Such patterns are essentially meaningless when the sample size is in the single digits. All the Democratic candidate needs to do to win in is as good as Hillary plus a tiny bit more in 3 states. Maybe some of the candidates can or can’t do that, but there’s no way to know right now… any such prediction is just a wild guess. Until Nate Silver puts his model out, we just don’t have any idea.
Yes, obviously he cares what an effectively neutral observer thinks.
I would put it somewhat differently. When both parties nominate a person who is unelectable, one of them will win anyway.
Trump’s tariff war has hurt farmers, but according to a report from Reuters, hope that the farmers will turn against him at the ballot-box may be misplaced:
Enjoying your shit sandwiches, fellas? Eat up, don’t be shy!
“This sandwich tastes like shit!”
“Maybe blame the guy who made it and sold it to you?”
“Nah. I’m going to blame “the government” And buy another sandwich from the same guy.”
I love replying to myself.
Trumps approval rating drops a whopping 6 points in a single month.
Let us not forget that both shit and sandwiches existed under the Obama and Clinton administrations.
Today’s reality:
Analysis: Trump leans on a changed GOP
The question is, what percent of the total electorate is that 86% in the phrase I’ve bolded. And will the Republicans be successful in blocking/limiting voters who oppose the party? (Assuming FPT* is the nominee, barring some unforseen–yet longed-for–event.)
A Democrat wins in 2020 if they run a campaign that wins MI, PA, WI.
If they double-down on a hard left campaign, Trump unfortunately wins again.
The Democrats are squandering the meltdown of the Trump administration on internecine squabbling. So much :smack:
The Democrats always squabble and argue.
They can’t beat a corrupt businessman in the likes of a George Steinbrenner, who reinvented himself after the Yankees won the 1996, 1998-2000 World Series.
If Trump wins again in 2020, and he is a 2-term president, watch as he may be reinvented as the GOP looks for a 2024 standard-bearer.
I’m really baffled at the lack of (D) confidence in this thread. Trump is going down in a landslide. Whatever internecine squabbling there is among the D’s right now is irrelevant; come August or October next year, the Democrats will be united like we haven’t seen in 40+ years. Trump will be lucky to hit 200 electoral votes.
Trump could still win. There’s not a shred of doubt in my mind he could.
I think people who look at his poll numbers and assume that a Dem is a shoe-in are ignoring the myriad possibilities in which this race could go sideways. For example, consider a third party run - or a third and fourth party run.
I know we all want “normal” again, but I fear that normal is gone - forever.
Democrats HAVE to unite behind whatever candidate emerges from the current pileup. There can’t be any spoilers (I’m lookin’ at you, Bernie) to split the vote. Will that happen? Maybe not. Maybe people will still need to make some kind of statement with their vote instead of putting it behind anyone to beat FPT*.
Absolutely yes. FPT* could lose the popular vote by even more than he did before and still win the electoral college vote.
I won’t feel confident in Trump losing until his administration is blamed for a major failure that he can’t hide from. The most likely event that fits that description would be a severe economic downturn, though if there’s a major embarrassment as a result of his handling of the Middle Eastern situation, that might do the trick as well. But the average person needs to be angry at the incumbent in order for them to be motivated to oust him, and it’s hard to be angry when there’s record low unemployment and wage growth. If that changes, then Trump’s fortunes change.
Trump is an intensely polarizing figure, but he can still win by Balkanizing the electorate.
One wonders. I was reading an article the other day (sorry, no cite, but prolly WaPo) about why farmers still support FPT*. They know he is hurting them economically, even potentially bankrupting them, but they love that he is trashing EPA regs. <shrug>
Storyboard for me how a hypothetical “severe economic downturn” would pull the rug out from under him. IOW how would it be clear that it was HIS admin’s fault? I see him lying his way out of it as he goes from rally to rally around the country, blaming Dems, Hillary, Obama, and the birds in the trees.
Please, please, spell out how you see it happening… a story like that would make me so happy, but I can’t picture it. And I want to, soooo bad.
Follow-up question: let’s say that, shortly before the election, Trump gets the chance to name a replacement for Ginsburg or Breyer — or, since we’re apparently now living in a movie, both. Do his odds of re-election go down, or up?
I don’t see the farmers voting for a Democrat; I could see farmers simply deciding “Fuck it, I’ll sit this one out.” That’s what we must hope for.
“Both”! You should write horror stories.
His chances of being elected would change, downward. Not because farmers or anyone who now supports Trump would switch and vote Democrat. Rather, they would have become sufficiently sated by the many and various conservative “wins” of the Trump Republicans to prefer to stay home and watch reruns of Duck Dynasty instead of putting on their pants and heading to the voting booth.
OTOH, Democrats and anti-Trumpists in general would become even further enraged and vote in record-breaking numbers. Then, following the parallel Democratic victory in the Senate, the new government would, with clear purpose and clear conscience, modify SCOTUS appointment laws.