Books reviewed this week: Patricia Highsmith, People Who Knock On The Door; Wendy Clarke What She Saw; Louise Doughty, Appletree Yard and Nicholas Coleridge, The Glossy Years: Magazines, Museums, and Selective Memoirs.
Television Comments this week: following Margaret Morgan’s contribution to A Country Podcast about being a script writer on A Country Practice, I relate my experience at being a would be (and eventually failed!) scriptwriter on the program.
The West Wing – article about the episode which has been rebooted to encourage voting in the 2020 Presidential Election.
Presidential Election Debate
The mute button played a part in controlling this debate, but Donald Trump replaced his verbal attacks with facial ones. Not so effective, and Joe Biden managed to talk about his ideas, ideals and, at times, proposed policies. However, in comparison with an Australian debate between prospective Prime Ministers, the American debates are very short on articulating policy.
According to the CNN poll immediately after the debate Biden won; in the North Carolina focus group of undecided voters, he was also successful in changing some votes, while Trump changed none.
One point that seems to have resonated, with viewers and commentators, is Biden’s empathy and Trump’s distinctive and unremitting lack of empathy. An interview on MSNBC with Mary Trump, author of Too Much, and Never Enough (Simon &Schuster, 2020) was aired the day after the debate.
Her observations made an good contribution to understanding Trump’s stance, on for example, the over 500 children who were taken from their parents by Border Control with no way of bringing parents and children back together. Her uncle’s attitude to a child lost in a shopping centre and crying would be, she said, to be annoyed that the child was interrupting his activities.
Trump’s attitude to dealing with the pandemic seems to be similar in its lack of empathy – ‘rounding the corner’ is his response, even as numbers of cases rose on the very day after the debate.
In contrast, Joe Biden said this at a campaign event in Georgia:
‘Has the heart of this nation turned to stone? I don’t think so. I refuse to believe it. I know this country. I know our people. And I know we can unite and heal this nation’.
Leadership and empathy resonates with some of the information coming out of the New Zealand election where Jacinda Arden’s perceived empathy seems to have been in part instrumental in her success.
Jon Meacham, Historian, MNSBC commentator, on the Debate:
‘One was running for a Fox News slot and one was running for President…you felt Biden trying to adhere to reality, and you knew Trump felt no similar compunction’.
Of course, today the election is only 6 days away. In Australia we hope to be celebrating with champagne in the garden, bearing in mind social distancing etc. No, nothing like the recent dangerous White House Garden parties .
Bob McMullan’s Report on the American Presidential Election
With less than a week to go it is possible to discern some tightening in the polls in some key states, although by no means all of them.
The overview remains that Joe Biden has a commanding lead in the national polls which is 3 to 4 times larger than Hillary Clinton’s lead at the same stage. RCP has the Biden national lead at 7.4%, 538 has it at 9.1%.
The tightening appears to be occurring in Florida and possibly Pennsylvania. RCP polling average has Trump ahead in Florida by 0.4%. The margin is obviously very slight but it is the first time for months that Trump has been ahead in Florida in any of the averages. The measured outcome is clearly distorted by one poll which showed Trump leading by 4% while most others still have Biden in front. 538 shows a slight tightening in Florida but still has Biden in front by 2%.
In Pennsylvania the averages show some ambiguity. RCP has the Biden lead down a little to 3.8% while 538 has it increasing to 5.3%. Again the result is affected by a outlier poll from Trafalgar which shows the race as a tie. It is important to note that Biden is at almost 50% (49.8%) which reflects the very low number of undecided voters and the weak performance of the Green candidate this time ( although I still wish he wasn’t there).
The only other significant change over the last week has been a noticeable improvement for Biden in Georgia in the 538 assessment. This may explain Biden’s late decision to make a major visit to Georgia this week.
I know many people are concerned about the potential for the Supreme Court to intervene to affect the result, a possibility reinforced by the last minute appointment of Justice Barrett. However, on current trends the result may well be sufficiently decisive as to remove the potential for Court decisions to impact the result. Should the election be very close there is still the possibility of the Court being influential. The Supreme Court now has three members who worked for Bush in case concerning the contested 2000 election.
While sustained attempts at voter suppression are evident, they do not appear to be having much impact so far. More than 60 million people have voted to date and it seems clear that we will see a very high voter turnout by American standards.
I will make a forecast next week (not on Wednesday!!). However, let me give two indications of the best current assessments of likely results at this stage.
The respected University of Virginia Center for Politics is currently predicting 290 Electoral College votes for Biden to 163 for Trump with 85 votes which they rank as ” toss-ups”. These 85 are from Iowa, Ohio, North Carolina, Georgia, Florida and Maine 2nd district.
The Center will make forecasts for all the EC votes by Tuesday. However, it would be remarkable if Biden did not win some of those “toss-ups”. On today’s averages you would have to make it at least 311 for Biden.
For a more Australian style of assessment I have looked at what swing Trump will need in the last week to win. The key state for Trump to get to 270 Electoral College votes remains Pennsylvania. To win that state and all the others he will need to get to 270 he would need a 4-5% swing in a week, a very unlikely prospect unless some extraordinary event occurs.
In 2020 the extraordinary is always possible but, unless the minority of more pro-Trump pollsters are correct, at this stage it remains likely the Biden will win with sufficient margin to reduce the possibility of meaningful dissent or Court intervention.
A note on the relevancy to the Presidential Election 2020 of Patricia Highsmith’s People Who Knock On The Door
This novel is particularly pertinent to the Presidential election in its observations about the impact of Christian fundamentalists on people’s perception of how they should live their lives. A vulnerable young man becomes committed to a fundamentalist church. His brother and his partner become the focus of their damaging attention when they seek an abortion. A vulnerable adult woman is victimized by a purportedly Christian community leader. The novel is a sharp reminder of the duplicity behind some of the movements trying to influence American voters.
Great news about Labor’s win in Queensland. So, New Zealand, Australian Capital Territory, and now Queensland.
Please, America.
Robin's Room 
I enjoyed your Apple Tree Yard review – and also enjoyed the book itself. A good pacy read but also some interesting social commentary, as you’ve discussed in your review.
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