For whom the polls toll
We must always keep in mind that polls, at best, when they’re remotely accurate, are nothing more than a photograph. They are NOT the movie. However, when polls are specifically related to an event, they can be useful as a crystal clear before and after snapshot of what the voting public thinks about that event. What event am I referring to in this instance? Oh, I dunno, how about convicted felon Donald Trump’s recent conviction on 34 felony counts, just for fun?
So with that in mind, I’ve got good news and bad news for convicted felon Donald Trump. First the good news. Thanks to his recent felony conviction on 34 felony counts, MAGA Republicans have announced that it’s good news for convicted felon Donald Trump. Getting convicted on 34 felony counts means that convicted felon Donald Trump is definitely going to be reelected president in November. Those MAGA Republicans have avowed that they are now a jillion times more determined to vote for convicted felon Donald Trump, now that he’s a convicted felon and all.
Now for the bad news. I’m not exactly sure what it means when MAGAs say they’re more determined to vote for convicted felon Donald Trump than ever. Does that mean they will screw up their faces and slam their little pencils all the harder on his ballot? Won’t that potentially ruin the ballot and invalidate their vote? I hope so. But I have sad news for MAGAs: no matter how determined they may be, they’ve still only got one vote each.
Now for the really bad news for convicted felon Donald Trump. Comparing the recent pre-conviction polls with the post-conviction polls, things do not augur well — for Trump. It looks like he’s lost considerable cachet with the undecided voting public, and even with some Republicans.
In the Reuters/Ipsos pre-conviction poll, Biden and Trump were roughly even at 40 to 40. Now in the same poll Biden leads 41 to 39. Does that mean anything useful? Has the needle really moved significantly? I think so, and I’ll tell you why I think so.
We know that after Trump was indicted, many Republicans decided Nikki Haley was a better prospect to represent their party. In fact, they thought so enough that they even went on voting for her in individual state primaries AFTER she officially dropped out of the race.
In a poll last month, many more Republicans indicated that if Trump was convicted, as indeed he was, they would change their vote and either not vote for him and stay at home, or vote for someone else. Some even said they would vote for Joe Biden.
Now it’s true, some people respond to polls specifically because they don’t want to appear like stupid assholes to the people conducting the polls. But when you remove that minor X-factor, it just makes common sense that people won’t want to vote for a convicted felon. That just makes logical sense, right? And believe it or not, in a world where a lot of people believe the earth is flat, there are still plenty of people who actually still think with their logical minds.
Besides, no matter how much the MAGA propaganda mill goes on screaming the lie that Donald Trump was prosecuted by the Biden administration, certain obvious facts cannot be challenged, and a moment’s sane reflection exposes those facts. For instance, Trump was convicted by a jury of his peers, not Joe Biden. That jury examined all the evidence. Biden didn’t present the evidence, that evidence was presented, in part, by Trump’s lawyers. Hell, those jurors were handpicked (or at least agreed to) by Trump’s lawyers. Biden didn’t come within 200 miles of that courtroom. They decided Trump’s fate in a room all by themselves, and they decided it swiftly and unanimously. You don’t need to be the resurrection of Albert Freaking Einstein to see all that.
Now, drooling MAGA idiots won’t consider any of that. But many Republicans will, and lots of independent voters will, and therein lies the magic formula. Trump’s road ahead is far worse than the one he faced in 2020, and light years worse then the one he faced in 2016.
But in the final analysis, this is still going to be a contest probably decided in the battleground states. We don’t have to worry about New York and California, for instance. They’re going our way. But we do have to worry about Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia. Those states, representing 93 electoral votes, are probably the ones that will decide this election. So let’s stay frosty.
In some “many worlds interpretation” of the quantum mechanical universe, Trump could win this election. We cannot, we must not ever become compascent. But we can and should take comfort from the certain knowledge that Trump has his work cut out for him. And Donald, ask not for whom the polls toll, evidently they toll for thee. And not in a good way. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.