Vegas Election Odds Overtime: Still No Presidential Payouts
Vegas Election Odds Overtime: Still No Presidential Payouts
2020 US Presidential Election Las Vegas Odds | Las Vegas
Vegas Election Odds 2020 - Political Betting Lines Las Vegas
2020 United States Presidential Election Odds to Win
Vegas Presidential Odds on the 2020 Election - Vegas Odds
2020 US Presidential Election Odds & Props | Las Vegas
2020 US Presidential Election Betting Odds & Props
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vegas odds on 2020 presidential election - win
General Election Polling Discussion Thread (September 2nd, 2020)
Introduction
Welcome to the /politics polling discussion thread for the general election. As the election nears, polling of both the national presidential popular vote and important swing states is ramping up, and with both parties effectively deciding on nominees, pollsters can get in the field to start assessing the state of the presidential race. Please use this thread to discuss polling and the general state of the presidential or congressional election. Below, you'll find some of the most recent polls, but this is by no means exhaustive, as well as some links to prognosticators sharing election models. As always though, polls don't vote, people do. Regardless of whether your candidate is doing well or poorly, democracy only works when people vote, and there are always at least a couple polling misses every cycle, some of which are pretty high profile. If you haven't yet done so, please take some time to register to vote or check your registration status.
Polls
Below is a collection of recent polling of the US Presidential election. This is likely incomplete and also omits the generic congressional ballot as well as Senate/House/Gubernatorial numbers that may accompany these polls. Please use the discussion space below to discuss any additional polls not covered. Additionally, not all polls are created equal. If this is your first time looking at polls, the FiveThirtyEight pollster ratings page is a helpful tool to assess historic partisan lean in certain pollsters, as well as their past performance. With the conclusion of both major parties’ nominating conventions, pollsters scrambled into the field to conduct polls of swing states and the national race. The result has been a slew of high quality pollsters releasing their numbers on Wednesday as well as today, which paint a picture of the electorate right after the candidates are expected to have received a temporary convention bounce.
Prognosticators are folks who make projected electoral maps, often on the strength of educated guesses as well as inside information in some cases from campaigns sharing internals with the teams involved. Below are a few of these prognosticators and their assessment of the state of the race:
Cook Political Reports - Charlie Cook's race ratings are well regarded in the political field, and he's been in the business for a while. Cook is known to incorporate both public and nonpublic (ie. internal polling) information in his projections. Also covers (and is perhaps better known for) Senate and House races.
Larry Sabato's Crystal Ball - Larry Sabato has also been in the political prediction business for a while now, and the team at the UVA Center for Politics has been fairly successful in past cycles. Towards the end of the election cycle, Sabato has a policy of making a call in each state, refusing to leave any race in the tossup category. Also covers Senate and House races.
Inside Elections - Inside Elections, run by Nathan Gonzales, is the successor to Stu Rothenberg's Rothenberg Political Reports, which used to be a part of Roll Call. This prognosticator did fairly well in 2018, though Rothenberg himself boldly (along with some other pundits) predicted in 2016 that Donald Trump's path to the presidency was nonexistent. Also covers Senate, House and Gubernatorial races.
Daily Kos Elections - Daily Kos Elections is the direct successor to the Swing State Project website, which merged with Daily Kos in 2010. Despite the liberal lean of the site as a whole, the Daily Kos Elections predictions tend to be fairly even-handed, if not even slightly bearish for Democrats. Presidential numbers aren't up yet but they have Senate, House and Gubernatorial races.
RRH Elections - Red Racing Horses Elections is a site founded by former conservative-leaning members of the Swing State Project community. Despite the conservative nature of the commentary, like DKE, the race predictions tend to be fairly neutral, if slightly bearish for Republicans. Like the Crystal Ball, RRH will call all races before the election so that none are left in the tossup category. The presidential rankings have not been published but they do cover Senate, House, Gubernatorial and Row Officer (statewide elected officials, such as state Attorney General, Secretary of State etc.) races.
Polling models are similar to prognosticators (and often the model authors will act like pundits as well), but tend to be about making "educated guesses" on the state of the election. Generally, the models are structured to take in data such as polls and electoral fundamentals, and make a guess based on research on prior elections as to the state of the race in each state. Below are a few of the more prominent models that are online or expected to be online soon:
FiveThirtyEight - 538's runs 40,000 simulations of the election and uses that data to come up with a projected winner out of 100 sampled outcomes. It also breaks down the projection to show potential electoral college results, popular vote share, tipping point state likelihood, and it can even be broken down into state-level analytics.
Princeton Election Consortium - this is the model run by Dr. Sam Wang, a neuroscience professor at Princeton University. This model has run in the past two cycles as well, though Sam Wang famously said he'd eat a bug if Donald Trump won the election because his model predicted no path to victory for the eventual winner of the 2016 election. Also includes projections for Senate and House.
JHK Forecasts - the earliest model on the scene this cycle. Jack Kersting's model is one of the newer ones this year and also includes projections for Senate and House.
The Economist - this is the model run by G. Elliott Morris, who previously had a midterm election model under The Crosstab.
Niskanen Center - Rachel Bitecofer's projection, which only seems to update a couple times a cycle. Part of this has to do with Bitecofer's central argument that there are generally no swing voters, and electoral fundamentals drive the outcome of the election. This was put to the test in the 2018 midterms, where Bitecofer very early on predicted a Democratic pickup of 40-45 seats in the House, which fell about where the election ended up.
Lean Tossup - a foreign model from Canada. This model did relatively well in the 2019 Canadian election, but this appears to be the first time they've tried forecasting the US Presidential election. Also includes Senate and House projections.
Primary Model - Helmut Norpoth's model does not actually change with inputs anymore. The outcome it predicts, stated as a 91% chance for President Trump to win reelection, is premised entirely on the primary vote totals in the New Hampshire and South Carolina primaries from earlier this year. Despite being a bit of an outlier against other models, this one was among the only to forecast that then-candidate Donald Trump was a favorite to win election in 2016, and has been applied to correctly predict the winner of 5 of the past 6 presidential elections.
Prediction Markets
Prediction markets are betting markets where people put money on the line to estimate the likelihood of one party winning a seat or state. Most of these markets will also tend to move depending on polling and other socioeconomic factors in the same way that prognosticators and models will work. Predictit and Election Betting Odds are prominent in this space, although RealClearPolitics has an aggregate of other betting sites as well.
What would you do if 2020 became a Groundhogs Day loop
Someone else brought up this hypothetical on collapse and figured it was so good needed to be here too. So imagine on new years Eve and the clock strikes midnight and it's now 1/1/2020. How are you reliving this timeloop. Not knowing if it will ever stop repeating unless you do the right thing. How are you living in this timeloop? Here's my story I posted on collapse. Please share yours! Well this is fucked. We're never getting out of this timeloop. Well let's see here. My first year on the timeloop will go something like this: January 1st as I spend the night as I began 2020 quarantined with the flu (or maybe covid who knows) watching the ball drop at midnight I am shocked to see Ryan Secreast wish everyone a Happy 2020. I'm like wtf I'm not that drunk. Checks the time on my phone. 2020 again fuuuuuck another year of listening to the msm bitch about Trump! Ah yeah and covids coming soon better make a TP, N95 mask and hand sanitizer run and buy that bidet I've been wanting now. Oh yeah and stock up on ammo that's gonna be expensive in a few months. Alright now time to buy up Stock in Tesla, Disney, Netflix, Amazon and watch them go to the moon before I sell them around the time people start running out of unemployment then cash out and donate it to people in need. Now that that's taken care of proceed to bet on LSU crushing Clemson in the championship by exact scores. Then fly out to Vegas and party like it's 2019 off my winnings before SHTF. While I'm there might as well put in a bet on a world pandemic happening in 2020 and also that all the casinos in Vegas will close. They'll give me 10,000:1 odds. I'll make an easy 20million off of it come April..... literally betting against Vegas and winning. I'll come back home mid January and while I wait on my big payday I'll put a bet on the Superbowl while I'm at it. Okay so we're up to early February now. Chiefs just won the Superbowl. Got some more funny money in the pocket to play with. Gonna buy an ebike and dress like a Cyberpunk character so I can roam the empty downtown streets in another month when the lockdowns hit and it's a true ghost town. The virus news is starting to go mainstream but no one's really taking it seriously yet. Wuhan is in lockdown. Vegas chuckles slightly worried....hehe. I decide make a bet with a friend $50 that Trump will name it China Flu and call it a democratic hoax. Plan to buy a 100 piece chicken nuggie platter with the winnings and eat them with my dog just cause we can. March hits. The chicken nuggies are all gone. Time to start doomer posting about the lockdowns coming and businesses closing and historic unemployment levels about to come. Nothing I didn't already do. Also start a campaign about the coming explosion in Beirut and hopefully it goes somewhere to prevent that shit from happening. Ok so April rolls around. I'm calling Vegas and they sound like their whole family died in a car wreck when I call to collect my $20 million. Tell them I'm a time traveler from the future and hang up. He'll spend the rest of the year thinking I was. I'll quit my job soon as the check clears and buy an RV and travel the US. I wanna go through Oregon and Cali before they burn. I'll post murals of George Floyd along the route with a BLM sticker on it. Also I'll post Proud Boi posters in every town I visit with a pic of two guys banging. While I'm at it I'll buy up billboard ads in every state that reads "Fish was right". I'll finish my end of the world tour in early May as the lockdowns have ended and settle on nice ranch I bought with my winnings. Start a doomer cult of the most worthy Doomers of collapse. We will make sour bough bread and donate it to the food banks. We'll preach the gospels of the 350k deaths to come this year of Covid and the Presidential Coup. Come June my cult will gain even more followers after the George Floyd events unfold and the months of riots begin. All of the murals I posted of Floyd will have lead them to the doomer cult website I made that was posted at the bottom of every mural. Also Rudy Giuliani will get millions of dick pics and gaping asshole pics sent to his email....his email account will be listed below all of the Proud Boi posters. As for "Fish was right". It will be linked to collapse. The sub gets flooded with new followers. We hit 10million within a week. The mods are so desperate for help they hire Satan to help filter out all the spam. He ends up just sending all the shit posters to hell. The subreddit loses 5 million followers within a month. Satan is just happy to have all the souls. July roles around and it's hot as hell. Satan confirms. Spend the month on the ranch building a giant wooden fish. We're planning the largest doomer gathering that didn't end in mass suicide. We all just do drugs and have orgy's for the month. Of course we keep it safe with 2 covid tests and a week of quarantine before they enter. Everyone shows up with their newly bought camping gear because everyone will become campers now. u/DJdickjob smuggles in the drugs up from Florida. I made him get rid of the heroin crack and meth though. Only the good drugs. The mass gathering was only supposed to last for a month but turns into 3. Summer of love is over. We all sober up mid October just in time to vote. I remember before the election to copyright the term "270" so I don't have to hear this buzzword a million times post election. We all vote for Bernie Sanders. Realized that we forgot he was screwed again and it was actually the dementia dude running for the ruling elite. That dude wins anyways. The Election has been unofficially called for Dementia. The doomer cult disperses to put up posters of Rudy Guliana with black goo running down his face. We put a link below that looks like it's a website to donate to Trump's election fraud battle. All the Trumpers donate. They get scammed. All the money goes to black families that need rent and food assistance during the pandemic. Somehow Gulianis email gets flooded again with dickpicks and assgaping. His email wasn't even included this time. 3 weeks later Gulianis head starts to ooze the black goo. We get more donations because of this. They think it's apart of the prophecy for Trump to win. More money goes to help black families. Over $1billion donated by Trumpers. I guess Black Lives really do matter to them after all. December roles around and Gulianis in a new scandal. Pictures of his gaping ass make it to the front page of cnn. Turns out he ended up emailing a few of the guys back and sending them pictures of his gaping ass with a nazi flag sticking out of it. Trump followers twist it as a sign that he's telling them that the Deep State made the Nazis look bad. That it was all propaganda and that they were actually the good guys. They excuse the gay image as him doing it for the cause and that the thigh highs, nipple clamps and dick cage were symbolic signs of how the deep state has made us weak and submissive. Trumper Q Anons start wearing nazi flags sticking out of their ass in unity to protest against mask wearing. Half of them decide that they like the flags so much that they need bigger flags. Ironically they chose black flags because they're bigger right. Now the Nazi flag Trumpers think that the Black Flag Trumpers are Antifa. They start fighting each other pathetically in the streets until they both Realize that Black Flags do matter and reunite the right. At this point I call it a year and go chill out until Christmas......oh shit I forgot about Nashv.....oh well too late gotta get ready for the last doomer gathering of the year. We're lighting the giant wooden Fish at midnight to see what happens. Will Fish get us out of the loop?
Events that happened but are not limited to: The Great Recession ends in June 2009, with job losses continuing through December, at a smaller magnitude. Air France Flight 447 crashes into the Atlantic Ocean, 228 lives are lost. (Jun 1) The H1N1 swine flu is declared to be a global pandemic by the WHO. (Jun 11) Mass protests erupt across Iran over a disputed presidential election. (Jun 13) The LA Lakers win 4-1 against the Orlando Magic, and Kobe Bryant is awarded the MVP final (Jun 14). NASA launches the Lunar Reconnaissance Probes/LCROSS Probes, the first lunar mission in 11 years (Jun 18) Michael Jackson, King of Pop and Farah Fawcett, actress and model passes away (Jun 25). Yemenia Flight 126 crashes off coast of Comoros with 153 on board, 1 survived, 14 yr old girl. (Jun 30) Sarah Palin, announces her resignation as 9th governor of Alaska for Jul 26 (Jul 3), 31 million American view Michael Jackson's funeral which is broadcasted live, potentially reaching 2.5 billion in viewership worldwide (Jul 7). Caspian Airlines Flight 7908 crashes in Iran, 168 lives are lost (Jul 15). 2 bombs go off separately in Jakarta, Indonesia at the Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott hotels (Jul 17) The longest total solar eclipse of the 21st century, lasting 6 minutes and 38 seconds occurs over parts of Asia and the Pacific Ocean (Jul 22). Bolivia, becomes the first country where the indigenous people is declared the right to govern themselves. (Aug 3) Typhoon Morakot hits Taiwan (Aug 7). Teen Choice Awards 2009 are hosted by the Jonas Brothers. (Aug 9) Michael Jackson's passing ruled a homicide by drug overdose. (Aug 28) Films that came out this summer include but are not limited to: Up (May 31), The Hangover (Jun 5), Imagine That (Jun 6), The Taking of Pelham 123 (Jun 12), The Proposal (Jun 19), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Jun 24), The Hurt Locker (Jun 26), Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (Jul 1), Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince (Jul 15), The Ugly Truth (Jul 16), Homecoming (Jul 17), G-Force (Jul 24), Orphan (Jul 24), The Ugly Truth (Jul 24), Aliens in the Attic (Jul 31), Funny People (Aug 2), 500 Days of Summer (Aug 7), G.I Joe Rise of Cobra (Aug 7), District 9 (Aug 14), Ponyo (Aug 14), World's Greatest Dad (Aug 21), Inglorious Basterds (Aug 21), Final Destination (Aug 28) Games that came out this summer include but are not limited to: inFamous (May 26), Sims 3 (Jun 2), Red Faction: Guerilla (Jun 2), Prototype (Jun 9), Guitar Hero Smash Hits (Jun 16), FarmVille (Jun 19), Anno 1404 (Jun 23), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Jun 23), Overlord II (Jun 23), Fight Night Round 4 (Jun 25), Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (Jun 30), Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince (Jun 30) Reign of Swords: Episode 2 (Jul 2), Battlefield 1943 (Jul 8), Wii Resort (Jul 26) Madden NFL 10 (Aug 14), Wolfenstein (Aug 18), Shadow Complex (Aug 19), Batman: Arkham Asylum (Aug 25) TV shows that started airing this summer include but are not limited to: Jon & Kate Plus 8 on TLC (May 25), The Little Couple on TLC (May 26), Wipeout on ABC (May 27), Tosh.0 on Comedy Central (Jun 4), 16 & Pregnant on MTV (Jun 11), Zeke and Luther on Disney XD (Jun 15), I Survived a Japanese Game Show (Jun 17) Destroy Build Destroy and BrainRu$h on Cartoon Network (Jun 20), Make It or Break It on ABC (Jun 22), America's got Talent Season 4 (Jun 23), Pawn Stars on History (Jul 19), Dating in the Dark on ABC (Jul 20), Shark Tank on ABC (Aug 9), Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami on E! (Aug 16). Kid/Teen Shows that were popular but are not limited to: PBS Kids Go!: Dragon Tales, Arthur, Sesame Street, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, Fetch! with Ruff Ruffman, Raggs, Miffy & Friends, Cyberchase, It's a Big Big World, Between the Lions, Barney & Friends, Super Why!, Curious George, Dragon Tales, Zula Patrol, Thomas & Friends, Maya & Miguel, Bob the Builder, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Clifford's Puppy Days, Caillou, Sid the Science Kid. Playhouse Disney: Little Einsteins, Imagination Movers, Charlie and Lola, Handy Manny, My Friends Tigger & Pooh, Special Agent Oso, Jungle Junction, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, My Friends Tigger & Pooh Disney: Jonas, Phineas & Ferb, Princess Protection Program, Wizards of Waverly Place, Cory in the House, Sonny With a Chance, The Suite Life on Deck, Life with Derek, Hannah Montana, Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie, Wizards on Deck with Hannah Montana, Pass the Plate, Zeke and Luther Nickelodeon: Spongebob Squarepants, Dora the Explorer, Max & Ruby, Maggie and the Ferocious Beast, The Fairly Odd Parents, Rugrats: All Grown Up, Drake & Josh, iCarly, Ned's Declassified, The Penguins of Madagascar, The Backyardigans, Ni Hao Kai-Lan, Jimmy Neutron, The Mighty B! Cartoon Network: Ben 10: Alien Force, Transformers: Animated, Johnny Test, Chowder, Total Drama Island, 6Teen, The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Pokemon: Diamond and Pearl - Galactic Battles, Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D'S, Ed Edd n Eddy, Tom and Jerry, The League of Super Evil, Bakugan Battle Brawlers, The Mr. Men Show Popular Cell Phones this summer include but are not limited to: Nokia 6300, Nokia E71, Apple iPhone 3G, LG EnV Touch, Palm Pre, HTC Touch Diamond 2, HTC Touch Pro 2, BlackBerry Tour 9630, Songs that were a hit this summer include but are not limited to: "Boom Boom Pow", "I Gotta Feeling", by Black Eyed Peas, "Run This Town" by Jay Z ft. Rihanna and Kanye West, "Poker Face" "Love Game" by Lady Gaga, "Waking Up In Vegas" by Katy Perry, "Right Round" by Flo Rida ft. Ke$ha, "Fire Burning" by Sean Kingston, "I know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)" by Pitbull, "Replay" by Iyaz, "Don't Trust me" by 3OH!3, "Good Girls Go Bad" by Cobra Starship ft. Leighton Meester, "You Belong with Me" by Taylor Swift, "Party in the USA", "The Climb" by Miley Cyrus, "Celebration" by Madonna, "New Divide" by Linkin Park, "If Today was your Last Day" by Nickelback, "Use Somebody" by Kings of Leon, and "Billie Jean" "Thriller" "Beat it" "Man in the Mirror" by Michael Jackson. Also, these kids were about to start the 2009/10 school year in these following grades/years: Gr. 12 (c/o 2010) b. 1991-92 Gr. 11 (c/o 2011) b. 1992-93 Gr. 10 (c/o 2012) b. 1993-94 Gr. 9 (c/o 2013) b. 1994-95 Gr. 8 (c/o 2014) b. 1995-96 Gr. 7 (c/o 2015) b. 1996-97 Gr. 6 (c/o 2016) b. 1997-98 Gr. 5 (c/o 2017) b. 1998-99 Gr. 4 (c/o 2018) b. 1999-00 Gr. 3 (c/o 2019) b. 2000-01 Gr. 2 (c/o 2020) b. 2001-02 Gr. 1 (c/o 2021) b. 2002-03 Kindergarten (c/o 2022) b. 2003-04 Pre-K / Preschool 4's (c/o 2023) b. 2004-05 Preschool 3's (c/o 2024) b. 2005-06
https://youtu.be/gMYJpBuCh8k Crazy Conspiracy, and i need answers opinions. So people will joke about the fact that Pizzagate emerged from the 2016 presidential election (around that time) which had convicted pedophile Epstein come into the light. It had a lot of points about how places were being used as child sex trafficking rings and stuff like that for wealthy elites. But because of the media power the democrats have, people made a joke, blew it out of proportion to relate it to absolute absurdity, watering down any actual talk of child trafficking rings as “an illegitimate meme”. But that’s not why I’m here; So Ellen (i hate her so much) and a few other celebrities have had conspiracies floating around to be under house arrest during the coronavirus due to child sex trafficking. Once again, wealthy elites doing shady shit, but those are allegations, idk how true that stuff is https://youtu.be/lZIxuX_-_18 Another video (from the same channel, this guys got interesting shit about this, but i heard it from another source) but I’d like to have someone else’s thoughts on this. I totally believe it, i mean again, i hate Ellen, day time tv and I’m a communist who hates wealthy people and they do shady shit. Another conspiracy (I’ve hit like 3 in this one post) brings up Andreochrome, which is a drug that’s extracted adrenaline compounds from live sources (average dude/child), and injected into the user (wealthy guy), which is said to have rejuvenating effects, and performance enhances, like how people blood dope to get better fitness results. This drug is expensive and stuff, and a famous journalist wrote about it, and had the movie “Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas” made with the reference to it. He says he “made it up” but more glossification in it withthis brief article What do other people make of this? Ellen has odd sweatshirts, celebrities have odd costumes, people have odd references all referring to a bloody face. Is there really a case, and is it being pushed to the side by their slaves (the Media, The Police & The Propagandists) because their masters are hiding a secret?
Our "Drive to 245": The Sixteenth Step (Second Quarter)
The Drive To 245: Deprive the GOP In 25
In 2014 and with 234 House seats, the NRCC launched the “Drive to 245” campaign for the 2014 midterms, which focused on securing 245 seats for the 114th Congress. At the close of the midterms, they ended up picking up 13 seats, putting their new majority to 247 seats, 2 seats above the goal. Now, we got 234 House seats to start with, assuming that we do not pick up any additional House seats in the upcoming special elections or have any more turncoats in disguise that are waiting to switch to the GOP (get fucked Jeff Van Drew). This is currently the same number as the GOP did in the 2014 election cycle, so getting to 245 seats in the next election is absolutely doable for us to achieve, if we're smart about it.
In late November 2018, I began by compiling an initial list of 25 potential districts that could give us the necessary gains for us to make the necessary net gain of 10 seats to fulfill our “Drive to 245” campaign goal. I then outlined the state representatives and state senators that we have on our side that live within (or at least represent a good portion of) the identified districts in the second step, which was split into parts one and two. These local officials are often our first line of offense when it comes to selecting appropriate candidates to flip GOP congressional districts, as these people often start out with significant amounts of name recognition (at least compared to most political novices), developed campaign infrastructures, and established donor networks to draw on. In the third step, I explored four different ways that these state representatives and state senators can help promising candidates build a solid platform to flip these 25 districts, even if we are not able to recruit any of these seasoned individuals themselves. I then proceeded to identify every individual local county Democratic organization within in each of these 25 districts to determine how much of a viable network exists towards flipping any of these districts, and whether any of them appear to be fledgling and underfunded, which was split into parts one, two, and three. I then proceeded to draw up rough battle plans to recruit the best candidates that are suitable towards making the necessary gains for the proposed 245 House seats, which I covered in parts one, two, and three. Since then, I updated my list of 25 districts to better reflect the developments that have occurred since November 2018, as well as the candidates from our end that have filed in those districts. After that, I covered updated game plans for the updated 25 districts, which was again split into parts one, two, and three. Another comprehensive update to the list was conducted in early July to account for the GOP retirements, lack of Democratic candidate recruitment for several districts, and other remarkable events that have occurred, all of which have been documented in said update. From there, more detailed plans were made that illustrated the overall status of the Democratic campaigns for each of these districts, which can be found in parts one, two, three, and four. These plans also highlighted which candidates appeared to have the most organized campaigns for each district, and which ones out of these strongest candidates needed the most assistance in terms of fundraising. Donation plans were also made that could sufficiently help out these struggling candidates, if every active user of this subreddit took part. After that, I provided a detailed plan for defending our 5 most endangered Democratic incumbents for this cycle. I next discussed the different methods that volunteers can help out a campaign, and what good campaigns should provide in such activities to optimize their voter outreach effectiveness, both of which can be found in parts one and two. In October 2019, I then provided another comprehensive review of the 25 districts that are the most likely to flip blue and the ideal strategies to accomplish that goal, which can be found in parts one, two, three, and four. After that, I provided an update on the overall status of our top 5 most endangered incumbents, and posted a rescue plan to help out the least financially stable campaigns, both of which can be found in this post. My next step provided day-by-day calendars highlighting volunteer events within the targeted 25 districts that helped participants develop vital Democratic infrastructure in those areas. These calendars, which ran from October 31 to January 15, can be found in parts one, two, three, and four. In late January, I gave a third update on the top 5 incumbents to defend this cycle.
This step will provide an updated comprehensive review for each of the 25 districts that this series will target in the 2020 elections. The review will also help identify which candidates can run a competitive campaign in each district, and which candidates simply lack viability. At this point, every district on this list has at least one candidate who has raised at least $100,000 from the start of his or her run. The candidates in question that have successfully done so have established their personal brands and a stable system of donors and volunteers to build up the needed name recognition and voter outreach to have a satisfactory chance of winning their primaries. At this point in the election cycle, we need to start consolidating Democratic activism and support to at least one of these viable candidates for each district. During the months that have transpired from the series’ last comprehensive review, excellent overall progress has been made in the target 25 districts, which currently cover regions located throughout fifteen states. These districts are sorted by state, then ordered by priority, which is roughly based on factors such as whether there is an important up-ballot statewide race (Presidential or Senate) to support, the overall flippability of the districts in question, and how soon within the 2020 cycle Democratic organization began within these relevant areas. Given the overall length of these strategies, this step will be split into four quarters. In the first quarter of this step, game plans were elaborated for districts located in Georgia, Colorado, Pennsylvania, and Michigan. This second quarter will go over the best approaches for districts situated in Texas, Illinois, and Nebraska. The Dem candidates that have filed for each district, their campaign websites (if they have one), as well as the amount of money they have raised according to the Year-End FEC reports (if one is filed). All candidates come from the FEC website. In each district, I will bold the candidate who I feel is the strongest at this point, assuming that there are no other candidates who could jump in later. Factors such as any elected offices the candidates currently hold, the size of their fundraising, as well as their overall organization that is reflected in their campaign websites, are considered on identifying which candidate is of the best quality in my perspective. However, I will not be encouraging users to donate to any one candidate at this point. For quite a few districts, multiple candidates have demonstrated significant strength when it comes to endorsements and fundraising. I believe that the optimal play right now is to put any donations towards flipping a particular district towards the eventual nominee fund and to let the Democratic voters choose their candidate. For each district, a link to the eventual nominee fund will be provided at the end of the list of candidates. Some candidates are indicated with a minus or a plus, which indicates the overall quality of their campaign websites (if they have one) according to criteria that was listed in the second half of the eleventh step of this series. If a hash symbol (#) is indicated next to the candidate’s fundraising haul, it means that the figure was taken from the raw Year-End electronic filings for the candidate’s campaign committee. Fundraising figures from raw filings are not always up to date, meaning that they should be treated with caution.
TX-10 (Michael McCaul, R+9, Lean R): Shannon Hutcheson (+) – $748,779; https://www.shannonhutcheson.com/Pritesh Gandhi (+) – $785,798 (#); https://www.gandhifortexas.com/ Mike Siegel (+) – $430,868; https://siegelfortexas.org/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/tx-10-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 I’m going to say that Gandhi still has the slight edge at this moment, since he has some endorsements from the Indian American Impact Fund. Shannon Hutcheson is also proving to be a viable candidate, and her website design is rather solid and allows potential volunteers to sign up easily. Mike Siegel’s losing margin of 4.3 points in his 2018 race is still far too wide for a rematch to be considered, and I do not think that we are going to nationally do 5 points better given the current trends. I’d say that you should take a look at each candidate’s website and support the campaign whose platform best matches your personal preferences. The priority right now is to organize in several high impact counties that the district at least partially covers. Harris and Travis Counties are critical areas to organize, as both of these counties overlap with multiple districts that are covered in this series. Harris County has covers parts of TX-22, while Travis County covers areas of TX-21, and volunteering in those areas would help us flip multiple districts in Texas for the same amount of effort. Colorado, Lee, and Waller Counties should also get some sizable outreach as the local Democratic parties in these areas are underfunded (or at least lacking in the latest web design). TX-21 (Chip Roy, R+10, Lean R): Wendy Davis (+) – $1,846,371 (#); https://www.wendydavisforcongress.com/ Virginia Louise Leeder (-) – $29,112; https://www.jennielouleeder.com/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/tx-21-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 Wendy Davis is the clear pick here, as she has continued to raise obscene sums of money over the past several months. Her website is pretty well organized with respect to recruiting volunteers, and she was a former state senator. The Democrats there have cleared most of the field for her and have given her a very strong showing of support in an unusually early display of unity. I’m personally excited to see if she can kick out Chip Roy, who really needs to go because of his efforts to block bipartisan disaster aid just because it didn’t fund the border wall. Like TX-10, the district has several high impact counties where we should step up our organization. Bexar and Travis Counties cover regions in TX-23 and TX-10 respectively, making them ideal for improving our odds in multiple districts for the same amount of work. Organization should also focus on Bandera and Real Counties, as the Democratic county party organizations are underfunded and could use some grassroots support. TX-22 (OPEN, R+10, Tossup): Sri Preston Kulkarni (+) – $1,111,461 (#); https://sri2020.com/Derrick Reed (+) – $142,458; https://derrickreed.com/ Nyanza Davis Moore (-) – $142,154; https://www.nyanzadavismoore.com/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/tx-22-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 Sri Preston Kulkarni’s website has definitely improved, as he now has a well-organized place for potential volunteers to sign up. I know that a lot of support and funds have gone for his second campaign, but Sri Preston Kulkarni lost by 4.9 points in his 2018 run, which makes me doubtful that a rematch is what we want here. This is because I again state that I do not think that we are going to do 5 points better nationally given the current political trends. I think we need a fresh face for this district for us to maximize our chance of flipping the district in 2020. I’m still saying Derrick Reed is the choice to support here, if you had to pick a Democratic alternative, as he is a Pearland City Councilman and thus has experience in a local elected office. However, Nyanza Davis Moore is also an okay candidate that has rather strong fundraising numbers. I honestly suggest that you should look at each candidate’s website and campaign platform and choose your candidate based on your personal stances on the hot-button issues. TX-23 (OPEN, R+1, Lean D): Rosalinda Ramos Abuabara (-) – No report filed yet; http://roseyfortx23.com/Gina Ortiz Jones (-) – $2,403,261; https://ginaortizjones.com/ Jaime Escuder (+) – $8,454; https://www.escuderforcongress.com/ Ricardo Rascon Madrid – No report filed yet; https://www.ricardomadrid.com/ Efrain Valdez (-) – No report filed yet, but less than $5,000 according to a miscellaneous 2020 FEC report; https://www.efrainvaldezforcongress.com/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/tx-23-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 Gina Ortiz Jones is the clear choice for this one. She only lost the district in 2018 in a very tight 0.4% squeaker and is way past the $1,000,000 fundraising mark. I actually think we are pretty much covered in terms of funding for now, and that the main focus for this district is to volunteer and get on the ground HARD, as every county except Bexar County (which should also be focused on to provide additional support for TX-21) and Medina County has an underfunded Democratic county party, meaning that grassroots efforts on the ground are needed to revitalize those areas. TX-24 (OPEN, R+9, Tossup): Richard L Fleming – $15,713; https://fleming4congress.com/Candace Valenzuela – $330,557; https://candacefor24.com/ Kimberly Olson (+) – $855,832; https://kimforcongress.org/ John Biggan (+) – $62,888; https://www.bigganforcongress.com/ Jan McDowell (+) – $67,078; https://www.janmcdowell.com/ Samuel Jairo Vega (-) – No report filed yet; https://samvega2020.com/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/tx-24-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 Since Crystal Fletcher dropped out in the last month, the primary in this district has basically come down to Candace Valenzuela and Kimberly Olson. It is a rather tough to decide which is the better candidate of the two, since both candidates have a website that is easy for potential volunteers to join, posted solid fundraising records, and have scored quite a few endorsements. Kimberly Olson is endorsed by VoteVets, Stonewall Democrats of Dallas, and several other national and local organizations. On the other hand, Candace Valenzuela has national and local endorsements such as Emily’s List and Voter Protection Project. I think that Candace Valenzuela is the very slight favorite since she does have experience winning and carrying out the duties of a local office, which is as a Carrollton-Farmers Branch School Board Trustee in this case. However, I strongly recommend that you take a look at the campaign platforms of both Candace Valenzuela and Kimberly Olson and make your decision based on which candidate better suits your views. TX-31 (John Carter, R+10, Lean R): Dan Janjigian – $34,127; https://www.danjanforcongress.com/ Eric Hanke – $46,390; https://hankefortexas.com/Donna Imam (+) – $207,532; https://www.votefordonna.com/ Christine Eady Mann (+) – $170,760; https://www.christine4congress.com/ Tammy Young – $50,937 (#); https://www.tammyyoungforcongress.com/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/tx-31-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 In this district, Donna Imam and Christine Eady Mann show some promise with respect to fundraising, endorsements, and relative ease of volunteer recruiting through their campaign websites. It is a rather tough decision to make when it comes to identifying a front-runner. Donna Imam has been endorsed by some local organizations such as Black Voters United and the Texas AFL-CIO. Christine Eady Mann has obtained endorsements from local organizations such as AFSCME Local 1624 and Physician Women SOAR. I’d say Donna Imam has the very slight edge since the Texas AFL-CIO has the most influence among the organizations that have chosen to endorse one of the two candidates. However, my suggestion is to take a look at both of these candidates and their perspectives on the issues and make your choice based on your personal impressions of each candidate, as their platforms are honestly rather strong for the district. IL-13 (Rodney Davis, R+3, Tossup): Betsy Dirksen Londrigan (+) – $1,417,492; https://www.betsydirksenlondrigan.com/ Stefanie Smith (+) – $6,795; https://www.stefanie2020.com/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/il-13-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 Betsy Dirksen Londrigan is the heavy favorite here and a very strong candidate, as she only lost by a squeaking 0.8% in her 2018 run, and has broken the $1 million fundraising mark. Quite a few counties lack Democratic support, which include Bond, Calhoun, Champaign, Christian, Greene, Jersey, Macon, Montgomery, and Piatt Counties. Organization on the ground for all of these counties should happen to try to improve our margins there. NE-02 (Don Bacon, R+4, Tossup): Ann Ashford (+) – $237,785; https://annashford2020.com/ Kara Eastman (+) – $465,110; http://eastmanforcongress.com/ Morgann Freeman (+) – $5,209; https://www.freemanforcongress.com/ Gladys Lucretia Harrison (+) – $24,345; https://gladys4congress.com/ Democratic Nominee Fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/ne-02-2020-democratic-nominee-fund-1 I personally think the pick is Ann Ashford, as she has racked quite a few endorsements from former elected officials and has raised a sizable sum for her congressional run. Even though political dynasties are really not favored among some members in this subreddit, Kara Eastman should NOT be renominated. Kara Eastman’s Justice Democrats-affiliated platform did not prove to be a good fit for the district, since it clashed very hard with Omaha’s private insurance companies, which make up a considerable part of the economy there. I believe that the only way to win this particular district is to run a moderate that does not completely follow the national Democrat line, which is what Brad Ashford did in his successful 2014 run.
So this marks the end of the step’s second quarter. The third quarter will describe ideal procedures for flipping target districts in New York, Ohio, Florida, and Virginia. After that, the final quarter will cover optimized tactics for districts within Indiana, California, Montana, and New Jersey. So stay tuned! Any corrections or comments are welcome.
What A Day: The Rohring '20s by Sarah Lazarus & Crooked Media (02/19/20)
"My name is Amy, and when I took Spanish in fourth grade, my name was Elena." - Elena Klobuchar, relating to Culinary Union members
A Barr Is Born
Having interfered politically in Justice Department criminal cases and granted clemency to some truly reprehensible characters, President Trump and his allies tried to cover his tracks with a lazily-written pack of lies.
On Tuesday night, Attorney General Bill Barr circulated a story that he’s thinking about quitting because Trump won’t stop tweeting about the Justice Department. Barr meant to suggest that he’s an unswayable attorney general who wouldn’t be aiding and abetting the president’s interference in DOJ cases, because they’re at odds. He’s asking for a huge suspension of disbelief: Yesterday Trump expressed his “total confidence” in Barr and said he thinks he’s “doing an excellent job,” which is not how Trump talks about people who stand up to him.
If Barr hit his head on something and suddenly takes the independence of his department seriously, he’ll have plenty of opportunities to prove it: Trump retweeted a series of posts critical of the Justice Department just this morning. He promoted the idea that Barr should “clean house,” and target officials who were involved in the Russia investigation. Trump also retweeted assertions of his power over the Justice Department, and a suggestion that he pardon Michael Flynn.
While Barr was pretending to have boundaries, Trump continued to purge the people who actually do. Today Trump forced out John Rood, the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy at the Pentagon, who warned the administration against withholding military assistance to Ukraine. Rood was part of the Defense Department team that certified Ukraine had made the necessary anti-corruption reforms to justify sending them the promised aid, undermining Trump’s claim that he was worried about corruption.
On the other side of the coin, Trump confirmed that he will name Richard Grenell, a notorious Trump propagandist who’s unqualified for his current role as ambassador to Germany, as the acting director of national intelligence. This is….beyond insane.
Barr’s story was far from the only bald-faced lie out of the administration today.
After basing his impeachment defense on an imaginary concern for corruption in Ukraine, Trump has bent the Justice Department to his own political purposes, pardoned a slew of corrupt public figures, and brushed off a new quid pro quo allegation with an easily debunked lie. Trump is on a mission to normalize corruption, and if his henchman Roger Stone receives a prison sentence tomorrow, it seems vanishingly unlikely that he’ll serve it to completion.
Look No Further Than The Crooked Media
To win in 2020, we need to organize volunteers, get out into communities across the country, and talk to voters about the future they want to see. We have to be in the field! And we need to start yesterday. Fortunately, there are groups on the ground who have been doing all of this, but they need our help to do everything they need to do. That’s why we’ve launched the Leave It All On the Field Fund—to support groups who are building their 2020 ground game right now →
Under The Radar
Impossibly, inexplicably, flying in the face of nature and God, there is another debate tonight. On stage for the ninth Democratic presidential debate will be: Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden, and, making his controversial debut, Michael Bloomberg. (Loosen a stupid tie for Tom Steyer, who did not qualify.) The action starts at 9 p.m. E.T., on NBC News and MSNBC, from the Paris Theater in Las Vegas. Tonight will be Bloomberg’s first exposure to direct scrutiny on a debate stage. Expect the other candidates to maul him over his history of discriminatory policies, sexual harassment lawsuits, objectionable comments, and his current efforts to buy the nomination with cold hard cash. They have no shortage of ammo: just yesterday a video surfaced of Bloomberg’s dehumanizing remarks about trans people from 2019. In preparation, Bloomberg has been hard at work practicing his zingers. Sanders has a comfortable lead in Nevada heading into tonight’s debate. Bloomberg, who isn’t even on the ballot until Super Tuesday, has suggested that other candidates drop out, lest Sanders attain an insurmountable delegate lead. Bloomberg and Sanders have set up a direct confrontation, with their campaigns feuding over the candidates’ respective health, and Sanders’s refusal to release more medical records than he already has. As always, we’ll be breaking it all down in real time in the Crooked Group Thread. Come watch with us →
The oil and gas industry has been a bigger contributor to the climate crisis than anyone realized. The bad news: A new study published in Nature indicates that we’ve been underestimating human fossil methane emissions by up to 40 percent. The better news: Tighter oil industry regulations and a switch to renewable energy could have a bigger positive impact than previously believed. The University of Rochester team conducting the study used a new method to identify the source of additional methane in the atmosphere, measuring methane levels in the pre-industrial era by examining air from that period trapped in Greenland glaciers.
Is That Hope I Feel?
A federal appeals court has upheld an injunction of a Florida law that barred people who had been convicted of felonies from voting if they had outstanding legal fines and fees. Florida Republicans passed the law in 2019 in an effort to suppress minority voters who had been re-enfranchised by Amendment 4, which restored the right to vote to 1.4 million former prisoners. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled that the law violated the Equal Protection Clause, by unconstitutionally barring a class of people from voting based on their wealth alone. We needn’t remind you that Florida is a crucial swing state, where this ruling particularly slaps.
THE ROARIN MAC'S Impeachment & Election Predictions, Picks, and Odds!
THE ROARIN MAC'S Impeachment & Election Predictions, Picks, and Odds! https://preview.redd.it/u47xq8hsdu641.jpg?width=851&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1d8c65b990b0b30a81122243cc5531e2ac862181 Professional Gambling Information from Retired Vegas Sports Consultant Roland "The MAC" McGuillaman! Donald Trump Impeachment & Election Predictions, Picks, and Odds! THE ROARIN MAC'S Impeachment & Election Predictions, Picks, and Odds! TRUMP ODDS, 2020 PRESIDENT REELECTION LINES, TRUMP ELECTION PROP BETS | DONALD TRUMP BETTING WILL DONALD TRUMP RUN FOR RE-ELECTION IN 2020? Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 10:00 AM YES -675 NO +425 WILL D TRUMP BE ELECTED TO A 2ND TERM AS POTUS? Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 10:00 AM YES -200 NO +140 NUMBER OF REPUB. SENATORS TO VOTE FOR IMPEACHMENT Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 1:00 PM 0 +150 1-4 +100 5-9 +650 10 OR MORE +1000 WILL MCCONNELL TRY TO DISMISS ARTICLES OF IMPEACH. Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 1:00 PM YES +250 NO -400 PELOSI TO SEND ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT TO SENATE Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 1:00 PM YES -3000 NO +2000 WILL MITT ROMNEY VOTE FOR IMPEACHMENT Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 1:00 PM YES +180 NO -220 WILL SUSAN COLLINS VOTE FOR IMPEACHMENT Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 1:00 PM YES +300 NO -500 WILL MARCO RUBIO VOTE FOR IMPEACHMENT Wager cut off: 2019 31st December 1:00 PM YES +250 NO -400 2020 US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION - TO WIN Wager cut off: 2020 10th January 10:00 AM DONALD TRUMP -250 BERNIE SANDERS +1000 PETE BUTTIGIEG +1000 JOE BIDEN +700 ANDREW YANG +4000 ELIZABETH WARREN +380 TULSI GABBARD +12000 AMY KLOBUCHAR +11500 CORY BOOKER +32500 MIKE PENCE +6000 JULIAN CASTRO +120000 JOHN KASICH +35000 MICHAEL BLOOMBERG +1700 HILLARY CLINTON +3300 NIKKI HALEY +8000 MARIANNE WILLIAMSON +120000 GENDER OF NEXT U.S. PRESIDENT? Wager cut off: 2020 10th January 10:00 AM MAN -500 WOMAN +350 It just doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that Joe Biden isn't a rocket scientist, and it doesn't take a feminist to know that there is no chance of there being a first American first lady-boy. Look, the bottom line is that Trump needs another 4 years as POTUS to set up his posthumous monetary bottom line by setting up a few more international back room deals & slippery handshakes with a few more Global Corporation CEO's, Military Leaders, and Offshore Banks! RedAlertWagers.com and Roland "The Roarin MAC" McGuillaman along with the American People will be voting TRUMP 2020 and that's just what it is! The MAC'S 2020 Presidential Prediction -DONALD TRUMP -250 Predictions are Courtesy of RedAlertWagers.com and Odds are Courtesy of MyBookie.ag Limited Introductory Offer: $7 a month gets access to all exclusive releases and top rated premium plays on Patreon! More Free Plays, Gambling Information and Exclusive Top Rated Premium Plays at RedAlertWagers.com
Why Bernie will emerge victorious from the crowded 2020 field [Opinion, 10 min read]
Below I want to take you through an argument for why, even when considering all of the slew of 2020 candidates we can expect to run, I think Bernie is a shoe in to be the winning candidate. To start out with here are the list of people I am considering. The List
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warren
Kamala Harris
Joe Biden
Kristen Gillibrand
Al Franken
Michelle Obama
Oprah Winfrey
Mark Zuckerberg
Corey Booker
Martin O’Malley
Andrew Cuomo
John Delaney
Amy Klobuchar
Mitch Landrieu
Terry McAuliffe
Mark Cuban
Note: Purposeful omissions include Nina Turner, Tulsi Gabbard, and Ro Khanna. I am assuming and truly believe that the Berniecrats will not run against Bernie. The Takeaways
In Democratic primary, Bernie closed the gap mainly because people started believing he could win, because others did. This could have been due to a combination of, Killing it in fundraising, Grassroots enthusiasm (phonebanking, social media, people talking about it with their families), and People seeing polling putting Bernie ahead in early primary states.
Trump was able to separate from the pack, because he got their attention, and was speaking their language. Most importantly he gave them hope, all of this was due to a combination of 1) His bombastic personality, which fit perfectly in our changing media landscape guaranteeing he was involved in every conversation, 2) His ability to talk to people where they were, regardless of facts. He talked about the stuff they cared about in a way they understood 3) The fact that he inspired people to believe that he could change things.
The common threads for being a people's candidate that can generate enthusiasm and separate oneself from the crowd are 1. Getting People's Attention 2. Populist Rhetoric 3. Unique and Strong Personality 4. Ability to inspire hope So who’s going to be able to evoke these threads the best, while separating themselves from similar candidates. To make sense of this, let’s try to shortlist. The Obvious These are ones I believe are clearly non-starter. John Delaney Who? He’s the first to announce he’s going to run, and while theres precadent for unknowns to rise, with this crowded pack, and the fact that he’s a firm moderate, I wouldn’t buy on his stock. Oprah She is quoted as saying “she will never run for office”. Let’s take her word for it. Michelle Obama Obama, a very likable and strong candidate, has stated that she will not be running for office. While people can change their mind, running for presidency requires at least a year of pre-primary war chest building and outreach. By my clock, if she’s not signaling by Fall 2018 that she wants to run, she won’t be able to. And nothing I’ve seen other than Vegas Odds gives signs that she will. Plus, I believe her, it probably is super hard on your family to be in the White House, I think she’ll stick to citizen action and courting bankers with her husband over another run. The “Too Dark to See” Horses For these we will have to compare them to our common threads identified above. Everyone from here on I believe will or can easily make it onto a debate stage, so we are now eliminating people who we think will drop off early due to lack of a) fundraising b) attention (through media coverage and personality) c) Ability to evoke hope. Mitch Landreiu He got some attention for his comments on statue removal in New Orleans. Hard to say if he can ride that wave and make a case that he’s more qualified, or is a better person to evoke change, and he won’t get any love from the identity politics peeps. He’s a dark dark horse, Andrew Cuomo He’s in hot water for his handling of the MTA among other things, and with his governor seat up for re-election, and middling polling, his star is not very bright right now. He also doesn’t have the credibility to be able to outflank any other establishment on his recent progressive accomplishments (i.e free public college in NYC). Terry McCauliffe White Male, Clinton Loyalist, double-talk sounding politician. McCauliffe would do well in a 2004 Presidential Primary, but in today’s landscape there’s no way people are going to be paying to attention to him in this crowded field. He might have some fundraising success, but he looks weak from where I stand. That leaves us now with these 11. 1. Bernie Sanders 2. Elizabeth Warren 3. Kamala Harris 4. Joe Biden 5. Al Franken 6. Mark Cuban 7. Mark Zuckerberg 8. Martin O’Malley 9. Amy Klobuchar 10. Corey Booker 11. Kristen Gillibrand This is a very interesting field. You Have 9 people who all have near 100% Name recognition of likely voters, 2 Billionaires named Mark, 1 former VP, 4 Women, 2 POC’s, 2 senators from the same state, and no one representing a swing state. Now, the first thing people are going to need in order to vocalize their support for you after the first or 2nd debate is attention. The sore thumb out of the bunch is Gillibrand. Being a woman, vocalizing support for single payer (indicative she’s going to campaign on a populist tilt) are good things going for her, but the fact 2 of the other women, and 4 other people on this list have come out for the same makes it seem that her message will get muddled, making it hard for her to get attention. She likely will get endorsements from some key democrats like Chuck Schumer, but its hard to see that translating into public interest in her candidacy. So Gillibrand is off the island.
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warren
Kamala Harris
Joe Biden
Al Franken
Mark Cuban
Mark Zuckerberg
Martin O’Malley
Amy Klobuchar
Corey Booker
Another glaring name on this list is Senator Corey Booker. His flip flopping on healthcare, and history of pharmaceutical lobbying makes him extremely vulnerable to attacks from the likes of Bernie and Warren. I don’t see Booker being able to turn his charisma and ability to turn a phrase around. He may stick around long enough because he’ll do well in fundraising, but I don’t see him garnering much enthusiasm once he has to endure that kind of criticism, especially when progressives groups have a target on him already. Bye Corey.
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warren
Kamala Harris
Joe Biden
Al Franken
Mark Cuban
Mark Zuckerberg
Martin O’Malley
Amy Klobuchar
Now it’s getting tough. So far we’ve really only been removing establishment politicians from their roost, because thems the times. But this election will IMO, be guaranteed to be one of the first times a non-politician has a large chance to win the Democratic Primary. Enter the Marks. So much can happen between now and 2019. Facebook will likely be bigger than it is, have more influence than it has, and thus make the notion of Zuckerberg’s candidacy all the more questionable. Cuban on the other hand has a pretty clean slate. Like our current president, he’s a reality tv star billionaire, but he might actually be a businessman that liberals can get behind. While Zuckerberg will have unique advantages in his youth, (he’ll be 35 in 2019), and his story, I think that the risk to Facebook’s shareholder value given the conflict of interest people might feel in watching the guy who’s controlling so much of the information flow in the US campaigning for president. And Zuck isn’t a bombastic manipulator able to say outlandish things to turn that attention in his favor. That might be a little too big Brother for many. I’m not kicking Zuck out but he’s getting downgraded to #9. Cuban on the other hand is looking like a BUY right now, bumping him up to 5 as he’s a wildcard that I think both voters, and the media will not be able to avoid coalescing around.
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warren
Kamala Harris
Joe Biden
Mark Cuban
Al Franken
Amy Klobuchar
Martin O’Malley
Mark Zuckerberg
Now the “snooze fest” votes are worth visiting. Martin O’Malley couldn’t do better than 1% in Iowa and dropped out right after the caucus. I think he’ll run because he REALLY wants to be a Vice President or be in line for a cabinet position, and running is only a positive for him. I like him better than Zuckerberg because he won’t be dealing with the media scrutiny, and people who see themselves as optimistic center-leftists will identify somewhat with him. Klobuchar is an interesting one. She’s cut from the Clinton school, but without the baggage. She’s very popular in her home state (more popular than Al Franken), she has a maturity I think people will identify with. I think if you voted for Clinton in the Primary, theres a strong chance you’ll gravitate towards Amy if you’ve never heard of her. The thing against her is she is not a stable-rocker. She will gravitate towards the party line as it moves towards Bernie, but she’ll always want to draw contrasts as a pragmatist and size down the ambitions of her counterparts. I don’t see this working as well as she thinks, as the snake person voting block is only growing. Which takes us to Franken, who’s the unique entertaineelected official on the list. Franken came off pretty strong in the Senate confirmation hearings, and I think that he’ll be able to mix his snark and his reserved eloquence. He came out for Single Payer, unlike Klobuchar who just stood next to Bernie Sanders and denounced it as a false choice. I think that if that continues, Klobuchar is going to have a hard time evoking the “hope” thread we identified above. Ok so I think I’m comfortable with the a Top 6 of 1. Bernie Sanders 2. Elizabeth Warren 3. Kamala Harris 4. Joe Biden 5. Mark Cuban 6. Al Franken I’d give any one of these guys more than 10% odds, all with a scenario where I see them winning. No long shots here. But now at least we can imagine what debate #4 or #5 might look like and who the public is going to respond to. Let me prophesies both scenarios one by one Al Franken The one where he wins: Al Franken is going to have to do a good job of separating himself as a person progressives can feel comfortable representing them vs. the other center-lefties (Harris, Cuban, Biden). If he can make himself look like the sensible option for those who might not want to take a chance on Cuban’s unknownness, Biden’s age, and get people behind his strong track record vs. Kamala Harris, I can see him going neck and neck with the progressives Bernie and Warren. At that point he’s got a great shot to go far. The one where he loses (My guess) I think this is more likely. I can see him besting Cuban if he missteps, but I’d actually bet on Mark. I can see him besting Biden due to the age thing, as well as the “fresh blood”, argument. But In reality, I can’t see him out charming both, as well as Harris who as an new senator can sort of “Obama” her rhetoric and paint her selves as a more authentic “people’s choice” candidate. Mark Cuban The one where he wins: Plane and simple, if someone gave me better than 15-1 odds in this field of 6 for Cuban, I’m taking that every day. Cuban both gets to appeal to the anti-establishment, disenfranchised voters who are sick of DC, as well as neoliberal who want someone to make sure the corporate donor base is happy. He’s not going to be pushing radical policy, but he will push a radical personality. If he does run, I predict he’ll spend a lot of time Pied Pipering, and trying to get his name and brand into as many political convos as he can, a la Trump. The one where he loses In reality, I think he’s his own worst enemy. I see little to none of the Bernie 2016 voters going his way, and if they just wanted a watered down “radical” leftist personality, they’d go Warren. He’s unique, which might draw in some Independents who want to roll the dice on him, but as a newcomer, I don’t think he’s right for the party for where I expect the base to be in 2020, and can’t see him doing very well in the blue collar states. Joe Biden The one where he wins: Honestly Biden could really just replicate Clinton’s play it safe primary strategy, 2020ify, give him the Diamond Joe smile, add in the Obama crowd endorsements, and add in a little more “lets fix this broken system” one liners that he’s known for, and I think he’s a super strong chance to knock out the entire establishment lineup from the very first caucus. If I’m looking at Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, I think that Warren & Bernie are the only ones who can match him. The one where he loses: Is where the public sees his age, or sees his name and says I want something new, and fresh. Its really hard to predict this kind of thing, as no one this old, while still very popular has been an option. I think the Clinton crowd is going to like Biden, but they’re really going to love their next candidate. And I think the Donor base will hedge their bets on that risk. Kamala Harris The one where she wins: If Joe Biden doesn’t run, Kamala Harris will be in the primary until the last weeks. While she might get some shade from the progressive left for courting donors in the Hamptons, I think that the “anti-trumpets” will be able to funnel their hopes and energy into her, without feeling like they are socialists. She can inspire across demographics, and her mostly OK track record (save the Mnuchin story) is peanuts compared to Hillary. I think that you’ll see that after the first few races, only one DNC loved candidate will be there to contend. Harris is the prototype pick for this. The one where she loses: I believe that a big factor at play here is the news landscape come 2019. 2016 was a very innovative moment for independent press. I think that unless she does a genuine job of gaslighting progressives, she’s going to have one of the biggest targets on her, especially if everyone else is dropping out around her. Elizabeth Warren The one where she wins: Vegas is giving her the best odds. I think thats fair. People have been begging her to run before, and she has been playing nice with the establishment long enough where I can see how she can totally sidestep the smear campaign that Bernie is sure to endure once we get close to the elections. People also like how she takes on Trump, and her electability on paper to a DC strategist looks really strong. 60-90% of progressives also LOVE her, she’s extremely smart, she’s done great work on the right kinds of issues. People across the party would gear up to campaign for her. I think this is a solid bet for the #2 most likely but…. The one where she loses: I think I’ll cover this in my final section, for who I think is going to be the ultimate winner. Bernie Sanders Why he will win: The most popular politician in this country. Someone who outraged the most well oiled political campaign in history, and revolutionized how campaigns can be financed. More snake person voted for him than Trump and Hillary combined in the primary. He got single payer to get 16 damn cosponsors, has been fighting for every important issue since he took office with the same message. Republicans even say he’s the most honest politician in the country. And that last part is the real wildcard that puts Bernie ahead of everyone else over the long haul of a campaign. When comparing to Warren, I can't see how she'll be able to draw a strong distinction against. She has a unique and strong track record, but he is doing pushing policies that would never have been thought possible even a year again, all of which she supports. On the other hand, Bernie can easily make distinctions of Warren playing the DC game, and being late to the party in certain instances (such as not endorsing him in the primary, Standing Rock, Single Payer). Yes he is old like Biden. But Biden doesn’t draw in independents, progressives, and young people like Bernie does. People won’t vote for Bernie over his age same as Biden, but more people will be organizing for him than any other candidate. Bernie can go to a random city in the middle of a red state and draw a minimum of a few thousand attendees to a rally. In a blue state metro area, that number exceeds an NBA stadium. Bernie will be more well-funded, more prepared, more organized, perceived as much less radical, more well known, more beloved, and more believed to be the best option to beat Trump. The biggest negative Bernie has to me is not his age, but the inherent bias that the establishment has against him. I believe the DNC will do much more of the same, but voters will be much more prepared for it. I believe the mainstream news media will also do such more of the same, but people will be believing them much less. That, and the fact that the centrist democrats vote is going to get cut into pieces by all of the hopefuls early on, Bernie is going to be the one people will be hanging on to every word for.
Win or lose, the Republican candidate and his inner circle have built a direct marketing operation that could power a TV network—or finish off the GOP.
By Joshua Green and Sasha Issenberg
On Oct. 19, as the third and final presidential debate gets going in Las Vegas, Donald Trump’s Facebook and Twitter feeds are being manned by Brad Parscale, a San Antonio marketing entrepreneur, whose buzz cut and long narrow beard make him look like a mixed martial arts fighter. His Trump tie has been paired with a dark Zegna suit. A lapel pin issued by the Secret Service signals his status. He’s equipped with a dashboard of 400 prewritten Trump tweets. “Command center,” he says, nodding at his laptop. Parscale is one of the few within Trump’s crew entrusted to tweet on his behalf. He’s sitting at a long table in a double-wide trailer behind the debate arena, cheek to jowl with his fellow Trump staffers and Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee. The charged atmosphere and rows of technicians staring raptly at giant TVs and computer screens call to mind NASA on launch day. On the wall, a poster of Julian Assange reads: “Dear Hillary, I miss reading your classified emails.” 10:02 p.m.: Trump, onstage, criticizes Hillary Clinton for accepting foreign money. “Fire it off!” Parscale barks. Instantly, a new Trump tweet appears: “Crooked @HillaryClinton’s foundation is a CRIMINAL ENTERPRISE. Time to #DrainTheSwamp!” 10:04 p.m.: Trump blames Clinton for $6 billion that went missing during her tenure at the State Department (actually a bookkeeping error). “Hit that hard,” shouts Jason Miller, Trump’s senior communications adviser. Parscale already has: “Crooked’s top aides were MIRED in massive conflicts of interest at the State Dept. WE MUST #DrainTheSwamp.” 10:09 p.m.: Trump deploys a carefully rehearsed WikiLeaks attack: “Podesta said some horrible things about you—and he was right.” The trailer erupts. “There it is!” someone shouts. “Push that,” Parscale commands. Within seconds, Trump’s roiling social mediasphere is bestowed with a curated Clinton burn from their leader: “Bernie Sanders on HRC: Bad Judgement [sic]. John Podesta on HRC: Bad Instincts #BigLeagueTruth.” When the debate wraps, Parscale leaps up, open laptop still in hand, and bolts from the trailer with Priebus and the rest of the senior staff to congratulate Trump as he comes off the stage. In the wings, Parscale joins Steve Bannon, Trump’s Machiavelli and campaign chairman, on leave from Breitbart News Network; Dan Scavino Jr., his social media director; and a clutch of Trump children and their spouses, including Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, whom Parscale considers nearly a brother. Up on stage, Trump had been visibly upset, snapping at Clinton (“nasty woman”) and tearing a page from his notebook. But a moment later, when he emerges from a dark corridor with a phalanx of Secret Service agents, he’s thronged by his worshipful band of advisers, quasi-celebrities, and hangers-on. Parscale, tweeting as he walks, nearly misses him. Trump leans over to whisper into Bannon’s ear, and a Secret Service officer ushers Trump, Bannon, and Parscale toward a row of black SUVs. A moment later, they’re gone. Trump reclaims possession of his virtual self. Parscale, now tweeting from his own account, celebrates the night’s haul: “HUGE 24hrs of online donations for @realDonaldTrump. 125,000+ unique donors grossing over $9,000,000! Thank you America! #MAGA.” Almost every public and private metric suggests Trump is headed for a loss, possibly an epic one. His frustrated demeanor on the campaign trail suggests he knows it. Yet even as he nears the end of his presidential run, his team is sowing the seeds of a new enterprise with a direct marketing effort that they insist could still shock the world on Election Day. Beginning last November, then ramping up in earnest when Trump became the Republican nominee, Kushner quietly built a sprawling digital fundraising database and social media campaign that’s become the locus of his father-in-law’s presidential bid. Trump’s top advisers won’t concede the possibility of defeat, but they’re candid about the value of what they’ve built even after the returns come in—and about Trump’s desire for influence regardless of outcome. “Trump is a builder,” says Bannon, in a rare interview. “And what he’s built is the underlying apparatus for a political movement that’s going to propel us to victory on Nov. 8 and dominate Republican politics after that.” If Trump wants to strengthen his hold on his base, then his apocalyptic rhetoric on the stump begins to make more sense. Lately he’s sounded less like a candidate seeking to persuade moderates and swing voters and more like the far-right populist leaders who’ve risen throughout Europe. Most Republican Party officials ardently hope he’ll go away quietly if he loses. But given all that his campaign—and Kushner’s group especially—has been doing behind the scenes, it looks likelier that Trump and his lieutenants will stick around. They may emerge as a new media enterprise, an outsider political movement, or perhaps some combination of the two: an American UK Independence Party (UKIP) that will wage war on the Republican Party—or, rather, intensify the war that Trump and Bannon have already begun. To outsiders, the Trump campaign often appears to be powered by little more than the candidate’s impulses and Twitter feed. But after Trump locked down the GOP nomination by winning Indiana’s primary, Kushner tapped Parscale, a political novice who built web pages for the Trump family’s business and charities, to begin an ambitious digital operation fashioned around a database they named Project Alamo. With Trump atop the GOP ticket, Kushner was eager to grow fast. “When we won the nomination, we decided we were going to do digital fundraising and really ramp this thing up to the next level,” says a senior official. Kushner, this official continued, “reached out to some Silicon Valley people who are kind of covert Trump fans and experts in digital marketing. They taught us about scaling. There’s really not that much of a difference between politics and regular marketing.” When Bannon joined the campaign in August, Project Alamo’s data began shaping even more of Trump’s political and travel strategy—and especially his fundraising. Trump himself was an avid pupil. Parscale would sit with him on the plane to share the latest data on his mushrooming audience and the $230 million they’ve funneled into his campaign coffers. Today, housed across from a La-Z-Boy Furniture Gallery along Interstate 410 in San Antonio, the digital nerve center of Trump’s operation encompasses more than 100 people, from European data scientists to gun-toting elderly call-center volunteers. They labor in offices lined with Trump iconography and Trump-focused inspirational quotes from Sheriff Joe Arpaio and evangelical leader Jerry Falwell Jr. Until now, Trump has kept this operation hidden from public view. But he granted Bloomberg Businessweek exclusive access to the people, the strategy, the ads, and a large part of the data that brought him to this point and will determine how the final two weeks of the campaign unfold. Several things jump out. Despite Trump’s claim that he doesn’t believe the polls, his San Antonio research team spends $100,000 a week on surveys (apart from polls commissioned out of Trump Tower) and has sophisticated models that run daily simulations of the election. The results mirror those of the more reliable public forecasters—in other words, Trump’s staff knows he’s losing. Badly. “Nate Silver’s results have been similar to ours,” says Parscale, referring to the polling analyst and his predictions at FiveThirtyEight, “except they lag by a week or two because he’s relying on public polls.” The campaign knows who it must reach and is still executing its strategy despite the public turmoil: It’s identified 13.5 million voters in 16 battleground states whom it considers persuadable, although the number of voters shrinks daily as they make up their minds. Trump’s team also knows where its fate will be decided. It’s built a model, the “Battleground Optimizer Path to Victory,” to weight and rank the states that the data team believes are most critical to amassing the 270 electoral votes Trump needs to win the White House. On Oct. 18 they rank as follows: Florida (“If we don’t win, we’re cooked,” says an official), Ohio, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Georgia. Trump believes he possesses hidden strength that may only materialize at the ballot box. At rallies, he’s begun speculating that the election will be like “Brexit times five,” implying that he’ll upend expectations much as the Brexit vote shocked experts who didn’t believe a majority of Britons would vote to leave the European Union. Trump’s data scientists, including some from the London firm Cambridge Analytica who worked on the “Leave” side of the Brexit initiative, think they’ve identified a small, fluctuating group of people who are reluctant to admit their support for Trump and may be throwing off public polls. Still, Trump’s reality is plain: He needs a miracle. Back in May, newly anointed, he told Bloomberg Businessweek he would harness “the movement” to challenge Clinton in states Republicans haven’t carried in years: New York, New Jersey, Oregon, Connecticut, California. “I’m going to do phenomenally,” he predicted. Yet neither Trump’s campaign nor the RNC has prioritized registering and mobilizing the 47 million eligible white voters without college degrees who are Trump’s most obvious source of new votes, as FiveThirtyEight analyst David Wasserman noted. To compensate for this, Trump’s campaign has devised another strategy, which, not surprisingly, is negative. Instead of expanding the electorate, Bannon and his team are trying to shrink it. “We have three major voter suppression operations under way,” says a senior official. They’re aimed at three groups Clinton needs to win overwhelmingly: idealistic white liberals, young women, and African Americans. Trump’s invocation at the debate of Clinton’s WikiLeaks e-mails and support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership was designed to turn off Sanders supporters. The parade of women who say they were sexually assaulted by Bill Clinton and harassed or threatened by Hillary is meant to undermine her appeal to young women. And her 1996 suggestion that some African American males are “super predators” is the basis of a below-the-radar effort to discourage infrequent black voters from showing up at the polls—particularly in Florida. On Oct. 24, Trump’s team began placing spots on select African American radio stations. In San Antonio, a young staffer showed off a South Park-style animation he’d created of Clinton delivering the “super predator” line (using audio from her original 1996 sound bite), as cartoon text popped up around her: “Hillary Thinks African Americans are Super Predators.” The animation will be delivered to certain African American voters through Facebook “dark posts”—nonpublic posts whose viewership the campaign controls so that, as Parscale puts it, “only the people we want to see it, see it.” The aim is to depress Clinton’s vote total. “We know because we’ve modeled this,” says the official. “It will dramatically affect her ability to turn these people out.” The Trump team’s effort to discourage young women by rolling out Clinton accusers and drive down black turnout in Miami’s Little Haiti neighborhood with targeted messages about the Clinton Foundation’s controversial operations in Haiti is an odd gambit. Campaigns spend millions on data science to understand their own potential supporters—to whom they’re likely already credible messengers—but here Trump is speaking to his opponent’s. Furthermore, there’s no scientific basis for thinking this ploy will convince these voters to stay home. It could just as easily end up motivating them. Regardless of whether this works or backfires, setting back GOP efforts to attract women and minorities even further, Trump won’t come away from the presidential election empty-handed. Although his operation lags previous campaigns in many areas (its ground game, television ad buys, money raised from large donors), it’s excelled at one thing: building an audience. Powered by Project Alamo and data supplied by the RNC and Cambridge Analytica, his team is spending $70 million a month, much of it to cultivate a universe of millions of fervent Trump supporters, many of them reached through Facebook. By Election Day, the campaign expects to have captured 12 million to 14 million e-mail addresses and contact information (including credit card numbers) for 2.5 million small-dollar donors, who together will have ponied up almost $275 million. “I wouldn’t have come aboard, even for Trump, if I hadn’t known they were building this massive Facebook and data engine,” says Bannon. “Facebook is what propelled Breitbart to a massive audience. We know its power.” Since Trump paid to build this audience with his own campaign funds, he alone will own it after Nov. 8 and can deploy it to whatever purpose he chooses. He can sell access to other campaigns or use it as the basis for a 2020 presidential run. It could become the audience for a Trump TV network. As Bannon puts it: “Trump is an entrepreneur.” Whatever Trump decides, this group will influence Republican politics going forward. These voters, whom Cambridge Analytica has categorized as “disenfranchised new Republicans,” are younger, more populist and rural—and also angry, active, and fiercely loyal to Trump. Capturing their loyalty was the campaign’s goal all along. It’s why, even if Trump loses, his team thinks it’s smarter than political professionals. “We knew how valuable this would be from the outset,” says Parscale. “We own the future of the Republican Party.” Like so many Trump die-hards, Parscale, 40, is an up-from-nothing striver who won a place in the Trump firmament by dint of his willingness to serve the family’s needs—and then, when those needs turned to presidential campaigning, wound up inhabiting a position of remarkable authority. He oversees the campaign’s media budget and supervises a large staff of employees and contractors, a greater number than report for duty each day at Trump Tower headquarters. “My loyalty is to the family,” he says. “Donald Trump says ‘Jump’; I say, ‘How high?’ Then I give him my opinion of where I should jump to, and he says, ‘Go do it.’ ” Parscale was born in a small town outside Topeka, Kan., a self-described “rural jock” whose size—6-foot-8, 240 pounds—won him a basketball scholarship to the University of Texas at San Antonio. When injuries derailed his playing career, his interest turned to business. “The day I graduated, I skipped the ceremony to go straight to California for the dot-com boom,” he says. It was 1999. He became a sales manager for a video streaming company, taught himself programming, and eventually bought some of the company’s intellectual property, in digital video and 3D animation, and struck out on his own. But after the dot-com crash, his company failed, he got divorced, and by 2002 he was back in San Antonio, broke and unemployed. He hustled consulting gigs, going door to door and cold-calling local businesses. “My first year, I tapped on shoulders in a bookstore to get my first customers, people who were buying web books, and asked if they needed help,” he says. One day in 2010, the phone rang. It was Kathy Kaye, the new head of Trump International Realty. “She said, ‘Would you like to bid on building the Trump website?’ ” Parscale recalls. “I said yeah. I bid $10,000 on the first website. I think they were shocked how cheap it was. Next thing I know, I’m talking to Ivanka. So they signed a contract with me, and I wrote the website by myself. I told ’em I’d give all the money back if they didn’t like it.” The Trumps liked it. He eventually built sites for Trump Winery and the Eric Trump Foundation. When Trump launched a presidential exploratory committee, he knew who could build a website for him on the cheap: Parscale charged $1,500. By then he’d partnered with a local designer and expanded into a design and marketing agency, Giles-Parscale. Trump’s own approach to self-promotion, reinforced by Kushner’s advice, was at odds with the highly targeted logic of the web. “If you’re running a burger shop, you have to let people know that your burgers are good and get them into your shop to buy them,” says a source close to the candidate. “It’s pretty similar with voting: You have to find out what people want and then convince them why your product is the right one.” Trump’s digital operation was focused primarily on tracking down the people who already liked his burgers and getting them to buy more. Parscale began toying with a list of registered voters acquired from a nonpartisan database vendor to learn more about who Trump’s backers were. Because the campaign hadn’t cultivated his supporters as donors or volunteers, most of what it knew about them came from requests for tickets to his rallies. After a March event in Chicago devolved into a melee, Parscale decided to stop relying on the ticketing service Eventbrite and build his own tool to accept RSVPs. He says he coded the program himself in two days so eventgoers would have to confirm via mobile phone. The added layer would weed out fraudulent requests placing tickets in protesters’ hands—and also collect supporters’ phone numbers. Parscale was given a small budget to expand Trump’s base and decided to spend it all on Facebook. He developed rudimentary models, matching voters to their Facebook profiles and relying on that network’s “Lookalike Audiences” to expand his pool of targets. He ultimately placed $2 million in ads across several states, all from his laptop at home, then used the social network’s built-in “brand-lift” survey tool to gauge the effectiveness of his videos, which featured infographic-style explainers about his policy proposals or Trump speaking to the camera. “I always wonder why people in politics act like this stuff is so mystical,” Parscale says. “It’s the same shit we use in commercial, just has fancier names.” As Kushner, who shares his father-in-law’s disdain for political professionals, became more active in the campaign’s operations, Parscale emerged from among dozens of vendors into a unique role. “Once Jared found Brad,” says a campaign official, “we were able to avoid building a big team and ran a lot of our back end through his office in San Antonio.” After Trump won the Indiana primary, vanquishing his remaining rivals, Parscale had to integrate his do-it-yourself operation with two established players who would jostle for primacy as supplier of Trump’s data. The first was Cambridge Analytica, on whose board Bannon sits. Among its investors is the hedge fund titan Robert Mercer and his daughter, Rebekah, who were about to become some of the largest donors to the Trump cause. Locations for the candidate’s rallies, long the centerpiece of his media-centric candidacy, are guided by a Cambridge Analytica ranking of the places in a state with the largest clusters of persuadable voters. The other was the Republican National Committee, to which Trump relinquished control over many of its tactical decisions. “I told him he’s going to want to use the RNC once he’s the nominee,” says Newt Gingrich. “Reince has built a real system, and it can be very valuable to him.” Soon after Trump secured the nomination, a team from the RNC flew to San Antonio to meet Parscale at his favorite Mexican restaurant and discuss what party officials began describing as “the merger.” Priebus boasted then of having put “more than $100 million into data and infrastructure” since Mitt Romney’s 2012 loss. More than 10 percent of that cash went solely to beefing up the RNC’s e-mail list, which now has a dedicated department of a dozen people managing a list of more than 6 million supporters. To win access to them, Trump negotiated a partnership. The party’s online fundraising specialists would use his name and keep 80 percent of the revenue, while Trump’s campaign would get the remainder. “This is exactly what the party needed the RNC to do—building assets and infrastructure and the nominee gets to benefit from it,” says Chief Digital Officer Gerrit Lansing. Trump’s team, which hadn’t actively raised money during the primaries, was unprepared. “I was put in the position of ‘We need to start fundraising tomorrow,’ ” says Parscale. That turn was so hasty that when, in late June, Trump sent out his first e-mail solicitation, it ended up in recipients’ spam folders 60 percent of the time. Typically marketers in that situation would have begun quietly blasting less important messages from a new server to familiarize spam filters with the sender’s address. Parscale shrugs off the ensuing criticism from technologists. “Should I have set up an e-mail server a month earlier? Possibly,” he says. “We also raised $40 million in two weeks. Woo-hoo, spam rating.” Parscale was building his own list of Trump supporters, beyond the RNC’s reach. Cambridge Analytica’s statistical models isolated likely supporters whom Parscale bombarded with ads on Facebook, while the campaign bought up e-mail lists from the likes of Gingrich and Tea Party groups to prospect for others. Some of the ads linked directly to a payment page, others—with buttons marked “Stand with Trump” or “Support Trump”—to a sign-up page that asked for a name, address, and online contact information. While his team at Giles-Parscale designed the ads, Parscale invited a variety of companies to set up shop in San Antonio to help determine which social media ads were most effective. Those companies test ad variations against one another—the campaign has ultimately generated 100,000 distinct pieces of creative content—and then roll out the strongest performers to broader audiences. At the same time, Parscale made the vendors, tech companies with names such as Sprinklr and Kenshoo, compete Apprentice-style; those whose algorithms fared worst in drumming up donors lost their contracts. Each time Parscale returned to San Antonio from Trump Tower, he would find that some vendors had been booted from their offices. Parscale’s department not only paid for itself but also was the largest source of campaign revenue. That endeared it to a candidate stingy with other parts of the budget. When Trump fired his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, Parscale’s responsibilities grew, then further still when Lewandowski’s replacement, Paul Manafort, flamed out. In June, Parscale, whose prior political experience was a Bexar County tax assessor’s race (his client lost), became Trump’s digital director and, in many ways, the linchpin of his unusual run. By the time Bannon became chief executive officer, Parscale had balanced the competition between the RNC and Cambridge Analytica, with different sources of data being tapped for the campaign’s fundraising appeals, persuasive communication, and get-out-the-vote contacts. “I’m the only one that hasn’t gained from any of this,” he says pointedly about the data rivalry. In June, Parscale granted his first national interview, to Wired, to preemptively explain why the Federal Election Commission was about to report that an unknown agency in San Antonio was the Trump campaign’s largest vendor. In August, Giles-Parscale handled $9 million in business from Trump’s campaign; two months later, the company’s total haul had cleared $50 million, most of it money passing through to online ad networks at little markup. Parscale was delivering his services at such a discount that Kushner even worried that the agency’s efforts might have to be classified as an in-kind contribution. “Jared’s a big part of what gave me my power and ability to do what I’ve been doing,” says Parscale, who sees himself as more than just a staffer. “Because you know what I was willing to do? I was willing to do it like family.” There are signs that Trump’s presidential run has dealt a serious blow to his brand. His inflammatory comments about Mexican “rapists” and demeaning comments about women triggered a flood of busted deals and lost partnerships. Macy’s stopped making Trump-branded menswear, Serta halted its line of mattresses emblazoned with his logo, and celebrity chefs fled his new luxury hotel in Washington. Booking websites show that visits to Trump-branded hotels are down. Win or lose, Trump’s future may well lie in capitalizing on the intense, if limited, political support he has cultivated over the past year. According to a source close to Trump, the idea of a Trump TV network originated during the Republican primaries as a threat Kushner issued to Roger Ailes when Trump’s inner circle was unhappy with the tenor of Fox News’s coverage. The warring factions eventually reconciled. But Trump became enamored by the power of his draw after five media companies expressed interest. “One thing Jared always tells Donald is that if the New York Times and cable news mattered, he would be at 1 percent in the polls,” says the source. “Trump supporters really don’t have a media outlet where they feel they’re represented—CNN has gone fully against Trump, MSNBC is assumed to be against Trump, and Fox is somewhere in the middle. What we found is that our people have organized incredibly well on the web. Reddit literally had to change their rules because it was becoming all Trump. Growing the digital footprint has really allowed us to take his message directly to the people.” It’s not clear how much of this digital audience will remain in Trump’s thrall if he loses. But the number should be substantial. “Trump will get 40 percent of the vote, and half that number at least will buy into his claim that the election was rigged and stolen from him,” says Steve Schmidt, John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign chief and an outspoken Trump critic. “That is more than enough people to support a multibillion-dollar media business and a powerful presence in American politics.” Digital strategists typically value contact lists at $3 to $8 per e-mail, which would price Trump’s list of supporters anywhere from $36 million to $112 million. The Trump enterprise could benefit from it in any number of ways. The easiest move would be for Trump to partner with Bannon’s global Breitbart News Network, which already has a grip on the rising generation of populist Republicans. Along with a new venture, Trump would gain a platform from which to carry on his movement, built upon the millions of names housed in Project Alamo. “This is the pipe that makes the connection between Trump and the people,” says Bannon. “He has an apparatus that connects him to an ever-expanding audience of followers.” As it happens, this cross-pollination of right-wing populist media and politics is already occurring overseas—and Trump’s influence on it is unmistakable. In early October, the editor-in-chief of Breitbart London, Raheem Kassam, a former adviser to Nigel Farage, announced he would run for leader of UKIP. His slogan: “Make UKIP Great Again.” The final ignominy for a Republican Party brought low by Trump is that its own digital efforts may undermine its future. The data operation in which Priebus and the RNC invested so heavily has fed into Project Alamo, helping Parscale build Trump’s base. “They brought to the table this movement and people who were willing to donate and activate, and we brought to the table a four-year investment and said we can process that for you,” says Sean Spicer, the RNC’s chief strategist. “That willingness to embrace what the RNC built allowed them to harness that movement.” If the election results cause the party to fracture, Trump will be better positioned than the RNC to reach this mass of voters because he’ll own the list himself—and Priebus, after all he’s endured, will become just the latest to invest with Trump and wind up poorer for the experience.
Jeremy Corbyn Is Leading the Left Out of the Wilderness and Toward Power
Jeremy Corbyn Is Leading the Left Out of the Wilderness and Toward Power by Mehdi Hasan via The Intercept URL: http://ift.tt/2r81w5o Thank you, Jeremy Corbyn. It is no exaggeration to say that the British Labour Party leader has changed progressive politics in the UK, and perhaps the wider West too, for a generation. The bearded, 68-year-old, self-declared socialist has proved that an unashamedly, unabashedly, unapologetically left-wing offer is not the politics of the impossible but, rather, a politics of the very much possible. Last Thursday’s election result in the UK is a ringing confirmation that stirring idealism need not be sacrificed at the altar of political pragmatism. In these dark, depressing times of Trump and Brexit, of the fallout from the Great Recession and the rise of the far right, Corbyn has reminded us that a politics of hope can go toe to toe with a politics of fear. Millions of people will turn out to vote for a leader who preaches optimism over pessimism, who offers inspiration instead of enervation. Corbyn has proved that the much-maligned young can be a force for change. Younger voters are not lazy, indifferent or apathetic, as the conventional wisdom goes, but will in fact come out in their droves for a leader who motivates and excites them; who gives them not just something to vote for — be it a scrapping of tuition fees or a higher minimum wage or a new house-building program — but something to believe in. A common struggle, a better future, a more equal society. Because something always beats nothing. Corbyn has showed how it is possible for progressives to build a coalition between the young, people of color and cosmopolitan liberals on the one hand and, yes, those dreaded white working class communities on the other. It is a fiction to claim that leaders on the left must choose between them, or play one marginalized group off against another. White ex-UKIP voters in the north of the country returned to Labor last week in their hundreds of thousands. So socialists and social democrats no longer need be on the defensive. Yes, mainstream center-left parties may have been crushed in recent European elections — think of France or the Netherlands. However, Corbyn — who spent 32 years toiling in obscurity on the backbenches before becoming leader of his party in a shock victory in 2015 — has now a paved a road out of the wilderness. To be clear: the Labour Party did not win the the UK’s general election. Theresa May’s Conservatives secured more votes and more seats. Yet it is difficult to overstate — as even Corbyn’s biggest critics have now conceded — the sheer size of his electoral achievement. Labour’s 40% share of the national vote is its highest since 1970, with the exception of Tony Blair’s two landslide wins in 1997 and 2001. Last Thursday’s election also saw the the biggest increase in vote share for Labour — nearly 10% — since the party’s post-war blowout in 1945 under iconic leader Clement Attlee. All of this despite Corbyn having begun the campaign more than 20 percentage points behind the Conservatives; having been written off by politicians and pundits from across the spectrum and relentlessly undermined by members of his own parliamentary party; and having endured an unprecedented campaign of demonization by the right-wing press. Corbyn, lest we forget, was smeared as a terrorist sympathizer; ridiculed for forgetting the details of various policies; dismissed as a crank and an eccentric. “To take Labour’s prospects seriously under Corbyn was to abandon being taken seriously yourself,” wrote the Guardian’s Gary Younge on the eve of the election. “The political class imparted as much to the media class, and the media class duly printed and broadcast it… The wisdom was distributed to all who mattered. Those who did not receive it did not, by definition, matter.” On Thursday, they proved once and for all that they mattered. And the quiet, unassuming Corbyn proved that he was indeed a serious and viable candidate for the highest office in the land — one analysis found that a mere 2,227 votes, in seven swing seats, blocked him from becoming prime minister at the head of a “progressive” coalition of Labour and the other smaller parties in parliament. As former critics of his now help themselves to bigger and bigger slices of humble pie, the Labour leader may want to consider borrowing George W. Bush’s famous malaproprism: “They misunderestimated me.” To be honest, I “misunderestimated” him as well. Full disclosure: I know Corbyn personally and share many of his political positions. I have never doubted his integrity or his honesty. Yet even I did not expect he would win 40% of the vote or prevent May from winning a majority in parliament. I did not imagine that Labour would win seats such as Canterbury, held by the Conservatives for the past 99 years, or Kensington and Chelsea, the UK’s richest constituency and home of the Daily Mail. I would not let myself believe, as many others on the left did, that a Corbyn premiership was a very real and live possibility, rather than a mad fantasy, a progressive delusion. I was wrong. Completely, utterly, hopelessly wrong … but never have I been happier to be wrong. Perhaps I should have paid more attention. The much-mocked Corbyn had a very clear plan from the very beginning. “The politics of hope are not an inevitable reaction when politics fails,” he declared in a speech at the London School of Economics in May 2016. “The politics of hope have to be rebuilt.”? ?Rebuilding, the Labour leader explained, required three things. First, “a vision to inspire people that politics has the power to make a positive difference to their lives.” Second, “trust – that people believe both that we can and that we will change things for the better.” Third, “the involvement and engagement of people to make the first two possible.” Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders speaks during a campaign rally on Feb. 14, 2016 in Las Vegas. Photo: Ethan MilleGetty Images Corbyn, like Bernie Sanders before him, succeeded on all three fronts. He mobilized huge numbers of people to get organized, attend rallies, knock on doors. He upended the old political and economic orthodoxies, refusing to embrace austerity, or demonize immigrants, or push for foreign wars. And guess what? It turns out that you don’t have to triangulate to win 40% of the vote. Nor do you have to kowtow to the reactionary and illiberal agendas of the Mail or the Murdoch-owned press to win marginal seats in Middle England. Neither Corbyn nor Sanders won their elections. But they came so close. Give them a bit more time. “One more heave” is no longer a political pejorative. With parliament hung, and Theresa May under fire from her own party, the next UK election could be held in a matter of months. The bookies have slashed Corbyn’s odds on becoming the next UK prime minister and a new post-election poll shows the Labour leader is now tied with his Conservative counterpart on the question of who would make the best prime minister. After last week’s shock results, what were once Conservative safe seats are now marginals and what were once Labour marginals are now safe seats. Here in the United States, meanwhile, the Corbyn-esque Sanders has become the most popular politician in the country and would probably win the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination by a landslide if the contest were to be held tomorrow. Some polls also suggest he might have defeated Trump last November, too. So: President Sanders? Prime Minister Corbyn? What were once progressive fantasies are now potential realities. The left may have finally awoken from its slumber — and, therefore, the attacks from the right will only escalate. But what was it Gandhi is said to have remarked? “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
Odds on the 2020 US Presidential Election according to Bovada Sportsbooks Schedule for Tuesday, November 3rd, 2020. Updated on November 7, 2020 - 8:10 AM ET Live Odds. Elections Specials and Exotics. Will the 2020 US US Presidential Election be called on November 6th or 7th 2020? Yes +135 No -180 An Alternative to Las ‘Vegas Odds’ That is why the majority of online bookmakers, otherwise known as ‘offshore sportsbooks‘ are the way forward for those looking to bet on the 2020 Election. In any normal scenario outside of the US election, it would have been expected that the Vegas odds Trump commands will be neck in neck with Biden, and this case shows with the online markets below. Note: Bookies are waiting for legal cases surrounding the election to cease before paying out on bets for the 2020 presidential race. 2020 US Presidential Race – Vegas Odds. It’s now an undecided two-horse race between Trump and Biden to be POTUS. Vegas sportsbooks & online books are already offering odds for the 2024 election result! Vegas Odds And Betting Lines For The 2020 Presidential Election. December 31 Update: Donald Trump has yet to concede to Joe Biden in the 2020 Presidential election amid claims of widespread fraud (though most Vegas political sportsbooks have paid out Biden bettors already).However, the biggest event right now is the Georgia Senate runoff on January 5, and all the top online election betting Vegas Election Odds Overtime: Still No Presidential Payouts “The winner of the 2020 presidential election was and continues to be the biggest event in Bovada’s A True Vegas Caper is a U.S. Presidential Election Props Will Trump win every state he won in 2016 No -800 Yes +500 . U.S. Presidential Election Props Winner of popular vote wins electoral college Yes -225 No +185 . Odds & Props on 2020 US Presidential Election according to BetOnline Sportsbook. Updated on September 24, 2020. U.S. Presidential Election Props Handicapping the Polls for the Presidency. The 2020 U.S. Presidential election is less than two months away, and Democratic candidate Joe Biden has increased his lead in the polls and various sportsbooks abroad. And some believe that online betting markets are better to forecast who will win on November 3.. The former Vice President is the favorite according to international oddsmakers
A Popular Vote Landslide?!? 2020 Election Map - YouTube
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