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Have you been enjoying the Democratic convention? I think it has been pretty good. I’ve never been a big Bill Clinton fan, but you have to say when his speech was the most boring, it’s been a good couple nights.

Even in a couple days of stand outs, Michelle Obama’s speech was probably the best. I was only half listening to it while doing other things, but when she talked about waking up in a house built by slaves, my spine stood bolt up. I can’t imagine the feeling for decedents of slaves listening to it. I’m very proud to be a Democrat, and to keep pushing forward.

Clinton	Trump
97.1% probability of winning	2.9% probability of winning
Mean of 314 electoral votes	Mean of 224 electoral votes

The previous analysis consisted of almost entirely pre-RNC polls, and the Monte Carlo analysis, based only on polls, suggested that Donald Trump would have no chance of winning an election held then. We now have a half dozen new post-RNC polls, including polls in NC, OH, and NV. As you might expect, the post-RNC polls show Trump, now the G.O.P. nominee, doing better against the likely Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton.

A change in this analysis is that I’ve tightened the “current poll” window from polls taken in the past three months to polls taken within the past month. This has two possible effects for each state. First, it makes the polling data more current, which is particularly important for an accurate portrayal of Trump’s performance. His image among Republicans has dramatically changed over the past 6 months, and we can expect he will start polling better now that he is the nominee. Additionally, the smaller “current poll” window will increase the uncertainty for many states just because there are fewer polled individuals included. Thus, we see some states turn from solid in the previous analysis to strong in this analysis.

Now, after 100,000 simulated elections, Clinton wins 97,074 times and Trump wins 2,926 times (including the 205 ties). Clinton received (on average) 314 to Trump’s 224 electoral votes. In an election held now, Clinton would have a 97.1% probability of winning and Trump would have a 2.9% probability of winning.

Update: Yes…Vermont is the wrong color on account of a data entry error for one VT poll. This has been corrected for the next analysis.

Did Trump get a convention bump? It appears so.

Here is the distribution of electoral votes [FAQ] from the simulations:
[Read more…]

A week ago during a convention’s prime-time broadcast we heard from the Duck Dynasty guy and Scott Baio. At a different convention a week later, we heard from Michelle Obama and Elizabeth Warren. One of the conventions seems serious. Please join us tonight for an evening of political pontification and convention chatter at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally.

We meet tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. You’ll find us in the small room at the back of the tavern. We start at 8:00pm.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings this week. Tonight, the Tri-Cities chapter meets. On Wednesday, the Burien and the North Spokane chapters meet. The Kent and Woodinville chapters meet on Thursday. And next Monday, the Yakima and South Bellevue chapters meet.

There are 184 chapters of Living Liberally, including nineteen in Washington state, three in Oregon and one in Idaho. Find, or go out and start, a chapter near you.

This is going to be pretty specific, and even if it’s not, it’s about a comic that ended its run in 2008, so feel free to just ignore me here, and jump right into calling each other names in the comments, or whatever goes on there.

I just finished Y The Last Man. It was so good, although I didn’t love the denouement. It was well plotted, and I kept being like I’ll just read one more chapter. Oh, just one more. Until, I finished all of the books as quickly as being a library user can. I mentioned a while ago that I’m still pretty new to comics, but that was by far the best I’ve read since starting up again.

Senate Democrats*	Senate Republicans
11.4% probability of a majority	88.6% probability of a majority
Mean of 48 seats	Mean of 52 seats

Control of the Senate is up for grabs this fall. My previous analysis showed Democrats with a average of 49 seats and Republicans with 51 seats, putting the Democrats in range to flip the Senate. That was over a half year ago, so it is time to update the analysis using a plethora of new polls released since then.

After 100,000 simulated elections, Democrats have a Senate majority 1,914 times, (and there were 9,521 ties), and Republicans control the Senate 88,565 times. If the election was now, Democrats would have an 11.4% probability of controlling the Senate and Republicans an 88.6% probability of controlling the Senate. Of course, if Republicans end up in the White House, the ties would go to them.

Here is the distribution of Senate seats from the simulations:^*

The most likely outcome is a 52 to 48 split with Republicans in charge. Here are some state-by-state comments.

Florida: Without question, the return of Marco Rubio to the Senate race has changed the likely outcome. Democrat Patrick Murphy has a fight on his hands. Polls occasionally favor Murphy, but the most likely outcome is a victory for Rubio (assuming they both come out on top in the August 30 primary).

[Read more…]

Exodus 35:2
For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a day of sabbath rest to the LORD. Whoever does any work on it is to be put to death.

Discuss

Political conventions are stupid.

Mental Floss: 26 Things that Inspired Movies.

James Corden with Michelle Obama: Carpool Karaoke:

Young Turks: Koch brothers cut funding of disobedient Republicans.

Farron Cousins: Rep. Steve King goes full “Grand Wizard” on MSNBC.

Sam Waterson: Important convention history

The 2016 Drumpf Shit Show:

• Trevor: “Make America Fear Again”
• Stephen catches Brett Baier hording Mustard at the RNC. #Mustardgate
• Slate: Melania’s OTHER bit of plagiarism.
• Dangerous President.
• Drumpf lightly gropes his daughter Ivanka.
• Nightly Show: The Kiss
• Stephen: The RNC finally got exciting.
• Samantha Bee: Born again in the USA
• Roy Zimmerman: TrumpPence (Feed the Birds):

• Stephen checks in with the African American delegate.
• Miserable Liberal: Donald Drumpf quotes give strength to those who most need it
• Trevor: It’s official…Drumpf nominee. And Ted.
• Everything will kill you according to the RNC
• Behind the scenes of Drumpf’s Twitter
• Stephen: So much Day 1 drama….
• The GOP freak show in two minutes
• Daily Show: When was America last great?
• James Corden: Taking a page from Melania’s book
• Stephen: Who is Mike Pence again?
• Samantha Bee: Not ready for prime time
• David Pakman: Unhinged underwear model at RNC, “I believe Obama is a Muslim”
• Young Turks: Drumpf advisor calls for the execution of Hillary
• James Corden welcomes Mike Pence and Scott Baio to the GOP spotlight.
• Jonathan Mann: The T is doing the P:

• Slate: some of the weirder swag at the Drumpf convention.
• Young Turks: Recap of Drumpf’s acceptance speech.
• Colbert with The Word: “Trumpiness.”
• Stephen does Hungry for Power Games at RNC
• Sam Seder: Drumpf “has sociopathic tendencies” says Art Of the Deal ghostwriter
• Seth Meyers: A Closer Look at the rough start
• Trevor: Make America Hate Again, staring Chris Christie
• Mike Pence has been a disaster for Indiana.
• Slate: How to impersonate Donald Drumpf
• Drumpf and Pence together on 60 minutes
• David Pakman The woman who took the fall for Melania’s plagiarized speech
• Thom: Drumpf is a scam…. G.O.P voters are actually voting for Pence
• Stephen: The RNC is like Christmas in July
• Kimmel on plagiarizing speeches
• Seth Meyers: A Closer Look at Mike Pence
• Slate: Every time the Drumpf campaign lied about Melania’s speech
• Seth Meyers: Republicans focus on attacking Hillary…a closer look
• Farron Cousins: FL AG Bondi and Drumpf sued in “pay to play” scheme.
• Stephen: Melania did not plagiarize her speech.
• Jimmy Dore interviews delegates on the floor.
• James Corden: Recapping opening night
• Samantha Bee: RNCinCLE check-in day 1
• Samantha Bee: RNCinCLE check-in day 2
• James Corden: The odd day 3
• David Pakman: Trump ends RNC with lying scam speech that KKK leader loved
• Stephen with Sen. Elizabeth Warren: “He sounded like a two-bit dictator”
• Drumpf throws down
• The Republican freak show
• Stephen: Drumpf accepts.
• Seth Meyers: Drumpf accepts…a closer look
• Obama debunks Drumpf’s convention speech.
• Roy Zimmerman: “Speechless”
• Jon returns to take down GOP bullshit:

• Slate: What did you think when Melania said….
• Dangerous President
• Stephen and Keegan-Michael Key on Drumpf, “His mind is free.”
• MoJo asks Drumpf supporters How should Clinton be punished for her alleged transgressions.
• Stephen sure knows how to make an entrance.

Jimmy Dore: Political jokes of the week.

Farron Cousins: Right wing voting laws getting killed in the courts.

Minute physics: Hitting the sun is hard.

White House: West Wing Week.

The party of Jebus meets a Muslim.

Young Turks are interrupted on their set by Alex Jones and Rodger Stone.

Young Turks: The Post-Alex debriefing.

Climate Change: 2016 is hottest year on record.

Blue on Black Violence:

• Young Turks: Unarmed submissive black man shot by cops.
• Trevor: Breaking the cycle of police violence.
• Young Turks: Cop assaults woman and explains, “blacks have violent tendencies.”
• David Pakman: Another unarmed black man shot…while laying on the ground with his hand up

Young Turks: KKKer David “Douchebag” Duke to run for Senate.

Stephen Colbert with Lewis Black.

The climate change ad that FAUX News didn’t want viewers to see.

John Oliver with some Endorsements.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Looks like more cost overruns and delays for the downtown tunnel.

We seem to be a lot better at making rail tunnels than car ones. So I say we should just make a commitment now to put rail in there. Then things will start to go swimmingly. It can be like the Gerorge Benson Streetcar, but without the view or most of the stops.

Clinton	Trump
100.0% probability of winning	0.0% probability of winning
Mean of 338 electoral votes	Mean of 200 electoral votes

The day of Donald Trump’s acceptance speech is a good time for another poll analysis, I figure. There are 121 new polls added since the previous analysis. A handful of them are newly-discovered older polls, but the majority are newly-released polls. Fifty one of the polls come from a 50-state + D.C. Morning Consult series that was conducted over the preceding three months. The data are newly released, but are not necessarily the most current.

I should mention that only a few polls include surveys conducted this week, and none of them fully cover the G.O.P. convention. So think of this as the pre-conventions baseline analysis. Subsequent analyses will gradually include polls taken after the Republican National Convention. Of course, the same thing will happen following the Democratic National Convention early next month.

As with the previous analysis, a batch of 100,000 simulated elections has Clinton winning 100,000 times and Trump winning 0 times. Clinton received (on average) 338 to Trump’s 200 electoral votes. In an election held now, Clinton would have a 100.0% probability of winning.

Notice, however, that Clinton’s average electoral vote total has dropped a bit from a mean of 354. We should expect at least some improvement for Trump as Republican voters accept and, in many cases, embrace him as the G.O.P. nominee.

There are two striking things about this analysis compared to the previous. First, many of the “outlier” states have “fallen in line” with expectations from recent elections: Nevada has gone from Red to Blue, Arizona from Blue to Red, Colorado from Red to Blue, Kansas from Blue to Red, Missouri from Blue to Red, Mississippi from Blue to Red and Kansas from Blue to red.

The second thing is that many states have become more polarized in the direction expected. You can look at the current map and the previous map to see this easily. For instance, many traditionally blue states have become “bluer”: e.g. OR, WA, MN, WI, MA and NJ. And many traditionally red states have gotten redder: TX, AR, LA, GA, UT, and ND are examples.

In other words, the states are falling into line as we would expect from previous elections. This suggests to me that this will be a conventional election with the battlelines coming down to the battleground states of recent elections. For the moment, Clinton leads in most of those battleground states in the East (PA, VA, NC, FL), Midwest (IA, WI, MI, OH), and West (CO, NM, NV). Of these, IA is very close, but trending toward Trump in the most recent polls, and Florida shows a slight trend in Trump’s direction.

Here is the distribution of electoral votes [FAQ] from the simulations:
[Read more…]

Not sure why, but this morning’s open thread seems to have been editing the previous one instead of adding a new one. Here’s my second try. Enjoy?

Ballots have dropped, and Donald Drumpf Shit-Show is happening right now. So please join us tonight for an evening of political critique and conversation at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally.

We meet tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. You’ll find us in the small room at the back of the tavern. We start at 8:00pm.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings this week. Tonight, the Tri-Cities and Vancouver, WA chapters also meet. The Lakewood chapter meets on Wednesday. And on Thursday, the Tacoma, Bremerton, and Spokane chapters meet.

There are 179 chapters of Living Liberally, including nineteen in Washington state, three in Oregon and one in Idaho. Find, or go out and start, a chapter near you.

I got my ballot. I’m still not sure who I’m voting for to replace McDermott. It’s between Walkinshaw and Jayapal for me, but any of the 3 major Dems would be pretty good. You can’t really vote for any of those three would be fine on your ballot though.

Also, there are too many executive positions. Please eliminate 3. I am not a crackpot.

Leviticus 11:20-22
All flying insects that walk on all fours are to be regarded as unclean by you. There are, however, some flying insects that walk on all fours that you may eat: those that have jointed legs for hopping on the ground. Of these you may eat any kind of locust, katydid, cricket or grasshopper.

Discuss.

What is populism?

Stephen: Former Daily Show correspondents dish on Jon Stewart.

Gun and Violins:

• Mark Fiore: The Amazing non-Binary Brain
• Roy Zimmerman: DWB.

• Thom: What the NRA doesn’t want you to know.
• How did police violence get so bad.
• Are gays for guns or gun control?

Jimmy Dore:Shrub clowns around during police memorial.

Dem Unity?

• Bye bye, Bernie
• Stephen: Hungry for Power Games—Bernie edition.
• Sam Seder: Sanders endorses Clinton.
• Slate: Bernie endorses Hillary
• Seth Meyers: Why Bernie waited so long….

Sen. Tim Scott discusses racial profiling.

Thom: G.O.P. focuses on heat of porn instead of climate change.

Sam Seder: George W. Bush crazily dances during Dallas memorial service.

Jimmy Dore chats with Bill O’Reilly about FAUX sexual harassment.

Drumpfest 2016:

• Stephen: Drumpf chooses a running mate.
• Hawkings on Penis Pence: “Almost everything Drumpf is looking for”
• Sam Seder: Drumpf’s latest way to humiliate Chris Christie.
• Nixon Drumpf fanning the flames of FEAR
• Young Turks: Drumpf flubs VP announcement.
• David Pakman: Drumpf once said Hillary would be a great President.
• Sam Seder: Drumpf’s new logo is NSFW!
• Seth Meyers: A closer look at the GOP convention.
• Jimmy Dore: Drumpf the racial healer.
• Sam Seder: Jeb bullied about being bullied by Drumpf.
• Stephen serves Bill Maher a bowl of Drumpf.
• Young Turks: Who is Drumpf’s running meet Mike Pence.
• Trevor Noah: Drumpf or Cruz?
• Do The Donald
• Sam Seder: Drumpf goes off-script and it is bad. It is very, very bad.
• Stephen: The Ginsberg-Drumpf Twitter feud heats up
• Jim Jefferies: Donald Drumpf (2016):

• Jimmy Dore: GOP platform is a cartoonish nightmare of twisted priorities
• Stephen: The GOP’s new platform is full of old surprises.
• Young Turks: Drumpf has problems with youth.
• Sam Seder: GOP Platform is a retrograde dumpfster fire
• Yosemite Drumpf: The law and order candidate

Sam Seder: Newt Gingrich calls for demented anti-Muslim policies on FAUX News to catch Trump’s attention.

White House: West Wing Week.

Mental Floss: 25 nerd facts.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

I mean, Mike Pence? Mike Pence. Is. I guess. Going to be Trump’s VP. I was mentioning in the last poll analysis that I was surprised that nobody had polled Indiana. Maybe some GOP pollster did, and decided they needed to shore it up? But still Mike Pence?