I wanted to share with you some of my findings about the mass mailing of Trump mailers to registered Democrats in swing states across the country. It’s a bit of a rabbit hole. So in part, understand it as such, an entertaining mystery. But I think it’s potentially a bit more than a rabbit hole. It also sheds some light on the dynamics of the campaign, specifically on the Trump campaign, which has firepower heavily weighted toward a series of super PACs and outside groups both for messaging and ground operations.

As I’ve discussed in a few posts, I started hearing from readers who are registered Democrats with long histories of straight-ticket voting who are being inundated with Trump mailers. In some cases it’s as much as two or three mailers a day everyday. Others aren’t quite that level of saturation. But lots of readers who fit in what we’ll call the category of “poor target” are getting them. The reports come from all the swing states, though they’re concentrated in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Georgia and North Carolina. They’re also in Arizona, Wisconsin and Nevada, but it seems to be a bit less there. In all cases the recipients have never seen anything like it before. So it’s not just that this is what always happens in swing states. Getting this many flyers from any Republican campaign is totally new. It all seems to have started in the last couple weeks.

Here are just a few facts and observations to keep in mind as we move toward Election Day.

• I have heard from numerous TPM readers in swing states, registered Democrats with long histories of voting for Democrats, who are being deluged by Trump flyers, sometimes as many as two or three new ones a day. I’ve heard from enough of them that I don’t think this is just a few people on the wrong list. I think it’s something more general. In the cases where I’ve been able to ask, it’s either mostly or all from Trump super PACs rather than the campaign itself. I don’t know yet whether this is evidence of very inefficient spending or whether the spending is so mammoth that this is in effect the splash created by unprecedented levels of spending.

I wanted to flag two articles to your attention, one from the Post and the other from CNN. They both cover similar ground but in different ways. The gist is that the Trump campaign has essentially given up on trying to improve voters’ impression of Donald Trump and decided the only path to victory is driving down Harris’ favorability numbers. When I first read the Post piece, it had the feel of what journalists call a “source greaser” — a favorable piece aimed at generating good will on the part of the subject and sources of the piece. The quote from GOP consultant Josh Holmes captures the tone of the piece: “I think it’s a serious paper tiger we’re dealing with here. I don’t think for 60 days they can keep the train on the tracks.”

Just before Labor Day, often treated as the quasi-official kick-off of the presidential election season proper, I wanted to share some notes on the state of the race — what the polls say, what they mean and whatever other scraps of information I’ve been able to pick up and glean.

Overall, I see a race that remains close, uncertain, but in which Kamala Harris holds a small but general advantage.

Let’s start with the shift from mid-summer and Harris’ entry into the campaign. When Biden left the race he was three or four points behind Trump in the national polls and was behind in all the swing states. This represented a small but critical drop from where he was in June before the debate. (Much of that drop was in the week prior to leaving the race.) Over the course of August, Harris moved from that starting point into a three- or four-point lead in national polls. So a shift of seven or eight points in Democrats’ direction, where she more or less remains. At the state level, Harris is now ahead or roughly tied in all the swing states. North Carolina, meanwhile, is now firmly in the swing state group, where it really hadn’t been under Biden.