Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Dr. Strangelove]

The House Intel Committee has abruptly ended the Russia Investigation and the House GOp has already written a full report and totally cleared Trump and everyone on the campaign of any wrong-doing. Oh and Republicans are leaking details of the report to Fox before Democrats are even allowed to look at it, lol

Also important: “We disagree with the Intelligence Community’s position that Putin favored Trump,” Conaway told Fox News Monday. He said he had “no contact” with the White House during the probe.

So House Republican are explictly going to say in this report that our Intel agencies (all of them) don't know what they're doing and the American people need to put their trust in House Republicans. BTW, don't forget to vote this November!!

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/03/12/house-intel-finds-no-evidence-collusion-between-trump-campaign-and-russia.html

[Kapture1]

Donnie Jr, Kushner, and Manafort met with Russian individuals (in Trump Tower) that Donnie Jr. had been told were from the Russian government and had dirt to spill on Clinton. That's not successful collusion, of course, but it's pretty demonstrable that the Trump campaign would have accepted help from Russian spies in order to win if the opportunity ever arose.

That incident alone justifies the investigation, IMO, but some here will disagree.

That Russian chick met with the CEO of Fusion GPS just before and just after that meeting.

But if you to talk successful collusion, Hillary paid a Brittish spy to dig up dirt from Russians, and that info was used to grant a FISA warrant to spy on the Trump campaign.


Hillary purchased a FISA warrant.

[Kapture1]

The House Intel Committee has abruptly ended the Russia Investigation and the House GOp has already written a full report and totally cleared Trump and everyone on the campaign of any wrong-doing. Oh and Republicans are leaking details of the report to Fox before Democrats are even allowed to look at it, lol

Also important: ?We disagree with the Intelligence Community?s position that Putin favored Trump,? Conaway told Fox News Monday. He said he had ?no contact? with the White House during the probe.

So House Republican are explictly going to say in this report that our Intel agencies (all of them) don't know what they're doing and the American people need to put their trust in House Republicans. BTW, don't forget to vote this November!!

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018...nd-russia.html

Given half of their facebook buys were pro Hillary, as well as the Not My President anti Trump Rally just after the election in NY.

We have Hillary emails, that per assange, were not the result of the Russian government, taken from a server that was never examined by the forensics guys at the FBI.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Julian Assange is very trustworthy. Only wants what's best for America

[Kapture1]

Julian Assange is very trustworthy. Only wants what's best for America

His organization's reputation is far and away better than any of the outlets you quote everyday.


So, the House Intel Committee concluded no collusion... that must mean they are all Russian agents.

[Dr. Strangelove]

His organization's reputation is far and away better than any of the outlets you quote everyday.


So, the House Intel Committee concluded no collusion... that must mean they are all Russian agents.

No, that Committee was filled with partisan hacks...on both sides. It was never a serious investigation from the start and turned into a cesspool of leaks and dishonesty. I'm glad it's been shutdown. Let more serious people take the reins from here.

[iam416]

That’s true. My guess is that Mueller will not find collusion, but will go out of his way to say that there was a basis for the investigation and that the FBI/DOJ acted properly. He'll also probably be very critical of PDJT's association with Manafort and, to a lesser extent, Gates. I feel pretty confident in the first prediction and less so about the rest.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Back to PA-18 for a bit..the importance of the race is being a little overstated because the district will be radically redesigned by November. That said, it's not unimportant either.

Probably the last poll that will come was put out by Monmouth today. It shows Lamb ahead by 6 points. What's interesting is they ran their numbers through 3 different models (based on high or low turnout) and Lamb was ahead in all 3.

https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/monmouthpoll_pa_031218/

It might not be enough. Who knows? The Dems chose a good candidate though and the Republicans nominated a sad-sack, pasty, state legislator. From a lot of reporters who are solid I've heard anecdotes about how the Dems were far better organized and energetic, and this Saccone guy is a terrible fundraiser who had to be bailed out by national conservative organizations. In fact, even some Republicans on the ground complain that Saccone seems to spend as little time in public as possible.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Found this incredible graphic today that shows just how much more Republican SW Pennsylvania has become versus 18 years ago.

[ame]https://twitter.com/databyler/status/973282689200648193[/ame]

[iam416]

It’s not insignificant. Candidates will always matter a great deal, but it’s a 15 point district and candidates don’t account for all of that.

Also, go to Mahoning County Wikipedia page and look at how the voting has shifted. Amazing. Do it for all Ohio counties!

[hack]

On the right side of history, with Devin Nunes. Good stuff.

I appreciate your attempt to bring it back to the big picture, SLF. Could add, just in terms of USG processes, that the administration refuses to comply with the law and implement various sanctions against Russia.

[Dr. Strangelove]

It’s not insignificant. Candidates will always matter a great deal, but it’s a 15 point district and candidates don’t account for all of that.

Also, go to Mahoning County Wikipedia page and look at how the voting has shifted. Amazing. Do it for all Ohio counties!

Heh, over the course of a month, I actually threw together a spreadsheet of the 200 largest counties in the country and how their political allegiances had changed over time from 1972 to the present. Now I used the current Top 200 rather than the largest in any given year, but there's been a dramtic shift of urban areas towards the Dems over the past 40 years (and I imagine a similar shift towards the Republicans in rural and mainly-white depressed areas).

1972 and 1984 are sort of outliers because Nixon/Reagan won in enormous landslides, but:

* 1972: Nixon won 85 of the largest 100 counties
* 1976: Ford won 48 of the largest 100 counties
* 1980: Reagan won 69 of the 100 largest counties

* 2008: McCain won 12
* 2012: Romney won 13
* 2016: Trump won 12

The trend is there even in red states. Harris, Dallas, and Bexar Counties, TX were all reliably Republican in the 70's and 80's but have voted Democrat three straight elections. People forget that Long Island, Staten Island, and the New Jersey suburbs were heavily Republican as recently as the mid-80's. Miami-Fort Lauderdale, Tampa, and Orlando were once dominated by Republicans.

Nixon won Orange County, FL (Orlando) by 60 points in 1972! Reagan won it by around 40 points both times. But Obama won it by double digits both times and Hillary won it by 24 points.

One of the few counties that's gone in the opposite direction is Westmoreland County, PA, which makes up part of the PA-18 and is mostly eastern Pittsburgh suburbs. Westmoreland County voted for a Democrat for six straight elections, from 1976 to 1996. But beginning in 2000 they switched to Republican and have gotten more and more intensely Republican since. Trump won there by 31 points! But on the other hand, the county's population peaked in 1980 and has shrunk from 390k to 355k today.

Interesting perspective on migratory patterns and how both citizen views change and party stances change.

[iam416]

That’s actually really interesting. Have you tracked “ring counties”? It’d be interesting to see those numbers both in terms of total numbers and splits. Perhaps you can track by MSA?

[Dr. Strangelove]

That’s actually really interesting. Have you tracked “ring counties”? It’d be interesting to see those numbers both in terms of total numbers and splits. Perhaps you can track by MSA?

MSA could be tough because they keep changing the definition of those and started using that "CSA" designation too. Counties, at least, are stable over time. But yeah, looking at MSAs would be pretty interesting.

Republicans are still on top in many of Counties #101-200, probably over half of them actually. But once the population rises above 500,000 things really start to skew Democrat. A lot of those are ring counties, just off the top of my head. The DC suburbs are an easy example...Montgomery County, MD, with around a million people now, went from being Nixon/Reagan country to voting for Obama/Clinton by 40+ points. Baltimore County, Maryland (which contains none of Baltimore City) was once heavily Republican but has voted Dem 7 straight elections now.

In Ohio...Mahoning County had a big swing this past election but was still over 60% for Obama. The bigger story in Ohio is probably how much Franklin County and Hamilton County have changed since the 70s. Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and Bush I all won Hamilton County by AT LEAST 20 points. From 1992 to 2004 the Republicans did much worse there. And since then, Obama won twice and Hillary once.

Incidentally, Delaware County is still reliably Republican but back in the 70's-80's, Republican candidates routinely got 65-70%+ of the vote. For the past three elections it's been closer to 55-60%.

[iam416]

Yeah, so DelCo is perfect example. Given the huge population jump there I’d bet the Rs run bigger margins now than when they were at 70.

So, the Ds are losing ground in every Appalachia county.