Ask A Genius 978: Immediate Pre-Debate Thoughts on Trump and Biden
Author(s): Rick Rosner and Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): Ask A Genius
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2024/06/27
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: I’m looking at the 538 polls from June 25 to June 17. As far as I can tell from the favorability and unfavorability ratings, Trump is about 10 or 11% unfavourable.
Rick Rosner: Trump’s net unfavourable rating is about 11.5%.That doesn’t look good. So, he’s in the hole by 11.5%, which seems good for Biden, except Biden’s in the hole by more than 17%.
Jacobsen: Why do Americans dislike these candidates so much?
Rosner: Well, Biden’s approval tanked after he pulled us out of Afghanistan and never recovered. But if you look at presidential approval over the past 80 years, starting with FDR in the mid-40s, the net approval of each president has declined as we become more polarized and angry with each other. So, do people really hate Biden and everything he stands for? Or is it that people hate the other side more and more? For example, today, polls from the New York Times and Siena College show low net disapproval of Trump, like minus 8%.
Biden’s disapproval rating is in the twenties. When I see something that seems at odds with the general sense of things, I look at the methodology. You can Google “New York Times Siena poll methodology” to see how they get their results.
Jacobsen: How are they getting these results? I always check for potential bias. I looked at their telephone polling methods.
Rosner: The New York Times Siena poll is all by phone — 90% by cell phone and 10% by landline. Any landline is a source of bias because only older people have landlines anymore. Older people are more likely to be lunatics who will lie about their political affiliations. I believe that increasingly. I have no basis for this except common sense and observing that polls have become increasingly untrustworthy. Even if only 2.5% are contaminated by liars, if one person in 40 says they’re a Democrat but plans to vote for Trump, and it turns out they’re not Democrats, that skews the results. The polls try to reflect the percentages of Republicans, Democrats, and independents. So, if Republicans are lying and saying they’re Democrats, just one person in 40 doing that is enough to skew the results by 5%. I think there’s some of that creeping in via landlines. Via cell phones, they admit that fewer than 2% of the people they call say “Yes” to being surveyed.
It’s well under 2%. It might be less than a quarter of 1%. When only one person in 400 agrees to be polled, you have to wonder if that person is a weirdo just for saying yes. Are that person’s views reflective of the Democrats, Republicans, and independents? I don’t think so. The poll results are a little off. Maybe not enough to be significant. As I said, I’m okay with adding 5% to Biden’s approval numbers and subtracting 5% from Trump’s because of how messed up polls have been lately. That doesn’t guarantee Biden winning, but it doesn’t mean Biden’s in as big a hole as the polls indicate.
Jacobsen: How are you defining “weirdo”?
Rosner: Somebody who’s like a Trump supporter trying to throw a wrench in the system by any means necessary. Somebody who thinks, “If I say I’m a Democrat voting for Trump, it will look better for Trump and maybe discourage people from voting for Biden.” We know that’s a thing because Republican pollsters have used that strategy — pushing out polls close to the election that show the Republican candidate far ahead to demoralize Democratic voters. Like Rasmussen polls, which are very right-leaning, the Rasmussen Report, I think it’s called, was dropped by 538 from its average of all polls for being too crazy, right-leaning biased.
Jacobsen: Which poll is considered the gold standard in the United States?
Rosner: Polling? I mean, yeah, because it’s based on sampling and statistics, but it’s become increasingly corrupted as regular people have no time for it. How many junk calls do you get on your cell phone a day?
Jacobsen: Not many because I’m in Canada. My question wasn’t why polling; my question was: What poll is considered the gold standard?
Rosner: I don’t know. There are venerable old polls like Gallup, but that was the first presidential pollster. They did the initial approval polls of FDR in 1944. Management can change, and once effective methodologies can get corrupted. I don’t know who’s like the gold standard now. Don’t act like the polls are true. Act like Trump has a two-thirds chance of winning. But get people out to vote as if those polls might be true. You don’t have to believe the polls. Just so you don’t go crazy, act like they’re true and work to get your people out to vote. Ensure you’re properly registered so you don’t show up to vote on Election Day and someone says, “Yes, your registration got bumped because you didn’t vote in the previous two elections.”
Jacobsen: What are the main ways Republicans and Democrats attempt to sway voters, especially as things get up to the finish line?
Rosner: Republicans claim unfair treatment, that things are rigged, that Democrats cheat. Trump says things like he will protect Americans from all foreign nuclear weapons once he’s president or shut down immigration entirely. When he’s president, he says a little facetious stuff, but maybe not like he will have immigrants fight cage matches to qualify to become citizens. If you win your cage match, maybe you can come to America. They hammer their people with nonsense. Democrats try to sound more reasonable and fight with facts. I wish Democrats were more aggressive. If the Republicans are going to mislead America, I don’t mind if Democrats exaggerate to sway America. But I don’t think the Democrats are aggressive enough. I wish they would. Do some more name-calling. I wouldn’t mind if, during tonight’s debate, they say, “You’ve got a rapist running for president.”
Jacobsen: Do you want to talk about tonight’s debate?
Rosner: Yes.
Jacobsen: What do you think the character of the debate will be?
Rosner: Each side has a stake in appearing competent and reasonable. Biden can’t have huge verbal glitches. He’s made gaffes in the past. He’s not the smoothest speaker. He has a stutter. However, he’s been doing lots of prep. He got through his last two big political appearances — the State of the Union and one before — without getting lost in a sentence or saying the wrong word. So, a lot is riding on Biden’s performance. Trump has a big stake. He’s been involved in five previous one-on-one debates, three with Hillary Clinton and two with Biden in 2020. According to post-debate polls, he’s never won a single one. About 30 to 35% of Americans, on average, say he won the debate, while 60 to 65% say Biden or Clinton won.
He comes off as creepy. He lurked behind Hillary, creeping into the frame behind her. He interrupted Biden, saying, “Wrong.” To win a post-debate poll, he has to be different from how he’s been in previous debates. But there are two things. One is winning a post-debate poll on CNN. Will losing the debate cause Trump to lose any votes? Will it gain Biden votes? Trump would have to be particularly unpleasant to lose support.
Jacobsen: What things do you think will be said during the unsavoury debate? What themes, moves, motivations, and word usage will be unsavoury?
Rosner: As liberals, we want Trump to say some unsavoury stuff. You want him to complain that the 2020 election was rigged and that the courts are rigged against him, that it’s called lawfare — using the legal system as warfare. You want Trump to say that Biden has dementia and engage in much name-calling, especially if Biden comes across as very sharp. You know, just obnoxious behaviour from Trump. There are a couple of things that may limit his obnoxious behaviour. There’s no audience, which I don’t think has affected the presidential debates much that Trump has been in. But the other thing is that everyone’s mic will be shut off when they’re not answering a question. However, their podiums are only six or seven feet apart so that Trump could yell. When Biden says something Trump doesn’t like, Trump could yell “wrong,” and we’ll still hear him even without his mic. And we want that because it’s kind of obnoxious.
Jacobsen: Wanna keep going or cut that section?
Rosner: I don’t know. I don’t have that much else to say. I would not say I like this kind of anticipation. You know, I have. There are, you know, if I care about us, an athlete, or a game, a basketball game or a football game, I can’t watch the whole thing. Unless my team is very far ahead or so far behind, they can’t possibly win. If there’s uncertainty, it just makes me too nervous. I feel that way about this debate. I’ll probably watch the whole thing but won’t enjoy it.
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Rick Rosner, American Television Writer, http://www.rickrosner.org
Scott Douglas Jacobsen, Independent Journalist, http://www.in-sightpublishing.com
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