Elections Serious Question: Why are Biden and Trump Going to win the Primaries?

[chardog]

I want to preface this post by saying the question asked in the thread title is not rhetorical. I’m not American, I’m Canadian. We do not have anything equivalent to primaries here for choosing the leaders of our political parties. If a Canadian wants a say in who will lead their party (and with it, the ability to have a say in who will be prime minister if the party wins the election) then they have pay to join a party, go to a party convention and then vote in a leadership race, which depending on a political party’s bylaws can only come every once in a very long time.

So as an outsider looking in, the primaries look amazing - the ability for all Americans to have a say in who will be their party’s nominee in the general election for president. So given this amazing opportunity and privilege, why is it a veritable certainty that Biden and Trump are going to be their party’s respective nominees again?

When I look at Trump dominating the primaries so far I don’t really get it. I understand that Trump is extremely popular with his ride or die base, but I’m surprised that there doesn’t seem to be a majority or even sizeable minority of Republican voters that don’t want him and would rather have any other Republican governor, Senator or Congressman running. Leaving aside the issue as to whether or not Trump was a good president or not during his first term it just strikes me as odd that people would think that perhaps someone else without all the baggage might be preferable. Yet Trump is slaughtering his opponents without even lifting a finger, having sat out all the debates. Like am I just underestimating how many republicans are actually all-in on Trump, or is it a case of only Trump’s supporters even participating in primary voting.

Now, as for Biden, I never understood how he got the nomination in 2020 in the first place, but why is he seemingly not being challenged by anyone else from the party this time? His popularity isn’t good, and the guy’s cognitive ability is frankly terrifying in my opinion. It would seem to be that he should be easily beatable by some other democrat politicians, but he doesn’t seem to be facing any major challenges.

So yeah, as a non-American I don’t understand how four years later it’s a veritable certainty that Americans are going to be left with only these two awful candidates to vote for in November. How or why did we get here?

Not only are you underestimating how much republicans love trump, you are underestimating the love for trump from all Americans

 

[Beechwood]

I've seen polling saying a great many Americans are not happy about another Biden/Trump election rematch. There is a desire for other candidates this election.

With Trump, most feel he is being wrongly prosecuted by Biden and the Democrats. As a result many are rallying behind Trump. The prosecution of Trump by Democrats might have been designed to undermine Trump and make him less popular. Instead the opposite has happened. The more Democrats prosecute Trump, with phony charges, the more popular Trump becomes.

Many Democrats have expressed a desire for Biden to step down, not run. Of late I've been seeing articles speculating that this will happen before the election. One problem with that idea is that Joe Biden has is his son, and other family members have done some ethically challenging acts. Some Biden family members might end up being charged for criminal acts. As president Biden receives a lot of donation money. if Biden were to step down and not run for President those donations, helpful for paying for lawyers, goes away.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

I want to preface this post by saying the question asked in the thread title is not rhetorical. I’m not American, I’m Canadian. We do not have anything equivalent to primaries here for choosing the leaders of our political parties. If a Canadian wants a say in who will lead their party (and with it, the ability to have a say in who will be prime minister if the party wins the election) then they have pay to join a party, go to a party convention and then vote in a leadership race, which depending on a political party’s bylaws can only come every once in a very long time.

So as an outsider looking in, the primaries look amazing - the ability for all Americans to have a say in who will be their party’s nominee in the general election for president. So given this amazing opportunity and privilege, why is it a veritable certainty that Biden and Trump are going to be their party’s respective nominees again?

When I look at Trump dominating the primaries so far I don’t really get it. I understand that Trump is extremely popular with his ride or die base, but I’m surprised that there doesn’t seem to be a majority or even sizeable minority of Republican voters that don’t want him and would rather have any other Republican governor, Senator or Congressman running. Leaving aside the issue as to whether or not Trump was a good president or not during his first term it just strikes me as odd that people would think that perhaps someone else without all the baggage might be preferable. Yet Trump is slaughtering his opponents without even lifting a finger, having sat out all the debates. Like am I just underestimating how many republicans are actually all-in on Trump, or is it a case of only Trump’s supporters even participating in primary voting.

Now, as for Biden, I never understood how he got the nomination in 2020 in the first place, but why is he seemingly not being challenged by anyone else from the party this time? His popularity isn’t good, and the guy’s cognitive ability is frankly terrifying in my opinion. It would seem to be that he should be easily beatable by some other democrat politicians, but he doesn’t seem to be facing any major challenges.

So yeah, as a non-American I don’t understand how four years later it’s a veritable certainty that Americans are going to be left with only these two awful candidates to vote for in November. How or why did we get here?

Without reading any other posts in the thread, I'd explain both like this -

Most Presidents win reelection with fewer votes than they initially won, and Trump lost reelection with 10 million additional votes. That proves he won over many people with his first term, which was great for three years and Covid was to blame for the last one, mostly.

With Biden in 2020, he was the DNC pick due to his connections he made with a half-century career in Washington DC, and the intelligence agencies, mainstream media, and social media corporations were all on his side hiding negative stories about him (Hunter's laptop).
For 2024, once again, he's the DNC pick so they haven't entertained any primary challengers.
But I'm of the opinion Biden cannot hide his obvious cognitive decline any longer so 'they' will somehow replace him on the ballot with....whomever 'they' choose to be a puppet. 'They' being whomever runs the executive branch, because it obviously isn't Biden.
They'll replace him when its convenient and get the mainstream media behind it to give their choice the 'Obama Celebrity/Messiah 2008' treatment to hopefully win over Trump come November.

Will it be Kamala Harris? Doubtful. Her poll numbers are worse than Biden's, she's very dislikable, and she's horrible in interviews.

Gavin Newsome is the #1 choice... probably.

 

[TrueBias]

Jack's insistence in every thread that Biden is doing a great job is concerning. Jack would allow Joe to fuck his husband. His partisanship is quite disgusting

After watching a mix of bidens trips, falls, and getting lost vids, I laughed but thought, ok wtf. Jerkoffs deliberately voted for this poor potato cuz they hate trump. Now, we have all these problems and this geezer has his personal problems getting worse.

Sick ass people putting him through this.

 

[Limit Smasher]

What happened between today and yesterday that caused the betting odds for Donald Trump to win the election to change so much?

Biden went from +200 to +300 on Oddschecker and Smarkets is now giving Trump a 48% chance to win today and it was like 34% yesterday.

Was it just because Trump won Nevada?

 

[My Spot]

What happened between today and yesterday that caused the betting odds for Donald Trump to win the election to change so much?

Biden went from +200 to +300 on Oddschecker and Smarkets is now giving Trump a 48% chance to win today and it was like 34% yesterday.

Was it just because Trump won Nevada?

Biden gave a speech last night after the report about classified documents and his supposedly poor memory was released.

 

[jeskola]

America is a diseased dog that needs to be put down

fuck off

 

[avenue94]

Well even if it’s abnormal to challenge an incumbent in a primary, given his current approval ratings and concerns about his age you’d think Biden would be the exception for democrats to worry about his ability to do the job for four more years, till he’s 86.

One of the institutional weaknesses of the Democratic party has been a failure to develop a good bench of candidates over the past decade or so. So there isn't really anyone else to tap even if the party wanted to change candidates.

 

[Law Talkin’ Guy]

What happened between today and yesterday that caused the betting odds for Donald Trump to win the election to change so much?

Biden went from +200 to +300 on Oddschecker and Smarkets is now giving Trump a 48% chance to win today and it was like 34% yesterday.

Was it just because Trump won Nevada?

Probably the special counsel declining to charge Biden on account of his dementia.

 

[Fox by the Sea]

What happened between today and yesterday that caused the betting odds for Donald Trump to win the election to change so much?

Biden went from +200 to +300 on Oddschecker and Smarkets is now giving Trump a 48% chance to win today and it was like 34% yesterday.

Was it just because Trump won Nevada?

do these bookkeepers know trump might go to jail?
very optimistic odds.

 

[Morning Star]

People like to whine and complain about how shitty everything is all the time and how things need to change, but at the end of the day they vote for the person closer to their side they think can win. @DEVILsSON is spot on most American's votes don't even really matter since it will only be 5-6 States determining the outcome. Hell I think I could accurately pick the outcome of every State, with the exception of 4.

 

[Jack V Savage]

I've seen polling saying a great many Americans are not happy about another Biden/Trump election rematch. There is a desire for other candidates this election.

With Trump, most feel he is being wrongly prosecuted by Biden and the Democrats. As a result many are rallying behind Trump. The prosecution of Trump by Democrats might have been designed to undermine Trump and make him less popular. Instead the opposite has happened. The more Democrats prosecute Trump, with phony charges, the more popular Trump becomes.

It's not Democrats (or Biden--WTF?) prosecuting Trump. It's the legal system, and I don't think most Americans generally support allowing politicians to commit crimes with no consequences. That's just Trump supporters.

 

[JudoThrowFiasco]

Because that is who the population voted for (aside from Biden being an incumbent) The US has arguably the most democratic party nomination process in the world, this is what the voters wanted.

 

[avenue94]

What happened between today and yesterday that caused the betting odds for Donald Trump to win the election to change so much?

Biden went from +200 to +300 on Oddschecker and Smarkets is now giving Trump a 48% chance to win today and it was like 34% yesterday.

Was it just because Trump won Nevada?

Betting odds are not predictions, they are market signals to drive betting action. That's a very important difference that most people don't grasp.

Most Presidents win reelection with fewer votes than they initially won, and Trump lost reelection with 10 million additional votes. That proves he won over many people with his first term, which was great for three years and Covid was to blame for the last one, mostly.

That's not really what happened. 2020 had a spike in voting turnout on both sides due to Trump, as well as a larger than average increased in VAP and to a lesser extent VEP. Most of these new voters didn't go to Trump, as evidenced by the wide loss in popular voting.

Because that is who the population voted for (aside from Biden being an incumbent) The US has arguably the most democratic party nomination process in the world, this is what the voters wanted.

It's less that the US has a very democratic party nomination process and more that parties in the US are very weak compared to most parliamentary systems.

 

[Chad R. Thundercock]

America is a diseased dog that needs to be put down and its leadership is reflective of this.

Go fuck yourself, Hamas sympathizer.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

That's not really what happened. 2020 had a spike in voting turnout on both sides due to Trump, as well as a larger than average increased in VAP and to a lesser extent VEP. Most of these new voters didn't go to Trump, as evidenced by the wide loss in popular voting.

You didn't necessarily contradict anything I said.

In 2020 Trump got 10 million more votes than in 2016.

Obviously, Biden got more.

 

[mkess101]

Betting odds are not predictions, they are market signals to drive betting action. That's a very important difference that most people don't grasp.


That's not really what happened. 2020 had a spike in voting turnout on both sides due to Trump, as well as a larger than average increased in VAP and to a lesser extent VEP. Most of these new voters didn't go to Trump, as evidenced by the wide loss in popular voting.

It's less that the US has a very democratic party nomination process and more that parties in the US are very weak compared to most parliamentary systems.

Betting odds aren't predictions but when there's news that motivates the books to move lines in anticipation of where they see action coming, it's hardly irrelevant.

Books obviously aren't gonna try to drive action from the public toward who they feel will win. If they think Biden still has a great chance, making his odds more appealing to the public than it previously was isn't what they'd do (duh).

Quite obviously the events of the past 24 hours have the books feeling that the betting public will tilt toward Trump more than previously. And unlike sports, the betting public are actually a subset of those who will determine this outcome so line movement is probably more important than with a sporting event.

 

[Fergelmince]

I want to preface this post by saying the question asked in the thread title is not rhetorical. I’m not American, I’m Canadian. We do not have anything equivalent to primaries here for choosing the leaders of our political parties. If a Canadian wants a say in who will lead their party (and with it, the ability to have a say in who will be prime minister if the party wins the election) then they have pay to join a party, go to a party convention and then vote in a leadership race, which depending on a political party’s bylaws can only come every once in a very long time.

So as an outsider looking in, the primaries look amazing - the ability for all Americans to have a say in who will be their party’s nominee in the general election for president. So given this amazing opportunity and privilege, why is it a veritable certainty that Biden and Trump are going to be their party’s respective nominees again?

When I look at Trump dominating the primaries so far I don’t really get it. I understand that Trump is extremely popular with his ride or die base, but I’m surprised that there doesn’t seem to be a majority or even sizeable minority of Republican voters that don’t want him and would rather have any other Republican governor, Senator or Congressman running. Leaving aside the issue as to whether or not Trump was a good president or not during his first term it just strikes me as odd that people would think that perhaps someone else without all the baggage might be preferable. Yet Trump is slaughtering his opponents without even lifting a finger, having sat out all the debates. Like am I just underestimating how many republicans are actually all-in on Trump, or is it a case of only Trump’s supporters even participating in primary voting.

Now, as for Biden, I never understood how he got the nomination in 2020 in the first place, but why is he seemingly not being challenged by anyone else from the party this time? His popularity isn’t good, and the guy’s cognitive ability is frankly terrifying in my opinion. It would seem to be that he should be easily beatable by some other democrat politicians, but he doesn’t seem to be facing any major challenges.

So yeah, as a non-American I don’t understand how four years later it’s a veritable certainty that Americans are going to be left with only these two awful candidates to vote for in November. How or why did we get here?

And a lot of people seriously don't get why someone would vote for this waste of skin

 

[avenue94]

You didn't necessarily contradict anything I said.

In 2020 Trump got 10 million more votes than in 2016.

Obviously, Biden got more.

What demographics do you think he won over versus 2016 exactly? There are a handful, but most of it was effectively squeezing blood from tapped out demographics. My point is to assume a trend from a sample size of two is a huge stretch.

Betting odds aren't predictions but when there's news that motivates the books to move lines in anticipation of where they see action coming, it's hardly irrelevant

A better way of putting this: bookies are only as accurate in predictions as the average American voter is. Which isn't very accurate, especially this far out. People need to remember that bookies don't have any interest in their odds being accurate probabilities. Their only interest is getting enough coverage on both ends.

And unlike sports, the betting public are actually a subset of those who will determine this outcome so line movement is probably more important than with a sporting event.

There isn't really much evidence of this. Bettor vs polling accuracy has been studied for decades.

 

[mkess101]

What demographics do you think he won over versus 2016 exactly? There are a handful, but most of it was effectively squeezing blood from tapped out demographics. My point is to assume a trend from a sample size of two is a huge stretch.

A better way of putting this: bookies are only as accurate in predictions as the average American voter is. Which isn't very accurate, especially this far out. People need to remember that bookies don't have any interest in their odds being accurate probabilities. Their only interest is getting enough coverage on both ends.

There isn't really much evidence of this. Bettor vs polling accuracy has been studied for decades.

Okay...THEORETICALLY betting on politics and line movement would have more relevance due to bettors also being voters (vs bettors just being spectators when it comes to sports).

But again you're simplifying how the books operate. This is an area I know extremely well. Not just having been someone who's been a profitable bettor for a long time (to be transparent, not on politics) but as someone with a close friend and a relative that were both involved in setting lines (and moving them) at major Vegas casinos.

Books generally want roughly equal action on both sides of a line (although it's a misnomer to believe they NEVER take a side, because there are times they do--not from inability to get enough action on one side but by design). But to get the coverage you're talking about, they are taking accurate probabilities into account too.