Thread by @shaunjlawson

Just for a moment, let's ignore the shenanigans which Trump's team has planned for the days after the election. Just for a moment, let's treat all things as essentially equal.

This thread covers why I've expected Biden to win this general election: since March.

1. The United States currently has not just its worst, but its most divisive President since at least the Civil War, and probably in history. At a time of national and global emergency.

What's Biden? A healer. Trump's exact opposite.

The idea that Biden was just "another Hillary" has always been nonsense. First, because Hillary was almost as divisive as Trump. Second, because he appeals to working class voters in the rust belt in a way she just didn't, at all. Third, because he's too plain gentle to be hated.

2. The United States has been horrifically polarised politically since, oooh, the culture wars really began to intensify around Bill Clinton's impeachment.

Yet what's Biden done? He's truly reached out to moderate Republicans who are disgusted, nauseated by Trump.

I regularly retweet stuff by @ProjectLincoln. They're important. They're principled, patriotic conservatives who've been against Trump since Day 1, and have become increasingly well organised and effective. Kudos to them.

3. Biden is starting to open an enormous lead among... over-65s. Senior citizens. Amazing, huh? Well no, not really. First because they know and trust Biden. Second, because Trump has put them all in terrible danger... and they know it.

You think pensioners are going to vote for someone who is openly endangering their health - not just with his policies, but his own personal behaviour? Let alone having cratered the economy too? Good luck with that.

Biden's tone is what they expect of a President too.

4. After what happened in 2016, when the left tore itself apart, took its eye completely off the ball, and let Trump in, a lot of people have given themselves a good hard look in the mirror.

That translated into a big Democrat win at the midterms: especially in the suburbs.

By which, I don't just mean the suburbs in traditionally blue areas... but the suburbs across the United States. The Republicans are petrified of what that's gonna mean for the future.

The Democratic lead on the generic ballot is consistent and long term.

Earlier this year, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said that in most other political systems, she and Biden wouldn't even be in the same party. Yet what's she done? Got right behind and campaigned for him. As has Bernie Sanders.

The big picture is uniting so so many people.

5. On Super Tuesday, something really remarkable happened. Turnout went way, WAY up... not for Sanders, but for Biden. It's as though Democrats everywhere experienced a collective awakening: "We have to have the guy best placed to win. This is too important for ideology".

No question, those voters' minds had been concentrated by Coronavirus, which was just beginning to sweep into the country.

As they also had by Jim Clyburn's intervention. A historic moment which set off an enormous Biden wave: a landslide in fact.

Clyburn made a huge point of emphasising everything Biden has done for Black Americans. And Black Americans make up a huge swathe of the Democratic Party.

But his speech, too, was healing and unifying. Capturing exactly the tone of the Biden campaign.

6. Now let's do a comparison with 2016. When:

- The media spent an absurd amount of time bashing Hillary for her emails, and treating Trump like entertainment

- James Comey's disastrous intervention tilted the whole thing in the final days

- Trump won the critical swing states by remarkably small margins

- Voters hadn't seen Trump in action yet, and many assumed he really WAS a successful businessman

- Trump's electoral college path was extremely narrow

In the days - maybe a week or so? - before the election, Kellyanne Conway attracted ridicule on the various networks when highlighting that Hillary just couldn't get above 50%. She was stuck in the high 40s, and this mattered.

Because it meant a path was there for Trump, if he carried the rust belt. She basically spelt out the entire Trump campaign's strategy on national TV... and the media and the Democrats laughed.

Oops.

So, where are we now?

- Is Biden scoring consistently above 50%? Yes.

- Is third party support dropping away? Thank heavens, yes.

- Has the country seen Trump in action? Unfortunately, yes.

- How's the economy doing? Disastrously badly.

- Is the head of the FBI gonna intervene (however unwittingly) on Trump's behalf? Nope.

- How many undecided voters are there for such a late intervention to affect? Not many.

Then factor in:

- Trump's catastrophic debate performance, which turned previous likely Republican voters against him

- Trump catching the virus thanks to his own recklessness

- Trump's ridiculous behaviour yesterday

And the next bit's crucial too.

Thankfully, the media has absolutely woken up to what Trump has planned post-election. Namely, to claim that all the mail-in ballots are rigged, try to stop them being counted, and go to a rigged Supreme Court to have all those votes thrown out.

And the media waking up to it means the public has woken up to it. Specifically: that their entire democracy being in grave peril is not hyperbole. It's the plan.

That's concentrated minds hugely. That's what happens when a President says he won't leave if he loses.

In that sense, Trump has blundered colossally... by basically telling the public what he has planned BEFORE doing it. Effective dictators don't do that. Effective dictators bring in Enabling Acts etc when the public's looking the other way.

7. And this matters too. People are already voting. Huge numbers of them. Before the final week of the EU referendum, Leave had already won thanks to huge postal voting. There was a late Remain swing, but it was too late.

All these various Trump-inspired disasters are happening at a time when the public, rightly cautious of a deadly pandemic, are already casting their votes. It's not a question of them somehow forgetting any of this a month from now. It's already destroying Trump's chances.

Oh, and the Supreme Court pick has been another dagger to the GOP. It's proven to the public that their party are a bunch of disgusting hypocrites who do not care about democracy or women's rights.

That's had a huge impact on Democratic fundraising and right down the ballot.

8. There may also be a broader shift beginning to happen in the West. Notice that poll the other day about what a huge lead staying in the EU now has among the British electorate?

That's because everything since 2016 has been a shitshow. Everything.

The virus isn't so much the last straw in that. I think it's wakened significant portions of people up to how dependent we all are on each other. How we all need to work together and support each other. How interdependent and connected the world truly is.

And that's shifting swathes of people away from nationalism, away from populism, away (please God) from selfishness.

Trump had his finger on the pulse in 2016. He doesn't now. He's all at sea.

Even then, in a contest v Obama, he'd have lost, bigly. Now, he's up against the closest thing to Obama: who can campaign on his record. Which is a million miles better than Trump's, and most Americans know it. Even Republicans respect Joe Biden.

So below, I'm attaching an electoral map of how I currently see things. With the large caveat attached that unquestionably, Trump's plan is to try and rig the election - and his supporters plan violence for the days after November 3, when the votes will still be being counted.

It's an electoral map, in other words, based on all votes being counted. Y'know: like in a democracy.

Even the above may still understate the final outcome. Ohio is in play. Texas is in play. If the latter goes blue, we're looking at a landslide.

Of course: none of this should make anyone feel complacent for a single moment. To any Americans reading this: VOTE.

VOTE to get this reckless, ludicrous, tax dodging man-baby out and to help your country back towards sanity, reason, and leadership.

But - again, with the rider that Trump WILL try and cheat - this election isn't close now. He's done for.

PS. One final thing I didn't mention above and certainly should've. What did the Amy Coney Barrett pick signify?

That the Republicans want to gut healthcare during a global pandemic. Electoral suicide.

Healthcare is on the ballot. SO VOTE FOR IT, AMERICA.