What is going wrong? And how do we make it go right?

[musicblind]

The polls are tightening. I know we're going to win. We're probably going to win by about 3 - 4 percentage points.

However, that's not good enough. If we are so damaged as a nation that we cannot repudiate a dangerous demagogue by double digits, I will be sorely disappointed in my country, my Democratic party, my friends, and even my family.

Just a week ago, we had polls coming out that showed Hillary 12 points ahead, 13 points, 14 points. It looked like we could do this by double digits and with big coat tails.

Now it looks like we might end up with a 3 point win and a narrow majority in the Senate.

Why? What changed and how do we get it to change back?

I have personally gotten as many as three friends to the polls for early voting per day. I am working my heart out and the people I know are working their hearts out. I know that most of you are too.

How did it come to this? Hillary hasn't had any new scandal break, she hasn't made any mistakes in the past week, and Trump has been just as crazy as ever.

If anyone has an October/November surprise, please drop it. Wasn't there an Apprentice producer who claimed there was footage of Trump using the N word?

I mean, I can't believe Rubio is still ahead in Florida. 538 has my Senator, Richard Burr, more likely than not to win. I still feel bad that we let Kay Hagan down in 2012.

What is going wrong and how do we make it go right?

[tonyt53]

1. Patience.

[musicblind]

8. I wish I had more of it. n/t

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Things are not going wrong. Look here:

http://election.princeton.edu/

The more polls there are, the wider the range of outcomes that you’ll see. With the election so near, we’re getting megadoses of polls: I count around 17 in a seven-day period. With that many, of course you will get outliers. As a rough rule of thumb, when the frequency of polls goes way up, you should expect the overall range of outcomes to double, more or less.

In this case, imagine that among pollsters, the standard deviation of the Clinton-Trump margin among pollsters is 3.5%. If there are 5 polls available, about half the time* one of them will be more than one standard deviation away from the median. Under current conditions, a typical range would be Clinton +2% to Clinton +9%.

With 17 polls available, the range will be more like 2.2 standard deviations in either direction. In that case the likely range is a whopping 16 points – Trump +2% to Clinton 14%. Which is just about what we saw this week.

Don’t be like journalists who run off after the most extreme report – that is ridiculous. The only honest thing to do is to take a median or average of all the polls you can get your hands on. Right now, the collected wisdom of all the poll is that Hillary Clinton is ahead by a median of 6 percentage points nationally. Not 4 points, and not 8 points. Her lead is 6.0 +/- 0.9 % (n=12 polls over the period October 20-26, median +/- estimated one-sigma standard error).

[musicblind]

5. Thank you for that link. I had not been to that site.

The front page article talks about there being a wide range of polls. Though, I feel like more recent polls are narrowing a bit... the ABC News one, for example.

What do you think will be the real outcome? Do you think we can get to double digits? I'm willing to fight as hard as it takes to make that happen.

One of my best friends is a pen pal of over a decade who lives in Australia. He is baffled by what's going on over here. Hell, I'm baffled. I'd love to be able to show him that our country didn't just beat Trump, but destroyed him.

[Maru Kitteh]

3. oh Jesus.

[musicblind]

6. Surely you're surprised too.

I know you want to beat him by double digits as badly as I do.

I just don't want to see some 4% win. I want to see us blow him out of the water and I'm honestly confused as to what has changed in the past week or so.

I honestly cannot fathom why anyone would vote for this man. If I were to create a cartoon character of the absolute worst stereotype of a Republican... Trump would be worse.

I'm not concern trolling, because I know we are going to win, but I am legitimately confused by why we are not winning by a lot more.

[MBS]

4. I also can't believe that Rubio is ahead.

Shouldn't Florida voters know by now that he has not, and will not, take his job as senator seriously? He really, truly, does not deserve reelection.

Please, Florida Dems and other enlightened Florida voters, send this cretin away!! The nation thanks you.

[musicblind]

7. They were saying CNN how Rubio has an above water approval rating in Florida.

Why?

The case you just laid out should be enough for people to not want him as their Senator. Who wants someone who barely shows up to work? I don't even think Rubio LIKES being a Senator. I feel like they twisted his arm to run this one.

Not to mention how spineless he comes off. I'm sure he's a decent person at home, I try not to demonize anyone, but I don't see how he is good for the state of Florida. He doesn't even want to do the job he is applying for!

[stonecutter357]

9. I'm not concerned at all.

[musicblind]

11. I'm not concerned that we'll lose. We're going to win.

I'm concerned that our country will not kick Trump's butt by double digits and thus send a message to the rest of the world that we will not stand for this kind of demagogue.

It isn't just about winning. It's about obliterating this man.

[NCTraveler]

10. Amazing to me that we just came out of an excellent Democratic Primary,....

Trump has damaged his brand, his campaign, and the republican party, and Clinton is kicking ass; yet the question is being asked "what is going wrong"?

[musicblind]

12. That's what I'm saying. Everything you said is true.

I can't think of a single thing that hasn't gone perfectly. All three debates were a win for Hillary, Michelle, Barrack, Warren, all of them have been giving killer stump speeches, Trump has done nothing but dig his hole deeper. Clinton's ads have been flawless. I don't see anything going wrong, except that we should be up double digits.

It isn't necessarily the Democratic party doing anything wrong... but something is very wrong with this nation if we can't beat Trump by double digits. Especially when we have the most qualified candidate for president in American history.

[NCTraveler]

13. "except that we should be up double digits. "

We seem to be up big. Multiple polls showing double digits. Shocking and positive state polls for out party.

What I'm missing is where things have gone wrong in your estimation.

[musicblind]

16. Last week we had several polls come out showing us up double digits.

This week, it's tightened. I don't get why it has tightened. I'm watching CNN right now and they were saying, about an hour ago, that the polls have tightened and it could be a 3 or 4 point victory. I'm just wondering what on earth is making it tighten because something must have gone wrong, but I'm looking at what we're doing and it looks like we're doing everything right. Heck, early voting in Iowa is 61% for Hillary so far. So what happened to cause them to tighten?

[NCTraveler]

19. "This week, it's tightened."

I haven't seen any significant tightening.

"I'm watching CNN right now and they were saying...."

Problem number one. You are clearly smart enough to understand CNN is a for profit organization. You are also clearly smart enough to look at the polls on your own without them being dissected by corporate agenda first.

"early voting in Iowa is 61% for Hillary so far"

[Jason1961]

14. We don't need any "October Surprise"

We're going to win and the sky isn't falling

[musicblind]

17. I don't just want to win. I want to knock it out of the ball park.

But I agree that we will absolutely win this.

[Thrill]

15. Kay Hagen was a weak candidate

And only won because of Obama's coattails. No one let her down

[musicblind]

18. Well, I feel guilty about it

because I certainly think she was better than Tillis. I still shake my head over that one.

[Thrill]

20. Yeah she was better than him

but I wasn't surprised she wasn't re elected. Much like with Ross, she's going to need Hillary voters to vote for her in order to beat that piece of shit Burr here.