It’s the Turnout, Stupid

My brother used to practice law in New Orleans. He took his first job out of law school with a firm whose senior partner was very politically connected. On election day, there were numerous stacks of cash on the large conference table in the partner’s spacious office with no effort to conceal it from associates or staff—it was considered normal. Very well-dressed young black men would arrive with bags, carefully count out some preset amount, and then depart. Their mission was to distribute the expected cash incentives to voters to turn out and vote.

There was also an odd young man of his acquaintance who was civic-minded enough to drive a vanful of selected voters to the precinct and then give them a ride to another precinct and…another.

In some precincts, when a voter showed up to vote, the person registering him or her would very loudly repeat the name so the party canvassers (barred from the actual voting area by law) could hear the name and check it off their lists so they could knock on the doors of those remaining to make sure they voted before the polls closed.

In my home state of Maryland, it was a running joke that the Baltimore graveyard that contained the remains of Edgar Allen Poe was a key swing precinct. (A spoilsport Republican governor got a law passed to mandate a check of voter rolls against the social security death list.)

With modern technology, none of those colorful practices are still needed to get out the vote. Elections are now determined by (a) maximizing preferred registrations and (b) procedures to compel maximum turnout regardless of the degree of enthusiasm of the voter (or his current residency or actual existence) by quasi-automatic voting.

“None of the above” (i.e., staying home) was once a key voting block. It can still be a particularly powerful voting block when many people sour on the ones they voted for in the last election but can’t bring themselves to vote for the alternative. Rich Democrats want to curtail that option for members of their party to generate the exact totals each election and they are succeeding.

See this depressing article, Ignore The Polls. Republicans Have A Major Voter Turnout Problem

While a long-used tool to predict election outcomes and margins, electoral polling has largely become obsolete because it can’t account for the highly sophisticated election machine Democrats have spent years building. On the nongovernmental side, left-wing nonprofits funded by leftist billionaires evade federal law by targeting and registering Democrat-friendly demographics, such as racial minorities, college-educated women, and young people. After these likely-Democrat voters are on the voter rolls, left-wing activists and groups chase and harvest these low-effort votes in the weeks leading up to Election Day.

It used to be that elderly and middle-class voters were the most reliable turnout voters and they tended to be conservative. Those of the lower economic strata were harder to mobilize, putting the Democrats at a strategic disadvantage. Now, the Trump coalition has a larger number of less-advantaged white voters who may not turn out en masse whereas Democrats have implemented the technology to garner the votes of their blocs regardless of candidate quality or voter enthusiasm.

Unless the GOP can tool up with a comparable turnout machine (and the means to rapidly challenge dubious Democratic registrations BEFORE the ballots are issued), performance will lag polling by an increasing amount every year.