The Political Junkie Thread

[CameronBornAndBred]

Apparently this guy thinks the easiest way to get rid of his political opponents is to have them whacked by a hit squad.

A little-known GOP candidate in one of Florida’s most competitive congressional seats was secretly recorded threatening to send “a Russian and Ukrainian hit squad” to a fellow Republican opponent to make her “disappear.”

During a 30-minute call with a conservative activist that was recorded before he became a candidate, William Braddock repeatedly warned the activist to not support GOP candidate Anna Paulina Luna in the Republican primary for a Tampa Bay-area congressional seat because he had access to assassins. The seat is being vacated by Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.), who is running for governor.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/secret-recor ... 55617.html

In Florida, of course.

[CameronBornAndBred]

Big happenings in NYC today. Basically they are voting for the next mayor today, since the chances of a Republican winning are extremely low. So who will walk away victorious in a crowded house? We might not know for days.
This election employs ranked choice voting in the race for the first time, which adds to the intrigue.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyc-mayoral- ... 26697.html

[CrazyNotCrazie]

Big happenings in NYC today. Basically they are voting for the next mayor today, since the chances of a Republican winning are extremely low. So who will walk away victorious in a crowded house? We might not know for days.
This election employs ranked choice voting in the race for the first time, which adds to the intrigue.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyc-mayoral- ... 26697.html

NYC voter here. I have invested countless hours of my life thinking about this election. It is basically the progressives vs. the moderates. But there is a lot of nuance to it. And as you noted, ranked choice adds to it - in this case I think it helps a lot. Otherwise I would be thinking a lot about gaming the system and making sure my vote counts the most, but I was able to legitimately vote for the people I liked best in order (and very purposefully exclude people who I think would be a nightmare). Lots of playing of the race and gender cards and public safety is a huge issue - the defund the police crowd vs. the pro public safety crowd. Everyone agrees the current mayor is a moron, though some are more distanced from him than others. No one knows what to make of Yang - he led early based on name recognition but has trailed off some. I love him on some issues but dislike him on others.

We also have primaries for city council, borough president, DA, comptroller (the CFO) and public advocate. The DA race is somewhat similar to the mayoral race but is the only one that is not ranked choice, so I had to be more strategic in my vote. The DA will likely be bringing one of the main cases against Trump, though there are a lot of major local issues involved in that also. Public advocate is a largely ceremonial role except they take over if something happens to the mayor - that one has a strong incumbent and little opposition.

[CameronBornAndBred]

Big happenings in NYC today. Basically they are voting for the next mayor today, since the chances of a Republican winning are extremely low. So who will walk away victorious in a crowded house? We might not know for days.
This election employs ranked choice voting in the race for the first time, which adds to the intrigue.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyc-mayoral- ... 26697.html

NYC voter here. I have invested countless hours of my life thinking about this election. It is basically the progressives vs. the moderates. But there is a lot of nuance to it. And as you noted, ranked choice adds to it - in this case I think it helps a lot. Otherwise I would be thinking a lot about gaming the system and making sure my vote counts the most, but I was able to legitimately vote for the people I liked best in order (and very purposefully exclude people who I think would be a nightmare). Lots of playing of the race and gender cards and public safety is a huge issue - the defund the police crowd vs. the pro public safety crowd. Everyone agrees the current mayor is a moron, though some are more distanced from him than others. No one knows what to make of Yang - he led early based on name recognition but has trailed off some. I love him on some issues but dislike him on others.

We also have primaries for city council, borough president, DA, comptroller (the CFO) and public advocate. The DA race is somewhat similar to the mayoral race but is the only one that is not ranked choice, so I had to be more strategic in my vote. The DA will likely be bringing one of the main cases against Trump, though there are a lot of major local issues involved in that also. Public advocate is a largely ceremonial role except they take over if something happens to the mayor - that one has a strong incumbent and little opposition.

Thanks for the local insight! I hope that RCV picks up steam and is employed by more states; I sure wouldn't be opposed to it. And it would make me think much harder and evaluate the candidates on a better level, I think. Right now, I tend to avoid the primaries unless there is someone that I REALLY like, or REALLY dislike. I'd participate more if I felt I could be happy with at least a couple of them.

[CrazyNotCrazie]

Big happenings in NYC today. Basically they are voting for the next mayor today, since the chances of a Republican winning are extremely low. So who will walk away victorious in a crowded house? We might not know for days.
This election employs ranked choice voting in the race for the first time, which adds to the intrigue.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyc-mayoral- ... 26697.html

NYC voter here. I have invested countless hours of my life thinking about this election. It is basically the progressives vs. the moderates. But there is a lot of nuance to it. And as you noted, ranked choice adds to it - in this case I think it helps a lot. Otherwise I would be thinking a lot about gaming the system and making sure my vote counts the most, but I was able to legitimately vote for the people I liked best in order (and very purposefully exclude people who I think would be a nightmare). Lots of playing of the race and gender cards and public safety is a huge issue - the defund the police crowd vs. the pro public safety crowd. Everyone agrees the current mayor is a moron, though some are more distanced from him than others. No one knows what to make of Yang - he led early based on name recognition but has trailed off some. I love him on some issues but dislike him on others.

We also have primaries for city council, borough president, DA, comptroller (the CFO) and public advocate. The DA race is somewhat similar to the mayoral race but is the only one that is not ranked choice, so I had to be more strategic in my vote. The DA will likely be bringing one of the main cases against Trump, though there are a lot of major local issues involved in that also. Public advocate is a largely ceremonial role except they take over if something happens to the mayor - that one has a strong incumbent and little opposition.

Thanks for the local insight! I hope that RCV picks up steam and is employed by more states; I sure wouldn't be opposed to it. And it would make me think much harder and evaluate the candidates on a better level, I think. Right now, I tend to avoid the primaries unless there is someone that I REALLY like, or REALLY dislike. I'd participate more if I felt I could be happy with at least a couple of them.

I am generally a fan of RCV. They have tried to do a lot of education but I think there are still many who don't get it.

In the mayoral race, my favorite candidate is not polling well. In a normal election I probably would not have voted for them as it likely would be a wasted vote, but this time there was nothing wrong with ranking them first. There are two candidates I despise, one of whom is polling fairly well, so I very specifically left those two out. There were basically eight candidates.

For my city council race, RCV might end up biting me, as I really like one candidate who is in one lane, and there are several other candidates in a different lane. So if it was a normal election, the other ones would be splitting votes and my candidate would like win pretty easily. But since the voters for the other candidates will likely be ranking them all 1, 2 and 3, the other one who does the best could beat my candidate.

The big challenge with ranked choice is that they can't start doing all of the reallocations until every single vote is in. So we will not be getting results for a while, and you can't even really start to guess. I'm not sure how much they will be releasing tonight. The estimates I have heard is that we will get results in about three weeks.

I have read analyses that if there had been ranked choice in the 2016 Republican primaries, Trump would not have won, as the other candidates were splitting votes so Trump would win states (and it was usually winner-takes-all) with well below 50%. At the time I think many of us thought Cruz and Rubio were only slightly less evil than Trump (with Kasich and Bush being more tolerable) but in hindsight they would have been much better as there would not have been all of the drama, self-dealing, and overall nastiness of the Trump presidency.

[ArkieDukie]

I have read analyses that if there had been ranked choice in the 2016 Republican primaries, Trump would not have won, as the other candidates were splitting votes so Trump would win states (and it was usually winner-takes-all) with well below 50%. At the time I think many of us thought Cruz and Rubio were only slightly less evil than Trump (with Kasich and Bush being more tolerable) but in hindsight they would have been much better as there would not have been all of the drama, self-dealing, and overall nastiness of the Trump presidency.

Interesting and likely true. I voted in the Republican primary to vote against Trump. Didn’t vote for my top pick (Kasich) because he didn’t have a chance at that point. I held my nose and voted for Rubio, because there’s no way I was voting for Cruz. Many others were likely in the same boat, and the “lesser of the evils” was different for each person. I probably would’ve voted for everyone but Trump and Cruz.

[Phredd3]

The big challenge with ranked choice is that they can't start doing all of the reallocations until every single vote is in. So we will not be getting results for a while, and you can't even really start to guess. I'm not sure how much they will be releasing tonight. The estimates I have heard is that we will get results in about three weeks.

I've been wondering why the media outlets all say that RCV will take a long time. It seems you shouldn't have to do a hand count for every round, so it should be able to move fairly quickly. It also seems odd that they'd need to count EVERY vote before moving on. Unless two choices are very close in votes, the winner in each round should also be pretty clear, so they can move to the next tier without undue delay. What am I missing? Or are they just being cautious because this is the first time they've used this system?

[CrazyNotCrazie]

The big challenge with ranked choice is that they can't start doing all of the reallocations until every single vote is in. So we will not be getting results for a while, and you can't even really start to guess. I'm not sure how much they will be releasing tonight. The estimates I have heard is that we will get results in about three weeks.

I've been wondering why the media outlets all say that RCV will take a long time. It seems you shouldn't have to do a hand count for every round, so it should be able to move fairly quickly. It also seems odd that they'd need to count EVERY vote before moving on. Unless two choices are very close in votes, the winner in each round should also be pretty clear, so they can move to the next tier without undue delay. What am I missing? Or are they just being cautious because this is the first time they've used this system?

Odds are it won't be an issue but it could be, especially because there are so many candidates in some of the races. The margins of error can start to compound. First they reallocate the votes of the last place person. So let's say they are off 20 votes there but those were all going to Candidate A. Then they reallocate the votes of the second to last place person, and they are off 20 votes that were all going to Candidate A. These can start to add up and even if someone has little chance of winning (i.e. they are going to be fifth or sixth) it might matter in what order their votes are reassigned.

Not sure if that clarified it or just made it worse. I think that 99.9% of the time you are right that it won't matter, but because of the multiple rounds, it matters a little more.

I do find it ironic that we blue New Yorkers love to complain about how other purple and red states conduct their elections yet I don't think our process is particularly good either.

[CameronBornAndBred]

In all of the insanity stemming from the 2020 election, and the "fraud" associated with it, this is pleasant.

An investigation by Michigan's Republican-led Senate Oversight Committee found no evidence of widespread voter fraud in 2020, and recommended that Michigan's attorney general investigate individuals who made false claims "for their own ends."
"The committee finds those promoting Antrim County as the prime evidence of a nationwide conspiracy to steal the election place all other statements and actions they make in a position of zero credibility," the report says.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/gop-led-mich ... 36563.html

[CrazyNotCrazie]

In all of the insanity stemming from the 2020 election, and the "fraud" associated with it, this is pleasant.

An investigation by Michigan's Republican-led Senate Oversight Committee found no evidence of widespread voter fraud in 2020, and recommended that Michigan's attorney general investigate individuals who made false claims "for their own ends."
"The committee finds those promoting Antrim County as the prime evidence of a nationwide conspiracy to steal the election place all other statements and actions they make in a position of zero credibility," the report says.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/gop-led-mich ... 36563.html

I'm sure that will be the lead story on Fox News...

[Phredd3]

Odds are it won't be an issue but it could be, especially because there are so many candidates in some of the races. The margins of error can start to compound. First they reallocate the votes of the last place person. So let's say they are off 20 votes there but those were all going to Candidate A. Then they reallocate the votes of the second to last place person, and they are off 20 votes that were all going to Candidate A. These can start to add up and even if someone has little chance of winning (i.e. they are going to be fifth or sixth) it might matter in what order their votes are reassigned.

Not sure if that clarified it or just made it worse. I think that 99.9% of the time you are right that it won't matter, but because of the multiple rounds, it matters a little more.

That's a fine explanation, but I guess I just think that the margin of error on voting is usually really, really small. State-wide, multi-million vote recounts often find just a couple hundred mistakes, if that much. It seems you'd be able to make a credible estimate of the likely margin of error before you even start counting. The race for the New York City mayoral office is itself is a multi-million vote race, so it seems that a 13-candidate race would have pretty low error rates. But I'm not a stats guy, so I'll certainly admit that, given the multi-dimensional aspect of it, with multiple votes per ballot becoming important and contributing to error, my perception may not match reality.

[CrazyNotCrazie]

Odds are it won't be an issue but it could be, especially because there are so many candidates in some of the races. The margins of error can start to compound. First they reallocate the votes of the last place person. So let's say they are off 20 votes there but those were all going to Candidate A. Then they reallocate the votes of the second to last place person, and they are off 20 votes that were all going to Candidate A. These can start to add up and even if someone has little chance of winning (i.e. they are going to be fifth or sixth) it might matter in what order their votes are reassigned.

Not sure if that clarified it or just made it worse. I think that 99.9% of the time you are right that it won't matter, but because of the multiple rounds, it matters a little more.

That's a fine explanation, but I guess I just think that the margin of error on voting is usually really, really small. State-wide, multi-million vote recounts often find just a couple hundred mistakes, if that much. It seems you'd be able to make a credible estimate of the likely margin of error before you even start counting. The race for the New York City mayoral office is itself is a multi-million vote race, so it seems that a 13-candidate race would have pretty low error rates. But I'm not a stats guy, so I'll certainly admit that, given the multi-dimensional aspect of it, with multiple votes per ballot becoming important and contributing to error, my perception may not match reality.

You are asking good questions so I wanted to get a better answer, both for you and for myself. Here are two articles - one from 538 and the other a newspaper article linked from the 538 article (the newspaper article is about the November presidential election but much of it still applies). Long story short, there are a lot of absentee ballots (there were 800k in person votes and 87k absentee ballots have been submitted, with many more potentially outstanding). Absentee ballots have to be checked against the in person ballots to make sure people didn't vote twice (because you can request an absentee then change your mind and vote in person), then they can start counting the absentee ballots. The number of absentee ballots is material, so at a minimum, they need to wait for that count. They can arrive as late as June 29.

Then there is a five day cure period to fix ballot mistakes - I'm assuming this is a much smaller number so if they give a preliminary result between the counting of the absentee ballots and the cure period, that probably will be fairly accurate.

As I said above, New Yorkers like to complain about how other states do their elections, but our method isn't much better.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/wh ... ts-so-far/

https://www.democratandchronicle.com/st ... 232803002/

[dudog]

I have read analyses that if there had been ranked choice in the 2016 Republican primaries, Trump would not have won, as the other candidates were splitting votes so Trump would win states (and it was usually winner-takes-all) with well below 50%. At the time I think many of us thought Cruz and Rubio were only slightly less evil than Trump (with Kasich and Bush being more tolerable) but in hindsight they would have been much better as there would not have been all of the drama, self-dealing, and overall nastiness of the Trump presidency.

We need to stop acting like Trump was/is an aberration in the Republican Party. He is a manifestation of the Republican Party.

[Phredd3]

You are asking good questions so I wanted to get a better answer, [etc.]

[CameronBornAndBred]

Man...not even best of the worst. (But pretty effing close.)

Out of 44 presidents reviewed for the survey by 142 historians and professional observers of the presidency, Trump landed at 41st, the lowest ranking of any president in the past 150 years. The only presidents who ranked lower than Trump were Franklin Pierce, Andrew Johnson, and James Buchanan.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/historians-r ... 32098.html

Somehow, though, I don't think Pierce, Johnson, nor Buchanan had their whole party clambering for their return.

[Phredd3]

Man...not even best of the worst. (But pretty effing close.)

Out of 44 presidents reviewed for the survey by 142 historians and professional observers of the presidency, Trump landed at 41st, the lowest ranking of any president in the past 150 years. The only presidents who ranked lower than Trump were Franklin Pierce, Andrew Johnson, and James Buchanan.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/historians-r ... 32098.html

Somehow, though, I don't think Pierce, Johnson, nor Buchanan had their whole party clambering for their return.

Yeah, let's just review who those guys are:

Pierce effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise, pretty much directly removing the last protection preventing the Civil War, then became so unpopular in how he handled the consequences of that decision that he didn't even win his party's re-nomination, let alone re-election. Buchanan immediately followed Pierce, and promptly affirmed that Kansas would enter the Union as a slave state, worked so that SCOTUS would decide Dred Scott the way it did, and then fractured his party so badly that they completely lost the next Presidential election, thereby directly precipitating the Civil War. Johnson followed after the Civil War and proceeded to approve the re-election of all the folks in the South who had started the war in the first place and tried to pass laws which completely restricted the rights of black people, and he opposed passage of the 14th Amendment. He spent his full presidency fighting with the Senate (which overrode most of his vetoes) and trying to dismiss many of his own cabinet, which led Congress to pass many of the office tenure laws that still exist today. He didn't win nomination, either, although since he was never elected to the presidency (having succeeded Lincoln shortly into the latter's second term), it wasn't a re-nomination.

So yeah, Trump didn't cause or try to continue the Civil War. That seems like kind of a low bar. Although, to be fair, he did kinda try to get under even that. The country just didn't quite let him get away with it.

[dudog]

Man...not even best of the worst. (But pretty effing close.)

Out of 44 presidents reviewed for the survey by 142 historians and professional observers of the presidency, Trump landed at 41st, the lowest ranking of any president in the past 150 years. The only presidents who ranked lower than Trump were Franklin Pierce, Andrew Johnson, and James Buchanan.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/historians-r ... 32098.html

Somehow, though, I don't think Pierce, Johnson, nor Buchanan had their whole party clambering for their return.

Yeah, let's just review who those guys are:

Pierce effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise, pretty much directly removing the last protection preventing the Civil War, then became so unpopular in how he handled the consequences of that decision that he didn't even win his party's re-nomination, let alone re-election. Buchanan immediately followed Pierce, and promptly affirmed that Kansas would enter the Union as a slave state, worked so that SCOTUS would decide Dred Scott the way it did, and then fractured his party so badly that they completely lost the next Presidential election, thereby directly precipitating the Civil War. Johnson followed after the Civil War and proceeded to approve the re-election of all the folks in the South who had started the war in the first place and tried to pass laws which completely restricted the rights of black people, and he opposed passage of the 14th Amendment. He spent his full presidency fighting with the Senate (which overrode most of his vetoes) and trying to dismiss many of his own cabinet, which led Congress to pass many of the office tenure laws that still exist today. He didn't win nomination, either, although since he was never elected to the presidency (having succeeded Lincoln shortly into the latter's second term), it wasn't a re-nomination.

So yeah, Trump didn't cause or try to continue the Civil War. That seems like kind of a low bar. Although, to be fair, he did kinda try to get under even that. The country just didn't quite let him get away with it.

Our current crisis is not over yet, you may not be giving him enough "credit".

[Phredd3]

Man...not even best of the worst. (But pretty effing close.)



https://www.yahoo.com/news/historians-r ... 32098.html

Somehow, though, I don't think Pierce, Johnson, nor Buchanan had their whole party clambering for their return.

Yeah, let's just review who those guys are:

Pierce effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise, pretty much directly removing the last protection preventing the Civil War, then became so unpopular in how he handled the consequences of that decision that he didn't even win his party's re-nomination, let alone re-election. Buchanan immediately followed Pierce, and promptly affirmed that Kansas would enter the Union as a slave state, worked so that SCOTUS would decide Dred Scott the way it did, and then fractured his party so badly that they completely lost the next Presidential election, thereby directly precipitating the Civil War. Johnson followed after the Civil War and proceeded to approve the re-election of all the folks in the South who had started the war in the first place and tried to pass laws which completely restricted the rights of black people, and he opposed passage of the 14th Amendment. He spent his full presidency fighting with the Senate (which overrode most of his vetoes) and trying to dismiss many of his own cabinet, which led Congress to pass many of the office tenure laws that still exist today. He didn't win nomination, either, although since he was never elected to the presidency (having succeeded Lincoln shortly into the latter's second term), it wasn't a re-nomination.

So yeah, Trump didn't cause or try to continue the Civil War. That seems like kind of a low bar. Although, to be fair, he did kinda try to get under even that. The country just didn't quite let him get away with it.

Our current crisis is not over yet, you may not be giving him enough "credit".

Sadly, that's a fair point.

[CameronBornAndBred]

Congrats to NYC (essentially) Mayor - elect Eric Adams.

Updated vote tallies posted online on Tuesday evening based on the city's new ranked-choice voting system showed Adams with what appeared to be an insurmountable lead over his nearest rivals, two weeks after Election Day.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/results-expe ... 45255.html

Two weeks is a while to wait to learn a victor, but it seems to be something we are becoming more used to. (Even when it's just two people running.)

[CrazyNotCrazie]

Congrats to NYC (essentially) Mayor - elect Eric Adams.

Updated vote tallies posted online on Tuesday evening based on the city's new ranked-choice voting system showed Adams with what appeared to be an insurmountable lead over his nearest rivals, two weeks after Election Day.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/results-expe ... 45255.html

Two weeks is a while to wait to learn a victor, but it seems to be something we are becoming more used to. (Even when it's just two people running.)

It was a drawn out process and they learned the lesson not to reveal any partial results - it is OK on election day to say what the preliminary first place results are, then wait until everything is officially tabulated to announce the end results.

I am OK with Adams - I had him third, but it was largely a coin flip for me. We could have done a lot worse (I am a moderate Democrat so the super progressive candidates really scared me). Adams is a little sketchy and there are things about him that I don't like but hopefully it will work out OK. If only Bloomberg had run again...