I’m getting weary of writing about Trump so much, but I go to sleep and wake up and there’s always a fresh all-you-can-eat buffet set up. Over here are the donuts:
A knowledgeable Republican source told CNN that some of Trump’s campaign staff — even campaign manager Paul Manafort — “feel like they are wasting their time,” given Trump’s recent comments…
…Two Trump insiders said Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus has talked to Trump several times in recent days, conveying the dismay among senior party leaders and donors.
It has been relayed to Trump hat he is losing what tenuous support he has in the party establishment, and that already skeptical donors are heading for the exits or telling the senior team can’t count on serious progress when he looks so toxic.
“(Manafort) has made clear no one can help him if no one believes he will do what it takes to win,” said a senior trump aide.
And over here are the scrambled eggs:
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump escalated his war with his own party’s leadership Tuesday by refusing to endorse House Speaker Paul D. Ryan or Sen. John McCain, two of the GOP’s highest-ranking elected officials, in their primary campaigns…
…Trump praised Ryan’s underdog opponent, Paul Nehlen, for running “a very good campaign” and said of Ryan: “I like Paul, but these are horrible times for our country. We need very strong leadership. We need very, very strong leadership. And I’m just not quite there yet. I’m not quite there yet.”
And over here are some bagels and cream cheese:
Meg Whitman, the Hewlett-Packard chief executive who ran unsuccessfully for governor of California in 2010, will back Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, joining other prominent Republicans troubled by Donald Trump’s candidacy.
“As a proud Republican, casting my vote for president has usually been a simple matter. This year is different,” Whitman wrote on Facebook. “Donald Trump’s demagoguery has undermined the fabric of our national character.”
Whitman, a major GOP fundraiser whose net worth is about $2 billion, also told the New York Times that she planned to raise money for Clinton.
And there’s a nice selection of fresh fruit and fruit juices:
Former Donald Trump campaign manager and CNN contributor Corey Lewandowski on Tuesday night suggested that President Obama did not release his Harvard transcripts in order to hide that he was not born in the United States.
And I can’t forget about the sausage and bacon:
Donald Trump on Tuesday defend his claim that the election will be rigged, offering no actual evidence but saying he hears and feels things.
“Well, I’m talking about at the voter booth,” Trump told CBS12 in Florida. “I mean, we’ve seen a lot of things over the years. And now without the IDs, you know the voter IDs, and all the things that are going on. And some bad court cases have come down.”
Asked if he had any reason to believe something illegal was going on, Trump offered the answer, “I just hear things, and I just feel it.”
I may get to some of these stories in more detail throughout the day, but I gorged myself on an entirely different buffet yesterday, writing about the president’s evisceration of Trump, the first iteration of his theory that the election will be rigged, pressure that Republicans feel to un-endorse him, and how there’s still so much dirt in his history that hasn’t even been discussed.
Tomorrow there will be a new buffet set up.
It’s exhausting for political writers, but I think it’s having an even more enervating effect on the Republican Party establishment.
More on that, next.
Yet he’s still only down about five points.
I don’t really understand these comments; Clinton’s six point national lead projects to a >99% chance of victory in a snap election. Sam Wang, who has a more conservative estimate of Clinton’s lead based on state polling (some of which is currently out of date) projects a similar chance of victory. There just haven’t been swing voters in the last several elections. The one outcome we can hope for, with the relentless assaults on Trump and the high profile defections, is to drive a small wedge in that coalition.
And a small wedge is really a highly optimistic scenario, in my opinion.
Yes. Obama was up only 2-3% on Romney and Wang had it at 99% based on the stability of state polling. And the Electoral College is an advantage for Democrats. Just as the concentration of Democratic voters in cities hurts regarding congressional districts (even in the absence of gerrymandering) the concentration of GOP voters giving them large majorities in a belt of redneck states means there are too many states where they have to somehow overcome demographic disadvantages to win. And Trump has made it nearly impossible for himself to win in any swing state with a significant Latino population so the states in play are even fewer. Even if the race were even in the national polls Clinton would have a good lead electorally.
And for the record, it’s looking more like an aggregate of 8 or 9% right now.
You know – I have a lot of respect for Sam.
But he was wrong in 2004. And in 2014.
Sam was wrong in 2004 because he put his thumb on the scale. If he does so again, he should be called out for it.
Midterms are another story. Primaries, too (although this year, Trump’s lead in republican polling was so commanding that you could see his candidacy coming if you were being honest with yourself).
He missed in 2014 as well – and predictability.
In the end red states vote for Republicans.
He didn’t get that.
Unless you’re talking about 2006 or 2008, that maxim is true.
Midterms are just less predictable. Turnout is lower and the polling isn’t conducted as often.
Not true. If you combine PVI and polling you would not have gotten a Senate Race wrong in 2014.
I think the comments are based on astonishment that there still aren’t many swing voters, even in this election. I mean, we laugh about people who’d vote for the rotting corpse of Reagan, but we don’t mean they’d literally vote for a literal decomposed corpse.
Trump makes Alan Keyes look overqualified. We should be down at the crazification factor. Instead, Trump is only a few points behind. This is a guy who picks fight with babies and the parents of a dead soldier.
He’s not just not qualified; he screams disqualifications at the top of his lungs. And we’re only 5% ahead? Obama beat Romney by 4%.
So the astonishment, I think, is the fear that the Crazification Factor isn’t 27% anymore. It’s closer to 40%. That’s a big jump in crazy.
If Trump starts to really fall apart (in the sense of losing even the 40% of the country that is committed red), I would think you would see those voters move to Johnson rather than Hillary.
This could be great for the electoral college results, as it means that Hillary could win some states on a plurality–much as Bill Clinton won Montana in 1992 and Arizona in 1996 on 3-way splits.
My fundie rightwing died in the wool Tea Party/GOP family members loathe Trump, and I suspect that his behavior over the past few days have solidified their disgust.
They will NEVER EVER EVER EVER vote for any D, most especially not a Clinton. That said, they claim that there’s no chance they’ll vote for Trump.
I think they’ll either skip voting for POTUS and just vote down ticket… or they’ll vote for Johnson.
I suspect that there will be a minority block of standard issue GOP voters who do something similar. How big that block is? That’s the question.
” … the Crazification Factor isn’t 27% anymore. It’s closer to 40%.”
No, it’s still 27%. The other 13% are Republicans who seem to be willing to vote for literally any candidate the party puts up (or puts up with).
That’s the definition of crazification! “Puts party identification, personal prejudice, whatever ahead of rational judgement.”
As Steggles said, it was more “thinking aloud” on the insanity of it being only a five-point race right now given what Trump is doing.
An absolutely fair point (both you and Steggles).
I think it’s fair to note that people have an entire generation of imprinting to overcome here. It will take time to change these opinions, especially deeply held ones.
I actually expected (and still expect) a fairly close race. I’ve been figuring it’s be HRC by about 6 since April-ish.
But still kind of amazing, given his behavior.
I think this is going up. My work says she wins by 10-13 and I have been saying that here for monts.
But I am looking at data from prior elections, and a couple have arguably worrying parallels:
Note: in 4 of the last 11 elections swings happened after labor day that are larger than Clinton’s lead is now.
Which is why these odds you see touted should not be trusted.
Polling in historical elections was carried out almost exclusively by a single outfit (Gallup) and thus were less reliable due to small sample sizes and lack of consensus. State polling also wasn’t conducted nearly to the extent that it is today. That’s setting aside how comparatively polarized the electorate has become, and the change in the modern media environment.
The relevant example is 2008, when McCain closed the gap on the heels of a successful RNC and the mobilization of his base with Sarah Palin. But it’s important to remember that Obama had already built a strong baseline once Clinton conceded and he was able to consolidate support. It’s true that he exceeded that baseline on election day, but the outcome was generally predicted by polling conducted from June to August. McCain’s bounce after the RNC was just that, a convention bounce. He never lead at any other point in the campaign.
That’s not to say that major events can’t change outcomes, but they become decreasingly likely to do so as the election progresses.
Also, Obama, being a past organizer, know the power and strength of infrastructure. He was able to get the people who supported him to the polls.
Trump has no campaign structure, and no money to finance it. That leads to the conclusion that he will under perform his polls.
Clinton, who has the money and structure, will probably over perform.
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I read this all of the time.
It it true, there were fewer polls.
But that has not one damn thing with any of this. The movement in ’68, ’76 and ’80 was not a result of polling error. Nor was it in ’08.
Your post completely misses the point.
How do you know?
Your post completely misses the point.
Let’s see:
Nixon led by 15 on October 1 in 1968.
Carter led by 10 on October 1.
Polling in 1980 was close to tied.
ALL OUTSIDE THE MARGIN of error.
You have no idea what you are talking about, because you haven’t the faintest idea what happened in those elections and you haven’t looked at the data.
Hell the numbers in 1996 were well outside the MOE too.
Secondly, the “snap” election comment refers to an “if the election were held today” scenario. Naturally you regress the confidence of your prediction based on the number of days out — but how much regression remains up to dispute.
There are not enough N, and they are to far apart, for these models to be reliable.
Really its the same mistake as the guys who foretasted default rates on mortgages make.
You cannot predict events that are unpredictable. There is no calculation that is possible. You can empirically note that they happen, but that does not provide the basis for a prediction.
What I can say with absolute confidence is they are more frequent than people think.
“There are not enough N, and they are to far apart”
On this, we agree.
I just heard that the Trump campaign has only one headquarters anywhere in Florida. Almost no organizers are going out and having persuasion conversations. Meanwhile I understand the Clinton campaign is organizing throughout the State.
Can you and others in Florida tell me what’s going on down there, and what are the main messages being driven by Hillary’s campaign?
1968, 1976, and 1980 aren’t really relevant to today.
Politics changed in the early 90’s from swing vote driven to base driven. Big swings are almost impossible now, because most voters are firmly committed to one side or the other.
2008 is relevant, and tells you what it would take: some black swan catastrophe that Obama gets blamed for. It could happen, but it’s very unlikely. Anything less won’t do.
Are you saying a financial crisis or a terrorist attack wouldn’t change votes in a big way?
Hubris.
Did the ’08 financial meltdown change votes in a “big way?” Not seen in the numbers. At best, it reinforced where the electorate already was. IOW the meltdown has previously been baked in the cake. (Had that not been the case, Obama as the first AA POTUS is unlike to have been possible in that year.
9/11 changed GWB’s poll numbers in a huge way. But if it had come in Sept ’04 would those numbers are swung by as much and in his favor?
The ’93 WTC and OKC bombings were between election cycles. The latter increased WJC’s approval ratings but neither impacted the subsequent election cycle.
Financial meltdowns during the ’80s may have been modestly helpful to House Democrats, but they retained a solid majority throughout the decade. And it was only in ’86 that Democrats took back control of the Senate after losing it in ’80. However, that (along with the many corruption scandals) didn’t hobble Reagan or Bush.
So, such events may or may not significantly impact and election and when they do, it’s not so easy to predict which way the shift will go.
Imo, I think McCain hurt himself significantly when he suspended his campaign and acted rattled while Obama, instead, looked confident that the people in charge of the economy would do THEIR jobs while he and McCain did theirs.
McCain’s “hail Mary.” He was rattled because he knew that the financial meltdown meant that there was no recovery for his campaign. Presidential nominees don’t allow any information to enter their consciousness that would inform them that they will lose. It’s the only way to maintain a level of confidence necessary to campaign until the very last day. Romney could ignore/deny the public polling (and believe the poor quality of his internal polling), but no way could McCain insulate himself from the financial meltdown.
No, I said something comparable (and something more like 9/11 than San Bernardino) to that is necessary, and that’s fairly unlikely.
A note on McCain’s convention bounce. The principle factor in that one was Palin. And objectively she made an excellent first impression — provided one didn’t look too closely in that first week after the announcement. However, even after calling it correctly in The Maverick Strikes Back, the polling in the subsequent two-plus weeks led me to question and doubt my assessment. Not about Palin or McCain but that narrow slice of the voting population that likes shiny new things and isn’t fussy about the quality of the new. Palin was such a lightweight that the package didn’t hold up after that and never recovered. The financial meltdown only reinforced the variables that had been in play since the beginning of the ’08 election which was always the Democrats to lose.
What we saw, IMO, in ’68, ’76, and ’00 is a retreat to the status quo as the election nears, even when severely damaged, if the opponent isn’t or can’t be viewed as demonstrably superior. (Ford is in an odd category of running in what would have been an open seat election year as an appointed incumbent.) However, a late break for the status quo is generally not enough for a win. Even in 1960, JFK mostly enjoyed a slight lead in the polls and Nixon (status quo) narrowed it to almost nothing on election day. IOW, the status quo acceptance or rejection sets up early and is generally defining of the outcome (’88 is an exception, but ’88 was an exception in almost all ways).
Expect that we’ll look back as 2016 and view it as one of the oddest ever. A high number of variables that are present when the electorate rejects that status quo exist. But Obama is personally acceptable, in part because like many incumbents, he’s enjoyed party protection, like Ike, Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, and GWB.) When reject grabs the electorate, it’s initially more intuitive than defined, and only later, sometimes much later, are voters able to articulate their gut sense with facts and/or reasoning.
Trump’s personal and business record and total lack of any prior position in elected office were always huge deficits for him. Overcoming all three was probably not possible. However, to have any real chance he would have needed to adopt an affable bully persona and wear a muzzle constructed by political consultants with some skill. Like Ike, Reagan, and GWB did. As there have been many moments when Trump did adopt such a posture, suspect he was aware of that. However, it was too new and too foreign for him to maintain for more than a fleeting moment. And when he stepped in it, he stepped too far into it to recover quickly and his jesting style is too intimate to play well on the big stage.
Team HRC did appear to recognize that 2016 would be a reject election. That’s why she ran from Obama in the early going. However, running to her comfort zone was the opposite of where the general election was. So, she retreated to hugging Obama.
It’s going to be an interesting next three months. TPM has got quite a bit on this today. First, the leaks out of the RNC and the Trump camp are starting to turn into a full-sized stream:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/rnc-chair-trump-staff-implosion-after-week-of-blunders
Pretty much everyone planning their exit strategy. Then lots of talk today about Trump possibly voluntarily quitting and the RNC replacing him. Josh Marshall addresses this with two posts:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/that-ship-has-sailed
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/it-doesn-t-get-easier
Josh argues that there is no realistic way Trump drops out. He also points out that this really isn’t about anything Trump did or said as they were thrilled with him when he jumped ahead in the polls after the RNC. It’s about the polls. He also points out that there is no obvious path for a replacement candidate.
Even so I can’t help but be just a bit concerned that if Trump gets out of the equation and if the GOP can coalesce around a new candidate Clinton will be very vulnerable. Although, as John says, it’s not clear who this hypothetical candidate would be because Trumps was the only consensus candidate they could muster – any other candidate exposes their intramural divisions.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio to the rescue.
Yes and let us not forget that Trump really enjoys the idea of using NUKES!! Yes I really want a President that wants to hit the NUKES button first and talk latter!
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/report-trump-kept-asking-during-foreign-policy-briefing-why-he-cant-just-
use-nukes/
so how long has Joe Scar been sitting on this “bombshell”?
he was all get along to get along and now trying to sound the alarm..
Trump is stampeding the media with a gallop of lies. Even if they did fact-checking, they couldn’t keep up and galloping on news shows is an established right-wing practice that ends with the host adding “We’ll have to leave that here.” Truth never outs in real time.
Not being fixated on the gallop, or better having some specialists who do fixate on debunking the gallop and moving on to policy coverage and other news would keep the Democratic side of the blog sane for the next three weeks.
Meanwhile, David Dayen reports that both Clinton and Trump have the dimensions of the White House windows for draperies and have moved on to setting up their transition teams to “hit the ground running” (and also show good faith with their endorsement and financial quid pro quos).
David Dayen, The New Republic: Clinton Presidency already taking shape; will the left have a voice?
Rehearses the economic policy warning signs that should have been noticed when Citibank’s Froman was put in charge of economic policy transition in Obama’s 2008 transition.
To answer David’s question, the answer is no.
“…Secretary Clinton’s cabinet and senior executive team is going to be packed with individuals who’ve spent their careers steeped in the same old, failed center-left neoliberal economic worldview that got us into the mess of extreme income inequality we’re plagued with today.”” If so, she will richly deserve the punishment that the entirely predictable recession will administer in 2018 or 2020. Those people do not have a clue or are willfully evil.
Using defense spending instead of infrastructure spending for stimulus has been propping up our delusions about the real economy for the last decade. Asset inflation is getting wobbly.
Her foreign policy choices will prefer that to continue, probably.
Her key FP advisor will be Jake Sullivan. There are worse people: he was part of the Iran negotiating team.
I had a lengthy conversation with him in November.
I told him we are going up going to war in Syria.
His answer was long winded, and not very reassuring.
Smart guy, no doubt.
Alas, he is not as smart as he thinks he is.
I remember telling him what I though the basis of all US ME policy was: Hubris.
Ah yes, hubris.
Or being hubristic
A common failing. Very common indeed.
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Although I believe this is more common.
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I am hoping Obama can put it out of her reach in the next few months. Aleppo could fall fairly soon and set up the possibility for building some stability. Kerry is in talks.
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/07/us-rebuke-russia-plan-aleppo-syria-demand-surrende
r.html
I’m hoping it could be settled soon, but it’s painfully slow. The Kurds have been besieging Manbij almost 2 months and it’s still not done. East Aleppo is larger and more populous, so it’s unlikely to be finished prior to the election. Also, Al Raqqa is almost certainly going to be still in Daesh’s control in November.
The other issue you’ll see following the Syria Livemap. The Islamicists have launched a huge counterattack on Aleppo, which isn’t too much of a surprise, but they are using an enormous amount of heavy weaponry, especially artillery, compared to anything I’ve seen this year. Somebody has given the Islamicists a huge supply of heavy military equipment recently. Given that one of the large Islamicist groups flipped (officially, anyway) from Al Qaeda to independent, I surmise it’s a Western-affiliated entity, probably Saudi Arabia or Turkey. So I think the chances of a quick resolution via Assad victory have dropped to almost nil.
In the tinfoily speculation department, I wonder if Assad might have had something to do with the Turkish coup attempt, and Erdogan has moved from “supporting the Islamicists” to “anything he can possibly do to make Assad lose”.
Thanks for that link.
The idea of Assad having control of agents in Incirlik and Turkish intelligence is distinctly strange. Erdogan has internal opposition from Kurds, internal ethnic groups, secularists, part of the military. And the part of the military trained in the US and with colleagues in the US military need not be under US authority to want better relationships in fighting Daesh.
Until more information comes out, I go with internal factions. But Russia is spinning the coup to encourage Erdogan to shift his alignment. That will require accommodation of some kind with Russia’s protege, Assad.
Look at the map of the region to see exactly whose national security is in a sling at the moment.
You did see where Kerry and Russians are discussing the fate of al-Nusra, along with ISIS.
No, I didn’t, although I see it via Google. Not sure how this feeds into that – IIRC the faction that flipped had been affiliated with Al-Nusra, but the Russians couldn’t possibly be happy with that group being bought off with artillery for an assault on Aleppo.
Actually, it seems that Kerry is discussing the fate of some of al Nusra’s rebel allies that the US has been arming, and the Russians are discussing the practical proposal of restoring stability by restoring Assad and then with the rebels out of the way taking down Daesh/ISIS/ISIL in the pretend caliphate.
But domestic US politics prevent Kerry from dealing headon with either Russia, Syria, or Iran. Too many gunshy Democrats when it comes to any sort of detente.
Mino your quote neglected the beginning of the sentence: “What’s still an open question is whether….”.
That kind of changes the meaning of the quote, doesn’t it?
The article really has no information about Clintons transition team, other than concern trolling that its gonna be a bunch of centrists that will completely ignore the left. Well, maybe. I’m sure many posters here will be able to find fault with her team whoever she chooses, once their identities are revealed.
And my reply began….”If she does”
Telling progressives and lefties to watch what is is occurring is not necessarily concern trolling. Between now and the election, there are still personal agreements and endorsements to be made. Clinton doesn’t have a free hand relative to financially affluent endorsers and donors. She shouldn’t have a free hand with groups that are working to deliver voters to the polls. What the rebellions in both parties is about is people being taken for granted and policy being set in the context not of the public interest but specific within-the-inner circle private interests.
Finding fault is one of the preliminary steps in vetting. Personnel is policy; personnel contrary to platform is policy contrary to platform. I thought we might have learned that over the past two decades.
That’s all quite reasonable; you are a reasonable person. The high degree of suspicion of Clinton and her motives, even before any actual information has come to light (in this particular case), is what I find unreasonable, and sometimes I guess I feel forced to comment on it.
One does not have to be suspicious to know that it is not necessarily personal principles that dictate the shape of the transition and that there is a lot of compensation for loyalty going on in appointments. If Sanders voters and organizers are going to be loyal, there needs to be a reasonable payoff in the transition and in the actual work on key Sanders initiative in the administration.
Having some clarity on this in advance and following through after a successful election can do much to increase margins, aid the downticket, and mitigate the image of Clinton as untrustworthy and unalterably neoliberal on doemstic policy and neoconservative on foreign policy.
It’s good old horsetrading politics. Why should lefties be excluded from making deals?
I’m a little baffled by Dayen’s article. I’ll vote for Clinton, and I’ll phone bank if things look terrifyingly tight, but … I’m not going to pretend to be shocked by the direction her administration takes. She’s a status quo Democrat. I didn’t know that she wants “a diverse executive branch, with women holding at least half of the cabinet positions.” That’s exciting. It’s real progress.
But will her administration be packed with people who’ve spent their careers steeped in the center-left neoliberal economic worldview?
Is that a genuine question?
Indeed. lol
“a diverse executive branch, with women holding at least half of the cabinet positions.”
Neo-liberal women, of course.
Actually, I’d bet neocon women in Foreign Policy. Two big ones.
Way to go.
This year with the showing of Sanders voters, it is a genuine question. In 2020 with Trump out of the way, it might be a a matter of not having the Democratic Party implode along establishment/populist lines like the GOP is doing this year.
It also affects downticket turnout in some critical geography.
By far the most critical area of concern is in infrastructure (which is a platform promise) and military Keynesianism. Another is how much emphasis is placed on balancing the budget and reducing the debt to pushing for reduction of entitlements. Another has to do with tax policy, simplification, and progressive tax rates. A last one is climate change response.
You write:
That’s the secret of his success so far. Will it last? I dunno. It’s lasted over a year, hasn’t it?
You quote:
More undecideds swing towards Trump every time some billionaire RatPublican says something like this. They feel…quite correctly…that the “fix” of which Trump speaks is indeed in, and the the proof of the pudding lies in this very kind of thing. The establishment is the enemy now in the minds of many Americans, and bipartisan support of Hillary Clinton seems to be sufficient proof of the matter for them.
You also quote:
You really don’t get Trump’s appeal to voters, do you?
He is saying “I’m just like you, only wealthier. I ‘just hear and feel things’ too. Do you think the system is crooked enough to go to those lengths to stop me from repairing it? I do, and I think you do, too.”
There was a great deal of evidence in the 2000 and 2004 elections that key electoral states were fixed. That evidence was stopped from having sufficient power to change things by Gore and Kerry’s public surrenders, ostensibly “for the good of the country.” Yeah, right. The Iraq War and the banking crisis and subsequent massive bailout were also “for the good of the country” as well, correct? Riiiiiight. Normal, walking-down-the-street people, people who also “just hear and feel” because they’re too fucking busy surviving to do much else are beginning to wake up to the truth of this matter, Booman. There is and has been an ongoing fix…a fix that has been propagated in numerous ways by the financial interests that own both parties…since at least the assassination years. Now the successes of Sanders and Trump are pointing towards an awakening of the general public to just this fact.
It took them long enough, but they’re finally waking up to that single fact.
Trump is openly running on that fact. The idea that he is if a crude, egomaniacal asshole does not seem to bother a large portion of the population. In fact, they seem to like it. They feel that he is one of them, that he is speaking for the people who have been massively injured by that fix.
Is he hustling them?
Yes. Of course. Hustlers hustle. It’s what they do. These people don’t care anymore. They have only two choices. It’s his hustle or the establishment hustle. The’re choosing his hustle.
Will this be enough to get him elected? We shall see, soon enough. Personally, I think that if the media just stopped its daily Trumpamania his campaign would begin to deflate within one week.
But…they aren’t going to do that. It’s too profitable for the media and the people who control the media simply aren’t smart enough or organized enough to get that done. Unless that happens? Unless the daily, fresh, all-you-can-eat Trump buffet is shut down and shut down soon, I think he’s either going to win outright…barring of course bipartisan vote fraud in a few states…or come so close that it goes right to the wire. And even then he won’t stop. Watch. I can see some version of the “Make America Great” party headed down the tracks already.
Watch.
Hustlers never voluntarily put down a profitable hustle. He’l ride it until it no longer works, then he’ll tank it just as he has his other bankruptcies.
Watch.
AG
I think the MSM is very close to making a parody of themselves. How DO they top the last headline?
Indeed.
But the truth of the matter is becoming clear because they are being forced to parody themselves in an attempt to trump Trump.
They are in the business of maintaining the status quo.
No change is really allowed except for the names of the winners. Bad for business, don’tcha know.
AG
Now a standalone post.
The Right/Center/Left Does Not Understand Trump’s Strength
Respond there if you wish to do so.
AG
“Hustlers never voluntarily put down a profitable hustle. He’l ride it until it no longer works, then he’ll tank it just as he has his other bankruptcies.”
Truer words have never been written, pal. But how do you know we’re not very close to that moment already?
How do I know that it won’t happen soon??
I don’t.
I just “feel and hear” it.
My own feelers and hearers are pretty good. I have been decrying the ongoing centrist fix (here and in other places on the net) for about 16 years…starting with Gore’s refusal to contest Bush II’s (
s)election…and I called Trump’s successful run in June of last year.Now many people are saying he same things. So…this is what I see now.
If I’m wrong?
Sue me.
Sue Nate Silver while you’re at it. He’s made big money with his bullshit…he’d be a better payday if you won.
AG
You “feel and hear” it. Many people are saying the same things.
Which is exactly Trump’s source of information. And we know he’s never wrong.
You feel and hear what you feel and hear. Many people are saying the same things, and many other people are saying different things.
Wait a sec. What are we talking about here? That it will happen soon, or that it won’t? If you’re saying Trump may be about to quit the hustle and leave the mess for ordinary mortals (in this case, the RNC) to clean up, then yeah, maybe you’re right. Because that is what he does.
Could happen…
Nothing would surprise me this year except maybe HRC turning out to be a populist/socialist and going after the banks.
AG
OK, then, we’re kind of on the same page.
But polling is showing that undecideds are not breaking Trump’s way during his catastrophic episodes of the last two weeks; much the opposite, in fact. This is evidence against your premise, a premise unsupported by data and based entirely on your angry, angry feelings.
If you want to retreat to your alternative battle station, that polling is meaningless, then you must answer to the fact that polling of the GOP primaries and caucuses showed that Trump had a stranglehold on the Party nomination from the moment he entered the race. Data was highly predictive then, and you’re asking us to believe, based on your feelings, that it means nothing now.
You’ve got nothing here.
Polls are meant to be shoved up peoples’ asses.
AG
Chills at the table, drinking his Bloody Mary and toasts Paul Ryan with one word – sucker. I have never agreed with Boehner once on policy but have to give him this – he got out while the getting was good.
So very true.
He did not like what he saw coming.
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