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The most active thread over the weekend was titled, "Harris beating Trump in Iowa" and posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. For years, the Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa Poll has been referred to as the "gold standard" for polls of Iowa politics. Pollster J. Ann Selzer has not been afraid to deviate from conventional wisdom and other pollsters and has often announced findings that are surprising at the time but later prove prescient. In 2016, Selzer spotted a trend toward former President, current cult leader, and convicted felon Donald Trump that other pollsters had missed. Her polling predicted that Trump would win Iowa by 7 points. He ended up winning by 9. Four years later, the DMR poll showed that Trump would win Iowa by 7. The actual result was Trump winning by 8 points. Selzer's final poll of this cycle showing Vice President Harris leading Trump 47% to 44% among likely voters was easily the most surprising news over the weekend. For Democrats, this was an invigorating shot of adrenaline. Democrats are by nature a pessimistic bunch, likely to see black clouds regardless of the amount of sunshine. For once, they began showing a hint of optimism as a result of the poll findings. Selzer found that the impetus for Harris' lead was support from older women. For many DCUM posters, this was not surprising because, they argued, many of these women had lived in a world where abortion was prohibited and were well aware of the dangers such a state of affairs can bring. They are furious about rights being stripped away. Moreover, this is one of the most dependable voting blocks in existence. As such, the Iowa findings might also translate to other states. The general attitude among DCUM liberal posters was that even if Trump were to pull out a slim victory in Iowa — something that is within the DMR poll's margin of error — he would be in terrible circumstances nationwide. The conservative response was one of disbelief and anger. Ignoring Selzer's history of accurately predicting Trump victories, Republican posters accused the poll of being a "Democratic poll," something that is obviously not true. Some suggested that Selzer had been bribed by the Democrats. Others argued that she is retiring and that the poll was her parting gift to Democrats. Others pointed to poll results by Emerson that were released the same day. That poll showed Trump leading by 10%. However, the DMR poll has a much better record than Emerson. Many of the conservative posters mocked liberals for taking the DMR results seriously, saying that there is no way that Iowa would vote for Harris. There is no doubt that if this poll turns out to be a big miss, it will be reputation-ending for Selzer. On the other hand, if the results are correct, it is likely that Trump has no hope of winning the election. As one pundit in my social media feeds said, this poll will either be the end of Selzer or Trump. They both can't survive these poll results.