Yes, it’s early. But it’s more than that.
First, if the Israel/Hamas war doesn’t subside and the carnage of Gaza civilians stop, Biden will lose the election. Period. Even the abortion issue won’t preserve the youth vote for him. Biden has been privately exerting pressure on Netanyahu, but that’s not enough when 35,000 have died in a futile effort to defeat a guerrilla hate group that uses children as human shields. Too many young people have a myopic and naive view of the conflict in which they conflate and oversimplify into rote formulas of “colonialism” and the mainstream Democrats are simply incapable of conveying the complexity of the history. Meanwhile, Biden comes across as weak, regardless of whether he is finessing the situation as best as can be done. Trump did no better when the fighting broke out in 2018, but he doesn’t count on the youth vote anyway.
And I don’t buy into the “black and brown voters are moving to Trump” story themes either. I’ve been reading stories about the Exodus of voters of color to the Republican Party for my entire adult life. It’s like Bullwinkle pulling a rabbit out of the hat. “This time for sure.” In 2020 there was some movement, but it wasn’t voters leaving the Democratic Party. It was low-information voters who hadn’t voted before – much like the white Trump supporters of 2016. But Trump has pretty much maxed out on that.
Trump wins if the left vote is suppressed due to lack of morale because they just don’t see Biden as standing for anything they believe in and because they don’t see Trump as an existential threat. Many young people have not really seen or studied authoritarianism – they don’t understand how it takes root and how it comes to power. Right now there are millions of authoritarian voters, and millions more in denial.
But the main reason I haven’t panicked and why most political analysts haven’t is that we’ve watched elections for decades and this isn’t like the the 1980s when Reagan was consistently over 50 percent and there were few undecided voters – patterns were fixed early on. Most of the polls where Trump has large leads have high single to mid double-digit undecided or third-party votes and I think that the Kennedy, Jr. support (from the left) is going to taper off, especially as he has come out as gung-ho pro-Israel using language that even makes me wince. When the polled are pressed to commit to a candidate, the numbers are closer, and Biden is even sometimes ahead.
Five-Thirty-Eight compared the President’s race with the Senate races and found that the Democratic Senate candidates are outperforming Biden in most states – sometimes by significant numbers. Biden is unpopular, but it’s extremely unlikely that there are all that many Democrats who will vote for Sherod Brown and Donald Trump. Independents maybe, but not Democrats. If you scroll down to the comparison chart in the article, the first on the list is Arizona where Gallego leads Lake 47% to 41% while from the same sample Trump leads Biden 43% to 39%. That’s 12% undecided in the Senate race and 18% undecided in the Presidential race. In 2020, most of the undecided votes broke for Biden, and I suspect that will happen again, but I also suspect that the 6 percent difference between the Senate and Presidential race is in effect protest, mostly over the war. They will not be voting for Trump. Will they leave the Presidential box empty, vote for someone else, or not vote at all? Or will they suck it up and just vote for Biden? Time will tell.
These are polling averages by the way. Check out the most recent Senate race polls. The Democrats are kicking ass. Do you really think these voters are going to vote for Trump? And they don’t even factor in the possibility of the Dobbs effect.
There is dissatisfaction with Biden, but it’s coming from the left. Can he fix that?
Sohum Parlance II 
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May 25, 2024 at 5:10 am
Just Trollin
…..”There is dissatisfaction with Biden, but it’s coming from the left.” Hate to be the one to break it to you vang, but your entire party has shifted to the left. But I wouldn’t worry about it…..
May 25, 2024 at 5:43 am
humboldturtle
Biden is a moderate. Harris is a former top law enforcement officer of a major city and the most populous state in the union. Sure, the defund-the-police signs were stupid, and Dems do tolerate the ideals of their young, but the entire party has not shifted left, the other party has dropped off the edge to complete fascism. So there. Nanny-nanny-poop-poop.
May 25, 2024 at 6:54 am
NegativeVibesMoriarty
Can he fix that?
Yes, but his people need to run “truth squads” – ala Ike’s in ’52. Do that. I think public perception is his habit of asking everyone including the janitor what they believe. Way too slow.
A partial list of what I think he’s fighting: He prefers back channel negotiations, locks in decisions with no room for flexibility (Afghanistan, Israel), and though they’re out on the road, his cabinet (save Yellen) are nowhere to be seen. Granted the media seems to consider him old-and-in-the-way, and/or not worth the print, but that’s a personal problem he should have been able to overcome long ago.
May 25, 2024 at 6:55 am
Jon Yalcinkaya
B/c I noticed this too to JW’s point, it would be great if you all could define what it means when you say “the left”.
It could refer to these groups which may or may not fully overlap in their interests:
a) democratic socialists a la Sanders
b) the nasty protestors you all find so frustrating, from the George Floyd/BLM protests to the Gaza protestors.
c) “shout your abortion” (to use the right’s phrase) woman’s rights activists including those who would see no government intervention between a woman and her doctor for the full term
d) African Americans and/or those who would like us to center “education” on our systemic inequities based on race. (Examples include 1619 project & DEI proponents in and out of institutions)
e) Climate activists
f) Immigration activists
g) anti-zionists
h) LGTBQ activists
I) etc: those I’ve missed.
Alternatively, we could talk about a schism in the Democratic Party as I do. I think then we could talk about the “establishment” and the upstart “left” as defined by the Sanders of the world, but you’ll note how hard it is to get you all to name yourselves, the “establishment” side of the coin, and how freely you all use the term “the left” derogatorily.
And by “you all” I mean the big 3, Eric, Mitch & PA. Since Turtle opined and so easily dismissed “the left”, I’d be remiss if I didn’t add them* to the group.
(and really Turtle, do you see what I mean, do you see how easy it was for you to associate “the left” with “defund the police” a slogan I will defend as they are in our tent, but one I agree doesn’t necessarily help us win the next election. But part of the reason it doesn’t, imo, is our establishment is so quick to disown them instead of explaining what it is they mean and how actually many liberals and Democrats agree with them. Problem is, as we now see with hindsight, they really didn’t they wanted to increase funding the police, not reform policing nor address the greater inequities that lead to increased crime.)
*I really should start fixing my default gendering that I adopted early on in blogging b/c most of the ID’d posters were male and I meant a male pronoun as the lesser-than in my own mind. I hope I can remember this going forward, but it seems to me unless an anon expresses a different preference “they/them” would be the most appropriate pronoun.
May 25, 2024 at 7:20 am
Just Trollin
turdle…..while the first two words might be “nanny nanny”, among others, the last two are “boo boo”, not poop poop. Always happy to educate. You’re welcome…..
May 25, 2024 at 7:28 am
humboldturtle
Jon, “Defund the police” is associated with “the left”, and that is harmful to the election efforts of actual liberals who want better government. The slogan is so stupid and harmful to the cause of police reform, I have to wonder who initially came up with the idea. Republicans? It is bad for Dems, for sure.
May 25, 2024 at 7:33 am
Jon Yalcinkaya
But you are more right than JW, “the left” as defined by democratic socialists and progressivism is in full retreat right now and has been ever since the neoliberals or establishment from Bloomberg to Buttigieg to Klobuchar to Biden joined together to beat the single most popular Democrat, Sanders. Harris, btw, was the most left among the 2020 establishment having co-sponsored Medicare for All and clearly stated what is now a Calfornia standard – Medicaid for all that are eligible, citizen & non citizen. I’m sure this, and her identity as a not-white woman, leads to her unpopularity as the next potential Presidential candidate post-Biden.
Otherwise, to JW’s point, it’s largely the cultural issues* where establishment Dems have moved left to include DEI and LGBTQ issues fought, not in the courts, but in school boards, other state & local agencies & even in the private sector (ESG). This culture war is where the right, as defined by the Judeo-Christian patriarchy, makes the claim of a left-wing (*whispering*- read: satanic) Democratic Party. That’s what conservatives and Republicans define as “left” when, for the most part, Democrats are handling the economy pretty well for those with money, sure they could cut taxes more as Republicans would, but you gotta find something to complain about as a conservative when the Dow is at 40K.
*oddly, but consistently, a war largely with acronyms.
May 25, 2024 at 7:38 am
Jon Yalcinkaya
The thing is turtle, that’s what mobs do, they emote. There is no K Street to tell them what to say or how to say it, they are fighting starting at the heart. Protesting or slogans from a protest are not designed to win an election, they are designed to express intense dissatisfaction in the status quo when elections fail to be able to resolve the injustice. They are our voters, it’s on us to make that case and to defend them because ultimately, they are right, perhaps not in the slogan, but if you look at our incarceration rates vs the rest of the world’s, THAT is where you can begin your defence. Something is wrong with our country and Democrats are the only party that can, or will, fix it.
May 25, 2024 at 7:41 am
Jon Yalcinkaya
*and by the left being in retreat, I failed to mention the most recent example, 2 progressives losing in OR to establishment Dems well funded by an off-shoot of AIPAC. One of them was Jayapal’s sister I believe and the other (McLeod-Skinner) had won a House seat previously so she had name recognition but still lost in the our current establishment Democrat world.
https://www.axios.com/2024/05/22/establishment-democrats-hail-wins-over-progressives-in-oregon
May 25, 2024 at 7:47 am
Anonymous
I want to see how Biden gets out of the current ICJ situation. And while many here have called the genocide and war crimes claims bunk, here it is for real. This will go to the security council, is the US going to veto it? Probably and then how does that look to the world let alone the US? And then the UN can vote to expel Israel which they probably don’t care away at least according to their UN ambassador. Meanwhile the rules based order is all but over because of Biden.
I know you and everyone keep talking about the youth, but I’ve got many friends older than me, so say 70’s+ life long dems that are not voting for Biden. They see his decline, don’t like his policies, and really don’t like his VP.
It doesn’t mean they will vote for Trump. They either won’t vote at all, will vote 3rd party or just not vote for the top of the ticket.
Bidennomics isn’t working as a sales pitch because the rubes know its not true no matter how much the NYT says its so. Larry Summers has said just the other day that the high interest rates are a huge problem and none of that is going to be fixed by the election.
Even Bill Mahar is asking if its not too late to replace Joe. When you’ve lost Bill….
Eric you keep saying the polls are wrong, yea could be and they could be off in the other direction with Trump even further ahead too.
We will know in the fall.
May 25, 2024 at 9:01 am
Henchman Of Justice
What is,
50% or 15%?
May 25, 2024 at 9:09 am
Henchman Of Justice
EK has his 4 or 5 paragraph epitaph, before anything on polls…
Me…still not going to vote in another sham 2 Party System election process… where a gag order is necessary to keep all election data confidential until the last polling station in USA has closed…
May 25, 2024 at 9:18 am
Henchman Of Justice
HT…curious for your response on this question,
You mentioned fascism, so I simply wrote just one agency of US FEDERAL GOVERNMENT that is rife with fascism to elicit your ego…
…of course, this particular fascist agency controls money 💰… AND who gets to be unprosecuted criminals…
May 25, 2024 at 9:27 am
Henchman Of Justice
Jonboi, “left” is more directional…associated with a long line of political history…
but as you already have been made aware as the resident Turk, the 2 major parties earned nicknames of dino and rino because the participants are fakes much too often… so left, right means zilch to many…
…nowadays, left is liberal, right is conservative, center is moderate and the fringe edges go way left and way right…
…and to be quite honest, I am waiting for terrafarming techniques to be implemented into political classifications and analyses framings…
May 25, 2024 at 10:09 am
Anonymous
If Jon is at all representative of whatever subset of “the left” he claims to be speaking for, then they’re doomed to perpetual self-marginalization. And perhaps that’s what they want, as it leaves them free to remain holier than thou, and never responsible for anything.
May 25, 2024 at 10:16 am
Mitch
Nanny-nanny-poop-poop.
May 25, 2024 at 11:59 am
Eric Kirk
It’s not that the polls are “wrong.” They’re right as they can be. But when you have 12 or 15 percent undecided and you know that most of those people not committing will end up voting, you know that the end results would be different even if the election were to be held tomorrow. In 2020 the undecideds broke decisively for Biden because moderates don’t vote for extremism.
And no Just Trolling, the party has not moved to the left. If you believe it has, please outline the policies. Since when? 1972? 1984? 2000? Clinton ended the federal guarantee against child poverty. Obama abandoned the push for universal health care and adopted a private enterprise-based half-ass measure originally proposed by the Heritage Foundation and which would have been embraced by Republicans if one of theirs had been President. The Republicans just voted down yet another reactionary border bill they would have embraced if we weren’t in an election season. Despite the fact that crime rates are just as high in cities with Republican mayors, the Democratic Party is taking the position that criminal justice reform is bad because of the irrational backlash in blue cities and will no doubt back draconian bullshit in the platform this year.
But the Democratic leadership is pissed that it has to earn the youth vote. Carville was lived recently, calling young voters morons or something.
I support Israel, but Hamas cannot be militarily defeated without killing civilians in the six figures and that’s just not an acceptable sacrifice. The death toll is already a third of the way there, and Hamas is still in the areas where they were supposedly cleaned out. Fortunately, the death numbers have held pretty steady for a few months now, but allowing the west bank settlers to destroy aid trucks and allowing soldiers to make videos where they take pleasure at blowing up Palestinian businesses has taken its toll. They’ve lost the sympathy they had as Oct. 7 is now distant history to everyone outside of Israel. I think Biden should be firm and tell Netanyahu that he had his moment. That he has to pull out. And that military aid will otherwise stop. Yes, Congress has dedicated the aid, but the President does have discretion re foreign policy as long as he’s not using it for something personal like digging up dirt on a political opponent.
But he’s not going to do that, so he had better figure something out to put an end to this so that young voters are not thinking about that war in the fall, and are focused on restoring choice for women. That’s how he wins.
And again, I think there are very few voters who will vote for Gallego or Brown and also vote for Trump. Trump is an authoritarian, and you have to either be an authoritarian or someone in severe denial to vote for him. We have millions of voters who fit into one of those categories, but they won’t vote for Brown or Gallego. And both are doing very well in the same polls that have Trump over Biden with a large uncommitted vote.
May 25, 2024 at 12:02 pm
Eric Kirk
And the only voters who will hold the fact that Trump is being held accountable for crimes in court against Biden are hardcore MAGA folk and GOP hacks.
May 26, 2024 at 7:00 am
Henchman Of Justice
EK was a retard for writing mid double-digit… then disrespectful for not answering directly a kind question…
May 26, 2024 at 7:04 am
Henchman Of Justice
Looks like polls now are pumping up Tulsi Gabbard… lol
May 28, 2024 at 3:11 am
Just Trollin
yea….there’s no panick……..
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/05/28/democrats-freakout-over-biden-00160047#:~:text=But Biden’s stubbornly poor polling,Biden in most battleground states.
May 28, 2024 at 6:12 am
Jon Yalcinkaya
Good to finally have one of the big 3’s red lines. 100,000 dead Palestinians is ACCEPTABLE. one hundred thousand … dead. Think about that as a boundary of what is acceptable and what isn’t and think about what that says about a person’s concern for human life. Think about what that says about a society, most of whom probably agree with Eric and would have an even larger number. #BastionOfNeoliberalism
May 29, 2024 at 4:41 am
Just Trollin
sure sounds like panick to me…..
May 29, 2024 at 5:15 am
Just Trollin
Just wondering if I can get an honest answer from the liberal political analysts in this chatroom: was trotting out a ranting robert deniro by the biden handlers a good move ?
May 29, 2024 at 5:48 am
Henchman Of Justice
Deniro did himself worse than Biden me thinks…