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The smug style in American liberalism

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Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#111

Post by gcp »

rbehrends wrote: post #109
yummyfajitas wrote: post #35

This is definitely the preference falsification election. Those who know me on HN know that I'm an outspoken proponent of unorthodox ideas. I'm regularly shouted down, called racist/evil/etc, downmodded and flagged on HN. I also get a steady stream of private emails: "I wouldn't say this publicly cause of the bullies, but that .gov link with all the data does seem to support you. I think you might be right, I need to…

> When pollsters call the preference falsification continues. I don't buy this. Sam Wang had projected Clinton winning the popular vote by 4.0% (+/- .6%). She's currently projected to win the popular vote by about 1% (the Electoral College margin is an artifact of the electoral system and unrelated to voting preferences). That means that maybe 1 in 60 Americans voted differently from what the polls predicted. So, whi…

the margin of error relative to the electorate was fairly small

But was it fairly small in statistical significance? A polling error of 3% is likely big enough to confirm a consistent and very significant bias.

It's like throwing a coin and getting 52000 heads and 48000 tails. "Only" a 4% error, but sure as hell evidence your coin is biased.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#112

Post by CalChris »

wojcech wrote: post #80
CalChris wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I pointed out above, the status quo is actually pretty good. And yes, I'm aware of Brexit at all. I think that Trump learned more about Brexit than we learned about Remain, Brexit being the politics of complaint.

> As I pointed out above, the status quo is actually pretty good. For you. And me. But we are not the majority. The majority does not benefit from automation, globalisation etc. as much as you and me. And it doesn't matter if in absolute terms we are all better of(for which citation would be needed, specifically for the lowest income bracket), it matters that the benefits of this new age are not spread around to thos…

"I love the poorly educated."

This wasn't about the economy at all which is pretty good. This was a demagogue preying on gullibility. Y'all just elected him, citation unnecessary.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#113

Post by tnmrnis »

gadders wrote: post #89
yummyfajitas wrote: post #35

This is definitely the preference falsification election. Those who know me on HN know that I'm an outspoken proponent of unorthodox ideas. I'm regularly shouted down, called racist/evil/etc, downmodded and flagged on HN. I also get a steady stream of private emails: "I wouldn't say this publicly cause of the bullies, but that .gov link with all the data does seem to support you. I think you might be right, I need to…

A similar thing happened with Brexit, and the last UK General Election. Right-leaning voters just can't be bothered to identify themselves and get involved in debates about it. They just vote.

The similar thing is happening all over europe right know. Right-leaning voters don't want to identify themselves because the negative social implications can be quite significant.

Also the west seem to have lost its debate culture. These days most debates of conservatives and progressives in shouting 'commie' and 'racist' at each other. In a good debate you wanna help your opponent to give the best possible argument for his position and then try to disprove it. Everything else is lazy and not beneficial for anyone.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#114

Post by mrow84 »

rorykoehler wrote: post #54
scarmig wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Full disclosure: I'm a Hillary voter, after much internal fretting about voting third party or writing in Obama. Looking at the reactions on my Facebook feed, the large majority of people seem to be taking from this experience the learning that Trump voters are all disgusting misogynistic racist pigs, and America deserves to be damned for its sins against the pro-Clinton media orthodoxy. It's tiring, because in terms…

Obama is a huge part of why this happened. He promised change and delivered empire.

I'm no expert on US politics, but wasn't he hidebound by a Republican house and senate?

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#115

Post by rbehrends »

gcp wrote: post #111
rbehrends wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When pollsters call the preference falsification continues. I don't buy this. Sam Wang had projected Clinton winning the popular vote by 4.0% (+/- .6%). She's currently projected to win the popular vote by about 1% (the Electoral College margin is an artifact of the electoral system and unrelated to voting preferences). That means that maybe 1 in 60 Americans voted differently from what the polls predicted. So, whi…

the margin of error relative to the electorate was fairly small But was it fairly small in statistical significance? A polling error of 3% is likely big enough to confirm a consistent and very significant bias. It's like throwing a coin and getting 52000 heads and 48000 tails. "Only" a 4% error, but sure as hell evidence your coin is biased.

Obviously, it's a bit of a black eye for the pollsters. But it does not reveal that a huge number of voters hid their preferences, which is what the original comment was about; if anything, it indicates the opposite.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#116

Post by deviate_X »

I have a feeling that this explanation overly complex, more like liberal self-beating and giving far too much credence

Simply those who voted for Trump feel like victims of "something"

And despite having won "everything" I have the feeling that they will still feel like victims of the undefinable "other" in the up and coming loooong years..

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#117

Post by deviate_X »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #64
ant6n wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've done a fair bit of arguing with the folks here on HN, it's interesting because it doesn't match the echo chamber I have on twitter or facebook. There seem to be a lot of Trump supporter here, which I find very surprising. This idea keeps coming up again and again that using the word 'racist' in the context of the Trump campaign is essentially name-calling, an insult. The problem is, racism is a big, big, big iss…

Using 'racist' in the context of criticizing Republicans is just name-calling. Bush displayed no open racism, bullied no one, and was not xenophobic. Same for Romney. Yet the anti-Trump language is just a more hysterical version of the anti-Bush and anti-Romney language. At some point the term "racist" came to mean "insufficiently left wing". This happened because left wing types called every Republican "raaacciiiiis…

He used it in the context of "Trump" not "Republican's"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-racist-exam...

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#118

Post by privong »

triplesec wrote: post #103
rorykoehler wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with everything you have said. Obama is a thoughtful type and a great orator. I'm sure he would have liked to enact some of the change he promised but he didn't. In many ways America regressed further under his watch and this is the outcome.

I think it's not that he didn't, but he couldn't, with the most obstructive Congress in modern history

> I think it's not that he didn't, but he couldn't, with the most obstructive Congress in modern history

Ironically, some of that might have been his own doing, though. The healthcare reform was passed essentially without republican support; I think that's a very rare example of major [healthcare] legislation that was not passed with bi-partisan support. Not doing more to bring R's on board likely burned lots of political capital and hardened opposition to him in Congress. I'm not saying Obama didn't try at all to bring R's on board, just that a bit more effort might have result in a more cooperative Congress.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#119

Post by emless »

cronjobber wrote: post #63
yummyfajitas wrote: post #35

This is definitely the preference falsification election. Those who know me on HN know that I'm an outspoken proponent of unorthodox ideas. I'm regularly shouted down, called racist/evil/etc, downmodded and flagged on HN. I also get a steady stream of private emails: "I wouldn't say this publicly cause of the bullies, but that .gov link with all the data does seem to support you. I think you might be right, I need to…

> This is definitely the preference falsification election. I agree. In fact, the point at which I started to think that Trump could win was Hillary's "Basket of Deplorables" blunder. It was a blunder because the way she phrased it, she put far too many in that basket. Paradoxically, because people believed what she said —that there are many Deplorables— she might have initiated the very preference cascade that cost…

With the risk of sounding "smug", I think most of this thread offers a poor analysis of the election.

The reason Trump won is, presumably, to a large extent that he managed to make his message more relevant. If this election would have been about schools, even in the same context, he most likely wouldn't have won and the deplorables comment wouldn't have mattered or even happened in the first place.

We've seen this in Europe repeatedly with new candidates offering easy solutions and a straight forward message, leaving the established parties on their heels trying to defend themselves. In Europe this normally results in 5-15% of the seats in parliament, while in the US (once you're in the running) this can win you the election because of the political system.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#120

Post by s_kilk »

gadders wrote: post #89
yummyfajitas wrote: post #35

This is definitely the preference falsification election. Those who know me on HN know that I'm an outspoken proponent of unorthodox ideas. I'm regularly shouted down, called racist/evil/etc, downmodded and flagged on HN. I also get a steady stream of private emails: "I wouldn't say this publicly cause of the bullies, but that .gov link with all the data does seem to support you. I think you might be right, I need to…

A similar thing happened with Brexit, and the last UK General Election. Right-leaning voters just can't be bothered to identify themselves and get involved in debates about it. They just vote.

The "Shy Tory" problem. I'm continually amazed at how pundits brush it aside.
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