Donald Trump declared this week that he wouldn’t need any swing votes in 2020, that he could win reelection with his base alone. Unfortunately for Trump, he’s the only one who has come to that conclusion. Independents voted decisively Democratic in the 2018 midterms. Democrats won independents by a 12 point margin, which is three times the margin that Trump won independents by in 2016, “and that trend is not Trump’s friend” says CNN analyst John Avlon. This clip is worth listening to for three and a half minutes, to get the overall picture and stats, where we are sixteen months out from the election. This is a lead we need to hold onto at the very least, and preferably expand exponentially by getting out the vote.
“The swing states of Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Colorado, Nevada…in Gallup state polling, Donald Trump is underwater in all of them. So dismissing swing voters would seem to be a form of electoral suicide…if he doesn’t court swing voters, he still has one option open to him. Go nuclear when it comes to negative partisanship. That means a scorched earth campaign, as he tries to convince swing voters that Democrats are too extreme.”
“Our radical Democrat [sic] opponents are driven by hatred, prejudice and rage. They want to destroy you, and they want to destroy our country as we know it.”
That’s the baseline gaslighting level where Trump started on Tuesday in Orlando. From here on out, the rhetoric will only get more heated and much worse. But Avlon mentions one very comforting statistic: 52% of voters polled said that they absolutely would not vote for Donald Trump. Let’s just hope that this is the same number (or an even better one) that we’re looking at on the other side of the 2020 election.
It will be soooo nice to see all this in the rear view mirror.
Yes, I cannot see him winning at all.
Yes, I cannot see him winning at all. But I thought that in ’16…
We can’t get complacent. We need to work on getting people registered, rides to the polls, all the basic work. We can’t assume anything. And we will REALLY be screwed if he wins reelection. The world is laughing at us, but we can still save the bacon if we vote him out. It will be a terrible chapter in our history, but Americans woke up and took their country back. If he wins reelection, then that will be a statement to the world that this is who we are, Trump country. That, plus all the damage being done with the tariffs, etc., may be problems we never recuperate from. Once you lose a market in the world, you lose it, and Trump has no problems watching Mexican business go to Argentina, China buying soybeans from the Russians and not us, all of that. He’s clueless, we suffer.
We need to do more (both for ourselves at home and for the world, especially to start the long process of rebuilding some credibility in the world) than just win. We need to BEAT Trump. “Bigly” and by a landslide margin in both popular and electoral votes. Given the goober states I don’t see 400 plus electoral votes as possible but at least we should peel off some light red states like Obama did in 2008 and get into the high 300s and we need a massive margin in popular vote. Like 8-10 million (like in the midterms to prove a trend) to send a message to the hard core white power folks (and other deplorable elements of Trump’s base) that their shit will no longer be tolerated and the need to crawl back under their slimy rocks.
I know the trauma of 2016 still rings strong in some people but I am firmly of the belief that our position has improved. The aforementioned damage you mentioned, Ursula, is only a piece of what has made that possible. The recent abandonment of the Mercers, the death spiral of the NRA and the recent fights over money in the NRCC tells me the big money may well be finally pulling out of the party as a whole. Trump made that possible.
2016 is only useful as a reminder to stay on guard. Otherwise, it can cripple our ability to go forward.
Agree 100%. Don’t count the chicks before the eggs have hatch. I think that and Russia is what happened the last time.
Complacency will kill us. Living in California, of course, I was worried about the down ballot last time, believing that that was all that I had to worry about. And the down ballot is still of great concern. Push comes to shove, if we can hold the House, and take back the Senate, then we can impeach Trump successfully in the worst case scenario that he gets reelected.
The main difference between 2016 and 2020 is that people who voted for Trump have had a chance to see how that worked out. I’m reasonably sure that farmers and blue collar workers who were lied to and paid a price, are not going to vote for him again.
BTW, Epimetheos, I was back in the dental chair Thursday, getting another root canal. But the good news is that I only needed one, not two. This is my New Normal, good news is when I only need one root canal. Sweet Jeebus. But seriously, I’m thrilled to save every tooth I can.
I hope they do see the difference. Here in Florida it really is a swamp. You can put up the best evidence in the face of a trumplandia resident and they’ll say “fake news”. I canvassed for Sen. Nelson and GOTV this past election and some days I felt the gators paid more attention.
Well my days with my own grown teeth are almost over. Wednesday I had the last of the upper section taken out and next month I will have the rest of the bottom extracted also. I know what you mean by saving as many as you can. There is no comparison to your own bite but in my case my illness doesn’t allow me to keep any. And I’m feeling the pain in two places; my mouth and my pocket. Geez louise I could buy a nice, a very nice second hand car with what is costing me.
Unfortunately, it may take more than just obtaining a majority in the Senate to successfully convict tRump. Given the craven state of the current GOP Senate, unless Dems hold a super-majority, I am doubtful that a single Republican senator would vote to convict, regardless of the evidence supporting impeachment charges.
In ’16 Dimwit Donny didn’t think he’d win.
Independents are independents because they are low information. They had less than a year to get to know Trump, and most obviously didn’t use that opportunity wisely, rather voting per what a friend told them, or the guy is different, or simply believed the lies sold to them by the Group Of Pricks.
Today, they state their unwillingness to again vote for Trump after seeing the assclown in action. In many cases, they are appalled when Trump does the very things he campaigned on.
That leaves his base……the 42% who support him. 42% will never win a two candidate election,regardless of how delusional he and his cabal are……only a third viable, electable candidate can make that delusion a reality.
The numbers can get very weird. Is Jill Stein running again, anybody know? Between Stein, the Russian bots, and people casting “protest votes” Trump managed to skate through the first time. Damn, I hope it doesn’t happen again.
Dr. Stein will do as she’s instructed by Vald….a picture’s worth 1000 words and you are who you associate with….plus, It would take a better draw than her…like if Bernie doesn’t get the Dem nod and goes rogue and runs as an Independent, to give a 42% vote the win.
With any luck, Bernie will be a lot smarter than that because if he even considers pulling such a move, he will lose EVERYTHING. He CANNOT win the White House as an Independent–all he’d accomplish is to ensure another 4 years for Trump/Pence. And, with any luck, the Democratic Party would strip him of ANY AND ALL committee assignments he’s been given and he should definitely be stripped of whatever DNC-related assignments and “outreach programs” he’s been given. (If I had any say with the DNC, the man would not be allowed to participate in the upcoming Dem primaries and caucuses since he broke his 2016 post-Convention promise to run as a Democrat in ALL future elections. He’s not a Democrat and the Party has shown itself to be open to the same type of grifting, self-serving candidacy that the GOP got when it let Trump run under the GOP banner. Of course, the GOP proved itself to be little more than a prostitute when it let all those Teabaggers take over in 2010.)
Bernie’s losing support now, because he’s still running with his 2016 campaign strategy.
Yeah, it’s a lot harder to make a splash when you’re one of twenty candidates, only one of which has Hillary-level baggage (not saying Hillary ever deserved such baggage–I’m fairly sure she didn’t–but 20 years of sliming put it there). And, bad as this may be for me to say, there may also be the question of Bernie’s age. We’ve already got one angry, old white man in the WH. Do we really want another? Apologies to all of Bernie’s supporters (and if he gets the nomination, don’t worry, I’m voting for him) but I can’t shake the feeling that we can do better.
When we mention age as a dis qualifier, do we mention VP Biden? I don’t think he is angry, quite irritated with the latest purity tests and judgement calls … he is a good-heart man that has a few left-over conventions of speech that get him in trouble once in a while … and yet, I don’t think he would budge an inch in his frustration with the worst so-called president EVER in the complete history of the US …
Also, he has that inside look at what REALLY our military actions and results are and COULD be disastrous … Trump is leaning on a very thin thread of support now and he, DJT has to know it …
He glows with the false adoration at his rants, shows his desperation with all the cat calls on the Democrats, a tired rhetoric, and I truly think his mind is clouding more all the time …
A glaring example in his idiot rant at his last hurrah speech in Orlando, his lie about the thousands of people, “outside because they could not get in”, no one was outside and there were empty seats inside, then his grand build-up to a new phrase, instead of MAGA to keep america great, then, as his final and loud call at the end of his program, and dunces held up ready-made signs with the new phrase, he hollered out, MAGA His mind is going fast, there is nothing there, but the old 2016 crumbs to chew on …
Sorry, Darrel, but yes in Uncle Joe’s case too. As I said with Bernie, I’ll still vote for him if he gets the nomination and, as you pointed out, he’d be better than Mr. Tangerine Man any day (and, personal prejudice talking here, better than Bernie too). I suppose if I wanted to be really nasty about it, I could apply that rubric to Elizabeth Warren too but that feels like a whole other can of worms.
But here’s my point: in my judgment, it is past time that the Boomer generation cedes the field to the next one coming up. Yeah, that they can be impatient, scary and a little more reckless than what some would like. But it’s their world now…how soon is too soon for them to be in charge of it? A younger, qualified candidate would help keep that energy going.
I have been assured by somebody whose political judgement I trust, and who knows the ways of Bernie well, that Bernie would not run as an Independent. I can’t see him being so foolish as to do so. But it is interesting, there’s been a lot of noise on Twitter and various places the past few days on this topic. The possibility worries a lot of people.
One has to also consider that a lot of these “independents” are actually Republicans in exile, a stat I imagine has jumped a great deal in the last two and a half years. And a good chunk of those are that because of Trump. No way they’re supporting him again…ever again. Also, consider this article in terms of putting Vlad in his proper context:
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/06/20/vladimir-putin-russians-227198
I’m perfectly fine with him believing and/or pushing that narrative. Combine that with the abandonment of the Mercers from his donor base (and possibly the rest of the Republican party, seeing how closely he’s intertwined with the latter) and it’s just jumping down the dragon’s throat. Assuming I’m on point, he’ll never know what hit him.
Amen ….
Sadly the Il Douche is winning.
I blame it on division.
Remember you are only as strong as your weakest link.
We need our people to survive.
Scott
That includes the homeless.