John the Virginian: The art of the deal vs the art of the steal.
- Donald Hartley
- Oct 30, 2020
- 5 min read
It doesn't look like there is much room for compromise here and the entire concept of a Real Clear Politics "average" seems absurd. If person 'A' thinks Trump will win by 10 and person 'B' thinks Biden will win by 10, the entire notion of averaging it down to a tie is absurd. It seems clear that some of us are going to be spectacularly right and some of us are going to be spectacularly wrong. The Right's and Left's perception of where this race is places us on opposite sides of the universe and we can only make our cases as to why we feel the data supports our position.
I fully admit that I like being right and do not like being wrong. I have that in common with most of the human race. Yet, as I grapple with the potentially apocalyptic consequences of this election, I confess that my hopes in being correct are motivated by hope and fear far more than by a prideful urge for vindication.
I also admit that I arrive at my conclusions by equal parts empirical and anecdotal evidence. What I mean is that the most compelling numbers and trends and projections are weighed against the backdrop of compelling evidence presented to my own eyes and ears. When I see perhaps 100,000 people at a Trump rally in Arizona or 35,000 in North Carolina, it is impossible to miss the 7 or 10 or 12 that showed up for Biden or Harris. I also cannot ignore that Biden, the Friday before an election is campaigning in Saint Paul.
Perhaps the strongest anecdotal evidence of all is that I see Biden taking most of his days off and when he does campaign he looks exhausted and bewildered and irrational as he loses track of his sentences, slurs his words and screams at a near empty parking lot.
Let's just be honest, folks. Team Biden does not look like a campaign that is winning. If either I use the data as a step off to what my eyes and ears perceive or vice versa, I arrive at the same place- a conviction that we have had the electoral wool pulled over our eyes for some months now and that Donald Trump is about to be reelected by a wide, perhaps even stunning, margin.
I could give 100 reasons and actually did give 25 in a recent DTR show..
I suppose that anyone reading this is looking for a compelling closing argument and I am going to my very best to present one. The closing argument, as I understand it, shapes all of the evidence into a single cohesive observation- a final word, if you will.
The final word on this election is results.
Deeds, not words, is the appropo expression. In this toxic cocktail of a year with all of it's challenges and in the preceding years that have led us to this point, Donald Trump can far more forcefully argue that he has been the man who has weathered the storm and risen to the moment. The results just prove it.
The 33% bounce-back in the economy, Covid deaths in full retreat, Peace deals, trade deals, the courts and a hundred other things stand in sharp contrast to Joe Biden who gives a toxic speech then retreats to his basement to count his ill gotten millions.
The winner vs the whiner. The art of the deal vs the art of the steal. Trump looks like a mighty titan standing against the raging storm, Biden looks like Winnie the Pooh taking cover in the rabbit hole to escape the little dark rain cloud.
In this great national job interview, we are all looking for clues as to what the boss is going to do and different people who claim to be in-the-know are telling us two very different stories. It is true that we must make some determinations of who we believe and who we don't and if our conclusions are wrong, the results will be very different from what we anticipate.
I do not think that is going to be the case. The argumentation for our side is just too compelling. The evidence is just too overwhelming. The chasm to-date, between the forecasts and the quantifiable results is just too enormous.
In short, the dog just don't hunt.
There isn't a chance on earth that Joe Biden and his ilk would spend part of his last pre-election Friday in states he is winning by 7, 8 and 17 points. We are being fed some choice male cow exhaust here.
Some polls say Biden has this thing wrapped up and some say he is bleeding all over the map. In the end, his demeanor and his schedule support the 2nd scenario and not the first and the media props that are holding up his campaign are feeding us arguments that just plain defy common sense.
Among them:
~Joe Biden will get more African American and youth support than Barack Obama.
~Joe Biden will get John Kennedy levels of support from his own party.
~With a position of hostility towards fracking and fossil fuels, religion and guns, Biden is going to win Texas.
~Joe Biden can lose Florida and Pennsylvania and still win the election.
~Joe Biden's campaign is awash with enthusiasm but they keep him shuttered in his basement as BO campaigns for him 30 minutes away.
~Donald Trump, who got 94% of his primaries support is losing the crossover vote to Biden, who got about 80% of his.
~Donald Trump, who holds a 52% approval rating, is headed to defeat.
~ 56% of Americans are better off than they were 4 years ago but are about to fire the incumbent anyway and replace him with the VP they just repudiated 4 years ago.
and finally.... the clincher.....
~Texas and Georgia are tossups and, at the same time, so are Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
Forgive me but, for me a belief that Joe Biden is winning this election requires one to curse his own lying ears and eyes, believe polling samples that are other-wordly, reject the factual early vote data that has been pouring in for more than a month and accept that the pollsters that were very, very wrong before will be very, very right now and the pollsters that were very, very right before will be very, very wrong now.
Additionally, we must believe that Democrats are about to shock the world and suddenly upend every single historical metric that points to electoral victory for the incumbent and storm the polls with throngs and multitudes who cannot wait to vote for this guy.
Come now.
In the end, an election is about one thing- a path to 270. For Biden, it just plain isn't there. Trump is not going to lose Florida or North Carolina or Ohio or Arizona. That core 4 just gives him too many paths to victory and Biden is not showing any signs of the inspiring support needed to close all those different roads.
Pennsylvania gets Trump there. Michigan gets Trump there. Wisconsin gets Trump there. Minnesota gets Trump there. If Trump were to lose all 4 of those (a virtual impossibility), he can still get there by winning Nevada and New Hampshire.
My sense (and the sense of many others I see ) is that Trump is not only not going to lose the biggest 5 of these 6, he's going to win all 6 and his map will look like this....
It is possible, Trump even adds a surprise state to this margin.
As far as the popular vote is concerned, I think RR has his approval pegged and Trump is going to win the popular vote 51% Trump 47% Biden 2% other
In short, if Trump loses this race, I will be stunned.....
then sick...
then horrified....
I don't see it happening.
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