Why were the errors only in one direction?
One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
391–400 of 565 posts
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#392Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you think the bulk of voters for Trump believe one of these things? He won a considerable number of votes.
Anecdotal, but every single person I've spoken to who voted for Trump does believe one or more of these conspiracy theories.
What's your sample size?
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#393Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you think the bulk of voters for Trump believe one of these things? He won a considerable number of votes.
I'm guessing but I bet that about 30-40% of his voters believe it.
No point guessing here, either produce proper evidence or don't bother ostracizing the other group.
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#394Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you think the bulk of voters for Trump believe one of these things? He won a considerable number of votes.
The bulk of Trump voters are from rural areas, and tend to be less (or un-)educated. I don't know what percentage of Trump voters believe QAnon conspiracy theories. But I do believe the bulk of Trump voters are voting against their self interests, because they are gullible. Why else would most Trump voters come from rural areas? If they had legit reasons to support Trump why aren't the voters spread equally among urb…
I know Trump voters who are extremely well educated, this is not an argument. Secondly, if by "educated" you mean holding a piece of paper, we already know that many colleges these days are infested by the far left, so again it is not an argument. What you care about are critical thinkers, and there's a much bigger disparity there. I'd argue that many college degree holders are not good critical thinkers.
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#395Earlier quoted context omitted.
The rejoinder to this line of thinking is generally: "if liberals are so smart, how come they always lose?" Worth a thought.
Because intelligence doesn't translate to popularity?
Quite the assumption that intelligent people would only vote liberal.
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#396This is my personal experience: over the course of my life, I have held both conservative positions and more progressive ones (depending on the topic, and in different periods of my life). I have always been much more willing to discuss openly those positions that I would describe as progressive. This is despite the fact that over the years I have been living in more than a handful of different countries, each one wi…
> I don't know why that is the case, and I would like to hear if anyone has an answer.
Cancel culture and SJW mobs.
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#397Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, that's true, and because of that the lower class systematically vote for parties and policies that harm lower class to benefit the wealthy. Actually, this - class consciousness / false consciousness; the understanding (or lack of it) of the role and interests of the class you're in - was one of key concepts of Marx writings, too bad that this association currently makes many people automatically discard these id…
Marx's problem was that he thought of everything in terms of class. If I'm poor, and I know I'm poor, but I also think about something other than class when making political decisions (no matter what that "something" is), then I have "false consciousness". That is, if I don't think about this totally the way Marx says, I'm stupid. Nice. If you think about your life that one-dimensionally, you're poor in a way that Ma…
999 times out of 1000 if I ask a working class American to explain Marx's concept of surplus labor time, they would have no idea of what I was talking about. That is false consciousness.
You're talking as if they rejected the idea. They don't even know what the idea is.
A sizable amount of working class Americans have no idea that people die. They have no idea that their grandparents died. They have been to wakes and have seen the corpse of their grandparents or whomever, but when I talk to them they say their grandparents are elsewhere and enjoying themselves. They do not mean this metaphorically, or that they live on via children or their works or memories. They have no concept that these people are not around any more, permanently. They go to churches where a man stands in front and says this, I guess they believe him. This would be part of false consciousness, although not a needed component of them. They are as ignorant of death as they are of their economic exploitation. They are ignorant and uneducated. If you want to call them stupid as you do, that's your right.
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#398Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you think the bulk of voters for Trump believe one of these things? He won a considerable number of votes.
Anecdotal, but every single person I've spoken to who voted for Trump does believe one or more of these conspiracy theories.
Anecdotally, I’ve seen the same thing. It’s weird because outside of these political conspiracies, they don’t really have any other odd beliefs as far as I know.
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#399Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh wow, I'm so happy I'm not the only one thinking this. I noticed this transition over the past few years on these forums and I even commented about it in the past.
I should qualify my statement as I get voted down into oblivion. Hn still has higher quality comments and I'd ever seen it slashdot. However those high value comments usually come on particular subjects that lie within the hn community's zone of expertise. However for political topics or for science articles, hn comments usually lack expertise or neutrality. They're all falls into whether hn thinks of itself more as…
The truth hurts.
Re: One pollster’s explanation for why the polls got it wrong
#400Earlier quoted context omitted.
Also rural areas see much less of the impact that government has. They see less infrastructure, they see less of the masses of students that have to be educated, etc. They tend to be pro-small government because they don't have a daily view of the impact government has on daily life. I don't view that as gullible, I view that as a perspective that is incomplete due to geographical circumstances. And I am sure that's…
To be clear, rural areas receive more federal support, but it’s farm subsidies, not visible infrastructure.
Farm subsidies aren't a major factor. The federal government spends about $20B per year on farm subsidies.
https://www.cato.org/publications/tax-budget-bulletin/reform...
To put that in context, the GDP of the state of Iowa is $173B. And that's just one state with a large agriculture sector.