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Editors’ Blog / Analysis & Opinion News Live Blog Morning Memo Cafe / outside voices & analysis Muckraker / scandal & investigations Prime / Member Exclusives Podcast Features Memberships View Options Contribute Learn MoreNewsletters Subscribe Get TPM Merch Shop Now Follow TPM Send Comments and Tips about contact careers FAQ terms of use site status © 2024 TPM MEDIA LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ABOUT TIPS EDITORS’ BLOG JUMP TOEDITORS’ BLOG LIVE COVERAGE May 13, 2024 May 13, 2024 NYT-Siena Obsessing Addendum by Josh Marshall Let me expand a bit on today’s BackChannel about that Times-Siena poll and polling issues more generally. I mentioned keeping an eye out for the delta between Likely Voter screens and Registered Voter ones. As we’ve noted a few times, this has become a consistent pattern in this presidential race: Joe Biden does substantially better in likely voter polls. And this isn’t an arbitrary difference. It’s not like saying Trump does better in the NYT-Siena poll than he does in the ABC-Ipsos one. So I prefer the latter. A Likely Voter screen is the pollster’s attempt to poll the actual voting electorate as opposed to the population of registered voters. So that distinction is very key. And if they diverge you really want to be doing better with Likely Voters, as Biden is. Read More LIVE COVERAGE May 13, 2024 May 13, 2024 The Dismal (Polling) Science Member Newsletter by Josh Marshall If you’re continuing to rise and fall with the latest polls, you know that the NYT/Siena poll came out today with pretty unwelcome news for the Biden campaign. Biden is close to tied or just behind in the key midwestern states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, but he is far back in the sunbelt states of Arizona, Nevada and Georgia. Possible preview: if Biden won the first three and lost the second three he would win the Electoral College with 270 electoral votes to Trump’s 268. These are bad numbers. There’s no arguing that. The NYT/Siena poll hasn’t been friendly to Biden, but it’s also a quality poll. I would recommend focusing on the averages which suggest a slightly, though not dramatically, different picture. Also, pay close attention to Likely Voter screens as opposed to Registered Voter screens. I won’t lie to you. I don’t like the look of this poll. But the overall picture continues to be one in which the polls have continued to tighten, albeit not as quickly as I’d like, since around the beginning of March. But I want to flag a different point: Congress. JOIN TO READ MORE LIVE COVERAGE May 13, 2024 May 13, 2024 Back to the UCLA Overnight Attack by Josh Marshall Remember a week ago I was trying to find out more information or really just any information about who the assailants were when a group of pro-Israel” rioters raided the pro-Palestine encampment at UCLA on April 30th. I’ve mentioned a few times hearing pervasive rumors (common knowledge,” the origin of which is unclear) which I wasn’t publishing because I couldn’t verify them. But on Friday The Guardian published a story confirming that a far-right Armenian-American man named Narek Palyan had been photographed both at one of the daytime counterprotests and then on the evening of April 30th, but still hours before the overnight assault. Read More LIVE COVERAGE May 11, 2024 May 11, 2024 Tragedy and Folly by Josh Marshall It gets lost in the myriad headlines at the moment about Rafah, weapons cut offs, Biden, horrific civilian loss of life, etc. But there’s a short piece in the Times of Israel this afternoon that captures a dimension of what’s happening right now in Israel that is mostly off the radar in the U.S. The piece is about a reported blow up between Netanyahu and IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi. Specifically, it has the latter telling Netanyahu that because he refuses to make diplomatic arrangements for the post-war government of Gaza, the IDF is having to go back to fight again in areas it already took over. In some cases they’re having to go back and fight for the same ground a third time! (Here’s another article in Haaretz on how the IDF is now going back into northern Gaza, which they conquered back in the fall. Privately the IDF says Hamas has reestablished control there because there’s no day-after plan, which is a diplomatic to-do item. If you blow it up and leave why wouldn’t they just go back?) Netanyahu refuses to do that because there’s really no way to plan for the future without blowing up his governing coalition. But without some plan, the Israeli army is reduced to doing something like pushing water up a hill with its hands. The article is replete with examples of heads of the army or intelligence services trying to get someone to give them a strategy, or actually more than a strategy, just a goal. And it has Netanyahu getting mad because they’re going to the defense minister, himself a former high-level IDF general. It’s not even a question of disagreeing on strategy really — that’s for the political leadership to decide. It’s refusing to come up with any strategy at all. Read More LIVE COVERAGE May 9, 2024 May 9, 2024 Facts On the Dining Hall? Sabra Hummus was the Main Get For UCR Protestors by Josh Marshall Earlier this month, University of California at Riverside, a campus in the UC system, reached a negotiated settlement with the encampment organizers on the campus which will allow the peaceful deconstruction of the university encampment. Initial reports suggested that UCR had in the agreement opened the door to possible disinvestment. But it’s more complicated than that. The individual UC schools don’t control their endowments. They are controlled by an investment office for the whole system. They agreed to create a task force to explore the removal of UCR’s endowment” from that central office and if that can happen to invest in a manner that will be financially and ethically sound,” with a particular emphasis on arms manufacturers. Read More LIVE COVERAGE May 9, 2024 Listen To This: Cricket’s Revenge by Jackie Wilhelm A new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast is live! This week, Kate and Josh discuss Kristi Noem’s epic self-immolation, presidential polling and the latest in Trump’s many trials. You can listen to the new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast here . LIVE COVERAGE May 9, 2024 May 9, 2024 Trump Attacks the Jews as Biden Puts His Foot Down Member Newsletter by Josh Marshall If any Jewish person voted for Joe Biden, they should be ashamed of themselves.” That’s ex-President Trump this morning as he headed into the courtroom in New York City. This is worth everyone taking a close look at. When Trump feels cornered and scared one of his go-tos is to lash out at American Jews. The overwhelming percentage of American Jews voted for President Biden in 2020. And there’s no pollster or political prognosticator who doesn’t think the same will happen this year. So this isn’t some hypothetical — if that happened they should be ashamed. It did happen and will again. While the precise percentage of American Jews voting for each party can shift a bit cycle to cycle, Jews are, along with African-Americans, the most consistent Democratic voting block in the country and have been so for the last century. And for this they should be ashamed of themselves, according to the Republican nominee. JOIN TO READ MORE LIVE COVERAGE May 8, 2024 May 9, 2024 Cutting the Spigot by Josh Marshall What was first communicated by reports of a slowdown in weapons transfers and then confirmed in leaks has now been brought into the open: Joe Biden is saying he will cut off the supply of heavy munitions (big bombs from the sky) if Israel goes ahead with a major ground incursion into Rafah, the southernmost city in the Gaza Strip, which is both the last refuge of Hamas’ intact battalions and hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians who have fled other parts of the strip over the last six months. This is in addition to the city’s normal civilian population. I have seen some...