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Geoffrey Skelley

@geoffreyvs

15 Jul

I looked at our historical polling data from 2016 as of same point 4 years ago & compared Clinton to Biden in our current averages.

National:
Biden +9.1
Clinton +2.1

EVs based on where candidate led by >6.0 or safe for a party (not incl. NE-2/ME-2):
Biden 307
Clinton 198

Right now, Biden and Trump combine for about 92% of the vote. In our historical polling average, Trump and Clinton combined for 82%, with Johnson polling at about 8% at same point. Doesn't look like we'll have to deal with the same kind of 3rd party complication this time around.

And regarding a question someone asked me, the 2016 Republican National Convention began on July 18, so the convention bounce hadn't hit yet -- in a handful of days, the data would start to overlap with the bounce period.

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Geoffrey Skelley

@geoffreyvs

25 Mar

@HBO

Coming into it, I was very curious to see how "The Plot Against America" on @HBO would work out a 1940 presidential election where FDR loses to Charles Lindbergh. So here's a little thread about the election result in Episode 2. (It's not a spoiler to say Lindbergh wins.)

First, it's useful to understand that FDR won the real 1940 election 54.7%-44.8% in the popular vote and by a huge margin in the Electoral College against Wendell Willkie (R), who was the opposite of Lindbergh on foreign affairs (i.e. an internationalist, not an isolationist).

So this means a fair amount has to shift for FDR to lose. Let's go through the states specifically mentioned by the show and talk about how realistic or not such a shift was.

Read 19 tweets

Geoffrey Skelley

@geoffreyvs

5 Mar

Michigan seems pretty do-or-die for Sanders. Big race of the night on 3/10, and if he can't win there, may only win ID and/or WA (neither guaranteed -- Clinton won WA's meaningless primary in 2016 & ID has a closed primary). Biden will win MS, favored in MO. ND = shruggie (1/3)

3/17 looks bad for Sanders if Clinton '16 vote is a guide; he may only be competitive in IL. Biden will win FL big, could be interesting in OH (open) or AZ (closed) but Clinton won both of those by 13+. MI loss might presage an IL loss. (2/3)

And if Sanders doesn't get big win on either 3/10 or 3/17, he has 3/24 with GA where Biden will crush. That means Sanders would have to wait until 4/4 for AK, HI, WY (LA will go Biden) which aren't big, then hope that WI gives him a big W on 4/7. So yeah, MI is big. (3/3)

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Geoffrey Skelley

@geoffreyvs

10 Nov 18

Nov. 11 is the 100th anniversary of #WWI's end. As US troops were only directly involved for ~1 year, it pales in comparison to WWII in the American psyche. But WWI was a massive conflict that altered everything & set the stage for WWII. Here's some stuff worth reading/watching:

Sometimes, the total black and white and silent nature of so much WWI footage makes it seem incredible foreign to us. So check out "World War One In Color," which came out around the time of the 75th anniversary of the conflict. It's all on YouTube.

For reading, a good place to start is "The Guns of August" by Barbara Tuchman. It has its historical criticisms, but it remains one of the best works on the outbreak of the conflict. It was a book that influenced JFK's thinking in the midst of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

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