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The myth of trump's falling support

Cardinal

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A common theme seen in the media and on this forum is the notion that trump's support is in free-fall. There is, however, zero evidence to support this. From 538's polling average of likely and registered voters:

support.jpg

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/voters/

The red vertical line represents May 18, a week after trump fired James Comey. In the 245 days since then there has been no trend downwards, but we've seen enough of a pattern to reasonably interpret its meaning. After May 18, there’s been a regular fluctuation from lows of 37.3% to highs of 42.3%. Certainly these fluctuations are responding to news cycles, but what does the regular 5% variance mean? This is the percentage of trump's base that doesn't like aspects of his behavior but will do anything to believe he's a good president. They may experience temporary doubt, but they want to believe they were justified in their decision to vote for him.

Trump's hard core base on election day is around 38%, but only if you’re depending on whatever it is that makes the 5% lose their enthusiasm for him happen at precisely the right time before the election, and that’s a dangerous gamble. The smarter mindset is to accept the Sun Tzu philosophy that "He who exercises no forethought but makes light of his opponents is sure to be captured by them," and assume that the wavering 5% will vote Republican again, bringing trump's real approval to 42.3%. Otherwise, we're in for a repeat of November 2016 when we all kicked back, watched the polls and smirked knowing Clinton would win.

But there were two problems with the polls (and no, it's not that they were wrong):

1) National polling doesn’t take into account the electoral college, and therefore doesn't deal with the geographic distribution of voters. We have the same problem now that we did a year ago: the majority of left-leaning voters are concentrated in urban areas of blue states. This is why we lost the electoral vote handily in spite of winning the popular election by 2.8 million votes. That said, the Democratic voters are still there in the red states, as demonstrated so remarkably in Alabama.
2) The response to the polling may have been honest, but it didn't take into account the excited vs. depressed turnout factor. This was’t lost on Michael Moore, who predicted the trump victory due solely to Republicans’ enthusiasm for trump while Democrats seemed only resigned to voting for Clinton.

So has anything changed a year later? Absolutely. Unlike 2016, Democrats are energized. While Obama focused his base with a message of hope, trump has focused the Democrats' rage into a perfect laser beam of purpose. Trump has put a face on everything wrong with the Republican Party and its policies, and it could be said that his greatest accomplishment was removing the thin mask of respectability they’ve maintained for decades. As a result, we are now as enthusiastic about kicking the Republican Party out of power as we were to put Obama in the Oval Office, with one additional element: we've learned the painful way that the "little" elections matter, demonstrated by the many gains recently made in Virginia, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Republicans understood that the base of their power lay in the vast web of thousands of smaller offices, and now we understand that too.

The key to winning Congress back in November is believing that no less than 42.3% of the country will turn out to keep their Republican Congressmen in power, and the only way to counter this is to vote yourself. Better yet, rent a bus and fill it with all your friends, family members and neighbors and vote en masse. Registration is also key as a great number of potential voters will have fallen off the voter rolls due to no fault of their own. A massive effort at registration and knocking on doors was made in Alabama, and combined with energized turnout voters were able to put the first Democrat from Alabama in the US Senate in 25 years.

All of this comes down to energized Democratic turnout and absolutely none whatsoever to depressed Republican turnout. To watch the polls and wait for a Republican abandonment that will never come will hand trump two more years of unchecked power. At that point, enjoy two more years of trump and his supporters grinning back at you after every new scandal that comes out. Because trump is a populist President, and populist Presidents are immune to scandal.

But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same.
 
The Trump supporters love the clamber about how wrong the polls were, but in most cases the polls were spot on. As you pointed out, the polls did not incorporate the Electoral College and simply projected "likely voter" totals. Those polls were proven correct by Hillary's popular vote win.

Depending on what polling entity you use, Trump's numbers remain stable and will likely continue to do so. The reality is that his numbers will likely not ever increase, and we will see how the non Trump supporters respond during the 2018 mid-term elections.
 
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Quote...

" But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same. "
Two words...
Ain't happening.
There's a better chance Shane returning to that kid than the liberal/Demos taking the House....well unless it's 1313 Mockingbird Lane.
 
Depending on what polling entity you use, Trump's numbers remain stable and will likely continue to do so. The reality is that his numbers will likely not ever increase, and we will see how the non Trump supporters respond during the mid-terms.

The trends are all pretty much the same regardless of the metric used. I think using likely or registered voters is a more dependable basis than anything else. It doesn't take into account increased Democratic enthusiasm, but in my opinion it's best to go with the most sobering metric there is.
 
Quote...

" But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same. "
Two words...
Ain't happening.
There's a better chance Shane returning to that kid than the liberal/Demos taking the House....well unless it's 1313 Mockingbird Lane.

Guess what. It's politics, and in politics nothing is ever settled long as there's another election on the horizon.
 
Quote...

" But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same. "
Two words...
Ain't happening.
There's a better chance Shane returning to that kid than the liberal/Demos taking the House....well unless it's 1313 Mockingbird Lane.

Who's Shane?
 
Yep. I really think what the Republicans have the most to worry about are motivated Democratic voters and apathetic Republican voters. Trump didn’t win because he got more votes than previous Republicans. He won because Democrats didn’t show up to vote. Either they thought it was a forgone conclusion that Hillary would win or they weren’t motivated enough by Hillary to show up. Frankly, I don’t think it matters who the Democrats run. Their total dislike of Trump will motivate them to vote and after beating Hillary The Chosen One, Dem voters aren’t going to take anything for granted this time.

Furthermore, I just don’t think as many Republicans will turn out to vote for Trump this time, especially if Hillary doesn’t run. I think a significant percentage of his voters will stay home. The only way I see Trump having a decent chance of winning is if the Dems do something mindnumbingly stupid, like nominating Hillary again. And even then, I think his odds will be worse than before due to the previously apathetic Dems turning out this time.

That is my guess, anyway.
 
The intelligentsia is busy burning up remained of their reputations.

Inspired by Trump.
 
A common theme seen in the media and on this forum is the notion that trump's support is in free-fall......

Trump's hard core base on election day is around 38%, but only if you’re depending on whatever it is that makes the 5% lose their enthusiasm for him happen at precisely the right time before the election, and that’s a dangerous gamble. The smarter mindset is to accept the Sun Tzu philosophy that "He who exercises no forethought but makes light of his opponents is sure to be captured by them," and assume that the wavering 5% will vote Republican again, bringing trump's real approval to 42.3%. Otherwise, we're in for a repeat of November 2016 when we all kicked back, watched the polls and smirked knowing Clinton would win.

But there were two problems with the polls (and no, it's not that they were wrong):

1) National polling doesn’t take into account the electoral college, and therefore doesn't deal with the geographic distribution of voters. We have the same problem now that we did a year ago: the majority of left-leaning voters are concentrated in urban areas of blue states. This is why we lost the electoral vote handily in spite of winning the popular election by 2.8 million votes. That said, the Democratic voters are still there in the red states, as demonstrated so remarkably in Alabama.
2) The response to the polling may have been honest, but it didn't take into account the excited vs. depressed turnout factor. This was’t lost on Michael Moore, who predicted the trump victory due solely to Republicans’ enthusiasm for trump while Democrats seemed only resigned to voting for Clinton.

So has anything changed a year later? Absolutely. Unlike 2016, Democrats are energized. While Obama focused his base with a message of hope, trump has focused the Democrats' rage into a perfect laser beam of purpose. Trump has put a face on everything wrong with the Republican Party and its policies, and it could be said that his greatest accomplishment was removing the thin mask of respectability they’ve maintained for decades. As a result, we are now as enthusiastic about kicking the Republican Party out of power as we were to put Obama in the Oval Office, with one additional element: we've learned the painful way that the "little" elections matter, demonstrated by the many gains recently made in Virginia, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Republicans understood that the base of their power lay in the vast web of thousands of smaller offices, and now we understand that too.

The key to winning Congress back in November is believing that no less than 42.3% of the country will turn out to keep their Republican Congressmen in power, and the only way to counter this is to vote yourself. Better yet, rent a bus and fill it with all your friends, family members and neighbors and vote en masse. Registration is also key as a great number of potential voters will have fallen off the voter rolls due to no fault of their own. A massive effort at registration and knocking on doors was made in Alabama, and combined with energized turnout voters were able to put the first Democrat from Alabama in the US Senate in 25 years.

All of this comes down to energized Democratic turnout and absolutely none whatsoever to depressed Republican turnout. To watch the polls and wait for a Republican abandonment that will never come will hand trump two more years of unchecked power. At that point, enjoy two more years of trump and his supporters grinning back at you after every new scandal that comes out. Because trump is a populist President, and populist Presidents are immune to scandal.

But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same.

I appreciate your optimism and thoughtfulness. You can count on my activism in Florida. Keep Believing!
 
I agree with your sentiments, but I disagree as to whether Trumps support is falling.

It's really hard to tell just how far it's fallen, poll sampling can create biases both ways. What is clear is that Democrats are outperforming the projected polls by double digits on all the special elections up to this point.

So either an ocean of Democrats have either suddenly come out of the woodwork, or Trump's support is falling with independents -- likely a little of both.

While in places like Virginia one can credit the election results to a more energized Democratic base, that still doesn't explain how deeply red parts of the country are opening the door for Democratic victories, unless Trumps base is shrinking among some independent voters.
 
Quote...

" But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same. "
Two words...
Ain't happening.
There's a better chance Shane returning to that kid than the liberal/Demos taking the House....well unless it's 1313 Mockingbird Lane.

Based on what I'm hearing the Democrats are likely to pick up 184 House seats and 26 more Senate seats. Granted, I watch CNN and read DailyKos but I believe those numbers are accurate.
 
I agree with your sentiments, but I disagree as to whether Trumps support is falling.

It's really hard to tell just how far it's fallen, poll sampling can create biases both ways. What is clear is that Democrats are outperforming the projected polls by double digits on all the special elections up to this point.

So either an ocean of Democrats have either suddenly come out of the woodwork, or Trump's support is falling with independents -- likely a little of both.

While in places like Virginia one can credit the election results to a more energized Democratic base, that still doesn't explain how deeply red parts of the country are opening the door for Democratic victories, unless Trumps base is shrinking among some independent voters.

What needs to be kept clearly in mind is the unfortunate quality young Democrats have of not voting if they believe others will pick up the slack. Obviously this is nothing to be proud of, but it needs to be accepted as a reality. If Democrats are to retake not just one house but maybe even both houses of Congress, there can't be a single Democratic voter anywhere on the planet that allows himself the luxury of believing other people have "got this." That goes not just for assuming other Democrats will vote, but for assuming Republicans won't vote as well. This is an all-hands-on-deck situation.

Oh, by the way, the point of my post was that trump's support isn't falling.
 
Based on what I'm hearing the Democrats are likely to pick up 184 House seats and 26 more Senate seats. Granted, I watch CNN and read DailyKos but I believe those numbers are accurate.

I don't read DailyKos, but I don't doubt they're probably telling overly rosy scenarios of the Republicans' total and complete exile from Washington. They're fools if they don't understand that by doing this they're harming left-of-center electoral interests.
 
I think your underestimating the energy and empowerment the Republicans now feel and know is because they got out and voted Trump into office. Especially when we were told we could never win in elections ever again....

Not to mention how hard it is for the minorities in the Democratic party, to not run off the white folks with their constant talk of racism.... :shock:

My belief is a strong economy wins the game every time. Trump will have exactly that in 3 more years of economic growth. Democrats squandered their chance away under Obama.. NK will be a feather in Trumps hat before this is over as well, as a deal will be made, and life will go on. The Republican party will change as well, encompassing even more minorities, especially blacks, who are going to do well sharing in the coming economic upturn.. and who understand the left is who has been holding them back, buying their vote, and the forgetting about them for years... Thinning the herd of illegals here will lead to even less unemployment, and higher wages for American citizens..

In short Democrats will have their hands full considering the gapping hole they now have at the DNC, and their aging leadership, with few bright up coming potential stars. In contrast the Republicans are ripe with new youthful potential winning candidates and leadership at the top, and a now clear message of how to make America great again..

Populist leaders work, and are very hard to beat if the people are winning. Trump is getting this to happen more and more. :mrgreen:
 
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A common theme seen in the media and on this forum is the notion that trump's support is in free-fall. There is, however, zero evidence to support this. From 538's polling average of likely and registered voters:

The red vertical line represents May 18, a week after trump fired James Comey. In the 245 days since then there has been no trend downwards, but we've seen enough of a pattern to reasonably interpret its meaning. After May 18, there’s been a regular fluctuation from lows of 37.3% to highs of 42.3%. Certainly these fluctuations are responding to news cycles, but what does the regular 5% variance mean? This is the percentage of trump's base that doesn't like aspects of his behavior but will do anything to believe he's a good president. They may experience temporary doubt, but they want to believe they were justified in their decision to vote for him.

Trump's hard core base on election day is around 38%, but only if you’re depending on whatever it is that makes the 5% lose their enthusiasm for him happen at precisely the right time before the election, and that’s a dangerous gamble. The smarter mindset is to accept the Sun Tzu philosophy that "He who exercises no forethought but makes light of his opponents is sure to be captured by them," and assume that the wavering 5% will vote Republican again, bringing trump's real approval to 42.3%. Otherwise, we're in for a repeat of November 2016 when we all kicked back, watched the polls and smirked knowing Clinton would win.

But there were two problems with the polls (and no, it's not that they were wrong):

(trimmed for brevity)

All of this comes down to energized Democratic turnout and absolutely none whatsoever to depressed Republican turnout. To watch the polls and wait for a Republican abandonment that will never come will hand trump two more years of unchecked power. At that point, enjoy two more years of trump and his supporters grinning back at you after every new scandal that comes out. Because trump is a populist President, and populist Presidents are immune to scandal.

But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same.

As usual, Cardinal, you cut through the rhetoric to critically and carefully analyze the situation.

Since about mid-May 2017, Donald's approval ratings have remained remarkably consistent in the mid to high '30s, and for likely voters it's a few ticks higher. It's been quite some time since we've seen that kind of stability of a president's ratings so early into his presidency. Clearly his supporters will accept literally anything he says or does, and most of the rest of us have already made up our minds that there is nothing redeemable about this man.

I also agree with your last paragraph. Any Democratic voter that hopes that Congress can remove Donald from power in 2019 has another thing coming. But impeachment--just the House's role--is not just about firing the president. That part alone can be used to neuter a president. If the Dems do take the House in November, that's what they should shoot for--to neuter this out-of-control president. It worked very nicely against Clinton and Jackson.
 
As usual, Cardinal, you cut through the rhetoric to critically and carefully analyze the situation.

Since about mid-May 2017, Donald's approval ratings have remained remarkably consistent in the mid to high '30s, and for likely voters it's a few ticks higher. It's been quite some time since we've seen that kind of stability of a president's ratings so early into his presidency. Clearly his supporters will accept literally anything he says or does, and most of the rest of us have already made up our minds that there is nothing redeemable about this man.

I also agree with your last paragraph. Any Democratic voter that hopes that Congress can remove Donald from power in 2019 has another thing coming. But impeachment--just the House's role--is not just about firing the president. That part alone can be used to neuter a president. If the Dems do take the House in November, that's what they should shoot for--to neuter this out-of-control president. It worked very nicely against Clinton and Jackson.

The numbers don't and will not exist for successful impeachment, but halting Republican legislative agendas and subjecting trump to public and brutal investigations using their power of the subpoena are fantastic goals to strive for.
 
The numbers don't and will not exist for successful impeachment, but halting Republican legislative agendas and subjecting trump to public and brutal investigations using their power of the subpoena are fantastic goals to strive for.

Agreed. If the Dems even take the House--which is possible--they can grind Donald's agenda to a halt. That would demoralize the Republican base like nothing else and put the Democrats in excellent position for 2020, so long as the base doesn't get mired in the petty infighting that they engaged in in 2016. That in my mind will be the deciding factor in the 2020 presidential election.
 
There's simply no excuse for the Democratic voters anymore.

We have a president that has given us a million reasons to get off our asses and vote. He spits in our face everyday, while he makes a mockery of the highest office we have. All this while the GOP rams through extremist policy that harms millions.

With numbers we have on our side demographic wise, if we lose the next election cycle, we will be out of excuses.
 
There's simply no excuse for the Democratic voters anymore.

We have a president that has given us a million reasons to get off our asses and vote. He spits in our face everyday, while he makes a mockery of the highest office we have. All this while the GOP rams through extremist policy that harms millions.

With numbers we have on our side demographic wise, if we lose the next election cycle, we will be out of excuses.

And with any luck, he will continue to. I don't think there's another human being on earth who could so successfully concentrate the entire Democratic base into a single, grim purpose.

That said, it will be extraordinarily important not to elect candidates with the purpose of spitting back, or trump will have changed the country for the worse, and for generations. If we elect candidates with the purpose of returning the country to a course that reflects a need for compassion and decency, then these two years will just be a bad memory.

As Dave Chapelle said, "It's still a great party, we just have a bad DJ."
 
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A common theme seen in the media and on this forum is the notion that trump's support is in free-fall. There is, however, zero evidence to support this. From 538's polling average of likely and registered voters:

View attachment 67227324

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/voters/

The red vertical line represents May 18, a week after trump fired James Comey. In the 245 days since then there has been no trend downwards, but we've seen enough of a pattern to reasonably interpret its meaning. After May 18, there’s been a regular fluctuation from lows of 37.3% to highs of 42.3%. Certainly these fluctuations are responding to news cycles, but what does the regular 5% variance mean? This is the percentage of trump's base that doesn't like aspects of his behavior but will do anything to believe he's a good president. They may experience temporary doubt, but they want to believe they were justified in their decision to vote for him.

Trump's hard core base on election day is around 38%, but only if you’re depending on whatever it is that makes the 5% lose their enthusiasm for him happen at precisely the right time before the election, and that’s a dangerous gamble. The smarter mindset is to accept the Sun Tzu philosophy that "He who exercises no forethought but makes light of his opponents is sure to be captured by them," and assume that the wavering 5% will vote Republican again, bringing trump's real approval to 42.3%. Otherwise, we're in for a repeat of November 2016 when we all kicked back, watched the polls and smirked knowing Clinton would win.

...

But if Democrats retake just one house of Congress, the Republican legislative agenda will come to a crashing end. And not only that, Democrats will get power of the subpoena, and at that point trump’s life will turn into complete and utter hell. You won’t get the pleasure of seeing him impeached, but watching him become subject to a brutal and ongoing public investigation with real teeth will be enormously fulfilling just the same.

Republicans have stopped quite a lot of their own agenda already without any Democratic help. I agree that Trump still has his avid supporters, none of those have left him. 538 or RCP approval ratings show this. Trump's was at 44% approval on inauguration day and today he is at 39%. But the drop isn't due to the loss of avid Trump supporters. It is independents who probably gave Trump the election. Independents voted for Trump 46-42 over Clinton with 12% voting third party. Back on inauguration day, 48% of independents approved of Trump vs. only 34% today. There you have Trump's 5 point drop in overall approval.

I think you're right about the Democrats being energized for the midterms. It's true they look upon Hillary with a ho hum attitude. Trump provided a spark, Hillary the wet mop. According to YouGov in their poll just prior to the election they showed only 48% of all Democrats were enthusiastic about Hillary being their candidate. 35% were satisfied, but not enthusiastic while 16% were either dissatisfied or upset at Hillary being their nominee. Probably the most dissatisfied and perhaps angry at Hillary being the Democratic nominee were sanders supporters because of the rigging of the Democratic primaries by the DNC and state party leaders in Hillary's favor. How many of Sanders supporters stayed home and didn't both to vote, no one knows. what we do know thanks to CCSE is 12% of Sanders voters voted for Trump while another 12% voted third party leaving Hillary with just 75% of the Sanders vote. Compare that to the overall Democratic base vote of 89% for Clinton, 8% for Trump and 3% third party. Fact is the Sanders to Trump voters probably cost Hillary the election. Or as NPR put it:

"Specifically, if the Sanders-Trump voters in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania had voted for Clinton, or even stayed home on Election Day, those states would have swung to Clinton, and she would have won 46 more electoral votes, putting her at 278 — enough to win, in other words."

You can scroll down to the graph to see how the Sanders to Trump voters gave Trump Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

https://www.npr.org/2017/08/24/5458...voters-ended-up-supporting-trump-survey-finds
 
Republicans have stopped quite a lot of their own agenda already without any Democratic help. I agree that Trump still has his avid supporters, none of those have left him. 538 or RCP approval ratings show this. Trump's was at 44% approval on inauguration day and today he is at 39%. But the drop isn't due to the loss of avid Trump supporters. It is independents who probably gave Trump the election. Independents voted for Trump 46-42 over Clinton with 12% voting third party. Back on inauguration day, 48% of independents approved of Trump vs. only 34% today. There you have Trump's 5 point drop in overall approval.

I think you're right about the Democrats being energized for the midterms. It's true they look upon Hillary with a ho hum attitude. Trump provided a spark, Hillary the wet mop. According to YouGov in their poll just prior to the election they showed only 48% of all Democrats were enthusiastic about Hillary being their candidate. 35% were satisfied, but not enthusiastic while 16% were either dissatisfied or upset at Hillary being their nominee. Probably the most dissatisfied and perhaps angry at Hillary being the Democratic nominee were sanders supporters because of the rigging of the Democratic primaries by the DNC and state party leaders in Hillary's favor. How many of Sanders supporters stayed home and didn't both to vote, no one knows. what we do know thanks to CCSE is 12% of Sanders voters voted for Trump while another 12% voted third party leaving Hillary with just 75% of the Sanders vote. Compare that to the overall Democratic base vote of 89% for Clinton, 8% for Trump and 3% third party. Fact is the Sanders to Trump voters probably cost Hillary the election. Or as NPR put it:

"Specifically, if the Sanders-Trump voters in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania had voted for Clinton, or even stayed home on Election Day, those states would have swung to Clinton, and she would have won 46 more electoral votes, putting her at 278 — enough to win, in other words."

You can scroll down to the graph to see how the Sanders to Trump voters gave Trump Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

https://www.npr.org/2017/08/24/5458...voters-ended-up-supporting-trump-survey-finds

Oh Jesus, I completely forgot about those ****ing people. Sanders voters who went over to trump clearly never went to Bernie's "on the issues" page. They almost certainly just assumed he was some crazy anarchist out to break the system, and if they couldn't have him then trump would do.
 
So has anything changed a year later? Absolutely. Unlike 2016, Democrats are energized. While Obama focused his base with a message of hope, trump has focused the Democrats' rage into a perfect laser beam of purpose.

The notion here is one I went into in a post back in November and I think it definitely still holds true...

Here's the thing about an inspiring leading figure. The side that needs that is the side in power, NOT the side outside of power. Why? Because the side outside of power has a target to unify AGAINST.

Basically, for a base to unify, they need someone to unify around. That unification can be in a positive fashion (IE an inspiring leader) or in a negative fashion (IE a hated enemy).

Democrats had a leader they wanted to follow from 08 to 15, while Republicans had a figure to fight against. Both had a unifying force, with the Republicans animosity being stronger than the Democratic inspiration as time drew on.

Right now, Republicans do not have a singular leader that is truly inspiring them in a unifying sense, but the Democrats have one to fight against. One side has that unifying force while the other side is in a bit of disarray.

There were interparty issues within the Republicans between 08 and 15 as well, but because they had a unifying figure to battle against it was easier to put those issues aside. The same is likely to be true of the Democrats right now. Sure your Sanders wing and your establishment wing aren't going to like each other a ton and may squabble a bit, but they can both easily unify against the central figure of Trump which overshadows the internal struggles.

That's the issue the Republicans face right now, and why I think the threat to them is potentially even worse than what Democrats were facing in the middle of the Obama years.

And as it relates to his support, and his effect on the opposition, and why it is an issue given the above:

I think most Democratic voters, like most people honestly, thought the notion of Trump winning was a joke. Now we've had a year of that bad joke, and the terror is real. That terror is spurring activity; from campaigning, to fundraising, to voting....

...there is a big difference between the Democrats of the Obama era and the Republicans of the Trump era. While the Republicans did have the singular figure to campaign against and rally their base with (to the tune of some monumental victories), the Democrats still were relatively unified behind that man. While the fervor and "inspired" feeling around Obama had waned in 2012 and beyond, especially amongst more moderate/independent types that bought in more for rhetoric than ideology, he was still extremely popular within his base. While there were quibbles here and there from those farther to the left, by and large he was a unifying figure for the party. While the inspiring excitement of 2008 was no longer there to drive massive turnout and activity significantly above the norm, there wasn't any major drag that was hindering turnout as well.

That's just not the case on the Republican side right now. The Republican party, and base, is going through a knock out drag out fight right now. Your moderate types are more disgusted with the party than ever before, and the Trumpian wing is emboldened and less willing to get behind the more moderate types than ever before. This creates a situation where there's some segment of the base in almost any election that is getting depressed in terms of it's turnout, if not multiple.

Trump isn't really losing support from his base portion of support. The problem is, that's likely not going to help Republican's when he's not on the ballot, and it may not help him all that much. Why? Because while he's not really bleeding off his support, he isn't really unifying his in-party detractors either or exciting his in-party doubters. So his support is just maintaining; maintaining at a level that it won the presidency with narrow margins in a few pivotal states against an amazingly uninspiring and unexciting horrible candidate in a cycle where the opposition thought the likelihood of his winning was basically non-existant.

He's going to have a stronger challenger next time, and he's going to have an opposition that is unified regardless of who that challenger is because HE is going to be the unifying force. And that can spell trouble, even if he does continue to maintain his base, and only his base, of support.
 
Oh Jesus, I completely forgot about those ****ing people. Sanders voters who went over to trump clearly never went to Bernie's "on the issues" page. They almost certainly just assumed he was some crazy anarchist out to break the system, and if they couldn't have him then trump would do.

I think you're discounting that there were a sizable portion of Sander's voters that weren't horribly political, weren't horribly ideological, but rather simply were part of the "outsider" and "shake up the system" fervor and happened to lean more left than right on a few issues in a superficial way. For THOSE kind of voters, where the message and idea and feelings/emotions surrounding their support of Sanders were far more important than the POLITICS, it actually makes plenty of sense why they would've gone over to Trump rather than Clinton. Especially when those would be the type that would also be most likely to feel "wronged" by Clinton "stealing" the nomination from him in their mind.

We sometimes lose sight of things being ingulfed in politics as much as we are that there are actual larger numbers of people involved in presidential cycle politics that don't ACTUALLY give a massive crap about the politics itself, or the ideology behind it; or where, at best, that stuff is kind of secondary.
 
Base + Independents.

I can't think of anything that Trump has done that would reduce his support in either of these demos. They know him already and they voted for him. They get Gorsuch and tax cuts. If he can get something on immigration that isn't a giveaway then he's a shoe in for 2020.
 
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