the polls showing Trump losing don't give me much satisfaction

The polls showed him losing big in 2016. I haven't trusted a poll since.

The polls showed him losing big in 2016.

I hate to be the stats nerd guy, but but they really didn't. On average, final polls showed him losing the popular vote by, on average, 2.5%. He lost it by about 2.1%, in the end. The polls were significantly MORE accurate in 2016 than any Presidential election since I was born.

The polls in WI, PA, and MI were a little more off, but also had relatively large numbers of undecideds, even in the final polls. The undecideds ending up breaking hard for Trump in those states.

There are many things about fivethirtyeight's political reporting I find annoying, but their pure statistical stuff is top notch, so I look to their database and model for my information. When they froze he model in 2016, their model gave Trump a 28.6% chance - better than the probability of flipping two heads in a row - and even described on November 5th, in [link] a possible scenario in which he won one or more of those states through polling error or late breaking decisions. That scenario was based entirely on simulations they performed using poll data as their input.

The fact is that Trump was lucky, but also that the polls always showed the race closer than the narrative allowed.

So I guess what I'm saying is - polls are fine and can absolutely be trusted, on average, to do a pretty good job at what they are designed to do. Just be wary of overly confident analysis or hype. (And also ignore hem until October for sure).

Good thoughts in Mary's way, Laura. And yay cats who are not making fuss!

I'm sad you had to return a dress with pockets.

Cute but distressingly short. Too much wind up me nethers.

Getting the cats used to the cage is a great idea.

In some ways I'm sorry you're not going to have co-drivers, but it's not like you haven't done the trip before.

I turned off Facebook and spent my afternoon/evening in the land of Marie Kondoing my bedroom (verdict: I have much more sheets than I thought I did, plus nowhere to put them) and watching Avatar The Last Airbender animated. Aang is super-annoying.

k-pop fans and tiktok, apparently. So pleased.

I spent some time yesterday discussing the current situation with one of my medical office managers, who is Jamaican-America. She was saying that the increased involvement of youth is the most encouraging sign. Of course she still worries about the Bros voting 3rd party or writing in Bernie, and she was discouraged that the black vote went down after the uptick in 2008. BUT, from the activity we see here from the Parkland kids, and the demographics apparent in the protests here and throughout the country, the younger set is more involved and motivated than they have been in many years.

Short version, k-pop fans give me hope as another sign that apathy is on the decline. There are many factors that gave us Trump, but apathy was one of them.

Yes, I should be packing.

Timelies all!

Happy Father's Day to all the Buffista dads and father figures!

(Cookies and I am tired and it's been a really long day, So I hope the post below is coherent):

k-pop fans and tiktok, apparently. So pleased.

There's something I thought of a few months back. Do you remember Dana's wonderful post, "Fandom Through the Years: The Dark Side"? I realized that I can probably map most of the chapter names there to the political discussion in my country: anything from "Who Says You Have To Know About Economics To Write Economic Critique?" to "Psychotic Fascists I have known".

I am terrified by the combination of politics as entertainment and Opinionated Fans, but it looks like some fandom knows what they're doing.

Tik Tok teens and K-pop stans, beating Tr*mp at his own game: controlling the narrative. They made the Tr*mp team believe a million people had snapped up tickets to the rally. Brad P*rscale was absolutely giddy on Twitter, posting as the numbers went up. Even knowing only maybe a third of people who grab free tickets will actually show up, Tr*mp team still fully expected a massive crowd. And they can't pretend they didn't, because they had a stage set up outside the venue to entertain the YUGE crowds who couldn't get in (the venue holds 19,000 people). A bunch of teenagers, using a social media app most old conservatives have never even heard of, manipulated Tr*mp team's expectations and set them up to believe a huge crowd was coming. If P*rscale had known only 6611 people (final official count) would be there, he would've booked a small venue and blamed it on the rona or the protesters. Instead he booked a big venue for a tiny crowd and made Tr*mp look pathetic.

Those kids had a plan. All it needed was about 400,000 people to grab one or two or four free tickets with a fake email account. And it worked. The older generations could never have even imagined that that many young people could come together, all over the nation and maybe the world, completely under their radar, and pull off a devastating epic troll of the master of narrative manipulation. Tr*mp looked totally exhausted when he got off the plane in DC last night. I hope I live long enough to see the 14-year-old Machiavelli I encountered on Twitter last night become President.

We still love a pink gingham.

THE JUNTA LIVES!!!!