Category: Politics

it’s 2024 — now more than ever, vote!

whbeebe

https://www.vote.org

We need to vote, in every election and in every jurisdiction we live in and are legally allowed to do so. For Florida, a.k.a. DeSantistan, we need to vote to push back hard against the decade’s long Republican campaign to deprive anyone who isn’t male, white, and rich of any rights they wish to enjoy, such as the right to vote.

The link beneath the vote.org logo will take you to a web site that will quickly and efficiently help you determine, based on where you live, when, where, and how to vote or register to vote if you aren’t registered. Voting works. It has been shown to work repeatedly in every election, major and minor, on year or off, if people are willing to vote and vote with compassion and intelligence, two key qualities that the Republican party are deathly afraid of and will do anything to stamp out within their own ranks. The Republican party is no longer the party of conservatism, but the party of authoritarianism leaning hard into fascism. Republicans now say the quiet parts out loud, that it is their intention to block and dismantle everything democratic that doesn’t support them and their rough ride over every citizen for political power and absolute control.

Please, at the very least, vote.

why i no longer trust polls

whbeebe
Statistical spread 7 November 2016 vi 538 website

The screen capture above was taken on my iPhone on 7 November 2016, the day before the 2016 presidential election. The 538 site takes its name from the total number of electors in the electoral college. It uses a unique algorithm to calculate an overall statistical aggregation. The view above showed the statistical standing of Clinton vs Trump the day before the 2016 presidential election.

538 showed Clinton having a significant statistical lead over Trump. I voted that day, as I’ve always voted ever since I was old enough in 1972. 538 wasn’t the only site showing Clinton statistically far ahead. Two other sites I followed at the time, Slate and Salon, also had a statistical scoreboard showing Clinton far ahead. Slate’s and Salon’s were far less rigorous in their analysis. The 538 analysis was what I hung my hat on for “the truth” of public sentiment before the election.

Of course we know how 2016 turned out, and we’ve lived the Trumpian nightmare ever since. The day after the 2016 presidential election I immediately stopped following 538, Salon and Slate and I’ve not gone back since. I have no idea how the 2024 presidential election will turn out, especially over a year out from the election. All I know is if we want to keep the insanity out of the White House then we need to take nothing for granted, ignore the polls, and vote as if our very existence as a democracy is at stake, because it is.

POLLS ARE NOT VOTES! DON’T BE A LAZY LIBERAL! VOTE!