Welcome to the master Wyatt's thoughts on the Election thread. I'ma try to hit everything i find interesting and want to express my opinion on in a rough order.

1. This is a day worth celebrating. Biden's victory over Trump is a triumph for Democracy, Love and every ideal of the Constitution and the Bible. Let no one diminish from the gravity of this moment. Trump led us the closest to fascism we've been since the 30's.

2020 is on track to be the deadliest year in American history. Joe Biden will be objectively better. If you don't believe that. You don't understand the stakes. Educate yourself.

2. Naysayers ain't wrong. The war was not won this week. Democrats will not have the mandate to reverse the recession, stave off climate change and unrig America. Through one lens the future looks grim. But let's not focus on that right now.

3. Polling was utterly deceitful in this race. Dems were convinced (half b/c of our hubris) that this would be a blowout. Maddeningly the error in polling wasn't even consistent (my state was rather accurate) but certain states were hilariously off.

Pollsters promised they had fixed their errors from last round and now they were even more off. There is a systematic error in polling that needs to be addressed before they can regain credibility.
From what i understand internal campaign polling for each side...

was a little better but not by much. Dems can't effectively deploy resources if they can't see the battlefield.
Biden up in Wisconsin by 17. Really?
Candidate in NC has a sexting scandal and it doesn't touch his numbers. Really?
We should have seen this coming.

btw i don't blame Nate Silver for any of this. I think 538 hasn't thrown enough pollsters under the bus but i'm pretty happy with the way they explained things to the American people before and during the election.

4. Strangely this outcome is very close to what was predicted back in March (sans the GA flip.) Liberal media really allowed themselves to get drunk on hope, myself included. I fear it may have made us sloppy.

5. The Republicans have demonstrated a devastating ability to turn out voters. They do not look like a party that is shrinking into nothingness as some Dem influencers have been predicting (for decades.) Fights in future elections will be even more bloody.

6. This is partially b/c Latinos are starting to flee to the Republicans. This is partially because Trump didn't spend this election calling Mexicans rapists, but there's been a theory that Republicans can appeal to Latinos for decades now.

Jeb Bush and Rick Perry did far better with Latinos in their states than the party nationally. There is a strand of Republicanism that appeals to that community and Dems need to match it. Imagine if Dems emphasized Latino support the way they emphasized Black support.

We need well known moderate Latino candidates running on kitchen table issues. The Dems need nationally recognized Latino party leaders and they need them now.

7. It seems confirmed at this point that Trump is weaker than the average Republican. Republican Congressional candidates did far better and my state was flipped by folk that voted for Joe Biden and against John Ossof.
This is why the party is cutting Trump loose.

8. Biden ran a very "beat Trump" campaign. We can't know if that hurt his down ballot races but a more policy focused message might have helped in the Senate.
We know what's popular in America.
Biden failed in Florida.
A minimum wage increase did not.

Wages, marijuana legalization, and protection of healthcare. Kitchen table policy needs to be the focus on the next race. Biden needs to spend this whole term talking up what the Republicans won't let him to for America.

9. Quick aside. I want to come back to an asterisk on #1. It is true that Biden and Harris are problematic and weak people. There is no denying that. My point is that they're a step in the right direction and getting where you want to go is all about momentum.

10. Was it really appropriate to wait so long to call this race? I think after two days of stasis media outlets got too nervous to want to risk a move. Feels like they left us in pointless suspense.

I'll pick this thread up tomorrow. I'm drunk and i gotta go to sleep.