Fox News, of all things, has a new poll showing Clinton opening up a 10-point lead: http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/03/politics/presidential-polls-hillary-clinton-donald-trump/index.html
I thought about starting anew thread about this but there are already too many threads about Trump and Clinton so I decided to just add to this one.
The primary dangers to Trump have been self generating on a regular basis every time he opens his mouth. But for Clinton the dangers were more in the direction of large scandals and events that could derail her entire candidacy.
The big concerns that I see have been.
[ol]
[li]Developments in the e-mail controversy[/li][li]The possibility that Sanders supporters wouldn’t go for her[/li][li]That a major terrorist attack would make people run to Trump[/li][li]General purpose dislike of her as a person.[/li][/ol]
But for the most part all of these have played out and figured into her current poll numbers.
[ol]
[li]Comey already had his say (and Clinton took the hit) but there are not going to be any indictments, so there is unlikely to be any new news on that front.[/li][li] The Convention is over, the Sanderites had their say and Sanders gave enthusiastic support. They have decided for themselves whether they will or will not support her, and for the most part they are.[/li][li]There has already been a large terrorist attacks in the US, and a string of attacks across Europe, and Clinton has survived.[/li][li] Any negative feelings people have for her as a person are pretty well baked in.[/li][/ol]
She still has the debates to go through, but she is a competent debater and can afford to play it safe. Its possible that Trump might “win” a debate or two but she won’t make any horrible gaffes. Of course anything can happen butas I see it, Trump’s numbers have the potential to go down if he for example calls Susan G. Komen a whiny bitch, but for Clinton all I see is relatively smooth sailing.
Does anyone else see any potential dark clouds on the horizon that I am missing?
- Unknown
Republicans For Clinton:
From article:
“Groups formed to support Clinton include Republicans for Her 2016, run by Republican lobbyist Craig Snyder; a grassroots organization called R4C16, led by John Stubbs and Ricardo Reyes, officials in former President George W. Bush’s administration; and the Republican Women for Hillary group co-led by Jennifer Pierotti Lim, an official at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce”
I heard Snyder interviewed on NPR yesterday (I think). He made no secret of the fact that he really didn’t like Clinton and that in normal times, he’s be campaigning against her. But he just kept coming back to his view that Trump was unstable and horribly uninformed. He seemed really honestly terrified of the prospect of a Trump presidency. A couple times he borrowed Clinton’s phrase “temperamentally unfit”. He said something like, “An election is like a banquet where they ask if you want fish or chicken. You can write in “steak”, but you’re going to get either fish or chicken.”
Whatever their talking heads sound like on air, Fox News polls have always been very well run. 538 rates them a solid A as a polling source, with good consistency and little bias.
A ten point lead seems like something of an outlier in today’s polarized politics, but obviously if true would represent an astoundingly huge lead. That is the point at which Trump would lose every swing state, half the Deep South, and Texas would be a coin flip for him at best.
It’s this sort of thing that makes me think a true Trump collapse might be in the offing.
Every election you find people saying they’re Democrat but won’t vote vote (Guy) or Republican but won’t vote for (some other guy) but they always turn out to be sort-of-party-affiliated at a municipal level, or are generally uninteresting for some reason.
But now you’re hearing actual Republicans saying precisely what a Democrat trying to convince them to vote Clinton would say; that they must support Clinton because they are frightened by Trump. Not that he’s got the wrong view on something; that he is scary and dangerous. Those are emotional arguments, existential arguments, that can cross a party barrier. You might call this the O’Rourke Position; “Clinton is wrong about everything, but she’s wrong within normal parameters.” This sort of thing taking hold represents a legitimate danger to Trump staying in the race because it’s not Democrats talking in Democratic echo chambers, and it’s not advertising to undecided voters; It’s Republicans telling other Republicans “This guy is nuts. He cannot be President. Make sure the country survives; we can try again in 2020.” That is a spark that can consume Trump’s hopes if it bursts into flame.
- Wikileaks releasing 31k emails that are definitely classified and deleted from server.
- Trump launching lawsuit after rally after convention, making Obama-era politics seem as a mere prelude as HRC is faced with civil disobedience issues, making it far more difficult to focus on implementing an agenda.
IIRC, someone on CNN mentioned yesterday that instead of directly attacking Trump’s every mistake or coming out with a sunny sales pitch to voters, she’s been personally working the phones: talking to any prominent Republicans who could maybe be convinced to back her, or at least announce that they can’t support Trump.
So when it looks like she’s just doing nothing and not interrupting the guy who keeps making mistakes, she’s actually working hard behind the scenes.
Hope so. He’s giving her a lot to work with. This has been a terrible week for him.
A WikiLeaks release has already been mentioned, but it’s worth noting both that Julian Assange wants Trump to become President (due to his white-hot hatred of the Clintons, apparently), and that he is adamant about concealing his sources.
The latter means that anything can be produced and claimed as genuine, whether it is real or fabricated.
So if Assange is committed enough to harming Clinton’s chances, the October Surprise could be “proof” of just about any damning thing he can imagine: a child-porn ring operating out of the infamous basement server; a purported agreement by Hillary to do something favorable to some nation in exchange for some specified amount of cash; an explicit blackmail or extortion demand from Hillary to some particular person—anything. Sky’s the limit.
On Assange confirming that he will never reveal a source:
nm
Can you please translate the for me, I understand all of the individual words, but they are in an order that I can’t make sense of?
OK, back to hiding my head under the covers until November. 
Basic campaign stops; yesterday she was in the news at a small clothing business, noting the Made in China on a Trump tie, I think. Oh, speaking of business, there’s:
- Economy goes south.
Lifted from Obama’s routine at this year’s White House Correspondents Dinner:
“Meanwhile, on the Republican side, things are a little more, how shall we say this, a little more loose. Just look at the confusion over the invitations to tonight’s dinner. Guests were asked to check whether they wanted steak or fish. But instead, a whole bunch of you wrote in Paul Ryan. That’s not an option people. Steak or fish. You may not like steak or fish, but that’s your choice.”
Ok.
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Hillary claims the 31k emails that were deleted was spam, personal info, etc. RussiaLeaks dumps them, and we find these emails are exactly the opposite: highly sensitive and classified info.
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Trump, insisting the election was rigged, decides to play spoiler when he loses and fights the result, both in court and in the sphere of public influence - speeches at rallies and comventions designed to deligitimize the election, lawsuits designed to question the process, and, of course, cries for acts of civil disobedience.
Marist, one of the best, now Clinton +15? Dang. Too bad this isn’t November 2nd!
Fifteen points would be a massacre of epic proportions. The electoral map would look like nothing we have seen since the 1980s. It’d be something like this:
Don’t forget the Omaha EV. That’s likely to flip before some states you have. Clinton was actually campaigning there a couple days ago.
Every little bit helps…
Last time I felt this bad about a candidate it was Nixon. Which is pretty bad. The fact that I was right about Nixon makes it worse.