***Official H&F LC Thread***

If Melk was a fact checker for the New York Times:

Cool.

Also cool. Irrelevant. You're definitely free to think those things. Doesn't make the term incorrect.

It's especially irrelevant in this case as I have discussed and posted all of the facts related to my point which again has nothing to do with immigration.

I love it that the best that you and Thremp can do is "Look at melk, he says 'undocumented'! It's not actually wrong. He also doesn't dispute the use of the word that I use instead. But because he uses that different term, everything he says is wrong. It's just logic. It doesn't even matter that the thing we are arguing about doesn't have to do with immigration policy specifics at all.".

Yes, this is how some Trump voters actually think.

That's the thing. It's very righty over here and everyone just goes with their team. You can't really judge by that. I mean some people who thought the guy who said in earnest "They're eating the dogs" won a televised debate in the US

I won the point a long time ago. Rich wants to talk about anything but the actual point we were talking about because it is irrefutable. Thremp doesn't even know what the point is, because he never bothered to actually read the posts involved. The best part of that was him firing shats at me while saying the CPI was a fine measure of inflation (which is what I was saying; Rich was saying the opposite).

I don't blame you for not following along. These text walls are AIDS. Here it is yet again, in case you missed it.

I should probably add
5. I'm not saying anything at all about the merits of either candidate's policies.

That should be obvious, but it has become painfully clear that it isn't.

Like the mother watching her son on the army parade ground and asks why every other member in her son’s squad is matching out of pace with her son?

Not exactly. Surely you're aware enough that if this conversation happened in a lefty space it would be received very differently.

But it's not like it wasn't obvious how this was going to go down. That's why I was focused on a point that no one really can refute. I'm having a good time. I don't interact with people like Rich Muny very much, so having a dialogue or whatever the fack this is, is quite amusing. It's like going to the zoo and seeing a panda. I mean I've seen photos and videos and I know they exist, but seeing a real one a few meters away is a very different thing.

You should get out more, Melk. There are more of me than there are of you.

LOL counting how many of you there are by the electoral college.

Do you really think the ratio is 226:312? Do you understand how the electoral college works?

Here's the relevant metric. Based on latest popular vote count:

Trump 49.9%
Not Trump 50.1%

It's pretty even, but still technically fewer of you. As I've told you many times, but I'm sure hasn't registered, I don't think Kamala is great, but in my mind she's better than Trump as are most people, even you.

LOL Melk. Trump got 2.5 million more votes than Kamala, and the third party voters you call "not Trump" KNEW Kamala needed their vote. They were really more "not Kamala" than "not Trump."

Oh, now we're doing people votes instead of electoral college? Impressive progress for one post!

You're stats aren't the most recent I've seen. Here's what I've got.

Also, I realize that this is going to be really difficult for you to comprehend, but it's possible for people to be both "not Kamala" and "not Trump". Anyway (as of right now, and it may change), more than half of people voted for someone other than Trump. That's all I'm saying. Nothing more. That's yet another indisputable fact, but feel free to keep arguing it against it.

man i don't even know what point melk is trying to make. Is he honestly trying to say "people only voted for trump b/c they're stupid, if they were smart they'd have voted Kamala"? Whatever, grunch

I'll put this here b/c it's far more interesting and worthy of study than presidential politics LOL.

Well, you're not alone there. I have repeated it numerous times. Not sure what more can be done

You're very close, but missing an important detail. I was worried someone would make that assumption and I clarified in earlier posts (one of which was a response to you). I'm saying that but without the causation. So it's,

*Less intelligent and informed people tended to vote for Trump

It is NOT

*Less intelligent and informed people tended to vote for Trump because they are less intelligent and informed.

It is also NOT

*If you voted for Trump, then you are less intelligent.

I said nothing about the electoral college. I posted an image of Trump winning the election. Yes, it included the projected electoral college outcome. That's how we vote in America. LOL at how hard you'll reach for whatever you can find.

2.5 million more people voted for Trump than for Kamala. It's not that hard.

Except you failed to prove either, mainly due to your lack of critical thinking skills.

The four questions that were polled were all Kamala talking points. So, of course Kamala voters were more likely to have been exposed to them from Kamala's emails, watching MSNBC, etc. The underlying points of the questions were also biased toward Kamala, meaning Kamala voters were more like to see them as useful data points than were Trump voters. If you want to prove Trump voters were less informed, you'll have to do better than that.

Same for intelligence. You claim you weren't trying to argue that smart people voted for Kamala because they're smart and dumb people voted for Trump because they're dumb, but you keep saying it without saying it. You should have said Kamala's agenda is skewed toward the needs and interests of the elite and, as people vote their interests, you think more elites voted for Kamala. Then you could post those walls of text trying to correlate intelligence and levels of education.

Of course, if Kamala voters were really smart, they'd not have continually gone online telling everyone how smart they think they are and how dumb they think Trump voters are. Same for MSNBC, CNN, and Kamala's surrogates. It's wasn't a very good strategy for winning an election.

Yeah. I even proved it a different way. You ignored it, of course:

Stock market up is a Kamala talking point? Come on, Trump talks way more about it. Crime being at an "all time high" wasn't a Trump talking point? Come on, man, really? Inflation wasn't a Trump talking point?

But it doesn't matter what they were. They were true statements that any reasonably informed person should know. Yeah, I know, you're going to tell me that maybe Trump voters interpreted those questions in some different way. Doesn't matter. If they can't understand the question, that is kind of what dumb is? Again, if you don't like this method, just use the one above. It's more direct and relies on zero talking points.

I love it. I don't say it. You know I don't say it. So you claim I "keep saying it without saying it".
How about we just stick to things I'm actually saying?

I don't understand. Is this what you think? You think more intelligent/educated people tend to vote Kamala? What are we even arguing about then.

Yes, that is a bad strategy for winning an election. Good thing I'm not making any claims about election strategy.

LOL. I'm Rich Muny. I didn't say anything about the electoral college. I just posted an electoral college map. Look at how clever and tricky I am.

Yes, that is true. I don't know who you think is disagreeing with that. It's not me. I'm not the one disputing obvious facts. Also more people voted for someone other than Trump than voted for Trump. That is also an undeniable fact. Sorry that bothers you. If it's any consolation, he may still pull it off a majority (but doubtful).

You're a weird dude, Melk. The only thing I said about the electoral college was that Trump won it. You're really trying to argue that I thought Trump's popular vote margin was the same as his electoral college margin? Weird. I've been posting the popular vote margin on X in earnest well prior to the post that fascinates you for unknown reasons.

As for third party voters, they are more aligned with me than they are with you. It's that simple. Otherwise they'd have voted for Kamala to save her doomed candidacy.

You posting a PBS article that stated a "diploma" bias in voters without a source? I didn't ignore it. I opined that Kamala's policies were more focused on the interests of elites and that people were voting their interests.

Your interest in this is in trying to prove that Trump voters are dumber and less informed, despite your repeated claims to the contrary.

The point is being used to show that we have a strong economy. It just happens at the stock market is doing better than most other indicators.

Crime is a major issue for many. Deny it all you want, but many voted on it, including many CA voters.

Phrasing it in terms of this year only, rather than total inflation during the Biden-Harris administration, was biased in favor of Kamala. Same story for border security. I explained both to you in detail already.

Not so. Many families know that money is tighter. For them, hearing that prices aren't going up as fast as they had been doesn't resonate with them. They are plenty informed about how much they spend and how much they have. Someone who watches too much MSNBC and gets all of ActBlue's emails will know Kamala's talking points here. That doesn't mean they're more informed. It means they pay more attention to Kamala'a claims.

FWIW, I was well aware of the four points from that survey. They didn't ring true to me because they don't tell the entire story. I'm well informed.

So explain your claim. Are you simply claiming the current Democrat platform is more aligned with the interests of elites, or are you saying something else?

The strategy should be NOT to do it. But, I hope you all keep it up. It doesn't offend me because I'm a lot smarter than you, but there are a lot of voters who are repelled by it.

The PBS article is the source, dude. And within they cited a poll from PBS/NPR/Marist. Also if that was your problem (which we both know it really isn't), I explicitly said I can provide more sources. Mindflayer provided another source as well (which I'm sure you also ignored) Let me know if you want more. This request is particularly hilarious from someone who posts almost zero sources for his claims, but one of us actually posts sourced info and I'm happy to continue to do it.

Are you seriously suggesting that less educated people don't tend to vote Trump? Because if you're not, then I don't know why you are arguing with me.

Sure, that may or may not be true. Doesn't matter. Doesn't change the underlying fact.

WAT? NO. That IS very close to I am trying to prove. I would state it slightly differently (i.e. dumber, less informed voters tend to vote Trump). I'm claiming this right now. How can you be this confused?

You really seem to have a problem with facts. It is not a point. It is fact. Stock market is up or down. The answer is factual, knowable and undeniable.

Yes, Crime is an issue. "Is crime at "all time highs" (even the single source you posted showed this to be untrue)?" is a question with a factual answer. People who did not know the answer tended to vote Trump.

LOL, so your argument is that "Well if they had asked a different question than what they asked, then the responders would have answered differently" Again knowing that the inflation rate is down is a fact. Knowing that inflation and prices are not the same thing is also a fact. People who didn't know these things tended to vote Trump.

It also means that they don't know the facts that describe the reality of our situation.

LOL, "they didn't ring true"? Well, they were true, as it sounds like you are aware. This is basically my point. People who didn't think things that were actually, literally, undeniably true tended to vote for Trump.

It's very easy for someone to think "Well inflation is down, but prices are still high, so I'll vote Trump". If that level of thought is to complex for you, then yes, you're kind of dumb.

It may or may not be. Irrelevant to the point.

Yes, you are a very clever boy!

I don't care about strategy. I'm not Harris' campaign manager. I'm not making any claims about strategy. I agree that the strategy should not be to call potential voters stupid no matter how stupid they may be. Also irrelevant to the point.

Nah, what's weird is talking about how many more people there are and then posting a graphic with the number of more electoral votes there are. Do you think that's not weird?

This is another figment of your imagination. I'd ask you for a source, but we know you don't do sources. There are plenty of polls that showed Harris up in WI/MI/PA. If she takes those three, she wins. Obviously, we now know those polls were way off, but someone could have easily thought Harris was going to win despite their not voting for her. Who knows?

But you're free to believe that your imagination actually reflects the truth.

That's a lot of text repeating the same questions I already answered for you, Melk. You should go back and read what I already posted to you.

While I dispute your characterization of people being "less educated" based on college degrees (and, on that, LOL if you think degrees in majors like gender studies are equivalent to those in STEM fields), I didn't make an argument regarding this one way or another. I simply disputed your implied claim that smart people vote for Kamala because that's the smart thing to do, and vice versa. I said people are voting their interests. Kamala had an agenda aimed at elites, so some of them voted their interests. You seem very confused on this point.

I'm personally happy that the stock market is up. Someone working paycheck to paycheck is less interested in the market and is more interested in other economic factors that weigh more directly on their day to day life. I'm not more informed about the stock market because I'm smarter. I'm more informed about the stock market because I have investments and I care about it.

Biden-Harris have been in office for almost four years. People are judging them on all four years, not just the prior twelve months. That's why inflation rate is more of a campaign talking point that resonated more with people looking for something positive to say about Kamala.

That makes no sense. They know total inflation during the Biden administration has been high. They see it daily.

No. It means they see through the spin. Dems think they can just tell us men are women, Califormia is tougher on crime than Texas, etc.

Did you even read that before you posted it? Prices went up during the Biden administration, they are still up, and people are voting based on that.

How many times are you going to do this! It's not an "implied claim". I never said it. I also explicitly said that I never said it. And I did this a million times. Maybe you should be the one to go back and read again, don't you think? To help you in this goal, here's a post very explicitly denying saying that. It's not even a day old:

It should tell you something that all you can do is argue against "implied claims" that I have explicitly disavowed instead of the actual words on the page. Why not try that instead?

That may or may not be true. It is irrelevant. If dumber people tend to vote for Trump, then dumber people tend to vote for Trump. The reason why they do does not change whether it is true or not.

Yes, in such a case, someone who simply didn't know that the market is up would definitely be less informed. They would not necessarily be less intelligent. I'm sometimes using the casual term dumber to encompass both. People who are less intelligent and/or less informed tend to vote for Trump. If they simply didn't know that the market is up that is less informed. If they thought that stock market is up means that "economy is doing better" by whatever metric they want to use , then they did not understand the question are less intelligent. You can take your pick. I suppose it could even be both.

It doesn't matter, man facts are facts. If they didn't know the inflation has declined in the last year they are uninformed. If they thought that "inflation has declined in the last year" really refers to the last four years, they either don't understand English or are very unintelligent. Take your pick.

Cool. That wasn't the question. The question was "True or False: Inflation has declined in the last year and is near historic averages". It does not ask what they see every day. And if they don't know the difference between prices declining and inflation declining, then yes, they are uninformed or unintelligent.

Unlike those issues, which are again irrelevant to the discussion, even you can't dispute the facts in the poll. That's why you keep bringing up a bunch of irrelevant stuff.

Sorry, I'm assuming you know too much. My bad. If inflation was 4% last year and 3% this year, then inflation went down, but over the entire time period prices went up. This should be obvious to anyone. If you don't understand that, we have bigger problems than I thought.

Man, I'm beginning to think you were one of the people polled. They didn't ask "Why did you vote for Trump?". They asked a very specific factual question. If you can't understand the difference between those two questions, then yes, you are dumb. There is no way around that as much as you keep grasping for straws.

You sound like the kid who took second place at a middle school debate.

I know thremp is retired, so it makes sense he can argue with melkerson.

But what about Muny? Melkerson? You guys retired too?? Must be nice.

LOL. Good talk. Get back to me when your reading comprehension and logic reach middle school level.

That's a no for me. Normally I just multitask on this shiet. I know you're not reading the text walls, but it's easy AF. Yesterday's posts were while I was at kids swim lessons. And on my rests when lifting, during which I was also watching football (super boring day in the NFL). Also, my wife's got us bingeing a not so great series right now, so easy to post while watching that.