We can't say polls don't matter when they are against us and that we are winning when the polls favor us. Just content and contrast who would do what that will impact our lives.
I've never said polls don't matter. What I've tried to do here is to explain how to read them, make sense of them. Polls don't predict the future, but they can tell us about where things are now. And where things are now is better than where they were a month ago.
And what I have also said again and again is that the data I find more important is how we are doing in elections, and that we keep winning. Polls can tell you a lot, and you need to pay attention to them but there are limitations to what they can tell you and one thing they cannot tell you is where the race is going to be a year from now, or even next month.
No poll can predict anything. All they can do is tell you where things are now. And everything can change tomorrow, as this election apparently has over the last few weeks.
I enjoyed the interview with Anderson last night. And thanks for going all-in on NC, my home state.
While we are waiting for election activities to gear up, I have a suggestion for any postcard writers out there in Hopium land. Field Team 6 (www.fieldteam6.org) has names and addresses of likely Democratic-leaning residents in US House district NC-01 who have not yet registered to vote. NC-01 is Rep. Don Davis's district and one of the House seats we need to keep in order to flip the House. blue.
You can purchase postcards from them (which include the QR code for the Voterizer app) or use your own postcards and print the QR code on a stick-on label using the Avery templates they provide. Field Team 6 offers you the choice of two messages to write - one of which is pro-choice and one which is more generic about inclusiveness. You can adopt a batch of 10 - 200 future voters at a time. I am currently working my way through a batch of 50 names.
Young people can swing the election in North Carolina !
Connect with Civic Influencers. CI uses “on-the-ground data to identify these tight-margin races, mobilizing our Civic Influencers to communities where young people have the best chance of making a difference.”
Check out CI Student Voting Heat Map for North Carolina.⬇️
Blue Wave Postcards specifically focus upon the youth voters as well as outlier groups who don’t always vote. I sent postcards for the Virginia campaign using their “kits” and was really pleased with their use of address labels and stamps which could be purchased from them also. The postcards cost was less than another I had tried initially. The team of women running BWP seemed really impressive. Post carding most likely not as effective as boots-on-the-ground like Civic Influencers but a great way for support from afar and anyway we can gotv!!
I’ve attended two Zooms with Civic Influencers/Maxim Thorne and it was so inspiring. It certainly encouraged me to keep supporting all these worthy grass-roots orgs focused on gotv for youth!
I love the work Laura Brill is doing at The Civic Center! She’s working with an Indivisible group in AZ to support them in their quest to have 100% of their High Schools have a program for voter registration!!!!!! She provides the whole program to those groups interested in her processes. I didn’t realize she also has postcarding in her offers. I’ll be sure and check that out. Thanks for the info.
One thing I remind myself of daily is that this problem we have with MAGA was years in the making and it will be a many years process overcoming it and getting to the other side of it....and as such you have to take a step back and look at things from a more holistic perspective to understand how you’re doing. When you take a 30,000 foot view of things, any fair reading of the time since Trump took office in January of 2017 says that the Democracy coalition is winning. It’s so easy to miss that when you’re engaged in the granular minutiae of what different bad actors are doing at various levels of government..... but I have calibrated myself to what winning a years long battle looks like....and it includes frustrating setbacks and unpredictable challenges....but when you repeatedly emerge victorious in the major battles during the course of the war, eventually you emerge victorious from the war. We’re winning, and all of us will benefit from adopting a realistic understanding of what that looks like in a decade+ long battle....and calibrating to that reality helps sustain optimism for the future as you deal with the day to day challenges brought forth by our opponents.
Simon, love the content on here and the focus on continued wins in 2024. In that spirit, I am hoping to connect with you on an important item coming up in early March at the local level that could be a rallying cry for others if successful. Not sure how best to connect as I don’t have your email but will drop my email here if you are willing and able to reach out. Thank you so much! Evavarma@gmail.com
I love the idea of expansion. Of course we can’t take the other swing states for granted but they are generally already well organized and full of volunteers so additional work there is diminishing returns. In contrast our work in NC could move the needle a lot and hopefully give us some margin for error next year and provide a blueprint to take back other states. I’m excited to help.
I completely agree with the focus on North Carolina. I got my Master’s degree in Chapel Hill a long time ago, and I know how rich the state is in terrific universities and college towns, as well as great cities from Asheville to Charlotte to Williamsburg, not to mention its enormous natural beauty from the mountains to the coast.
I see NC on an analogous path to that my home state of Virginia has taken, as its urban/suburban, highly educated and more progressive areas expand and fight to take power away from the backwards forces that have had a chokehold on the countryside for so many years now. NC + GA, along with the Southwest, are the most promising areas for Dems to expand our blue beachheads.
I well remember the racist meanness that Sen. Jesse Helms used to use to get elected in NC and more recently, all the trickery millionaire Art Pope has used to undemocratically consolidate GOP power here. So yes, count on an ugly battle to win in NC - but I do believe it is a place with a Democratic future if we work hard enough to make it so.
I tried to post this comment on the Founders post but kept getting an error message.
I’m sorry I couldn’t make the Friday meeting. I am excited about being part of this group. I watched the recording today. Your work is tremendously effective and so I am very happy to support your work as much as I can.
Let me look into it....and thank you! My goal is get this group up from the 25 or so we have now to 75-100 by the spring. Folks were on board, ready to get to work. It was gratifying, and I want you to know I see all of your supportive messages out there and I am really grateful.
Thanks, Simon. You encourage us; may it return to you every day. Perspective on polls much appreciated.
We can't say polls don't matter when they are against us and that we are winning when the polls favor us. Just content and contrast who would do what that will impact our lives.
I've never said polls don't matter. What I've tried to do here is to explain how to read them, make sense of them. Polls don't predict the future, but they can tell us about where things are now. And where things are now is better than where they were a month ago.
And what I have also said again and again is that the data I find more important is how we are doing in elections, and that we keep winning. Polls can tell you a lot, and you need to pay attention to them but there are limitations to what they can tell you and one thing they cannot tell you is where the race is going to be a year from now, or even next month.
Question please. Is there really any value in a poll that uses "3,662 likely voters" to predict an election 52 weeks in the future?
No poll can predict anything. All they can do is tell you where things are now. And everything can change tomorrow, as this election apparently has over the last few weeks.
I enjoyed the interview with Anderson last night. And thanks for going all-in on NC, my home state.
While we are waiting for election activities to gear up, I have a suggestion for any postcard writers out there in Hopium land. Field Team 6 (www.fieldteam6.org) has names and addresses of likely Democratic-leaning residents in US House district NC-01 who have not yet registered to vote. NC-01 is Rep. Don Davis's district and one of the House seats we need to keep in order to flip the House. blue.
You can purchase postcards from them (which include the QR code for the Voterizer app) or use your own postcards and print the QR code on a stick-on label using the Avery templates they provide. Field Team 6 offers you the choice of two messages to write - one of which is pro-choice and one which is more generic about inclusiveness. You can adopt a batch of 10 - 200 future voters at a time. I am currently working my way through a batch of 50 names.
Young people can swing the election in North Carolina !
Connect with Civic Influencers. CI uses “on-the-ground data to identify these tight-margin races, mobilizing our Civic Influencers to communities where young people have the best chance of making a difference.”
Check out CI Student Voting Heat Map for North Carolina.⬇️
https://civicinfluencers.org/young-people-can-swing-elections/
Kathy,
Blue Wave Postcards specifically focus upon the youth voters as well as outlier groups who don’t always vote. I sent postcards for the Virginia campaign using their “kits” and was really pleased with their use of address labels and stamps which could be purchased from them also. The postcards cost was less than another I had tried initially. The team of women running BWP seemed really impressive. Post carding most likely not as effective as boots-on-the-ground like Civic Influencers but a great way for support from afar and anyway we can gotv!!
Thanks, Irene ! I wasn’t aware of https://www.bluewavepostcards.org/
I have written postcards to youth in Ohio with The Civics Center :https://www.thecivicscenter.org/
I’ve attended two Zooms with Civic Influencers/Maxim Thorne and it was so inspiring. It certainly encouraged me to keep supporting all these worthy grass-roots orgs focused on gotv for youth!
💙
I love the work Laura Brill is doing at The Civic Center! She’s working with an Indivisible group in AZ to support them in their quest to have 100% of their High Schools have a program for voter registration!!!!!! She provides the whole program to those groups interested in her processes. I didn’t realize she also has postcarding in her offers. I’ll be sure and check that out. Thanks for the info.
They have a letter writing campaign for AZ !
$50,000 by March? Let’s go for $75,000 to be a bigger help to Anderson C.!
aren't we all just "TIRED OF WINNING?".....HELL NO!
One thing I remind myself of daily is that this problem we have with MAGA was years in the making and it will be a many years process overcoming it and getting to the other side of it....and as such you have to take a step back and look at things from a more holistic perspective to understand how you’re doing. When you take a 30,000 foot view of things, any fair reading of the time since Trump took office in January of 2017 says that the Democracy coalition is winning. It’s so easy to miss that when you’re engaged in the granular minutiae of what different bad actors are doing at various levels of government..... but I have calibrated myself to what winning a years long battle looks like....and it includes frustrating setbacks and unpredictable challenges....but when you repeatedly emerge victorious in the major battles during the course of the war, eventually you emerge victorious from the war. We’re winning, and all of us will benefit from adopting a realistic understanding of what that looks like in a decade+ long battle....and calibrating to that reality helps sustain optimism for the future as you deal with the day to day challenges brought forth by our opponents.
Excellent comment PianoManSteve.
Simon, love the content on here and the focus on continued wins in 2024. In that spirit, I am hoping to connect with you on an important item coming up in early March at the local level that could be a rallying cry for others if successful. Not sure how best to connect as I don’t have your email but will drop my email here if you are willing and able to reach out. Thank you so much! Evavarma@gmail.com
I love the idea of expansion. Of course we can’t take the other swing states for granted but they are generally already well organized and full of volunteers so additional work there is diminishing returns. In contrast our work in NC could move the needle a lot and hopefully give us some margin for error next year and provide a blueprint to take back other states. I’m excited to help.
I completely agree with the focus on North Carolina. I got my Master’s degree in Chapel Hill a long time ago, and I know how rich the state is in terrific universities and college towns, as well as great cities from Asheville to Charlotte to Williamsburg, not to mention its enormous natural beauty from the mountains to the coast.
I see NC on an analogous path to that my home state of Virginia has taken, as its urban/suburban, highly educated and more progressive areas expand and fight to take power away from the backwards forces that have had a chokehold on the countryside for so many years now. NC + GA, along with the Southwest, are the most promising areas for Dems to expand our blue beachheads.
I well remember the racist meanness that Sen. Jesse Helms used to use to get elected in NC and more recently, all the trickery millionaire Art Pope has used to undemocratically consolidate GOP power here. So yes, count on an ugly battle to win in NC - but I do believe it is a place with a Democratic future if we work hard enough to make it so.
Hi Simon,
I tried to post this comment on the Founders post but kept getting an error message.
I’m sorry I couldn’t make the Friday meeting. I am excited about being part of this group. I watched the recording today. Your work is tremendously effective and so I am very happy to support your work as much as I can.
Sacha
Let me look into it....and thank you! My goal is get this group up from the 25 or so we have now to 75-100 by the spring. Folks were on board, ready to get to work. It was gratifying, and I want you to know I see all of your supportive messages out there and I am really grateful.
Sounds good