techwooded

  • 19 Posts
  • 65 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: July 19th, 2023

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  • The problem with exit polling, as with the problem with polling in general (exacerbated by the modern age), is that they’re voluntary. The simplest explanation is that a higher percentage of women answered the exit poll than men. Or that women who voted for Trump were less likely to answer the poll. Or the people lied when they answered the poll.

    There can also be statistics reasons for it too. Not knowing the methodology behind how this was collected, but you can also have selection effects. If I’m trying to run a statistical analysis on a population, I want as many respondents as possible to reduce the error and deviation, but I also have to operate with limited funds. Be much more efficient to post a few people up in higher density places like cities that tend to vote more blue anyways than having pollsters scour the backroads of Wyoming, for example, where I would wager a higher percentage of women voted for Trump.

    In the end, don’t put too much stock in pre-election polls, and definitely don’t put too much stock in exit polls. Think about it like this, if you got a phone call from a random number, would you pick up and answer questions about how you vote in such a controversial election? If the answer is no, then you know why polls aren’t accurate




  • techwoodedtoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlCan Puerto Ricans vote as expats?
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    1 month ago

    Don’t forget that these restrictions also apply to the Americans living in Guam, American Samoa, and the US Virgin Islands, as they all have the same status as Puerto Rico. It’s interesting too because citizens of the 50 states can vote absentee from other countries, and American Astronauts have voted from space. That would make Puerto Rico, Guam, US Virgin Islands, and American Samoa the only places in the universe an American can’t vote for President





  • As other have said, housing, at least in the US, has always been seen as an investment, and investments are supposed to appreciate in value. It is difficult to sell to political bases that one of two things must then be true: 1) People who bought houses 20+ years ago will have to lose equity on the house which they potentially were relying on for some amount of retirement, or 2) The government will have to step in and fill the gap (a la systems similar to agricultural subsidies). Neither of those things would you be able to sell to a wide enough base that they could be acted on.

    In the end, this was caused by two things. On a practical level, prices continued climbing while wages stagnated over the past 40 years. On a more philosophical level, I personally don’t think that necessities such as housing should be commodified.

    This also brings up the fact that single family homes, the predominant home type in the US, are not good from an environmental standpoint or an urban planning standpoint. It would be better to convert into duplexes and such. In the end, I agree that buying a home is way too much, but in the long run it may be good that the market is pushing more people towards lower impact forms of housing





    • Accidental Tech Podcast: Three dudes talking about tech and (mostly) Apple
    • The Allusionist: podcast about language and linguistics
    • The Bruenigs: Matt & Liz Bruenig talk about random stuff
    • Cortex: podcast about productivity by Myke Hurley & CGP Grey
    • Factually: Interviews with interesting people hosted by Adam Connover
    • Hello Internet (Dead): two dudes talking, GGP Grey & Brady Haran (Numberphile)
    • Intentionally Blank: Random conversations with Brandon Sanderson & Dan Wells
    • No Such Thing As a Fish: Intersting and odd facts by the team behind the British TV show QI
    • Puck Soup: Ice Hockey News and information
    • Stuff You Should Know: Funny podcast about all kinds of stuff
    • The Tennis Podcast: podcast about tennis
    • Ungeniused: brief episodes about interesting Wikipedia pages
    • The Unmade Podcast: mostly random stuff, but about pitching ideas for other podcasts
    • Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me: the NPR News quiz


  • For me I think part of it is more nostalgia for a certain relationship I had with this person, even if it wasn’t a close one, and my life during the time I knew them.

    I think that the internet has given us this almost elongation effect to personal relationships though. Some people are just meant to pass into our lives for a brief time then pass out of them, and that’s okay





  • Fairly far left myself. I agree with the person who said that

    The left is loyal to ideals, not people

    To me, one of those ideals is being anti-death penalty. I believe that no matter what the crime is, a government that claims to represent all people, as a democratic government theoretically does, can never justify the killing of one of those people by their hand. Were it up to me, they would be removed from office, prosecuted, tried, convicted, and tossed in jail for the rest of their natural life (which judging by the age demographic of the federal government, wouldn’t be too long).

    The prospect for an impeachment for treason raises some interesting questions about how the legal and political systems of the United States interact though. Because impeachment is a political process, impeaching a government official doesn’t constitute that a crime was committed, and committing a crime doesn’t necessarily impose grounds for impeachment. If the Vice President was impeached and removed from office due to committing treason and let’s say criminal proceedings were brought, there’s no precedent as to whether any of the evidence brought in the impeachment trial or the successful removal would count towards evidence of the treason trial itself. In the most extreme of cases that would likely never happen, a government official could be arrested, tried, convicted, and (under current law that I disagree with) executed without ever being impeached and leaving office.

    Also wanted to note that impeachment doesn’t just apply to the President, it applies to

    The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States

    Which means federal judges, cabinet officers, etc. Though most notably, no one in Congress