fivethirthyeight--2020-09-29--MLB Starting Pitchers Will Have Less Rest This Postseason

Starting pitching tactics in baseball ’ s postseason , which starts today , often differ from those of the regular season .
Because of the off days needed for travel between cities in a playoff series , pitchers typically enjoy more rest .
That allows teams to lean on their best pitchers more than they can in the regular season .
For instance , en route to a World Series championship last fall , the Washington Nationals ’ top three starting pitchers — Max Scherzer , Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin — started 13 of the team ’ s 17 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 58.6 percent of the Nationals ’ postseason innings , vs 40.5 percent during the regular season .
But this year , teams will not be able to avoid their weaker links as easily .
Much of this season ’ s playoff games will be played at neutral bubble sites due to COVID-19 concerns .
Teams , therefore , won ’ t travel as much , and so they won ’ t receive as many off days .
In fact , there are no off days built into the wild-card round or the Division @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have to go deeper into their starting pitching rotations , which will likely help some teams and hurt others .
Which teams could benefit , and which might be hurt ?
Let ’ s look at this question in a couple of different ways .
First , let ’ s use FiveThirtyEight ’ s pitcher ratings , which are based on rolling game scores .
These scores try to predict how a pitcher will perform in a typical start ; they ’ re not perfect — because of the shortened season this year @ @ @ @ @ @ @ year ’ s season still contributes to each pitcher ’ s rating — but they offer a good first cut at the question .
We looked for teams that had at least one high-end , ace-type starter and depth — meaning four or more active starters with average-or-better rolling game scores .
When examining MLB playoff rotations , there are clear haves and have nots .
In the American League field , the Cleveland Indians , Minnesota Twins and Tampa Bay Rays all appear to enjoy the greatest advantage from the playoff format @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is the only AL club with three starters boasting rolling game scores of 55 or better , including AL Cy Young — and perhaps MVP — candidate Shane Bieber , whose 63.1 rolling game score trails only New York Yankees ace Gerrit Cole in the AL .
Behind Bieber are Carlos Carrasco , who has been among the best pitchers in the AL over the last 30 days , according to FanGraphs ’ wins above replacement ( WAR ) , and Zach Plesac , who had the 10th-best ERA among starting pitchers this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ doesn ’ t stop there , as Aaron Civale ranks as one of the top No .
4 starting options in baseball , while rookie Triston McKenzie gives the Indians another league-average option .
The Rays have a top-end option in 2018 AL Cy Young winner Blake Snell and two near-elite options in Charlie Morton and Tyler Glasnow .
( Among starting pitchers with at least 40 innings pitched , Glasnow trails only Bieber and Jacob deGrom in strikeout percentage . )
And though the Rays lost a quality option in Yonny Chirinos @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have Ryan Yarbrough , one of the better fourth options in the game .
The Twins ’ offseason acquisition of Kenta Maeda , meanwhile , has yielded great returns , as he ’ s employed his elite split-changeup to rank third among AL pitchers in WAR .
The Twins have allowed him to work deeper into games , while his former club , the Los Angeles Dodgers , approached his workload cautiously and curiously ( transitioning him into the bullpen late in recent seasons ) .
He will get a chance to start @ @ @ @ @ @ @ four good-if-not-great arms , including Michael Pineda , who has been among the top pitchers in the game over the last month .
The Rays and Twins also have two of the best bullpens in the AL , sporting the best and second-best relief units by WAR .
Other teams shouldn ’ t be penalized too sharply by having to go deeper into their starting rotations .
The Yankees , for example , have one of the top arms in Cole , whom they signed to a record contract in the winter , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But James Paxton , who they hoped would be a co-ace , has again landed on the injured list .
The Astros have lost their best pitcher , Justin Verlander , who is out for the season , but their five active starting pitchers all rate as above-average arms , according to our ratings .
( More on the Astros in a bit . )
What about AL teams that could face uphill challenges due to the format change ?
According to our ratings , the Blue Jays and White Sox only have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , who have rolling game scores above 50 .
While each team has an ace-caliber option in Hyun Jin Ryu and Lucas Giolito , each also lacks depth .
The Oakland A ’ s have the opposite problem : They have five starting pitchers performing at average or better rates , but not one with a rolling game score of 55 or greater .
In the NL , the Dodgers and Cincinnati Reds stand out as clubs with the rotations best suited to take advantage of this fall ’ s format .
Each @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( The San Diego Padres did too , but we ’ ll get to them in a second . )
The Dodgers have three pitchers with rolling game scores of 55 or better : Clayton Kershaw , Walker Buehler and rookie Tony Gonsolin .
In total , the Dodgers have five average-or-better starting pitchers , including Dustin May , their fifth-ranking arm , whose fastball averages 99 mph , tops in the majors .
Yep .
That ’ s L.A. ’ s fifth-best option .
The Reds rank second only to Cleveland in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ season .
They are led by NL Cy Young contender Trevor Bauer , who has a 58.9 rolling game score , with Sonny Gray ( 57.2 ) and Luis Castillo ( 56.7 ) just behind him .
The Dodgers are the only other playoff team with three pitchers with scores of 56 or better .
The Reds have a fourth above-average arm in Tyler Mahle .
The Cardinals don ’ t have multiple aces but they do have one in Jack Flaherty , who is backed by a deep rotation .
Just days @ @ @ @ @ @ @ excellent staff for October , but they ’ ve recently run into some poor luck on the injury front .
The Padres attempted to improve their World Series chances by acquiring top pitching talent Mike Clevinger from Cleveland prior to the trade deadline .
But Clevinger was pulled from his start on Sept. 23 after one inning due to tightness in his right biceps .
The club hoped he would team up with breakout star Dinelson Lamet to give the Padres two potential difference-making arms in the playoffs , backed by two other @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) who have been above-average this year .
But not only is Clevinger ’ s status in doubt , Lamet also left his start on Sept. 25 due to biceps tightness , though the team is optimistic he can make his first playoff start .
NL Teams that might not care for the new format include the Miami Marlins , who have just three pitchers who rank average or better according to our ratings ( though one of them , rookie Sixto Sanchez , has the talent to dominate in any start ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had starting pitching questions before an injury to Cole Hamels .
They now have just two healthy pitchers ( Max Fried and Ian Anderson ) with better-than-average ratings .
The Chicago Cubs and Milwaukee Brewers have strong options at the top of their rotation in Yu Darvish and Corbin Burnes , respectively — but Burnes , one of the most improved pitchers in the game , is out for the wild-card round of the playoffs and , should the Brewers advance , doubtful for the divisional round with an oblique strain .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Kyle Hendricks ) performing at average-or-better levels , and the Brewers have three .
That might have been OK a year ago with more off days , but it makes a run in this year ’ s condensed playoff schedule more difficult .
Again , since our pitcher ratings have certain limitations , let ’ s also gauge each playoff club ’ s depth according to WAR .
Just as they did in FiveThirtyEight ’ s rolling pitcher game scores , the Indians and Reds stand out with talented and deep rotations @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Cleveland rank first and second , respectively , in average WAR per starting pitcher among four-man rotations .
If clubs are faced with lengthy series and no off days , they could elect to pitch starters on short rest as teams sometimes do in the postseason , or even throw bullpen games — efforts cobbled together by relievers .
Starting pitchers don ’ t often pitch on less than the typical four days between starts , but when they do , their performance tends to decline .
That was true last regular season @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Cubs and Astros — even without Verlander — are the fourth- and fifth-best positioned staffs when looking at average WAR of a team ’ s top four pitchers , while the Rays , who look formidable in terms of rolling game scores , rank near the bottom half of that measure .
While the Astros lost their star pitcher , their No .
4 and No .
5 options — Lance McCullers and Framber Valdez — have combined for 2.9 WAR .
And though the Cubs lack the Astros ’ depth , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ combo in a playoff series , having combined for 4.9 WAR in the regular season .
There may never be another playoff schedule quite like this one .
So it ’ s hard to say exactly how the condensed schedule and lack of travel will affect different teams .
But teams with deeper starting pitching staffs — and bona fide aces — should start with an advantage .

MLB Starting Pitchers Will Have Less Rest This Postseason Which teams are best set up to take advantage of the new playoff format?
Starting pitching tactics in baseball’s postseason, which starts today, often differ from those of the regular season. Because of the off days needed for travel between cities in a playoff series, pitchers typically enjoy more rest. That allows teams to lean on their best pitchers more than they can in the regular season. For instance, en route to a World Series championship last fall, the Washington Nationals’ top three starting pitchers — Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin — started 13 of the team’s 17 postseason games. The three combined for 58.6 percent of the Nationals’ postseason innings, vs 40.5 percent during the regular season.
But this year, teams will not be able to avoid their weaker links as easily. Much of this season’s playoff games will be played at neutral bubble sites due to COVID-19 concerns. Teams, therefore, won’t travel as much, and so they won’t receive as many off days. In fact, there are no off days built into the wild-card round or the Division and League Championship Series.
Clubs will have to go deeper into their starting pitching rotations, which will likely help some teams and hurt others. Which teams could benefit, and which might be hurt? Let’s look at this question in a couple of different ways.
First, let’s use FiveThirtyEight’s pitcher ratings, which are based on rolling game scores. These scores try to predict how a pitcher will perform in a typical start; they’re not perfect — because of the shortened season this year, performance during the end of last year’s season still contributes to each pitcher’s rating — but they offer a good first cut at the question. We looked for teams that had at least one high-end, ace-type starter and depth — meaning four or more active starters with average-or-better rolling game scores. When examining MLB playoff rotations, there are clear haves and have nots.
In the American League field, the Cleveland Indians, Minnesota Twins and Tampa Bay Rays all appear to enjoy the greatest advantage from the playoff format, based on our criteria.
Cleveland is the only AL club with three starters boasting rolling game scores of 55 or better, including AL Cy Young — and perhaps MVP — candidate Shane Bieber, whose 63.1 rolling game score trails only New York Yankees ace Gerrit Cole in the AL. Behind Bieber are Carlos Carrasco, who has been among the best pitchers in the AL over the last 30 days, according to FanGraphs’ wins above replacement (WAR), and Zach Plesac, who had the 10th-best ERA among starting pitchers this season. Cleveland’s pitching juggernaut doesn’t stop there, as Aaron Civale ranks as one of the top No. 4 starting options in baseball, while rookie Triston McKenzie gives the Indians another league-average option.
The Rays have a top-end option in 2018 AL Cy Young winner Blake Snell and two near-elite options in Charlie Morton and Tyler Glasnow. (Among starting pitchers with at least 40 innings pitched, Glasnow trails only Bieber and Jacob deGrom in strikeout percentage.) And though the Rays lost a quality option in Yonny Chirinos to Tommy John surgery, they still have Ryan Yarbrough, one of the better fourth options in the game.
The Twins’ offseason acquisition of Kenta Maeda, meanwhile, has yielded great returns, as he’s employed his elite split-changeup to rank third among AL pitchers in WAR. The Twins have allowed him to work deeper into games, while his former club, the Los Angeles Dodgers, approached his workload cautiously and curiously (transitioning him into the bullpen late in recent seasons). He will get a chance to start this postseason. Maeda is backed by four good-if-not-great arms, including Michael Pineda, who has been among the top pitchers in the game over the last month. The Rays and Twins also have two of the best bullpens in the AL, sporting the best and second-best relief units by WAR.
Other teams shouldn’t be penalized too sharply by having to go deeper into their starting rotations. The Yankees, for example, have one of the top arms in Cole, whom they signed to a record contract in the winter, and three quality starters behind him. But James Paxton, who they hoped would be a co-ace, has again landed on the injured list. The Astros have lost their best pitcher, Justin Verlander, who is out for the season, but their five active starting pitchers all rate as above-average arms, according to our ratings. (More on the Astros in a bit.)
What about AL teams that could face uphill challenges due to the format change? According to our ratings, the Blue Jays and White Sox only have three and two starting pitchers, respectively, who have rolling game scores above 50. While each team has an ace-caliber option in Hyun Jin Ryu and Lucas Giolito, each also lacks depth. The Oakland A’s have the opposite problem: They have five starting pitchers performing at average or better rates, but not one with a rolling game score of 55 or greater.
In the NL, the Dodgers and Cincinnati Reds stand out as clubs with the rotations best suited to take advantage of this fall’s format. Each has multiple elite starters and depth. (The San Diego Padres did too, but we’ll get to them in a second.)
The Dodgers have three pitchers with rolling game scores of 55 or better: Clayton Kershaw, Walker Buehler and rookie Tony Gonsolin. In total, the Dodgers have five average-or-better starting pitchers, including Dustin May, their fifth-ranking arm, whose fastball averages 99 mph, tops in the majors. Yep. That’s L.A.’s fifth-best option.
The Reds rank second only to Cleveland in FanGraphs’s starting pitching WAR this season. They are led by NL Cy Young contender Trevor Bauer, who has a 58.9 rolling game score, with Sonny Gray (57.2) and Luis Castillo (56.7) just behind him. The Dodgers are the only other playoff team with three pitchers with scores of 56 or better. The Reds have a fourth above-average arm in Tyler Mahle. The Cardinals don’t have multiple aces but they do have one in Jack Flaherty, who is backed by a deep rotation.
Just days ago the Padres looked to have an excellent staff for October, but they’ve recently run into some poor luck on the injury front. The Padres attempted to improve their World Series chances by acquiring top pitching talent Mike Clevinger from Cleveland prior to the trade deadline. But Clevinger was pulled from his start on Sept. 23 after one inning due to tightness in his right biceps. The club hoped he would team up with breakout star Dinelson Lamet to give the Padres two potential difference-making arms in the playoffs, backed by two other pitchers (Zach Davies and Garrett Richards) who have been above-average this year. But not only is Clevinger’s status in doubt, Lamet also left his start on Sept. 25 due to biceps tightness, though the team is optimistic he can make his first playoff start.
NL Teams that might not care for the new format include the Miami Marlins, who have just three pitchers who rank average or better according to our ratings (though one of them, rookie Sixto Sanchez, has the talent to dominate in any start). The Braves, meanwhile, already had starting pitching questions before an injury to Cole Hamels. They now have just two healthy pitchers (Max Fried and Ian Anderson) with better-than-average ratings. The Chicago Cubs and Milwaukee Brewers have strong options at the top of their rotation in Yu Darvish and Corbin Burnes, respectively — but Burnes, one of the most improved pitchers in the game, is out for the wild-card round of the playoffs and, should the Brewers advance, doubtful for the divisional round with an oblique strain. The Cubs have only two pitchers (Darvish and Kyle Hendricks) performing at average-or-better levels, and the Brewers have three. That might have been OK a year ago with more off days, but it makes a run in this year’s condensed playoff schedule more difficult.
Again, since our pitcher ratings have certain limitations, let’s also gauge each playoff club’s depth according to WAR.
Some playoff teams have deeper starting pitching Average and total wins above replacement (WAR) of starting pitchers on playoff clubs, among top starters by WAR on each team Average War Total WAR League ▲ ▼
Team ▲ ▼
Top five starters ▲ ▼
top four starters ▲ ▼
top five starters ▲ ▼
top four starters ▲ ▼
NL Reds 1.64 1.93 8.2 7.7 AL Indians 1.56 1.85 7.8 7.4 NL Brewers 1.30 1.50 6.5 6.0 NL Cubs 1.12 1.38 5.6 5.5 AL Astros 1.12 1.33 5.6 5.3 AL Twins 1.16 1.28 5.8 5.1 NL Dodgers 1.04 1.20 5.2 4.8 AL White Sox 0.98 1.18 4.9 4.7 NL Padres 0.96 1.13 4.9 4.8 AL Yankees 0.92 1.00 4.6 4.0 NL Marlins 0.84 0.95 4.2 3.8 AL Athletics 0.84 0.93 4.2 3.7 NL Braves 0.68 0.83 3.4 3.3 AL Rays 0.70 0.80 3.5 3.2 NL Cardinals 0.64 0.70 3.2 2.8 AL Blue Jays 0.54 0.63 2.7 2.5 Source: FanGraphs
Just as they did in FiveThirtyEight’s rolling pitcher game scores, the Indians and Reds stand out with talented and deep rotations per FanGraphs’ WAR. Cincinnati and Cleveland rank first and second, respectively, in average WAR per starting pitcher among four-man rotations.
If clubs are faced with lengthy series and no off days, they could elect to pitch starters on short rest as teams sometimes do in the postseason, or even throw bullpen games — efforts cobbled together by relievers. Starting pitchers don’t often pitch on less than the typical four days between starts, but when they do, their performance tends to decline. That was true last regular season and again this season.
However, the Cubs and Astros — even without Verlander — are the fourth- and fifth-best positioned staffs when looking at average WAR of a team’s top four pitchers, while the Rays, who look formidable in terms of rolling game scores, rank near the bottom half of that measure. While the Astros lost their star pitcher, their No. 4 and No. 5 options — Lance McCullers and Framber Valdez — have combined for 2.9 WAR. And though the Cubs lack the Astros’ depth, Darvish and Hendricks are a formidable one-two combo in a playoff series, having combined for 4.9 WAR in the regular season.
There may never be another playoff schedule quite like this one. So it’s hard to say exactly how the condensed schedule and lack of travel will affect different teams. But teams with deeper starting pitching staffs — and bona fide aces — should start with an advantage.


fivethirthyeight--2020-09-29--How Trump’s Tax Returns Could Affect The Election

On Sunday , a New York Times exposé on President Trump ’ s tax returns revealed decades of tax avoidance and millions of dollars in business losses over the past two decades .
The picture painted by Trump ’ s returns is sharply at odds with the shrewd , deal-making image the president has tried to fashion as a real estate mogul and TV star on a show built around his business prowess , “ The Apprentice.
” Now , five weeks from Election Day , the question is will these new revelations affect the presidential race ?
There are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ First , will The Times ’ s revelations change perceptions of Trump ’ s record as a businessman ?
And second , do perceptions of Trump ’ s business acumen matter in who voters decide to support ?
We ’ ll take those one at a time , but spoiler alert : Past polling and research belies the notion that “ nothing matters ” when it comes to public perceptions about the president .
In May 2019 , after The New York Times published a report that showed Trump had lost around $ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ public polling found the story could lower public opinion regarding Trump ’ s business acuity .
In a Politico/Morning Consult survey , 54 percent of voters said Trump had been a “ very successful ” or “ somewhat successful ” businessman , while only 36 percent thought he ’ d been unsuccessful .
But after being presented with information about Trump ’ s financial losses , the share of voters who thought he ’ d been a successful businessman dropped to 43 percent .
And that slide was felt across the board , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Democrats and Republicans , and 8 points among independents .
Meanwhile , another May 2019 poll from Fox News suggested that evidence against Trump ’ s business savvy could influence the attitudes of a small but meaningful share of voters : 20 percent said there was a “ strong ” or “ some ” chance that new revelations could affect their views of him .
That 2019 polling squared with findings from a study by political scientists at the University of Maryland , which found that voters ’ opinions of Trump ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republicans when told how Trump had benefited substantially from his family ’ s financial help .
The study showed that a lack of knowledge about Trump ’ s background mattered to how Americans perceived him , as a sizable share of Americans — around 40 to 50 percent — didn ’ t know that Trump grew up very wealthy and received millions of dollars in financial assistance from his family .
If respondents had fewer misperceptions about the president ’ s financial background and the aid he received from his family , they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ poorly , the study found .
All in all , past surveys and research suggest that The Times ’ s latest story — which is more significant in scope and covers a more recent part of Trump ’ s business dealings than past revelations — could put a dent in how the public views Trump ’ s business acumen .
Whether that actually happens may come down to how much sustained media attention the story receives .
For example , will the first presidential debate , on Tuesday night , dwell on Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tax returns do stay in the spotlight , there is reason to think they could hurt Trump electorally .
For one , Trump is an underdog for reelection at the moment and the clock is ticking — any day during which he ’ s not making up ground is a problem .
But the malleability of voters ’ views of Trump ’ s business record is also notable because we have reason to think Trump ’ s business credentials played at least some role in his electoral success in 2016 , and may @ @ @ @ @ @ @ today .
First , Trump ’ s image as a business maven helped him attract support in the 2016 Republican presidential primary .
In a February 2016 Gallup survey , 16 percent of Republicans cited his being a “ good businessman ” as a key reason for their support , a trait that trailed only his political outsider status ( 22 percent of respondents ) as a factor in GOP voters ’ support .
And as a September 2015 Pew Research poll showed , 65 percent of Republicans wanted someone with new ideas @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gave them in spades as a businessman outsider .
Trump ’ s image as a successful businessman may have also played a part in his defeat of Hillary Clinton in 2016 , too , by helping to fuel the view that he would handle the economy better .
In the national exit poll , 48 percent of voters said Trump would better handle the economy , compared to 46 percent for Clinton .
Those same exit polls found Clinton leading Trump on who voters thought would better handle foreign policy ( by 11 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ better commander in chief ( by 3 points ) .
Voters , in other words , thought Trump was best prepared to handle the economy relative to other issues .
That view was especially prevalent ( and critical ) among independent voters , particularly in key swing states .
Among independents nationally , 48 percent preferred Trump on the economy versus 43 percent who picked Clinton .
And independents in Florida , Michigan and Wisconsin all preferred Trump to Clinton on the economy by double-digit margins , possibly boosting Trump ’ s performance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the Electoral College , all of which he won by incredibly narrow margins .
Trump ’ s relative strength on the economy has continued to be apparent in 2020 , even as the country ’ s economic conditions have taken a massive hit due to the coronavirus .
His approval ratings on the economy have tended to run ahead of his ratings on other issues , such as crime , education , foreign policy , etc .
While the strong economy in the early years of Trump ’ s presidency undoubtedly boosted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the issue , even in the face of the coronavirus crisis , Trump polled better on the economy than on most issues only months into his presidency , too .
It ’ s hard not to see that as partly a result of the image he has sought to cultivate as a savvy businessman .
We can ’ t know how the public will react to the revelations in Trump ’ s tax returns , especially because we don ’ t know how quickly the news cycle will move on .
But we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at least a few voters question Trump ’ s business acumen .
And perceptions of that acumen have played a role in Trump ’ s electoral success .
With The Times promising further revelations from Trump ’ s tax returns , Trump trailing in polls nationally and in most swing states , and people already starting to cast their ballots , the tax returns have the real potential to prevent Trump from making up ground on Joe Biden , or even to ( most likely marginally ) eat into Trump ’ s support @ @ @ @ @

On Sunday, a New York Times exposé on President Trump’s tax returns revealed decades of tax avoidance and millions of dollars in business losses over the past two decades. The picture painted by Trump’s returns is sharply at odds with the shrewd, deal-making image the president has tried to fashion as a real estate mogul and TV star on a show built around his business prowess, “The Apprentice.” Now, five weeks from Election Day, the question is will these new revelations affect the presidential race?
There are really two parts to that question: First, will The Times’s revelations change perceptions of Trump’s record as a businessman? And second, do perceptions of Trump’s business acumen matter in who voters decide to support?
We’ll take those one at a time, but spoiler alert: Past polling and research belies the notion that “nothing matters” when it comes to public perceptions about the president.
In May 2019, after The New York Times published a report that showed Trump had lost around $1.2 billion between 1985 and 1994, public polling found the story could lower public opinion regarding Trump’s business acuity. In a Politico/Morning Consult survey, 54 percent of voters said Trump had been a “very successful” or “somewhat successful” businessman, while only 36 percent thought he’d been unsuccessful. But after being presented with information about Trump’s financial losses, the share of voters who thought he’d been a successful businessman dropped to 43 percent. And that slide was felt across the board, falling more than 10 percentage points among Democrats and Republicans, and 8 points among independents. Meanwhile, another May 2019 poll from Fox News suggested that evidence against Trump’s business savvy could influence the attitudes of a small but meaningful share of voters: 20 percent said there was a “strong” or “some” chance that new revelations could affect their views of him.
That 2019 polling squared with findings from a study by political scientists at the University of Maryland, which found that voters’ opinions of Trump’s business skills fell among both Democrats and Republicans when told how Trump had benefited substantially from his family’s financial help. The study showed that a lack of knowledge about Trump’s background mattered to how Americans perceived him, as a sizable share of Americans — around 40 to 50 percent — didn’t know that Trump grew up very wealthy and received millions of dollars in financial assistance from his family. If respondents had fewer misperceptions about the president’s financial background and the aid he received from his family, they tended to rate his business competence more poorly, the study found.
All in all, past surveys and research suggest that The Times’s latest story — which is more significant in scope and covers a more recent part of Trump’s business dealings than past revelations — could put a dent in how the public views Trump’s business acumen. Whether that actually happens may come down to how much sustained media attention the story receives. For example, will the first presidential debate, on Tuesday night, dwell on Trump’s tax returns?
If the tax returns do stay in the spotlight, there is reason to think they could hurt Trump electorally. For one, Trump is an underdog for reelection at the moment and the clock is ticking — any day during which he’s not making up ground is a problem. But the malleability of voters’ views of Trump’s business record is also notable because we have reason to think Trump’s business credentials played at least some role in his electoral success in 2016, and may continue to undergird some of his support today.
First, Trump’s image as a business maven helped him attract support in the 2016 Republican presidential primary. In a February 2016 Gallup survey, 16 percent of Republicans cited his being a “good businessman” as a key reason for their support, a trait that trailed only his political outsider status (22 percent of respondents) as a factor in GOP voters’ support. And as a September 2015 Pew Research poll showed, 65 percent of Republicans wanted someone with new ideas and a different approach — something Trump gave them in spades as a businessman outsider.
Trump’s image as a successful businessman may have also played a part in his defeat of Hillary Clinton in 2016, too, by helping to fuel the view that he would handle the economy better. In the national exit poll, 48 percent of voters said Trump would better handle the economy, compared to 46 percent for Clinton. Those same exit polls found Clinton leading Trump on who voters thought would better handle foreign policy (by 11 points) and who would be a better commander in chief (by 3 points). Voters, in other words, thought Trump was best prepared to handle the economy relative to other issues.
That view was especially prevalent (and critical) among independent voters, particularly in key swing states. Among independents nationally, 48 percent preferred Trump on the economy versus 43 percent who picked Clinton. And independents in Florida, Michigan and Wisconsin all preferred Trump to Clinton on the economy by double-digit margins, possibly boosting Trump’s performance in three of the most critical states in the Electoral College, all of which he won by incredibly narrow margins.
Trump’s relative strength on the economy has continued to be apparent in 2020, even as the country’s economic conditions have taken a massive hit due to the coronavirus. His approval ratings on the economy have tended to run ahead of his ratings on other issues, such as crime, education, foreign policy, etc. While the strong economy in the early years of Trump’s presidency undoubtedly boosted how the public views his handling of the issue, even in the face of the coronavirus crisis, Trump polled better on the economy than on most issues only months into his presidency, too. It’s hard not to see that as partly a result of the image he has sought to cultivate as a savvy businessman.
We can’t know how the public will react to the revelations in Trump’s tax returns, especially because we don’t know how quickly the news cycle will move on. But we have some evidence that it could make at least a few voters question Trump’s business acumen. And perceptions of that acumen have played a role in Trump’s electoral success. With The Times promising further revelations from Trump’s tax returns, Trump trailing in polls nationally and in most swing states, and people already starting to cast their ballots, the tax returns have the real potential to prevent Trump from making up ground on Joe Biden, or even to (most likely marginally) eat into Trump’s support as it currently stands.


fivethirthyeight--2020-09-29--The Tampa Bay Lightning Finally Delivered On Their Stanley Cup Potential

A year after an epic unraveling , the Tampa Bay Lightning have completed their redemption arc .
The Bolts hoisted their second ever Stanley Cup on Monday night after dispatching the Dallas Stars 2-0 , bringing to an end a hard-fought but ultimately comfortable series after six games .
In doing so , Tampa exorcised any demons that may have invaded the soul of the franchise last spring when it was swept in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs by a dogged but less accomplished Columbus Blue Jackets team .
That iteration of the Lightning — the one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wins and 128 points — entered the playoffs as the overwhelming favorite but was unable to get the job done .
This iteration entered the playoffs as the betting favorite too , but instead of folding under the weight of their own greatness , the Lightning did exactly what was expected of them : They won the Stanley Cup .
To be sure , the Bolts weren ’ t as good during the 2019-20 regular season as they were in 2018-19 .
They won a smaller share of their games and finished with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ play was less devastating ; their penalty kill was less effective ; they got worse goaltending in terms of save percentage , which accounts for a higher proportion of a team ’ s success than any other factor ; and they were less impressive according to HockeyReference.com ’ s Simple Rating System .
But the bookmakers still liked their odds to lift Lord Stanley ’ s shiny soup bowl more than any other team , including the Presidents ’ Trophy-winning Boston Bruins .
The bookmakers were right in the end .
Excluding their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ just four games en route to the Stanley Cup Final .
They swatted aside the Jackets , their bugbear from a season ago , and the Bruins — the team that appeared most equipped to give them trouble in the East — like so many mosquitos , needing just five games to beat each of them .
The New York Islanders provided more of a challenge in the Eastern Conference finals — after an 8-2 Game 1 loss , the Isles found their game and forced the Bolts to overtime in Games 5 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ depth and class proved too much in the end .
For the first time since losing to Chicago in 2015 , and after failing in two conference finals in the interim , the Bolts were headed back to the Stanley Cup Final .
Once they got there , Tampa was dominant .
Though the Stars made things difficult , winning Games 1 and 5 , the outcome hardly ever felt in the balance .
Before the finals , the Bolts struggled on special teams , especially with the man advantage .
But Tampa @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Dallas .
In the first three rounds of the playoffs ( including the round robin ) , the Lightning scored on just 17.9 percent of their power play opportunities , a shocking rate for a team that ranked fifth in the league ( 23.1 percent ) during the regular season .
But against the Stars , Tampa scored on an astonishing 36.8 percent of its power play opportunities .
Indeed , seven of Tampa ’ s 18 goals during the series came on the power play .
The Bolts were able to take @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a strength during the regular season — and turn in into a silver bullet during the finals .
Tampa ’ s exceptional power play performance was fueled by veteran defenseman Victor Hedman , who scored once with the man advantage and added four assists .
The Swede ’ s magnificent overall play from the blueline during the Cup run put him in the Conn Smythe Trophy conversation , but his influence on the power play during the finals sealed the deal .
Silky centerman Brayden Point ’ s three power play goals — @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kucherov ’ s five power play assists didn ’ t hurt Tampa ’ s chances either .
The Tampa Bay Lighting have been extremely good for the better part of a decade .
Since the 2013-14 season , the Bolts have finished the regular season in first or second place in their division on six occasions .
They ’ ve earned 100 or more points four times , and they ’ ve reached at least the conference finals four times too .
But until Monday , they had underachieved .
None of that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have lifted their second Stanley Cup — and buried their historic collapse from a year ago in the past .

A year after an epic unraveling, the Tampa Bay Lightning have completed their redemption arc. The Bolts hoisted their second ever Stanley Cup on Monday night after dispatching the Dallas Stars 2-0, bringing to an end a hard-fought but ultimately comfortable series after six games.
In doing so, Tampa exorcised any demons that may have invaded the soul of the franchise last spring when it was swept in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs by a dogged but less accomplished Columbus Blue Jackets team. That iteration of the Lightning — the one that finished the regular season with 62 wins and 128 points — entered the playoffs as the overwhelming favorite but was unable to get the job done. This iteration entered the playoffs as the betting favorite too, but instead of folding under the weight of their own greatness, the Lightning did exactly what was expected of them: They won the Stanley Cup.
To be sure, the Bolts weren’t as good during the 2019-20 regular season as they were in 2018-19. They won a smaller share of their games and finished with an inferior points percentage; their power play was less devastating; their penalty kill was less effective; they got worse goaltending in terms of save percentage, which accounts for a higher proportion of a team’s success than any other factor; and they were less impressive according to HockeyReference.com’s Simple Rating System. But the bookmakers still liked their odds to lift Lord Stanley’s shiny soup bowl more than any other team, including the Presidents’ Trophy-winning Boston Bruins.
The bookmakers were right in the end. Excluding their round robin games, the Lightning lost just four games en route to the Stanley Cup Final. They swatted aside the Jackets, their bugbear from a season ago, and the Bruins — the team that appeared most equipped to give them trouble in the East — like so many mosquitos, needing just five games to beat each of them. The New York Islanders provided more of a challenge in the Eastern Conference finals — after an 8-2 Game 1 loss, the Isles found their game and forced the Bolts to overtime in Games 5 and 6 — but Tampa’s depth and class proved too much in the end. For the first time since losing to Chicago in 2015, and after failing in two conference finals in the interim, the Bolts were headed back to the Stanley Cup Final.
Once it got there, Tampa was dominant. Though the Stars made things difficult, winning Games 1 and 5, the outcome hardly ever felt in the balance. Before the finals, the Bolts struggled on special teams, especially with the man advantage. But Tampa turned its special teams play around against Dallas. In the first three rounds of the playoffs (including the round robin), the Lightning scored on just 17.9 percent of their power play opportunities, a shocking rate for a team that ranked fifth in the league (23.1 percent) during the regular season. But against the Stars, Tampa scored on an astonishing 36.8 percent of its power play opportunities. Indeed, seven of Tampa’s 18 goals during the series came on the power play. The Bolts were able to take a playoff weakness — which had been a strength during the regular season — and turn in into a silver bullet during the finals.
Tampa’s exceptional power play performance was fueled by veteran defenseman Victor Hedman, who scored once with the man advantage and added four assists. The Swede’s magnificent overall play from the blueline during the Cup run put him in the Conn Smythe Trophy conversation, but his influence on the power play during the finals sealed the deal. Silky centerman Brayden Point’s three power play goals — and five goals total — and Nikita Kucherov’s five power play assists didn’t hurt Tampa’s chances either.
The Tampa Bay Lighting have been extremely good for the better part of a decade. Since the 2013-14 season, the Bolts have finished the regular season in first or second place in their division on six occasions. They’ve earned 100 or more points four times, and they’ve reached at least the conference finals four times too. But until Monday, they had underachieved. None of that matters anymore, though. The Lightning have lifted their second Stanley Cup — and buried their historic collapse from a year ago in the past.


fivethirthyeight--2020-09-29--Here’s Where The Candidates Stand Before The First Presidential Debate

How likely do you think each is to win ?
How likely are you to vote for each ?
Tonight , President Trump and Joe Biden finally face off for the first of three planned debates .
We ’ re once again partnering with Ipsos to track how the debate affects Americans ’ views of the election and their feelings about the two candidates .
The FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos poll uses Ipsos ’ s KnowledgePanel to interview the same group of people both before and after the debate to see how it changes their minds — if it does so at all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of third-party candidates or ‘ someone else.
’ Additionally , they could indicate that they will not vote .
When asked how likely they were to vote for each candidate on a scale from 0 to 10 , most respondents seemed very sure of their vote : The overwhelming majority gave one candidate a 10 and the other a 0 .
On average , Biden received a score of 5 out of 10 , and Trump a score of 3.8 , reflecting Biden ’ s lead in the polls .
However , when @ @ @ @ @ @ @ win the election , respondents were more divided , with many saying both candidates were about equally likely to win .
In fact , respondents gave the two about the same chance , a score of 4.7 for Trump and 4.6 for Biden , on average .
We ’ ll see whether either of these metrics changes substantially after the debate , as one thing that ’ s proven somewhat constant is people thinking that Trump has a good chance to win even though he ’ s been trailing Biden in the polls @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are excited How likely and how excited respondents are to vote in the 2020 presidential election , by preferred candidate We grouped respondents by which candidate they gave the higher score to ( out of 10 ) .
Respondents who gave both candidates the same score are not included .
Respondents who already voted are included in the “ absolutely certain ” bucket and respondents who gave themselves a 50-50 shot of voting are included in the “ not too likely ” bucket .
The overwhelming majority of both candidates ’ supporters said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vote — 84 percent of Biden ’ s backers and 81 percent of Trump ’ s .
( That includes a small percentage who said they ’ d already voted , around three percent in Biden ’ s case and two percent in Trump ’ s . )
Most other supporters said they were “ very likely ” to vote .
However , enthusiasm wasn ’ t quite as high : Just under 50 percent of each candidate ’ s supporters said they were “ very excited ” to vote for them , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ somewhat excited .
”

On Tuesday, President Trump and Joe Biden faced off for the first time, in a rocky and, at times, tumultuous debate. We once again partnered with Ipsos to track how the debate affected Americans’ views of the election, using Ipsos’s KnowledgePanel to interview the same group of people both before and after the debate. The topline is clear: Americans were not impressed with the president’s performance. Whether that will actually lead people to change their votes remains to be seen, though it seems unlikely.
Biden may have gained a little support, but many still think Trump has a good chance of winning
How likely respondents are to vote for each candidate and how likely, they think each candidate is to win, on a scale from 0 (no chance) to 10 (absolutely certain)
Respondents were also given the option of third-party candidates or ‘someone else.’ Additionally, they could indicate that they will not vote.
Most respondents started out firmly in either Biden or Trump’s camp, and the debate didn’t change that: In fact, very few people changed their minds at all about how likely they were to vote for each candidate.
That said, the debate did have a bit more of an effect on who people think will win the presidency. Slightly more respondents now think both candidates have some chance of winning, although those respondents gave Biden a slightly better chance of winning than Trump.
Biden got higher marks for his performance — and his policies
How respondents rated each candidate’s debate performance and their answers on policies
Performance Policies Candidate good poor good poor Trump 32.9% 66.2% 39.1% 57.4% Biden 59.7 39.1 56.6 39.2
Only among respondents who said that they had watched some or all of the debate.
Debate watchers were pretty decisive in their verdict of last night’s performances: Only about one-third said Trump’s performance was “somewhat good” or “very good,” and 50 percent said it was “very poor.” Biden’s performance was more positively received, with around 60 percent saying they thought he performed well. Respondents gave more mixed grades on how they thought the candidates outlined their policies, but Biden received better marks here, too: Almost 60 percent said they thought his policies were “somewhat good” or “very good,” compared to about 40 percent who said the same for Trump.


fivethirthyeight--2020-09-30--Will Such A Cacophonous Debate Change Any Minds?

Welcome to a special , post-debate edition of FiveThirtyEight ’ s politics chat .
The transcript below has been lightly edited .
sarah ( Sarah Frostenson , politics editor ) : Last night marked our first real opportunity to see President Trump and Joe Biden go head-to-head , but it was very much unclear who was in control of the debate , given the interruptions and sniping .
But let ’ s discuss what our takeaways are… What surprised you the most ?
geoffrey.skelley ( Geoffrey Skelley , elections analyst ) : I guess I expected interruptions and “ Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ degree to which the debate couldn ’ t proceed without constant interruptions was pretty remarkable … er , tiresome .
julia_azari ( Julia Azari , political science professor at Marquette University and FiveThirtyEight contributor ) : I ’ m surprised that I — and seemingly a lot of other people — are surprised .
Trump did nothing out of character based on what we know .
But somehow in a debate setting it rattled us .
Norms are eroded , but we still , out of habit , expect something different in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s a fair point .
Trump memorably crossed some lines in 2016 , including in a town hall debate when he loomed behind Hillary Clinton while she was speaking .
So I guess we should have taken what we expected to be the worst possible debate and then gone lower .
What ’ s the headline takeaway from this debate ?
lee.drutman ( Lee Drutman , senior fellow at New America and FiveThirtyEight contributor ) : The standard debate format has outlived its usefulness , at least for a while .
julia_azari @ @ @ @ @ @ @ don ’ t really have a point , this one kind of really didn ’ t .
There weren ’ t even coherent exchanges .
The idea that I keep coming back to is that Trump used that chaos to keep the debate on his own terms .
geoffrey.skelley : Well , until the end when Trump once again refused to say he ’ d accept the results of the election , I would say it was the exchange about race relations that was headline grabbing for me .
Chris Wallace , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ supremacists and right-wing militias , and Trump instead said , “ Proud Boys , stand back and stand by , ” a reference to a white supremacist group .
That organization is apparently very happy to be mentioned by the president , too , and may view it as a call to arms ahead of the election .
lee.drutman : Geoffrey , I think “ exchange ” is a generous term for what was happening .
julia_azari : Trump reframed the question on race so completely that nothing substantive was said about structural @ @ @ @ @ @ @ defend the Obama administration and take positions that might divide Democrats didn ’ t really work .
That said , I think it does show that Trump ’ s one area of success might be in shaping how people talk about politics and what the salient issues are .
The fact that he ’ s the incumbent president at a time when 200,000 people are dead from the coronavirus means it ’ s a feat that the entire debate is not devoted to his record on that alone .
Did Trump help his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ case , as I understand it , is that Biden and the Democrats represent a radical left threat to America .
He tried to goad Biden into that , but Biden didn ’ t take the bait .
So in that respect , I don ’ t see how Trump helped his case .
geoffrey.skelley : I think the fundamental problem for Trump is that he ’ s down by 7 points nationally and trails in most of the swing states .
So Trump needs to expand his base by winning over some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t watching , but will hear about the debate tomorrow — or convert some Biden supporters .
He certainly tried to argue that Biden is a leftist or that he ’ s in league with radical socialists .
He also tried to attack Biden on “ law and order ” by claiming that Biden wants to defund the police .
But Trump ’ s campaign has been trying these lines for months without much apparent success , including at the GOP convention .
Why would it work now ?
Perhaps more people are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could be brought in by his appeals , but even then I ’ m pretty skeptical .
lee.drutman : No , I don ’ t think we ’ ll see any movement in the polls .
These are two candidates who are extremely well-known at this point , and everyone knows their strengths and weaknesses , and nothing we saw did anything to change those deeply-held views .
julia_azari : I think Biden ’ s temperament and demographic profile allowed him to get a bit angrier than , say , Hillary Clinton could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
I wouldn ’ t say that debates have been Biden ’ s best format in the 2020 cycle , but he came off more or less as expected .
lee.drutman : And if you are an undecided voter from a cave just tuning in , you went back into your cave and planned to hibernate for another four years .
julia_azari : I saw some Twitter grumbling about Biden ’ s statements about the police , but his position on those issues are well-known , so the fact that he didn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t particularly surprising .
geoffrey.skelley : Biden was pretty weak early on , but at the same time , it wasn ’ t all that different of a performance from the ones he had in most primary debates , either .
And like Lee said , things are pretty baked in at this point .
Moreover , challengers have tended to gain after the first debate , so if the polls do move , it ’ s possible that Biden might gain instead of Trump .
Did you learn anything new ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ I learned anything new , but this feels like a new low .
Debates are an important exercise in legitimate opposition , and the norms that candidates follow seemed unimportant … until they were gone .
lee.drutman : My priors going into tonight were : 1 ) Biden is sluggish and sometimes incoherent ; 2 ) Trump is often all over the place ; and 3 ) American democracy is in a dark place in 2020 .
I ’ m not sure that changed after tonight , to be honest .
geoffrey.skelley : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ entirely rule out some poll movement , but I ’ d be pretty amazed if it shifted the state of the race to a noticeable degree .
And even if it does , that might be ephemeral .
Our forecast model anticipates that a post-debate change might be temporary and that the polls could return to the pre-debate equilibrium .
So I think we ’ ll have to wait and see .

Welcome to a special, post-debate edition of FiveThirtyEight’s politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.
sarah (Sarah Frostenson, politics editor): Last night marked our first real opportunity to see President Trump and Joe Biden go head-to-head, but it was very much unclear who was in control of the debate, given the interruptions and sniping. But let’s discuss what our takeaways are…
What surprised you the most?
geoffrey.skelley (Geoffrey Skelley, elections analyst): I guess I expected interruptions and “Trump to be Trump,” but the degree to which the debate couldn’t proceed without constant interruptions was pretty remarkable … er, tiresome.
julia_azari (Julia Azari, political science professor at Marquette University and FiveThirtyEight contributor): I’m surprised that I — and seemingly a lot of other people — are surprised. Trump did nothing out of character based on what we know. But somehow in a debate setting it rattled us. Norms are eroded, but we still, out of habit, expect something different in a debate.
geoffrey.skelley: Julia, that’s a fair point. Trump memorably crossed some lines in 2016, including in a town hall debate when he loomed behind Hillary Clinton while she was speaking. So I guess we should have taken what we expected to be the worst possible debate and then gone lower.
What’s the headline takeaway from this debate?
lee.drutman (Lee Drutman, senior fellow at New America and FiveThirtyEight contributor): The standard debate format has outlived its usefulness, at least for a while.
julia_azari: After years of people saying debates don’t really have a point, this one kind of really didn’t. There weren’t even coherent exchanges. The idea that I keep coming back to is that Trump used that chaos to keep the debate on his own terms.
geoffrey.skelley: Well, until the end when Trump once again refused to say he’d accept the results of the election, I would say it was the exchange about race relations that was headline grabbing for me. Chris Wallace, the moderator, asked Trump to condemn white supremacists and right-wing militias, and Trump instead said, “Proud Boys, stand back and stand by,” a reference to a white supremacist group.
Proud Boys in social media groups are going wild about the "Stand back and stand by" comment. They are basically seeing it as acknowledgment and a call to arms — Ezra Kaplan (@EzraNBC) September 30, 2020
That organization is apparently very happy to be mentioned by the president, too, and may view it as a call to arms ahead of the election.
lee.drutman: Geoffrey, I think “exchange” is a generous term for what was happening.
julia_azari: Trump reframed the question on race so completely that nothing substantive was said about structural racism. Trying to push Biden to defend the Obama administration and take positions that might divide Democrats didn’t really work. That said, I think it does show that Trump’s one area of success might be in shaping how people talk about politics and what the salient issues are.
The fact that he’s the incumbent president at a time when 200,000 people are dead from the coronavirus means it’s a feat that the entire debate is not devoted to his record on that alone.
Did Trump help his case?
lee.drutman: Trump’s case, as I understand it, is that Biden and the Democrats represent a radical left threat to America. He tried to goad Biden into that, but Biden didn’t take the bait. So in that respect, I don’t see how Trump helped his case.
geoffrey.skelley: I think the fundamental problem for Trump is that he’s down by 7 points nationally and trails in most of the swing states. So Trump needs to expand his base by winning over some undecided voters — who probably weren’t watching, but will hear about the debate tomorrow — or convert some Biden supporters.
He certainly tried to argue that Biden is a leftist or that he’s in league with radical socialists. He also tried to attack Biden on “law and order” by claiming that Biden wants to defund the police. But Trump’s campaign has been trying these lines for months without much apparent success, including at the GOP convention. Why would it work now?
Perhaps more people are paying attention now and some lower-information voters could be brought in by his appeals, but even then I’m pretty skeptical.
Did Biden lose any ground tonight?
lee.drutman: No, I don’t think we’ll see any movement in the polls. These are two candidates who are extremely well-known at this point, and everyone knows their strengths and weaknesses, and nothing we saw did anything to change those deeply-held views.
julia_azari: I think Biden’s temperament and demographic profile allowed him to get a bit angrier than, say, Hillary Clinton could when facing off against Trump in 2016.
I wouldn’t say that debates have been Biden’s best format in the 2020 cycle, but he came off more or less as expected.
lee.drutman: And if you are an undecided voter from a cave just tuning in, you went back into your cave and planned to hibernate for another four years.
julia_azari: I saw some Twitter grumbling about Biden’s statements about the police, but his position on those issues are well-known, so the fact that he didn’t strike a more progressive stance wasn’t particularly surprising.
geoffrey.skelley: Biden was pretty weak early on, but at the same time, it wasn’t all that different of a performance from the ones he had in most primary debates, either. And like Lee said, things are pretty baked in at this point. Moreover, challengers have tended to gain after the first debate, so if the polls do move, it’s possible that Biden might gain instead of Trump.
Did you learn anything new?
julia_azari: I don’t think I learned anything new, but this feels like a new low. Debates are an important exercise in legitimate opposition, and the norms that candidates follow seemed unimportant … until they were gone.
lee.drutman: My priors going into tonight were: 1) Biden is sluggish and sometimes incoherent; 2) Trump is often all over the place; and 3) American democracy is in a dark place in 2020. I’m not sure that changed after tonight, to be honest.
geoffrey.skelley: I don’t think we can entirely rule out some poll movement, but I’d be pretty amazed if it shifted the state of the race to a noticeable degree. And even if it does, that might be ephemeral. Our forecast model anticipates that a post-debate change might be temporary and that the polls could return to the pre-debate equilibrium. So I think we’ll have to wait and see.


fivethirthyeight--2020-09-29--What Went Down During The First Presidential Debate

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fivethirthyeight--2020-09-30--Trump’s Chances Are Dwindling. That Could Make Him Dangerous.

President Trump ’ s quest to win a second term is not in good shape .
He entered Tuesday night ’ s debate with roughly a 7- or 8-point deficit in national polls , putting him further behind at this stage of the race than any other candidate since Bob Dole in 1996 .
If we look at potential tipping-point states , the race is a bit closer , but not that much closer .
After a couple of strong polls for Joe Biden earlier this week in Pennsylvania — the state that ’ s currently most likely to decide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by 5 to 6 points .
He ’ s down by about 7 points in Michigan and Wisconsin , meanwhile .
Those states , along with Minnesota , Maine and New Hampshire — where Biden has also polled strongly lately — suggest that Biden is winning back some of the Obama-Trump white working-class voters who flocked to Trump four years ago .
Indeed , Biden is as close to winning South Carolina or Alaska as Trump is to winning Michigan and Wisconsin , based on recent polls of those states .
At a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the debate probably didn ’ t help him either — it may have hurt him .
Every scientific poll we ’ ve seen had Trump losing the debate , some by narrow margins and some by wide ones .
That includes the poll FiveThirtyEight conducted with Ipsos , which surveyed the same group of voters before and after the debate .
While the poll didn ’ t show a massive swing — most voters stuck to their initial preferences — more voters did rate Biden ’ s performance favorably , and Biden @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the number of voters who said they were certain to vote for him , roughly tantamount to a 3-point swing toward Biden in head-to-head polls .
Now , I ’ m not predicting this will happen , but if Biden ’ s national lead were to expand to 9 or 10 points , which is consistent with the sorts of polling bounces we ’ ve seen in the past for candidates who were perceived to win debates — especially challengers debating an incumbent for the first time — Trump ’ s situation could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , none of this means that Trump ’ s chances are kaput .
As of this writing , our forecast still gives him around a 21 percent chance of winning the Electoral College .
That ’ s not great , but it ’ s a lot better than zero .
But it ’ s possible Trump ’ s chances may decline further after post-debate polling begins to roll into our forecast .
Furthermore , the mere passage of time helps Biden in our model , because every day that Trump doesn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fate becomes slightly more sealed .
( Lots of people have already voted ! )
Case in point : In an election held today — Trump has no more time to make up ground — his chances would be 9 percent , not 21 percent , according to our forecast .
Then again , there are some possibilities that our model doesn ’ t account for , and they have become more pertinent after Trump has repeatedly refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power and declined to commit to respecting the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ launching the forecast : Let ’ s back up for a second .
This is FiveThirtyEight ’ s fourth presidential election campaign .
And in the previous three , there was at least some question about who was ahead in the stretch run of the race .
John McCain , for instance , briefly pulled ahead of Barack Obama following the 2008 Republican convention , and Obama didn ’ t really solidify his lead until early October .
In 2012 , national polls were very tight between Obama and Mitt Romney following the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tight thereafter ( although Obama always maintained an Electoral College edge ) .
And people forget how close the 2016 race was for stretches of the campaign ; it was not such a huge upset .
In fact , Hillary Clinton led by only 1.4 points in our national polling average heading into the first debate that year .
But there isn ’ t any of that ambiguity this time .
Since we launched our general election polling averages on June 18 , Biden has never led by less than 6.6 points nationally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a Rasmussen Reports poll that put Trump ahead by less than a full percentage point — has shown Trump leading by any margin during that period .
It ’ s been an exceptionally stable race .
But , amazingly , that hasn ’ t really shaken people ’ s confidence in Trump ’ s ability to win .
In our own poll with Ipsos , we found respondents thought Biden and Trump had roughly equally likely chances of winning .
And maybe that boils down to three perpetual sources of anxiety I hear @ @ @ @ @ @ @ readers : • Trump could win the Electoral College despite losing the popular vote by a wide margin .
• There could be a large polling error in Trump ’ s favor .
• Trump could somehow steal the election .
All three are legitimate sources of concern for Biden backers .
The first two are relatively easy to quantify , however .
Indeed , the whole purpose of a model like FiveThirtyEight ’ s presidential forecast is to answer questions like those .
The third one , however , is harder to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s talk about No .
1 and 2 first..
The Electoral College could still help Trump , but it only goes so far The possibility of an Electoral College , popular vote split remains a point in Trump ’ s favor .
In fact , there ’ s an 11 percent chance that Trump wins the Electoral College but not the popular vote in our forecast ( but less than a 1 percent chance the other way around ) .
At the same time , Biden ’ s strength in the Upper @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at least , if polls are correct there — potentially mitigates this disadvantage to some extent .
The table below shows Biden ’ s probability of winning the Electoral College given various popular vote margins , according to our forecast as of Wednesday afternoon .
And as you can see , Biden is only truly safe to win the Electoral College once he has a popular vote margin of 5 points or more !
But , he ’ s a fairly heavy favorite with a 3- to 5-point margin , and has roughly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ margin .
So , for practical purposes , you can take Biden ’ s lead in national polls and subtract 2 or 2.5 points from it to infer his margin in tipping-point states .
In other words , if he ’ s ahead by around 7.5 points in national polls , that ’ s more like the equivalent of a 5-point lead in the Electoral College .
That ’ s still a reasonably large advantage ; empirically , it ’ s not that easy to overcome a 5-point deficit at this stage of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could help Trump … or Biden One of the misconceptions I hear about FiveThirtyEight ’ s forecast is that “ it assumes that polls are right.
” Actually , in some sense the whole purpose of the forecast is to estimate the chance that the polls are wrong .
In 2016 , the polls did show Clinton ahead , but between tight margins in tipping-point states and the large number of undecided voters , there was a fairly high probability — around 30 percent , according to our forecast — that Trump was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a polling error is possible — indeed , our forecast assumes there ’ s likely additional error this year because of an uptick in mail voting — it would still take a bigger error than in 2016 for Trump to win .
Assume that current polls hold until Election Day , and subtract 3 points from Biden ’ s margin in every state ( roughly the average error in swing state polls in 2016 ) … Biden still wins Pennsylvania , Michigan and Wisconsin fairly comfortably , and therefore , the Electoral College @ @ @ @ @ @ @ slight favorite in Arizona .
And as our friends at the Upshot have calculated , even if you had a polling error of the exact same magnitude in the exact same states as in 2016 , Biden would still win , albeit narrowly .
Of course , nothing intrinsically rules out a larger polling error .
We had one in 1948 — when Dewey didn ’ t defeat Truman , after all — and in 1980 , when Ronald Reagan won in an epic landslide instead of the narrow margin that polls predicted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ such an error would favor Trump .
Historically , the direction of polling bias has not been predictable from cycle to cycle ; the same polls that underestimated Trump in 2016 tended to underestimate Obama and Democrats in 2012 , for instance .
If anything , to the extent there are polling errors , they sometimes come in the opposite direction of what the conventional wisdom expects .
I want to spend more time on this topic in the coming days , so I won ’ t go on at too much length @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that a 7-point Biden lead on Election Day could , indeed , turn into a 2-point Biden popular vote win where Trump narrowly wins the Electoral College .
As I wrote earlier in the piece , our forecast gives Trump about a 9 percent chance of winning an election held today despite his current deficit in polls — not bad when you ’ re 7 points down !
But it ’ s about equally likely that a 7-point Biden lead could translate into a 12-point Biden win , in which he ’ d @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Texas , but would also have a shot in South Carolina , Alaska and Montana .
Trump ’ s comments on respecting the election outcome are deeply worrisome , but it ’ s hard to estimate his chances of overturning the result Hoo , boy .
At some point I ’ m going to have to write a column about this too , I suppose .
As I said at the outset , our forecast assumes that the election is free and fair — at least to the extent that past elections that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ free and fair .
( Throughout American history , there has always been plenty of voter suppression and voter disenfranchisement . )
But for now , let me advance a few propositions : • Even a small probability that the U.S. could become a failed or manifestly undemocratic state is worth taking seriously .
• There are a wide range of things that Trump could attempt to do , many of which would be quite damaging to the country , but they are not necessarily equally likely to succeed .
• Trump ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ actually change the result of the election if the outcome is close , and right now , the most likely scenario is that Biden wins by a not-so-close margin .
Beyond that , it ’ s hard to estimate the probability that Trump could steal the election to any degree of precision .
It requires , at a minimum , some knowledge of the probabilities in a free and fair election plus some knowledge of election law and how many votes could realistically come under dispute plus some theory of the institutional incentives @ @ @ @ @ @ @ courts plus some opinions on how Congress might interpret the Constitution in the event of a disputed election .
Maybe a panel of experts could get together and try to put together some reasonable bounds on the probability of various scenarios , but I don ’ t know that any individual could — certainly not me .
After Trump ’ s actions over the past few weeks , though , I wonder if there ’ s some tradeoff between Trump ’ s chances of winning legitimately and his willingness to engage in authoritarian @ @ @ @ @ @ @ probably wouldn ’ t succeed at stealing the election .
It ’ s not like this is coming entirely out of left field ; Trump also said in 2016 that he wouldn ’ t necessarily respect the election results .
But his recent statements have come at a moment of increasing peril for his campaign .
It ’ s hard to know for sure , but I think Trump ’ s comments might be more tempered if he were 2 points ahead in Wisconsin instead of 7 points down .
It ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has left to play or which contingencies could work in his favor enough for him to win — other than if the polls have been wrong all along .
Consider that Trump ’ s convention produced , at best , a very meager bounce in his favor .
His attempt to pivot the campaign to a “ law and order ” theme fell completely flat in polls of the upper Midwest .
He ’ s thrown the kitchen sink at Biden and not really been able to pull down Biden ’ s favorables @ @ @ @ @ @ @ turn the corner on COVID-19 before the election are diminishing after cases have begun to rise again in many states .
His campaign , somehow , is struggling to hold on to enough cash to run ads in the places it most needs to run them .
The New York Times and other news organizations are likely to continue publishing damaging stories on his taxes and personal finances from now until the election .
And now he ’ s seemingly lost the first debate .
If Trump intuits that he ’ s unlikely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not hard to imagine him escalating his anti-democratic rhetoric and behavior .
It ’ s also not hard to imagine this rhetoric further eroding his position in polls .
It ’ s highly unpopular in focus groups ( yes , take those with a huge grain of salt ) and Trump ’ s polling over the past several days has been particularly bad ( although there ’ s been a lot of other news , too ) .
So we could be headed for a vicious cycle where Trump increasingly gives up on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and voters increasingly give up on him .
But from a polling standpoint , this is one of the clearer elections to diagnose : Biden isn ’ t home-free , but he ’ s in a strong position .
Nonetheless , the outlook for what ’ s actually in store for America has rarely been more cloudy .

President Trump’s quest to win a second term is not in good shape. He entered Tuesday night’s debate with roughly a 7- or 8-point deficit in national polls, putting him further behind at this stage of the race than any other candidate since Bob Dole in 1996.
If we look at potential tipping-point states, the race is a bit closer, but not that much closer. After a couple of strong polls for Joe Biden earlier this week in Pennsylvania — the state that’s currently most likely to decide the election — Trump now trails there by 5 to 6 points. He’s down by about 7 points in Michigan and Wisconsin, meanwhile. Those states, along with Minnesota, Maine and New Hampshire — where Biden has also polled strongly lately — suggest that Biden is winning back some of the Obama-Trump white working-class voters who flocked to Trump four years ago. Indeed, Biden is as close to winning South Carolina or Alaska as Trump is to winning Michigan and Wisconsin, based on recent polls of those states.
At a time when Trump desperately needed a boost, the debate probably didn’t help him either — it may have hurt him. Every scientific poll we’ve seen had Trump losing the debate, some by narrow margins and some by wide ones.
That includes the poll FiveThirtyEight conducted with Ipsos, which surveyed the same group of voters before and after the debate. While the poll didn’t show a massive swing — most voters stuck to their initial preferences — more voters did rate Biden’s performance favorably, and Biden gained ground relative to Trump based on the number of voters who said they were certain to vote for him, roughly tantamount to a 3-point swing toward Biden in head-to-head polls.
How Trump could spark a full-blown election crisis | FiveThirtyEight
Now, I’m not predicting this will happen, but if Biden’s national lead were to expand to 9 or 10 points, which is consistent with the sorts of polling bounces we’ve seen in the past for candidates who were perceived to win debates — especially challengers debating an incumbent for the first time — Trump’s situation could become quite desperate.
To be clear, none of this means that Trump’s chances are kaput. As of this writing, our forecast still gives him around a 21 percent chance of winning the Electoral College. That’s not great, but it’s a lot better than zero.
But it’s possible Trump’s chances may decline further after post-debate polling begins to roll into our forecast. Furthermore, the mere passage of time helps Biden in our model, because every day that Trump doesn’t gain ground is a day when his fate becomes slightly more sealed. (Lots of people have already voted!) Case in point: In an election held today — Trump has no more time to make up ground — his chances would be 9 percent, not 21 percent, according to our forecast.
Then again, there are some possibilities that our model doesn’t account for, and they have become more pertinent after Trump has repeatedly refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power and declined to commit to respecting the election results. As we wrote when launching the forecast:
We assume that there are reasonable efforts to allow eligible citizens to vote and to count all legal ballots, and that electors are awarded to the popular-vote winner in each state. The model also does not account for the possibility of extraconstitutional shenanigans by Trump or by anyone else, such as trying to prevent mail ballots from being counted.
Let’s back up for a second. This is FiveThirtyEight’s fourth presidential election campaign. And in the previous three, there was at least some question about who was ahead in the stretch run of the race. John McCain, for instance, briefly pulled ahead of Barack Obama following the 2008 Republican convention, and Obama didn’t really solidify his lead until early October. In 2012, national polls were very tight between Obama and Mitt Romney following the first presidential debate, and remained fairly tight thereafter (although Obama always maintained an Electoral College edge). And people forget how close the 2016 race was for stretches of the campaign; it was not such a huge upset. In fact, Hillary Clinton led by only 1.4 points in our national polling average heading into the first debate that year.
But there isn’t any of that ambiguity this time. Since we launched our general election polling averages on June 18, Biden has never led by less than 6.6 points nationally. Literally only one national poll — a Rasmussen Reports poll that put Trump ahead by less than a full percentage point — has shown Trump leading by any margin during that period. It’s been an exceptionally stable race.
But, amazingly, that hasn’t really shaken people’s confidence in Trump’s ability to win. In our own poll with Ipsos, we found respondents thought Biden and Trump had roughly equally likely chances of winning. And maybe that boils down to three perpetual sources of anxiety I hear in conversation with liberal friends or liberal readers:
Trump could win the Electoral College despite losing the popular vote by a wide margin. There could be a large polling error in Trump’s favor. Trump could somehow steal the election.
All three are legitimate sources of concern for Biden backers. The first two are relatively easy to quantify, however. Indeed, the whole purpose of a model like FiveThirtyEight’s presidential forecast is to answer questions like those. The third one, however, is harder to get a handle on, so let’s talk about No. 1 and 2 first..
The Electoral College could still help Trump, but it only goes so far
The possibility of an Electoral College, popular vote split remains a point in Trump’s favor. In fact, there’s an 11 percent chance that Trump wins the Electoral College but not the popular vote in our forecast (but less than a 1 percent chance the other way around). At the same time, Biden’s strength in the Upper Midwest relative to Clinton’s — at least, if polls are correct there — potentially mitigates this disadvantage to some extent. The table below shows Biden’s probability of winning the Electoral College given various popular vote margins, according to our forecast as of Wednesday afternoon. And as you can see, Biden is only truly safe to win the Electoral College once he has a popular vote margin of 5 points or more! But, he’s a fairly heavy favorite with a 3- to 5-point margin, and has roughly break-even odds with a 2- to 3-point margin.
Biden’s favored, if he wins the popular vote by +2 to +3 points Chances of Biden winning the Electoral College under different popular vote scenarios, according to the FiveThirtyEight presidential forecast, as of Sept. 30 POPULAR VOTE MARGIN scenarios Biden’s chances
of winning the ELECTORAL COLLEGE Biden +6 to Biden +7 >99% Biden +5 to Biden +6 98 Biden +4 to Biden +5 93 Biden +3 to Biden +4 77 Biden +2 to Biden +3 54 Biden +1 to Biden +2 29 TIE to Biden +1 11 Trump +1 to TIE 3 Trump +2 to Trump +1 <1
So, for practical purposes, you can take Biden’s lead in national polls and subtract 2 or 2.5 points from it to infer his margin in tipping-point states. In other words, if he’s ahead by around 7.5 points in national polls, that’s more like the equivalent of a 5-point lead in the Electoral College. That’s still a reasonably large advantage; empirically, it’s not that easy to overcome a 5-point deficit at this stage of the race.
A big polling error could help Trump … or Biden
One of the misconceptions I hear about FiveThirtyEight’s forecast is that “it assumes that polls are right.” Actually, in some sense the whole purpose of the forecast is to estimate the chance that the polls are wrong. In 2016, the polls did show Clinton ahead, but between tight margins in tipping-point states and the large number of undecided voters, there was a fairly high probability — around 30 percent, according to our forecast — that Trump was going to win anyway.
So while a polling error is possible — indeed, our forecast assumes there’s likely additional error this year because of an uptick in mail voting — it would still take a bigger error than in 2016 for Trump to win.
Assume that current polls hold until Election Day, and subtract 3 points from Biden’s margin in every state (roughly the average error in swing state polls in 2016) … Biden still wins Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin fairly comfortably, and therefore, the Electoral College; he’d also be a slight favorite in Arizona. And as our friends at the Upshot have calculated, even if you had a polling error of the exact same magnitude in the exact same states as in 2016, Biden would still win, albeit narrowly.
Of course, nothing intrinsically rules out a larger polling error. We had one in 1948 — when Dewey didn’t defeat Truman, after all — and in 1980, when Ronald Reagan won in an epic landslide instead of the narrow margin that polls predicted.
But there’s no guarantee such an error would favor Trump. Historically, the direction of polling bias has not been predictable from cycle to cycle; the same polls that underestimated Trump in 2016 tended to underestimate Obama and Democrats in 2012, for instance. If anything, to the extent there are polling errors, they sometimes come in the opposite direction of what the conventional wisdom expects.
I want to spend more time on this topic in the coming days, so I won’t go on at too much length here. But for now, know that a 7-point Biden lead on Election Day could, indeed, turn into a 2-point Biden popular vote win where Trump narrowly wins the Electoral College.
As I wrote earlier in the piece, our forecast gives Trump about a 9 percent chance of winning an election held today despite his current deficit in polls — not bad when you’re 7 points down! But it’s about equally likely that a 7-point Biden lead could translate into a 12-point Biden win, in which he’d not only carry states like Georgia and Texas, but would also have a shot in South Carolina, Alaska and Montana.
Trump’s comments on respecting the election outcome are deeply worrisome, but it’s hard to estimate his chances of overturning the result
Hoo, boy. At some point I’m going to have to write a column about this too, I suppose. As I said at the outset, our forecast assumes that the election is free and fair — at least to the extent that past elections that we used to train the model were free and fair. (Throughout American history, there has always been plenty of voter suppression and voter disenfranchisement.)
But for now, let me advance a few propositions:
Even a small probability that the U.S. could become a failed or manifestly undemocratic state is worth taking seriously.
There are a wide range of things that Trump could attempt to do, many of which would be quite damaging to the country, but they are not necessarily equally likely to succeed.
to do, many of which would be quite damaging to the country, but they are not necessarily equally likely to succeed. Trump’s actions are much more likely to actually change the result of the election if the outcome is close, and right now, the most likely scenario is that Biden wins by a not-so-close margin.
Beyond that, it’s hard to estimate the probability that Trump could steal the election to any degree of precision. It requires, at a minimum, some knowledge of the probabilities in a free and fair election plus some knowledge of election law and how many votes could realistically come under dispute plus some theory of the institutional incentives of the Supreme Court and various other courts plus some opinions on how Congress might interpret the Constitution in the event of a disputed election. Maybe a panel of experts could get together and try to put together some reasonable bounds on the probability of various scenarios, but I don’t know that any individual could — certainly not me.
After Trump’s actions over the past few weeks, though, I wonder if there’s some tradeoff between Trump’s chances of winning legitimately and his willingness to engage in authoritarian rhetoric and behavior, even if it probably wouldn’t succeed at stealing the election. It’s not like this is coming entirely out of left field; Trump also said in 2016 that he wouldn’t necessarily respect the election results. But his recent statements have come at a moment of increasing peril for his campaign. It’s hard to know for sure, but I think Trump’s comments might be more tempered if he were 2 points ahead in Wisconsin instead of 7 points down.
It’s not easy to see which cards Trump has left to play or which contingencies could work in his favor enough for him to win — other than if the polls have been wrong all along.
Consider that Trump’s convention produced, at best, a very meager bounce in his favor. His attempt to pivot the campaign to a “law and order” theme fell completely flat in polls of the upper Midwest. He’s thrown the kitchen sink at Biden and not really been able to pull down Biden’s favorables. His hopes that we’d turn the corner on COVID-19 before the election are diminishing after cases have begun to rise again in many states. His campaign, somehow, is struggling to hold on to enough cash to run ads in the places it most needs to run them. The New York Times and other news organizations are likely to continue publishing damaging stories on his taxes and personal finances from now until the election. And now he’s seemingly lost the first debate.
If Trump intuits that he’s unlikely to win legitimately — it’s not hard to imagine him escalating his anti-democratic rhetoric and behavior. It’s also not hard to imagine this rhetoric further eroding his position in polls. It’s highly unpopular in focus groups (yes, take those with a huge grain of salt) and Trump’s polling over the past several days has been particularly bad (although there’s been a lot of other news, too).
So we could be headed for a vicious cycle where Trump increasingly gives up on trying to persuade or turn out voters and voters increasingly give up on him. But from a polling standpoint, this is one of the clearer elections to diagnose: Biden isn’t home-free, but he’s in a strong position. Nonetheless, the outlook for what’s actually in store for America has rarely been more cloudy.


fivethirthyeight--2020-09-30--The Debate Was One Of The Few Opportunities For Trump To Shake Up The Race. He Probably Didn’t.

The Debate Was One Of The Few Opportunities For Trump To Shake Up The Race .
He Probably Didn ’ @ @


fivethirthyeight--2020-09-30--Politics Podcast: Trump Interrupts To Point Of Chaos In First Debate

In a late-night installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast , the crew reacts to a chaotic first presidential debate .
@ @ @ @ @ Trump ’ s few remaining opportunities to shake up the dynamics of the 2020 race @ @ @ @ @ likely didn ’ t help him .
You can listen to the episode by clicking @ @ @ @ @ in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes , the ESPN App @ @ @ @ @ .
If you are new to podcasts , learn how to listen .
The FiveThirtyEight @ @ @ @ @ and Thursdays .
Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and @ @ @ @ @ a comment , question or suggestion for “ good polling vs. bad polling ” ?
@ @ @ @ @ , on Twitter or in the comments .

In a late-night installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew reacts to a chaotic first presidential debate. It was one of President Trump’s few remaining opportunities to shake up the dynamics of the 2020 race, but his aggressive interruptions likely didn’t help him.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.