# Donald Trump's 2016 General Election Campaign **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [May 4, 2016, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901 "2016-05-04T02:37:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 127
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2523 "2016-07-13T19:28:04Z")
For one thing, in a debate only half the house (roughly speaking) are likely to be his fans. Where’s the fun of speaking in public if you can’t feel they all adore you and are hanging on your every word? Nowhere, that’s where. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Bravo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_bravo/32/493_2.png) [@Johnny\_Bravo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Bravo)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2524 "2016-07-13T19:28:47Z")
Trump does best when the people he’s attacking can’t respond. It’s been a long, long time since he was in a position where he had to let anyone talk back. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2525 "2016-07-13T19:46:00Z")
I keep on hearing about great debaters, but have yet to actually meet one except for Ross Perot. Perot is the only guy I’ve seen get a crowd on his side and substantially increase his poll standing as a result of debating. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2526 "2016-07-13T19:51:32Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > That is absolutely, positively NOT what Nate Silver and 538 are saying. They very clearly say that if the election were held today, Clinton would have a 70% chance of winning. No. You are wrong. I have followed Nate Silver and his peripatetic website closely since 2008, his podcast is a must-listen every week or more often, and he has clearly stated that the 70% number is for November. The number for if the election were held today is the “Nowcast”, where Drumpf’s chances are much lower. > [@RickJay](#): > > He is probably going to lose. Not certainly. “Certainly” isn’t 25%. “Certainly” is 100%. Did you really not see the word “almost” that I put _right before_ the word “certainly”? In any event, I will say it again: focusing on the horserace polls is missing the forest for the trees. Many candidates have had horse race deficits of this size. None of them had overwhelming numbers of women expressing very strong antipathy for the candidates, and a clear common sense reason as to why this would be so. Women are not stupid or flighty enough to change their minds on this, even if we thought Drumpf could suddenly start acting like a different person. And the same goes for minorities and college-educated white men. And none of the polling even reflects the deficits in fundraising, the lack of staff, the fact that many experienced Republican operatives refuse to work for him, the quixotic targeting of states he can’t win, the refusal to try to emulate the sleek and efficient Democratic turnout data operation, or the fact that Hillary can lose most of the swing states and still win the election. But sure, other than all that, Drumpf is doing great. He’s got her right where he wants her! ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2527 "2016-07-13T19:55:33Z")
Trump will not debate Hillary. He’ll come up with an excuse, the lights are unflattering, the venue is wrong, the media are against him. And if, by some chance he does, he sure as fuck won’t do it twice. She’ll tie so many knots in his tail, he’ll qualify as macramé. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2528 "2016-07-13T19:56:10Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Well now I see the betting markets are swarming to Pence now, so maybe it will be Pence. Which is actually a great pick, because it will bring home a lot of conservative voters. I wonder how the Log Cabin Republicans will be able to spin their support for that ticket. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2529 "2016-07-13T20:08:52Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > That is absolutely, positively NOT what Nate Silver and 538 are saying. They very clearly say that if the election were held today, Clinton would have a 70% chance of winning. There is no certainly whatsoever that she would win in a landslide. > > The 538 method, boiled down, is to simulate the election twenty thousand times. Election after election is played out, and the number of times Clinton beats Trump is about 14,000 times out of 20,000. Each possible result is individually counted, so Silver notes, for instance, that the most likely outcome is one where Clinton wins 348 electoral votes. However, there are instances where Trump wins 302, or Clinton wins 350, and there are instances where it’s 270-268 for one candidate or the other. In 5.6% of all simulated elections, Clinton wins the popular vote but loses the electoral college; this only happens for Trump 0.8% of the simulations, which makes sense if you think about it (Clinton has a larger opportunity to pick up votes in population-rich states where it won’t change anything anyway; winning California by another 500,000 votes doesn’t help.) All those things COULD happen, and saying this means Trump has no chance suggests a refusal to admit the plain truth. But those 20,000 runs included increased uncertainty due to the possibility of differences between the poll results today and those in November. For example, he currently has[Clinton up by 7 points in Minnesota](http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/). If the election were held tomorrow she would probably win by between 4 and 10 points. Only a massive problem with the polls would mean a victory for Trump in Minnesota if the election were held tomorrow. But the election is not being held tomorrow, and Nate realizes that this 7 point cushion may not hold up in the future, so he only gives her a 78% chance of winning the state. If this poll stays 7%, the bar will narrow and Clinton likelihood of victory will increase as the election gets closer. Or to quote Nate himself from that page [QUOTE= 538 election page] Our model produces a distribution of outcomes for the national popular vote. The curves will get narrower as the election gets closer and our forecasts become more confident. [/QUOTE] In this [article discussing his model](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/donald-trump-has-a-20-percent-chance-of-becoming-president/)he claims to have a Now Cast published, but I haven’t been able to find it. [QUOTE=Nate Silver] In addition to the polls-only and polls-plus forecasts, we’re also publishing something called a now-cast. The now-cast isn’t a forecast; it’s a hypothetical projection of what would happen if the election were held today. The now-cast is designed to be extremely aggressive about identifying trends in the polls, more aggressive than is optimal when forecasting an election several months out. (One of the big lessons of our model, in fact, is that you want to be fairly conservative about declaring turning points early in the race. Apparent shifts in the polls often reverse themselves.) As a result, the now-cast is subject to some fairly violent swings and will sometimes pick up more noise than signal. Still, it can provide for an interesting diagnostic of which candidate has momentum, however fleeting. [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2530 "2016-07-13T20:17:36Z")
[Trump sues former campaign aide for $10 million](http://www.cnbc.com/2016/07/13/trump-seeks-10-million-from-former-aide-in-disclosure-case.html). ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2531 "2016-07-13T20:28:09Z")
> [@Buck\_Godot](#): > > In this [article discussing his model](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/donald-trump-has-a-20-percent-chance-of-becoming-president/)he claims to have a Now Cast published, but I haven’t been able to find it. I just found the Now-cast button and I stand corrected regarding the landslide. I still stand by my claims that his models take into account the fact that uncertainty over time, but it seems that Nate includes quite large error bars when translating this polls into winning likelihoods. But then he’s studied elections more than I have so I won’t try to second guess this. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2532 "2016-07-13T20:29:26Z")
Silver had a _lot_ of the primary elections very wrong. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2533 "2016-07-13T20:33:46Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > I wonder how the Log Cabin Republicans will be able to spin their support for that ticket. They’re already pretty pissed off about the GOP platform: > **[A Message on the GOP Platform from Log Cabin Republicans President Gregory T....](http://logcabin.org/a-message-on-the-gop-platform-from-log-cabin-republicans-president-gregory-t-angelo/)** > > Dear Friend, There’s no way to sugar-coat this: I’m mad as hell — and I know you are, too. Moments ago, the Republican Party passed the most anti-LGBT Platform in the Party’s 162-year history. Opposition to marriage equality, nonsense about... ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2534 "2016-07-13T20:40:31Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > Silver had a _lot_ of the primary elections very wrong. Yes, and he’s explained what he misread: > **[How I Acted Like A Pundit And Screwed Up On Donald Trump](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-i-acted-like-a-pundit-and-screwed-up-on-donald-trump/)** > > Since Donald Trump effectively wrapped up the Republican nomination this month, I’ve seen a lot of critical self-assessments from empirically minded journalists… Also, for the record: he got the vast majority of the individual primaries right. Where he messed up was underestimating Trump’s chances to win the nomination. As he admits in the article: > [@](#): > > Unlike virtually every other forecast we publish at FiveThirtyEight — including the primary and caucus projections I just mentioned — our early estimates of Trump’s chances weren’t based on a statistical model. Instead, they were what we “subjective odds” — which is to say, educated guesses. In other words, we were basically acting like pundits, but attaching numbers to our estimates. I like Silver a lot; I think he’s quite brilliant. I also think that polls have gotten increasingly difficult to interpret, due to the issues in data collection, as well as the high negatives that both candidates have, and the possible unwillingness of some Trump voters to admit (even to a pollster) that that’s who they’re going to vote for. I think that, if there is _anyone_ capable of reading the November tea leaves properly, it’s going to be someone like Nate Silver; OTOH, I also think that there’s a non-trivial chance that even the best polls aren’t going to be right come election day. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2535 "2016-07-13T20:50:46Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > Silver had a _lot_ of the primary elections very wrong. I’ve heard a lot of people say this, but I found his defense of the numbers pretty persuasive. A lot of it comes down to probability. If, to simplify things, you take ten states where he thought Candidate X had a 60% chance of winning, and in four of those states Candidate Y won, most people will say “Silver got almost half of them wrong” even though this is the \*optimal \*result for his prediction. Whereas if Candidate X won all ten, people would say “Silver nailed it on all ten”, but if he’s honest he has to wonder if this result suggests that he gave Candidate Y too high a chance in some or all of those states. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2536 "2016-07-13T20:59:37Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > They’re already pretty pissed off about the GOP platform: > > [A Message on the GOP Platform from Log Cabin Republicans President Gregory T. Angelo - Log Cabin Republicans](http://www.logcabin.org/pressrelease/a-message-on-the-gop-platform-from-log-cabin-republicans-president-gregory-t-angelo/) > [@](#): > > “Take back the Platform. Take back the Party. Stand up today and let the folks on the Platform Committee who paved the way to this foolishness know you’re **not going down without a fight!** ” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2537 "2016-07-13T21:19:10Z")
No Mr. Trump, **you** are the one making false accusations designed to incite more division. [http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/a-propagator-of-race-hatred-and-violence](http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/a-propagator-of-race-hatred-and-violence) > [@](#): > > This isn’t getting a lot of attention. But it should. Everybody took note when Donald Trump repeatedly claimed that American Muslims across the river in New Jersey celebrated and cheered as the Twin Towers fell on 9/11 - an entirely fabricated claim. Last night on Bill O’Reilly’s show and then separately at a rally in Westfield, Indiana he did something very similar and in so doing cemented his status an impulsive propagator of race-hatred and violence. > > The details of a the rapid-fire fulmination are important. So let’s look at them closely. > > Trump claimed that people - “somebody” - called for a moment of silence for mass killer Micah Johnson, the now deceased mass shooter who killed five police officers in Dallas on Thursday night. There is no evidence this ever happened. Searches of the web and social media showed no evidence. Even Trump’s campaign co-chair said today that he can’t come up with any evidence that it happened. As in the case of the celebrations over the fall of the twin towers, even to say there’s ‘no evidence’ understates the matter. This didn’t happen. Trump made it up. > > The language is important: “When somebody called for a moment of silence to this maniac that shot the five police, you just see what’s going on. It’s a very, very sad situation.” > > Then later at the Indiana rally: “The other night you had 11 cities potentially in a blow-up stage. Marches all over the United States—and tough marches. Anger. Hatred. Hatred! Started by a maniac! And some people ask for a moment of silence for him. For the killer!” > > A would-be strong man, an authoritarian personality, isn’t just against disorder and violence. They need disorder and violence. That is their raison d’etre, it is the problem that they are purportedly there to solve. The point bears repeating:\*\* authoritarian figures require violence and disorder. \*\* ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2538 "2016-07-13T21:41:34Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > No. You are wrong. I have followed Nate Silver and his peripatetic website closely since 2008, his podcast is a must-listen every week or more often, and he has clearly stated that the 70% number is for November. The number for if the election were held today is the “Nowcast”, where Drumpf’s chances are much lower. Is 31.7 lower than 30 now? Must be the new math. **Today’s Nowcast: Clinton 68.3, Trump 31.7.** > **[2016 Election Forecast | FiveThirtyEight](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/#now)** > > Nate Silver's predictions and polling data for the 2016 presidential election between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump Those numbers I wrote above are as posted on the 538 Nowcast on July 13, 2016, the day you wrote the post to which I replied. Buck Godot, please note this. That’s the prediction if the election were held now. It is not the prediction assuming uncertainty between now and November. I don’t know how you can’t find the Nowcast, it’s right there with the polls and polls-plus options. ---
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2539 "2016-07-13T21:50:40Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > Silver had a _lot_ of the primary elections very wrong. No he didn’t. At least, not number-wise. He and his pundits wrote article after article “unskewing” the poll numbers. Probably because they could not believe what they were seeing. But the actual poll numbers held up pretty well. ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2540 "2016-07-13T21:52:20Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > No Mr. Trump, **you** are the one making false accusations designed to incite more division. > > [A Propagator of Race Hatred and Violence - TPM – Talking Points Memo](http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/a-propagator-of-race-hatred-and-violence) This really needs to be highlighted. Donald Trump is making up lies about black people and Black Lives Matters in order to paint them as dangerous Others - just like Hitler did with the Jewish people. Donald Trump is holding himself out as the strong leader who can save America from the dangerous Others - just like Hitler did in the run up to World War 2. Actually, while I believe that Donald really is a racist - I don’t believe he actually gives a shit about Black people or America. I think he’s just in it for the money. But it doesn’t matter what he actually believes in his heart of hearts. What he’s _doing_ is deliberately following Hitler’s playbook of demonizing some Outside group and promising that he’s the Authoritatian Figure who can save us. This is facism. It’s racism. It’s scary as fuck. It is not politics as usual from the Republicans, even though the Republicans have been quietly embracing racism for decades. This is different and it needs to be stopped - by all of us. All the voters. All the press. All the officals and judges. This is on all of us to stand up and speak truth to power. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2541 "2016-07-13T22:18:41Z")
Actually, Miss Alabama called him a martyr: [http://www.whas11.com/news/nation/first-black-miss-ala-calls-dallas-police-shooter-a/271566752](http://www.whas11.com/news/nation/first-black-miss-ala-calls-dallas-police-shooter-a/271566752) ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2016, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/2542 "2016-07-13T22:22:01Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Actually, Miss Alabama called him a martyr: > > [http://www.whas11.com/news/nation/first-black-miss-ala-calls-dallas-police-shooter-a/271566752](http://www.whas11.com/news/nation/first-black-miss-ala-calls-dallas-police-shooter-a/271566752) As pointed in the pit, nutpicking, and outside any of the organizations making the protests. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901.md?page=126) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901.md?page=128)