously using the December 16th polling average to argue your point but then confused when I analyze the polling averages of the 13th against the 16th because there are "no polls after the 13th"

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xp1337 posted...

can we just skip to the part where you say you don't understand how 538 works based on
* the fact that it does not show impeachment support over 50% on its polling average "last week" at all despite your claims.
* that you're simultaneously using the December 16th polling average to argue your point but then confused when I analyze the polling averages of the 13th against the 16th because there are "no polls after the 13th"

Yeah, it doesn't make sense. I don't even know how your pulling specific dates out unless that's not doable on the phone. I am simply looking at the dips and stating how it is trending downward. You are arguing some well it may have plateaud for a couple of days so the downward trend isn't there. So, I dunno u tell me.

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In fact, starting one month ago (I'll use Nov 16 since the 17th just started) 538's average has shown Impeachment support bounded between [45.6, 47.8] It has literally just stayed in that range for the entire month. And that high of 47.8? That was the polling average of this weekend. Like literally the average dropped from 47.8% to 46.9% from Sunday into Monday. Not only is that noise IMO until proven otherwise but it sure as hell is suspect that that's the day someone would go, "impeachment swinging against the dems. total failure!" when it was literally at its month high the day before.

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Corrik7 posted...

Yeah, it doesn't make sense. I don't even know how your pulling specific dates out unless that's not doable on the phone. I am simply looking at the dips and stating how it is trending downward. You are arguing some well it may have plateaud for a couple of days so the downward trend isn't there. So, I dunno u tell me.

Maybe it doesn't work on mobile, but on desktop you can move your mouse over the graphic and it'll show you what the numbers were on every day if you move it left-to-right on the graphic. The numbers it displays by default is the current day (well the 16th because it was last updated last night)

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xp1337 posted...

In fact, starting one month ago (I'll use Nov 16 since the 17th just started) 538's average has shown Impeachment support bounded between [45.6, 47.8] It has literally just stayed in that range for the entire month. And that high of 47.8? That was the polling average of this weekend. Like literally the average dropped from 47.8% to 46.9% from Sunday into Monday. Not only is that noise IMO until proven otherwise but it sure as hell is suspect that that's the day someone would go, "impeachment swinging against the dems. total failure!" when it was literally at its month high the day before.

I mean, maybe you can't notice curves in the graph but the impeachment one and the approval one are both edging in Trump's favor lately. But, I guess if you can't see the way they are edging then more power to ya!

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_trump_job_approval-6179.html

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538's average is only trending in Trump's direction based of literally yesterday where it moved frmo a month high down about a point. The graph is basically a flat line. It's marginally lower than say... mid October, sure, but it's also marginally higher if you look at the trend from Thanksgiving.

Like, and I'll be totally serious here, I don't know what the graph looks like on mobile but quite literally the line is ever so slightly moving up from Dec 4-ish to the end-minus-yesterday.

My argument primarily is, and always was, it's basically a flat line. The last real movement you see is in support of impeachment when it makes a big jump at the end of September (right after the inquiry started) and where support for impeachment overtakes don't impeach. Once you hit mid October it basically goes nowhere. You can make out the slightest downward crawl (and we're literally talking ~2 points total) from there to Thanksgiving where support was at its weakest (45.6-45.5, Nov 21) after which you see it recover and bounce back up to the ~47 number it had been hanging out.

Don't support makes a notable pop back up in the past week but is still well below where it was pre-inquiry.

Like I honestly did not enter this conversation intending to fight with you. I like polling and data, saw a conversation, and wanted to dive a bit deeper into the crosstabs. I disagree with the narrative that "omg impeachment backfire on the dems" and don't believe the data shows this. I think you can only get there by looking at the tiniest day-to-day fluctuations and ignoring the overall average that has been stuck in place. Will it in the future? Maybe, it could, who knows? I don't think it will, but I can't see the future.

As for Trump approval? Like... yeah, technically it's on a slight upswing, but not only is it still horrid but I mean... we're again talking about glacial changes. His average has been chilling in the 42ish range for like... nearly a year. It went down around the time the impeachment inquiry and related stories came out and is now recovering... to about 43. That is an improvement, objectively, if it stays there. Only a single point, but a point it is. But I'm not thinking "impeachment backfire!" so much as Rs circling the wagons if I'm thinknig anything at all about it. Again, it's mostly been frozen in place.

I don't think it's controversial to state that a recurring theme in this administration is that pretty much everyone has had their opinion mostly locked in from the start so you hardly ever see any moves either way and when something big enough does push it one way or another (shutdown, impeachment) it eventually regress back to the mean.

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So we start by spiking down (don't support up), we relatively plateau, then spike up, rapidly trend down, trend up, plateau, slowly trend down, spike up, trend down, then trend back up, trend down rapidly, plateau, small spike up, small plateau, major spike up, very slow trend down, spike up, small plateau, and the latest trend is going down.

I said the numbers are trending down currently and it could reverse but if it continues that it would be a disaster for Dems.



As you can see, Indies are currently trending down as well after they spiked up.

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jesus that is an awful view. mobile stays losing

Corrik7 posted...

So we start by spiking down (don't support up), we relatively plateau, then spike up, rapidly trend down, trend up, plateau, slowly trend down, spike up, trend down, then trend back up, trend down rapidly, plateau, small spike up, small plateau, major spike up, very slow trend down, spike up, small plateau, and the latest trend is going down.

First off, everything before I bolded is pre-inquiry so I'm not sure it's even that relevant to this discussion. You can see in the bottom the months in question. On desktop, 538 also helpfully adds a few guide marks like Mueller's testimony and where the Ukraine story started taking off. But a good 70% of that image is pre-inquiry and when impeachment was mostly an online thing and the House was mostly *shrug emoji* outside the Squad and other progressives.

Squished all together like that loses some of the detail so I can see how you're reading it that way. Though I don't really see any difference in slope between the current section that you call "going down" and the previous one you characterize as "very slow trend down" if I'm being honest.

As for the Indy line, yeah, that's going down, but again it being scrunched down looks a bit worse than it does on desktop where - yes, it is very slowly tracking down, but again very slow. In both cases you can clearly see it is way higher than it was pre-inquiry (where the huge spike you see occurred) Even on the scrunched mobile version I think it'd take nearly a year projected out to reach pre-inquiry levels lol.

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Though I'll note I'm only commenting on how those lines look on your mobile version. I was giving the exact numbers with mine which are obviously the more important data points since they actually make up the line which just tries to visually represent it as best it can.

which to pre-empt some predictable arguments - yes the numbers are also going down but only slightly, they're still way higher than pre-inquiry, it's not like they fell off a cliff lol. Movement of 1-2 points is, until we've got more to go on, within the MoE and could simply be noise. Certainly it's more reasonable to think it that than some harbinger of the end for the democrats in 2020.

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42.8% is relatively low for what Democrats should want for impeachment. They had to of hoped this would rise above 50%. 42% is basically exactly in line with what voted for Hillary in 2016 in her loss. Which is why I said if this continues to trend downward to a net negative for impeachment and for Indy's to go under 42% that it is bad news for Dems.

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I mean, more people voted for Clinton than Trump so that doesn't seem like the worst thing.

only difference is that democrats will have the majority in the "electoral college" of impeachment - the house - this time.

As I noted in one of my previous historical lookbacks, the numbers for impeaching Trump were always way ahead of those for supporting Nixon at the equivalent points in time. That has probably ceased to be true at this point because unlike then, the Republican party didn't abandon Nixon and have instead chosen to circle the wagons around him and defend him. But I expect that the vs. Nixon comparison failed only about a week ago or two because support for impeaching Nixon was still way below what numbers Trump had during the "public hearing" phase of things. (We're at the "Nixon resigned" point in that timeline now, and I don't think public support for impeaching Nixon even got to 50 until a few days before that, so yeah.)

You would always want higher numbers but net support is still there, the base wants it, the evidence is there. It was always known the Senate would let him off the hook and they're not even pretending when you have McConnell saying he's coordinating with Trump's team and Graham literally stating he is not a fair juror.

The numbers are about as good as you could expect in this polarized environment.

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Trump may not have gotten Time Person of the Year, but he can take solace in the fact that he got PolitiFact Lie of the Year!

https://twitter.com/PolitiFact/status/1206628733433593858

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https://twitter.com/sppeoples/status/1206895643509301249?s=21

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Good policy proposal from Romney and Bennet - a fully refundable child tax credit:

https://twitter.com/crampell/status/1206765781624770560?s=21

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Sorry to... quadruple post but...

DMITRY FIRTASH, Ukrainian oligarch who is currently avoiding extradition to the US for conspiracy charges, was the one who paid Lev Parnass wife $1 million:

https://twitter.com/steventdennis/status/1207006856973037569?s=21

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LordoftheMorons posted...

Good policy proposal from Romney and Bennet - a fully refundable child tax credit:

https://twitter.com/crampell/status/1206765781624770560?s=21

This is good and I am impressed to see Romney supporting it. Would also be very surprised if this got more than like two republican votes total, given that it's literally the party of plutocrats.

Seeing Romney in the news reminded me of this story I read the other day:

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/12/16/politics/senators-worry-white-house-and-gop-leaders/

The group isn't big enough to threaten Trump's presidency -- there would have to be at least 20 Republicans break with Trump to provide the 67 votes needed to actually remove him from office and no one is predicting that. But if enough peel off they could provide Democrats with the 51 votes needed for key wins, such as to compel witnesses, demand documents and push through other procedural motions Democrats may seek during a trial.

McConnell is working to avoid surprises like that, but short of a reaching a broad agreement in negotiations with Schumer outlining the rules of a trial, he has said the twists and turns of a trial could be decided by 51 votes. Republicans hold a 53-47 seat majority, meaning just four Republicans voting with Democrats could have a major impact.

tl;dr

While peeling off the number of Republican senators to actually impeach Trump is all but impossible, there may be some hope in getting enough to actually force McConnell to do a trail. We would need four. So that could theoretically be attainable. Maybe. Possibly.

(But probably not)

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The Republican party is dangerous. They would let Trump murder their own children and still not impeach him, but if President Sanders or Warren wear the wrong color suit they will start the impeachment proceedings almost instantly.

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Suprak the Stud posted...

Seeing Romney in the news reminded me of this story I read the other day:

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/12/16/politics/senators-worry-white-house-and-gop-leaders/

tl;dr

While peeling off the number of Republican senators to actually impeach Trump is all but impossible, there may be some hope in getting enough to actually force McConnell to do a trail. We would need four. So that could theoretically be attainable. Maybe. Possibly.

(But probably not)

Republican senators are too smart to fall for that. They will stick together. Maybe give you 2 votes to dangle the carrot in front of the Democrats a little longer. But they are not going show any meaningful dissension publicly.

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It's not "showing dissension".

It's doing their job to accurately determine the merits of impeachment/removal.

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LordoftheMorons posted...

Good policy proposal from Romney and Bennet - a fully refundable child tax credit:

https://twitter.com/crampell/status/1206765781624770560?s=21

I would support eliminating payroll taxes entirely. They are an outrageous tax on the poor and working class and an ever-present reminder that the Democratic Party has utterly betrayed the cause of socialism.

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Forceful_Dragon posted...

It's not "showing dissension".

It's doing their job to accurately determine the merits of impeachment/removal.

Yes, they will privately determine that there is no merit to this impeachment and publicly show a united front on that.

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