First the aggregates as collected by The NY Times of "select pollsters," the most reliable. Then the aggregate from RealClearPolitics. Last is Nate Silver's operation; Silver Bulletin. A reminder is probably no longer needed, but Nate sold 538 to ABC News, which I would have done had I also been sitting on that goldmine of non-predictive predictions. That is, polls don't predict, though some people persist in believing they do, which is what turns them off of polling, when elections fail to square. Pollsters, as best they can — most pollsters; other are a bit insidious in playing to partisanship — merely present where the American mind sits at the time of their surveys. Methodologies vary widely, though, which can then present equally wide variations in findings. The Times:
This matches RCP's:
Nate Silver's aggregate, 2 Aug., combines findings from both registered and likely voter polling:
I certainly don't mean to rub it in to poor Joe, but here's where the polling stood in late June and well into July:
Looking at specific national polls of most recent vintage, there's this from Newsweek: "RMG Research is the latest pollster to find Harris ... with a 5-point lead (47% to 42%) over the former president." Conducted 29 to 31 July. (RMG is headed by one Scott Rasmussen but the firm is unassociated with Rasmussen Research. Its methodology is a little weird. Anyway ...)
Yesterday I posted some general background information on Civiqs' polling — its sudden, and first, major upswing for Harris made me suspicious; my suspicions were allayed. Newsweek also notes the poll: "[It] showed Harris with a 5-point [that's inaccurate, 4-point] lead over Trump." Both RMG and Civiqs' polling are of RV ("registered voters").
Sufficient battleground polling runs from absent to suggestive. These averages, from The Times.
Polling of the three states with adequate polling to average out is available simply because these are the states Harris must win for Democrats to retain the White House — if, a big one, she also wins all the states and districts that Biden won by 6 points in 2020. And so Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania have been pretty heavily polled.
In general — which, regrettably, will make no difference to perhaps 11,780 absolute knuckleheads in Georgia and thousands elsewhere somewhere on the scattered battleground — what's incontrovertible is that Harris is on a roll and Trump is just rolling downhill.
One question that hangs is whether the polls are shifting because voters are taking to Harris, and with sudden rapidity, or is it because they're just now recalling what a despicable buffoon Trump is.
Several answers obtain. Democrats are again unified — almost universally — after weeks of antagonistic debate about Biden as the nominee; Harris has so far avoided any verbal stumbles, something more than a few onlookers had anticipated (some with glee); she's seems virtually indefatigable on the campaign trail, energetic and upbeat, which is contagious; and most of all, Harris is delivering hourly body blows to the shadow-boxing buffoon, which previously were only occasional (and which I'll never understand).
Hence Trump is beginning to look bruised. His largely self-promoted image as the fist-raising, ballistic-punctured hero of political warfare waned with nearly the velocity of the would-be assassin's bullet. About this, I have a theory. Americans love heroes who refrain from reminding the nation of what they themselves label as extraordinary heroism with each clicking-on of a klieg light.
But Trump's narcissism can't help itself. One also wonders why he disdains captured or shot-and-wounded and especially KIA soldiers as "losers" yet he declares heroism because of a nicked ear?
Trump also blew up his re-debut at his ultra-manly party gathering of late. "Somehow, it was just two weeks ago that Donald Trump headed into the Republican National Convention looking like a juggernaut," wrote The Atlantic's David Graham yesterday. "That all feels like a long time ago."
It was ages ago, both blissfully forgotten and yet, oddly enough, branded into our brains. Again with the nicked-ear heroism — at unbearable length — and overall, 90 minutes of me-me-meism; promises of national unity but speakers demonizing everyone even faintly left of Martin Bormann; and then the colossally misguided launch of JD Vance, Trump's V-1 rocket: Vergeltungswaffe; "Retaliation Weapon One." He went down as swiftly as the U.S.' 1957 Vanguard rocket, which exploded on liftoff.
In assessing the totality of public-opinion shifts, there is no zero-sum. Like most everything, there's a mixture. Kamala Harris is a cyclone of fresh air; Democrats and those whose lean Democratic can feel it — and they're opting for it. As he always will, Trump retains his wooden-headed core of supporters, somewhere in the 35-40% range of the electorate. Polling evidence and a dollop of common sense, however, suggest that wavering semi-Trumpers and unknown swaths of undecideds are also feeling the whirlwind that is Kamala, while Donald is coming across as ... the despicable buffoon that he is.
My guess is that in another month or so, when voters begin comprehending that America's future is at stake and there happens to be a November election to decide it, national polls will uniformly show the Democratic nominee with blue plus-signs in the upper range of single digits. If high enough — that is, markers of +7 or +8 among likely voters — those signs will reflect a draining of Trump's support in battleground states. It is that nationally polling watershed that is key.
Those state races will likely remain much closer than other averages, which of course is what makes them grounds for battle, though none of this would be necessary if not for the idiotic Electoral College. Nevertheless, if high anxiety there is to be in October, that's where the straitjackets will be found.
Kamala Harris is a fresh, cool, ocean breeze.
Trump is like the Santa An winds: hot, dry, dusty blustery air that's full of bad vibes and fuels destructive fires.
Posted by: Anne J | August 03, 2024 at 04:34 PM