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Dana Houle Profile picture
Dana Houle
@DanaHoule
Family’s 1st HS grad. Worked for unions. Elected Dems. Did policy. Got rare disease. Nearly died 5 times. Getting healthy/writing/gardening/ferrying twins.
Oct 31 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
When my son was little & we lived in the city my son would hear a garbage truck & sprint through our flat & out of the building so he could stand in the parking area & watch the sanitation workers. The recycling people weren’t friendly & were occasionally a bit jerky…/1 …but the people who emptied the residential trash cans were very friendly & would always talk to my son. I made it clear to my kids that those workers did hard work that was important for all of us & I don’t think it ever occurred to them to not respect those workers…/2
Oct 23 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Excellent thread. A few points…/1 First, a little context. Those three R counties are growing like crazy, all over 10% just since 2020. That may account for some of the increase. But also important, Forsyth & Cherokee have huge Dem trend lines. Here are the Repub margins in each county…/2
Oct 22 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Few more thoughts about this
*A close election helps Trump (& potentially SCOTUS) steal it. If it’s a big win it’s harder
*Election night matters; Trump will allege Dems are dumping a bunch of fake votes. But if we win marginal Repub areas it could speed the process…/1 …of the networks calling places like Michigan & Wisconsin, and it also limits Trump’s lead (& possibly prevents one) when we’re looking at 13% or 42% of the vote counted & reported.
*Which Dem states aren’t close & have surprisingly quick calls, & which Repub states…/2
Oct 22 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Read this article closely, esp what Plouffe says. My take:

*They think she’s ahead
*They don’t believe public polls that have the battlegrounds all within 2 points; suggests they believe some are in the bag
*They don’t need Repub votes to win
*Going after Repubs /1 …& doing a bunch of outreach in unorthodox places isn’t as much to squeak out a win as it is to run up the score
*They trust their data more than their polling
*Their internal presentations of where the campaign is & where it’s headed must be really good if…/2
Aug 11 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
NYT/Sienna Harris v Trump, likely voters

A. Total as reported per NYT/Sienna

B. Head to head (only 2020 voters)

C. All candidates (only 2020 voters)

MI:
50-46
52-48
51-44

PA:
50-46
54-44
51-42

WI:
50-46
55-45
52-42

Limit it to 2020 voters & it’s a BLOWOUT
/1 These are the first NYT/Siena polls that have had Trump trailing. But like all the NYT/Siena polls, Trump does MUCH better bc of the respondents who didn’t vote in 2020

Now, it’s normal for there to be a not insignificant % of the electorate who didn’t vote in the previous…/2
Jul 2 • 27 tweets • 5 min read
1/ Democrats cannot nominate anyone except Joe Biden or Kamala Harris. It's impossible.

If the Biden candidacy ends, so does the Biden campaign. It's not transferable. Anyone else other than possibly Kamala Harris would have to start from nothing. That's can't be done. 2/It's possible I'm missing something, but I don't think so. Here's why the Democrats can nominate Joe Biden, or possibly Kamala Harris, but nobody else.

There's only one candidate with a 2024 presidential campaign committee registered with the Federal Election Commission
Jun 30 • 15 tweets • 3 min read
1/It’s possible the best option is Biden steps aside. But I think it’s more likely that would make things worse. I see lots of people saying Biden needs to step aside, I see almost nobody explaining what happens next & why that would be better

Bad vs not-bad doesn’t exist… 2/…in this situation. It’s about bad vs worse.

Not bad RE Biden’s performance; his performance has been stellar. Top ten President-caliber. And not certain that he’ll decline so badly he can’t effectively perform the duties of the office. Just bad that he’s 81.

That’s old…
Jan 23 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
1/Last 3-4 weeks the vibes about the election have significantly shifted. For three years I’ve been asking why people assumed that after 1-6, Dobbs, indictments, & cognitive decline that Trump would keep or even add to his 2020 voters. It’s always been a bad assumption 2/Part of the problem, of course, has been the media polls, which have seemed predicated on similar or greater Trump turnout (as if there are a lot of people who didn’t vote in 2016 or 2020 but now, after all that has happened since Nov 2020, finally felt strongly…
Dec 19, 2023 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
1/More about that NYT poll:

Likely voters
Biden 47%
Trump 45%.

Among likely voters who voted in 2020?

Biden 53%
Trump 42%

10% of their respondents are non-2020 voters, which seems reasonable. But they favor Trump 55-33, which is wacky since they’ll skew young… 2/ FWIW, I doubt Biden is at 53% & leading by 11. Something more like 48-42 seems more plausible. But what I thing is happening—& I’ve talked to several pollsters & data people about this, it’s a mix mostly of what they’ve said—is public pollsters are worried…
Nov 13, 2023 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
1/ A. Trump seems more cognitively healthy than Biden
B. 1-6/indictments/trials will have no effects on voters
C. Biden’s 5 pt margin will be wiped away by Biden voters now pro-Trump or think Biden is as bad as Trump
D. After underperforming in 2018/2020/2022 Repubs are now… 2/…seen by voters as a functional & serious party capable of governing
E. Dobbs no longer matters to women
F. There’s a large poll of non-voters who will vote in 2024 & favor Trump by 15 points (as in the Siena polls)
G. Trials won’t hamper Trump’s campaigning or…
Oct 16, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Weird to say it, but if he keeps the government open until January 2025, we may actually be better off w Speaker Jordan than w McCarthy or a Speaker Scalise. He may blow everything up, but from outside the Speaker’s office he would have anyway. Now he may see incentives in a CR/1 Jordan is the dog who caught the car. He’s in over his head. He’s the heckler about to be humiliated by the comedian. Whatever metaphor you want to use is fine as long as it conveys his achievement of going from outside rabble-rouser to Speaker will be disastrous for his career/2
Oct 3, 2023 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
I’m not sure what Dems should do. But I think it’s unhelpful & bad political thinking to frame a vote to keep McCarthy as “saving McCarthy.” If they vote for him they’d be making a political calculation, & McCarthy the person wold be nearly irrelevant to that calculation /1 Fact is the best way for Dems to win the House next year is for Biden to win. Best thing the House could do is help Biden win. Most Americans will barely notice who’s the Speaker. But they might notice a resumption of the enhanced child tax credit. They might notice…/2
Apr 1, 2023 • 26 tweets • 7 min read
Think of the worst people on Twitter. Your list may include some of these people:

Christopher Rufo
Bari Weiss
Jilani
Megyn Kelly
Sully
Shellenberger
Lee Fang
Trans haters
Anti-woke grifters
Rightwing operatives

Pay attention, bc they may be coming after your school board /1 I bring this up bc Tues there are elections, for school board in Evanston, & mayor in Chicago. In both cases there are connections to the dishonestly named Foundation Against Intolerance & Racism. In Evanston they’re likely running a stealth campaign…/2 fairforall.org
Mar 31, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Looking at a rough evening Here comes the hail
Mar 10, 2023 • 19 tweets • 4 min read
According to @DLeonhardt, Michigan Dems repealing right to work (for less) shows that the “Dem Party again seems to be emphasizing organized labor”

I was the person who did labor policy for MI Senate Dems from 1998 to 2003. Democrats never stopped emphasizing organized labor /1 For 40 years Michigan Dems have been on the defensive on just about everything, maybe on nothing more than on the role of organized labor. Not just labor’s role in providing workers collective power to defend their rights & assert their interests in the workplace…. /2
Nov 11, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
NY redistricting hurt Dems. But look deeper. Nationally most Dems were = or + Biden #’s. Except Higgins (Buffalo) NY Dems underperformed Biden.*

But go beyond NYS. In CT Hayes/Himes/DeLauro underperformed Biden. Courtney did not. Northern NJ Dems underperformed Biden…/1 …but the Dem incumbents in South Jersey did not.

In short, all Dems in NYS underperformed. But so did CT/NJ Dems in the NYC media market

Why?

A guess: the messaging on crime from Adams & Zeldin hurt Dems not just within NYS but everywhere in the NYC media market. /2
Oct 26, 2022 • 12 tweets • 3 min read
This is nearly a Platonic form of political press bullshit. The reporters know it’s bullshit. But the NYT plowed ahead w a bullshit headline & laughably predictable & lazy exercise in dishonesty

First, I saw the headline & thought “gotta be Rendell”…/1 nytimes.com/2022/10/26/us/… When lazy reporters, or reporters desperate to produce what they know is bullshit but was demanded by their editors, need a “Dems in disarray” quote from a Dem, they call Ed Rendell, Dick Harpootlian, or another of the 6-8 bitter has-beens who will always take a call from…/2
Oct 25, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
I guess I got that one right It’s not as bad as I thought yesterday, when I saw a picture of a press conference w Jayapal at the mic & Raskin & others behind her. I didn’t look closely then, but it must have been an old photo (why run it?), bc they didn’t have a press conference.

But also doesn’t…
Oct 11, 2022 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
I question the assumption that it’s only now that a kid might benefit from therapy.

Need for mental health care for kids/teens far exceeds capacity. And being a teen is often hard. But his article is dubious

First, he says “suicides have been increasing since 2007… …passing homicide as the second-leading cause of death for those ages 10-24.”

I checked the date of his article. It was published today. So why is he using 8 year old data?

He linked to research published in 2016 using data from 2014. Does that data support his claim…
Aug 3, 2022 • 20 tweets • 4 min read
Kansas has been at the center of abortion as a political issue from the beginning. It’s worth looking at Kansas’ history to grasp the momentousness of tonight’s victory for the right of women to control their bodies

/1 Go back to the beginning of Kansas. It was born in controversy. (Look up “Bleeding Kansas.”) It was founded in part by abolitionists from MA. It’s admission to the US was intertwined with the fight over slavery. This mural of the militant abolitionist John Brown… /2
Jul 6, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
What concrete policy/legal actions can Biden/Cong Dems take to respond to Dobbs &/or SCOTUS’s perversion of the Second Amendment?

Please give a concrete answer, or STFU about Biden/Congressional Dems, & face the reality that nothing really changes until we elect many more Dems Don’t want to see this Q asked every day?

Unfollow me now.

Because I’m going to ask this Q every day. Because people need to confront the reality that there’s no easy solution, there’s little to nothing Biden/Cong Dems can do now, & it only changes by electing many more Dems