Nobody knows anything

You determine what happens on Election Day

Photo by BP Miller on Unsplash

I saw a headline the other day that drew my attention: “No one really has any clue about what’s going to happen in the midterms.”

It sat atop an op-ed by Kurt Bardella in the Los Angeles Times, which argued that the media is too fixated on polling.

No surprise, there.

As a 30-year veteran of the news business, most of it as a political writer, I can attest the powerful pull of polling in covering elections.

In the last few weeks, that fascination with polling has led the punditocracy to the narrative that an unstoppable Republican “red wave” is building – and just in time for Election Day, too.

The story essentially is this: Democrats saw their high point over the summer in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s abortion decision, but with gas prices and inflation still high – and President Biden’s popularity ratings still low – the electorate is coalescing around the party out of power, pointing to a big night for Republicans.

It may be true.

Some of the recent news reporting pointing to Democrats investing in races they shouldn’t have to bother with, like the New York governor’s race, should be troubling for the party.

If Democrats have to worry about reliably blue New York, the reasoning goes, next Tuesday will be a catastrophe for them in battleground states.

Again, it may be true. But Bardella’s column reminds me of the old line by screenwriter William Goldman, who once said this about predicting which movies will succeed at the box office: “Nobody knows anything.”

This is true in politics, too, though it’s not fashionable to admit it.

Nobody has ever really known for sure what will happen in an election.

Only the voters, collectively, provide the real answer.

For his part, Bardella points to polling misses in recent years to bolster the idea that nobody has a clue what will happen this Tuesday.

In addition, some pundits have suggested that Republican pollsters are flooding the zone with surveys that paint a rosy picture for the GOP, purposely adding to the red wave narrative.

That seems a bit Machiavellian to me, but over my career I have come to the conclusion that precious little happens in politics by accident.

Still, I tend to have a level of trust in polls; and I know some pollsters are more trustworthy than others. But I also know it’s not always a good idea to trust what the pundits do with those poll numbers. Too often, they fail to emphasize their limitations. I’ve been guilty of that myself.

What’s most worrisome about the incessant wave of tea-leaf reading, however, is that it may discourage turnout; it may convince some voters they have nothing to gain because the outcome already is certain. As a result, they’ll just stay home out of a sense of futility.

That’s dangerous, especially for local candidates down the ballot, who often aren’t so tied to ideology – and who have the most direct impact on the lives of people in their communities.

When people don’t vote in these races – because they believe the outcome in top-of-the-ticket races are already settled – they surrender their most potent political power: the power to determine how we are governed locally.

One example: The proposed state constitutional amendment that would subject gun regulations to “strict scrutiny” in the courts. Only three other states have approved such a measure, and the consequences are unknown. If voters accept it here, it could be harder to sustain commonsense gun regulations. It’s vital that this amendment be defeated, as a letter from Clinton County’s retired sheriff, Rick Lincoln, said the other day in the North Scott Press.

For that and many other reasons, I hope people won’t stay home this year. Far too many ignore non-presidential election cycles in the first place.

When a 53% turnout among the voting-age population is considered an amazing achievement, as it was in the 2018 midterms, that’s not a good track record.

As a regular voter, I confess I don’t understand why so many people stay away from the polls.

There are myriad reasons. One thing that often gets the blame is the sludge of political ads that run this time of year.

I can understand why that might turn people off.

Nobody should trust a TV ad to tell the truth. Politicians and their handlers are experts at manipulation, and advertisements are the weapons of their cynicism.

Look at Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds’ latest TV ad.

Amid images of sunny skies, Iowa’s governor touts the state’s virtues, cleverly saying at one point that among them is our ability to know “boys from girls.”

The line is expertly designed to feed into the culture wars and bait reporters and others into amplifying it, even if it has little to do with the real challenges facing the state.

At the same time, this one-liner allows the ad to mislead without challenge.

An example: Reynolds falsely claims that Iowa didn’t have shutdowns during the pandemic. Sorry, governor, but we did. You ordered it. You also ordered a mask mandate, albeit after the 2020 election and weeks after medical professionals urged you to do so.

Here’s another example: The idea that Iowa’s “record low unemployment” is Reynolds’ doing. (News flash: Iowa almost always has a low unemployment rate, especially relative to other states. Second news flash: This is true no matter what party is in power. Third news flash: The governor’s policies have practically nothing to do with it. The free market, direction of the national economy and demographic trends tend to determine the shape of Iowa’s labor force, not some politician in Des Moines.)

Democrats mislead in their ads, too.

Here in the Quad-Cities, TV ads targeting Republican Mike Thoms in a hotly contested state Senate race in Illinois have been deeply misleading, especially claims that Thoms, Rock Island’s mayor, is a habitual tax raiser who tried to sell off the city’s water and sewer service.

Still, the machinery of manipulation churns on.

Designed in many ways to separate you from your common sense, and even your civic obligation, it is a well-funded exercise in salesmanship.

To some extent, this has always been the case. But another thing also is true: As trite as it sounds, Americans still control the most powerful franchise in the free world. Our right to vote.  And we shouldn’t let political ads demoralize us away from the polls, nor should pundits convince us it’s futile to exercise that sacred right because the outcome has already been determined.

Remember William Goldman’s line: “Nobody knows anything.”

All of us, together, determine what will happen on Election Day. The more of us, the better.

Along the Mississippi is a proud member of the Iowa Writers Collaborative. Please check out the talented roster of writers and journalists below, and consider subscribing to their publications, too.

Laura Belin, Iowa Politics with Laura Belin, Windsor Heights

Doug Burns: The Iowa Mercury, Carroll

Dave Busiek: Dave Busiek on Media, Des Moines

Art Cullen, Art Cullen’s Notebook, Storm Lake

Suzanna de Baca: Dispatches from the Heartland, Huxley

Debra Engle: A Whole New World, Madison County

Julie Gammack: Julie Gammack’s Iowa Potluck, Des Moines and Okoboji

Jody Gifford: Benign Inspiration, West Des Moines

Beth Hoffman: In the Dirt, Lovilla

Dana James: New Black Iowa, Des Moines

Robert Leonard: Deep Midwest: Politics and Culture, Bussey

Chuck Offenburger: Iowa Boy Chuck Offenburger, Jefferson and Des Moines

Barry Piatt: Behind the Curtain, Washington, D.C.

Mary Swander: Mary Swander’s Buggy Land, Kalona

Mary Swander: Mary Swander’s Emerging Voices

Cheryl Tevis, Unfinished Business, Boone County

Ed Tibbetts: Along the Mississippi, Davenport

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