Are Democrats Whistling Past the Graveyard?
b'A New York Times and Siena College poll released Nov. 5 showed Donald Trump leading Joe Biden in five of the six key swing states, with a notable jump in support among nonwhite and young voters. In response, Democrats freaked out.\\n\\nBut then two days later, voters across the country actually went to the polls, and Democrats and Democratic-associated policy did pretty well. In Kentucky, Andy Beshear held the governorship. Democrats took back the House of Delegates in Virginia. And Ohio voted for an amendment protecting abortion rights.\\n\\nI asked Mike Podhorzer, a longtime poll skeptic, to help me understand the apparent gap between the polls and the ballot box. Podhorzer was the longtime political director of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. And as the founder of the Analyst Institute, he was the godfather of the data-driven turn in Democratic campaign strategy. He also writes a newsletter on these topics called \\u201cWeekend Reading.\\u201d\\n\\nWe discuss the underlying assumptions behind polling methodologies and what that says about their results; how to square Biden\\u2019s unpopularity with the Democrats\\u2019 recent wins; why he thinks an anti-MAGA majority is Biden\\u2019s best bet to the White House and how that coalition doesn\\u2019t always map cleanly onto demographic data; what a newly energized labor movement might means for Biden; and much more.\\n\\nMentioned:\\n\\n\\u201cWe Gave Four Good Pollsters the Same Raw Data. They Had Four Different Results.\\u201d by Nate Cohn\\n\\nBook Recommendations:\\n\\n\\u201cPolitics and the English Language\\u201d by George Orwell\\n\\nTyranny, Inc. by Sohrab Ahmari\\n\\nCrashed by Adam Tooze\\n\\nThoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com.\\n\\nYou can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of \\u201cThe Ezra Klein Show\\u201d at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.\\n\\nThis episode of \\u201cThe Ezra Klein Show\\u201d was produced by Rollin Hu. Fact checking by Michelle Harris and Kate Sinclair. Mixing by Jeff Geld and Efim Shapiro. Our senior editor is Claire Gordon. The show\\u2019s production team also includes Emefa Agawu and Kristin Lin. Original music by Isaac Jones. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser. And special thanks to Carole Sabouraud.'