GA senatorial campaign

[echappist]

Oh how the droll "he who smelled it, dealt it" rings true yet again. I guess none of us should be surprised that Walker is a hypocrite on the issue of abortion

I guess this shouldn't come as a surprise, as there has been the incident of an anti-abortion PA congressman who had to resign b/c he did in fact pay to terminate a pregnancy as result of his extramarital affair.

But this is perhaps the highest profile of such incidents. It is reported that Walker, who's actively running on an anti-abortion platform, has recently been closing the gap to Sen. Warnock, only for this tidbit to be unearthed. No idea what effect this might have on the GA senatorial race.

The prevarication and cynicism aside, one wonders how strained the father-son relationship is that the son, who was previously spotted wearing a pro-Trump T-shirt, is trying to actively sabotage his father's campaign.

In the grander scheme of things, one gets the sense that selective enforcement would always be how things operate. "Inner Party" members get a free pass; "Outer Party" members might get a free pass if the morality police deems a particular person worthy; proles and all others get smacked with full brunt of the law.

[Clyde]

Hypocrites run random in politicking. On the other hand I love to fart. And no intention to derail your well thought out political discourse. HW was a fun to watch RB in college. He’s petered out now.

[caleb]

In the grander scheme of things, one gets the sense that selective enforcement would always be how things operate. "Inner Party" members get a free pass; "Outer Party" members might get a free pass if the morality police deems a particular person worthy; proles and all others get smacked with full brunt of the law.

I thought the major point of appointing oneself a member of the sexual morality police was that it came with a free pass for your personal behavior? (see evangelical pastors from Ravi Zacharias to Jerry Falwell Jr., not to mention the clergy sex abuse scandal.)

The more loudly someone decries X, the more likely they're doing some version of it.

[bigbill]

Ray Wylie Hubbard said it best. Substitute politician for a preacher.

He said, "Come on over here son, let me show you around
Over there's where we put the preachers, I never liked those clowns
They're always blaming me for everything wrong under the sun
It ain't that harder to do what's right, it's just maybe not as much fun
Then they walk around thinking they're better than me and you
And then they get caught in a motel room
Doing what they said not to do"

[Scott G.]

Politicians are rated on the character of their content,
instead of the content of their character.


Screen Shot 2022-10-04 at 5.48.13 PM.png

[echappist]

Ray Wylie Hubbard said it best. Substitute politician for a preacher.

He said, "Come on over here son, let me show you around
Over there's where we put the preachers, I never liked those clowns
They're always blaming me for everything wrong under the sun
It ain't that harder to do what's right, it's just maybe not as much fun
Then they walk around thinking they're better than me and you
And then they get caught in a motel room
Doing what they said not to do"

HW is more of a carnival barker than a politician with bona fides.

Whatever one thinks of the ilks of Ted Cruz and such, one gets the sense that there's at least a high functioning brain behind that reptilian demeanor. HW, to use a phrase used to describe the current British government, is someone whose ambition wildly exceeds his capabilities, except unlike the ilks of Truss and Kwarteng, there's not much there other than bombastic rhetoric in the case of HW.

We now have one former SEC football coach as a senator, and another former SEC star running for senator. Big time sports is often compared to the circus aspect of Bread & Circus of Roman times, but at least they didn't have circus clowns and trainers with no credential other than circus acts become Roman senators.

[Peter Polack]

I'm just waiting for Trump to tell his followers and his Republican Party what to think. Then I'll don my MAGA hat and follow.

[Bob Ross]

[Saab2000]

Question regarding polling:

Because I’ve taken a bit more of an active role in recent years being on a mailing list of a local party branch (though not a member), I get a lot of texts with links to polling. I delete the messages because I’m skeptical of them. I know my phone number and email address are sold.

It used to be that polls were fairly accurate though imperfect. Nowadays most landlines are gone and most folks screen their calls far more thoroughly. We saw in 2016 that polling data in the age of the smartphone and the internet is less reliable than ever.

Thoughts on this and how reliable data is these days? Anyone know how polling data is acquired in 2022?

[JoB]

There's people trying to account for that using mathematical models or infusing a 'smells right' human approach. for the former, fivethirtyeight.com is doing a decent, albeit somewhat sensationalized, job. for the latter, Larry Sabato's Crystal Ball from the U of VA is great. it's a decidedly less panicky approach with posts ever few days during the 'regular' season. https://centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/

During the last presidential election, both 538 and Sabato were remarkably accurate in their predictions, as memory serves. long time ago.

Question regarding polling:

Because I’ve taken a bit more of an active role in recent years being on a mailing list of a local party branch (though not a member), I get a lot of texts with links to polling. I delete the messages because I’m skeptical of them. I know my phone number and email address are sold.

It used to be that polls were fairly accurate though imperfect. Nowadays most landlines are gone and most folks screen their calls far more thoroughly. We saw in 2016 that polling data in the age of the smartphone and the internet is less reliable than ever.

Thoughts on this and how reliable data is these days? Anyone know how polling data is acquired in 2022?

[htwoopup]

Question regarding polling:

Because I’ve taken a bit more of an active role in recent years being on a mailing list of a local party branch (though not a member), I get a lot of texts with links to polling. I delete the messages because I’m skeptical of them. I know my phone number and email address are sold.

It used to be that polls were fairly accurate though imperfect. Nowadays most landlines are gone and most folks screen their calls far more thoroughly. We saw in 2016 that polling data in the age of the smartphone and the internet is less reliable than ever.

Thoughts on this and how reliable data is these days? Anyone know how polling data is acquired in 2022?

Way back in the 2005-ish time, there started to be a huge disconnect not only in political polling but all market research/ tv ratings etc about "cell phone only homes" because all kinds of stuff was getting way out of whack. Also, the way research has always been done it is trying to measure people by type (for instance Caucasian, male, 35-49 years old, college educated, professional managerial, lives in an A sized county, divorced, home owner, and about a zillion other attributes). What was happening as cellphone usage grew it was affecting different segments of the population differently. So that put another total fudge factor onto everything.

Ironically, now that cellphones are ubiquitous that is lessened. Also, not only ironically but distressingly to those who worry ethically about what they do with data, because of the data available with the UI's in cellphones and online internet tracking it can turn a problem into opportunity. Although the opportunity can be scary ethically.

Now, the discussion is how does the industry move from "looks like" in other words matching all of those segments and then extrapolating to the population correcting for under/over sampling of given segments to a way to do a better "acts like". There are some 25 year olds who act like 70 year olds. And how do you explain the 80 year old dads who are thrilled when their granddaughter gives them tickets to a Dua Lipa concert.

And then you also have sample bias and misreporting...simplistically although apropos of your OP...in surveys about TV everyone says they watch PBS but in truth they are streaming internet porn from their computer to the TV. All of that has to be corrected for (even examples not as extreme). In political polling it has long been known that folks tend to report what they think the person on the other end of the line (or even a machine) WANTS to hear. That is why extremes/ racism/ sexual proclivities/ etc so often make for polling that is way less than accurate.

All of this increase sample error and deviations etc. as adjustments are made.

All of the above is to give a bit more detail (prolly too much) of the goings on in what @JoB posted.

It is why data science has become more akin to anthropology than biology of late.

[Marvinlungwitz]

Oh how the droll "he who smelled it, dealt it" rings true yet again. I guess none of us should be surprised that Walker is a hypocrite on the issue of abortion

I guess this shouldn't come as a surprise, as there has been the incident of an anti-abortion PA congressman who had to resign b/c he did in fact pay to terminate a pregnancy as result of his extramarital affair.

But this is perhaps the highest profile of such incidents. It is reported that Walker, who's actively running on an anti-abortion platform, has recently been closing the gap to Sen. Warnock, only for this tidbit to be unearthed. No idea what effect this might have on the GA senatorial race.

The prevarication and cynicism aside, one wonders how strained the father-son relationship is that the son, who was previously spotted wearing a pro-Trump T-shirt, is trying to actively sabotage his father's campaign.

In the grander scheme of things, one gets the sense that selective enforcement would always be how things operate. "Inner Party" members get a free pass; "Outer Party" members might get a free pass if the morality police deems a particular person worthy; proles and all others get smacked with full brunt of the law.

Doesn't surprise me, but the father/son dynamics are sad.

Herschel is certainly in the running for hypocrite of the year, although perhaps we should bestow the title in memoriam to Ken Starr, acknowledging extraordinary achievements he accomplished in this regard during his life.

Another recent favorite example of political duplicity is Hunter Biden's troubles and probable eventual prosecution. While Jared's blockade threat and subsequent billion dollar bail out from Qatar will never even face an investigation. (Although in part that's due to lack of cooperation from the extorted party).

[Too Tall]

Take the money out of politics and what remains?

[monadnocky]

Take the money out of politics and what remains?

The insatiable lust for power?

[Too Tall]

The insatiable lust for power?

Pretty mulch.

[Scott G.]

Take the money out of politics and what remains?

According to the Supreme Court money is speech, remove the money and.......

And in the naked light, I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never shared
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence

[echappist]

More serious question, and on the issue of money, is it worth it for a regular joe like me to donate money?

Two years ago, I donated to Stacy Abraham's organization. Not much, a few hundred, IIRC, but I thought it was going to a good cause (get out the vote).

Now I get inundated with all sorts of solicitations. I'm not opposed to donating to the campaign of the local challenger for U.S. Senate, but I'm not sure if it would make a difference. After all, the funding disadvantage is tremendous (or what this challenger's campaign tells me), and I'm not all that sure a few hundred to his campaign would do more good vis-a-vis donation to the local food bank.

[Mark Walberg]

A couple weeks ago, I saw a reporter asking Herschel Walker about whether he was going to participate in the debate with his opponent.
Herschel said. "He's smarter than me and he'll just make me look bad."

At first, I thought that was a very funny thing to admit on his part.

After thinking a bit, I realized that being smart or intelligent is not an asset in the eyes of most voters.
The only thing that matters is whether the voter thinks the candidate will vote the "right way".

Seems like a less than ideal system.

[Too Tall]

Don't vote.

It only encourages "them".

[dgaddis]

Don't vote.

It only encourages "them".

As a GA voter who's pretty in the middle politically (I'm one of those annoying 'fiscally conservative socially liberal' folks) once again I'm disappointed in my choices. I'm definitely not voting for Walker for the simple fact that I don't think people with known brain damage (or who have claimed to have multiple personality disorders) should be running our state. Plus he seems like a moron and a terrible person and has no real qualifications for the job. But, white conservatives LOVE a black conservative (see Candace Owens), and add in the fact that he was GA Bulldawg and well shit, he might well win. Especially since Warnock is no saint either, he's got his own allegations of domestic abuse/violence and parenting missteps.

I'm not a huge fan of Kemp, his extremely cringeworthy ads during his last campaign were the stuff of SNL skits and it pissed me off when he bailed on a debate to instead attend a Trump rally. But, I think he did a good job during COVID getting us opened back up earlier than most places and back to normal life. All in all GA has done well these last few years I think. Abrams has many things going against her for me, most recently she said the heat beat you hear on a sonogram isn't real, that it is a manufactured sound so men can control women's bodies. Ugh.

Gotta pick a lizard though.

(EDIT to add - photo is from one of the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy books, I forget which one, but if you haven't read them you absolutely should as they're fantastic. There's only three and they're a quick funny read.)