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Comment by pie420 | Hacker News Reader

This is so incorrect it's laughable. If you look at the data, public opinion in america has changed almost exactly in step with new generations emerging and old generations dying. People almost never change their opinion on political issues, they just die.

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Did you look at the data? Because I don't think you did. I lay it out here[0]. In short, what we can see is that in 2021 the 55+ age group has higher support than the 35-54 group did in 2012. This is not people aging into the new bins and bringing their support with them. If that were what was happening, then the 2021 55+ group could not have greater support than the 2012 35-54 group. There is missing growth from your model. We're literally talking about 50% of the growth being unexplainable by your model.

[0]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39087434

Except, of course, the politicians. It's always entertaining to watch them say or do the very thing they previously condemned.

That's precisely what you'd want politicians to do: represent the shifting will of the people.

Or, dare I say, learn what they themselves were wrong about and become right about it.

We vilify politicians when they change direction and make them dance around and mince words, when what they really want to say is "I was wrong before".

Yeah I don't get why people get upset over that. It's like the people that are like "we didn't learn that in school when I was your age." Times change, we learn, we correct, we update our beliefs. Being static is not healthy and creates a dissonance between the public and the __representatives__. i.e. the representatives become disaligned from those they are supposed to represent. And as my claim (which I add data to in other replies) shows, that's not even just a function of age.

We should commend people for updating their beliefs, not condemn. To me, one of the most honorable phrases one can say is "I stand corrected."

We wouldn't need politicians if all they did was repeat opinion polls. And very very few politicians say that they were wrong or that they stand corrected- they'll just blame their earlier comments on "it was a different time" or some similar nonsense.

To admit they were wrong would be to say everyone who previously voted for them was also wrong. We don't have that much bravery from most of our politicians.

Editing to add: of course, the real reason nobody expects them to ever say they were wrong is because nobody trusts they actually fully believe what they say in the first place.

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