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>Didn't this literally just happen? >If Biden hadn't suffered in the polls after the nature of his debate performance, I don't see how we'd be here today. No,

>Didn't this literally just happen? >If Biden hadn't suffered in the polls after the nature of his debate performance, I don't see how we'd be here today. No, this didn't happen at all. There has been no election yet, and polls are not elections, they're just random-ish samplings. The polls showed voters weren't very enthusiastic about Biden, but back in 2015, the polls showed that Trump was absolutely certain to lose in a landslide to Hillary, and that didn't happen. I do agree with the poll results this time around, but that's just my opinion and not at all backed up by an actual election, which we now won't have (since the election will have a different candidate). We'll see how well the new candidate fares. >However indirect the mechanism by which he was ousted This "mechanism" was not part of the government at all, and not really part of "democracy". It was just a bunch of opinion polls organized by mostly the press, and they influenced Biden to stop his campaign, but again this is not some central feature of democratic systems at all. The only way of truly assessing what candidate voters choose is to have an election. Everything else is just guesswork.

carso 2y ago
And I wouldn't be sure the polls were the key factor - big donors calling the shots by withholding funds may have been the deciding factor.
Shoop 2y ago
Didn’t 538 give Trump an ~1-in-3 chance of winning?
GolDDranks 2y ago
From an outsider perspective, the US bipartisan system seems to be a big problem. There are almost no meaningful choices. Moving to transferable vote would perhaps improve things? But I doubt that would happen anytime soon, because the current system is a live-lock of two wrangling powers that don't want more competition.
- kagakuninja 2y ago
  First we have to git rid of our ludicrous electoral college system. This requires a constitutional amendment, which must first be approved by 2/3 of both houses of congress, then ratified by 3/4 of the state legislatures. Since that is the only thing that has enabled Republicans to barely win presidential elections since 2000, we will not get anywhere close to passing such legislation, let alone get it approved by 3/4 of the state legislatures. As a side note, the last attempted constitutional amendment was the Equal Right Amendment, giving equal rights to women. It was proposed in 1972, and is maybe close to finally being approved. https://www.equalrightsamendment.org https://www.equalrightsamendment.org
  - vkou 2y ago
    > This requires a constitutional amendment, which must first be approved by 2/3 of both houses of congress, then ratified by 3/4 of the state legislatures. Actually all it requires is the state legislatures of enough states to hit 270 EC votes to pass the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Intersta.... It's at 209/270 at the moment. The electoral college is an utterly idiotic system, but can be broken from within.
    - kcplate 2y ago
      The NPVIC is a fucking awful solution that would backfire on the idiots supporting it eventually. Talk about vote disenfranchisement on a massive scale—it could literally invalidate entire states worth of votes just because California, Texas, Florida, and New York decided to vote the same way. Which means that candidates would ignore literally every state except the 4-5 with the largest population because they are the only ones that would matter.
      - wbl 2y ago
        California might be 60/40 but that 40 would matter a lot. Republicans would go to Bakersfield Dems to Santa Cruz. Right now you only campaign in a handful of swing states vs getting whatever you can.
      - 2y ago
tempestn 2y ago
Polls can not and did not promise absolute certainty.
rrrrrrrrrrrryan 2y ago
> back in 2015, the polls showed that Trump was absolutely certain to lose in a landslide to Hillary The polls had Trump winning in 3/10 simulations, which is far from absolutely certain: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/ https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/

carso 2y ago

And I wouldn't be sure the polls were the key factor - big donors calling the shots by withholding funds may have been the deciding factor.

Shoop 2y ago

Didn’t 538 give Trump an ~1-in-3 chance of winning?

GolDDranks 2y ago

From an outsider perspective, the US bipartisan system seems to be a big problem. There are almost no meaningful choices. Moving to transferable vote would perhaps improve things? But I doubt that would happen anytime soon, because the current system is a live-lock of two wrangling powers that don't want more competition.

kagakuninja 2y ago
First we have to git rid of our ludicrous electoral college system. This requires a constitutional amendment, which must first be approved by 2/3 of both houses of congress, then ratified by 3/4 of the state legislatures. Since that is the only thing that has enabled Republicans to barely win presidential elections since 2000, we will not get anywhere close to passing such legislation, let alone get it approved by 3/4 of the state legislatures. As a side note, the last attempted constitutional amendment was the Equal Right Amendment, giving equal rights to women. It was proposed in 1972, and is maybe close to finally being approved. https://www.equalrightsamendment.org https://www.equalrightsamendment.org
- vkou 2y ago
  > This requires a constitutional amendment, which must first be approved by 2/3 of both houses of congress, then ratified by 3/4 of the state legislatures. Actually all it requires is the state legislatures of enough states to hit 270 EC votes to pass the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Intersta.... It's at 209/270 at the moment. The electoral college is an utterly idiotic system, but can be broken from within.
  - kcplate 2y ago
    The NPVIC is a fucking awful solution that would backfire on the idiots supporting it eventually. Talk about vote disenfranchisement on a massive scale—it could literally invalidate entire states worth of votes just because California, Texas, Florida, and New York decided to vote the same way. Which means that candidates would ignore literally every state except the 4-5 with the largest population because they are the only ones that would matter.
    - wbl 2y ago
      California might be 60/40 but that 40 would matter a lot. Republicans would go to Bakersfield Dems to Santa Cruz. Right now you only campaign in a handful of swing states vs getting whatever you can.
    - 2y ago

tempestn 2y ago

Polls can not and did not promise absolute certainty.

rrrrrrrrrrrryan 2y ago

> back in 2015, the polls showed that Trump was absolutely certain to lose in a landslide to Hillary The polls had Trump winning in 3/10 simulations, which is far from absolutely certain: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/ https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/