Wow: New CNN poll finds that 91% of Republicans think Trump will be their nominee. And 49% say the party will not unite.
— Matt Viser (@mviser) May 2, 2016
.@jbouie with the most perfect and depressing turn of phrase for the day. https://t.co/5767y4uGYR pic.twitter.com/25wxxsjFL7
— Gus Dahlberg (@gdahlberg) April 28, 2016
The last time the GOP was this unpopular, Bill Clinton became president https://t.co/UUR6G7eGPz
— Justin Green (@JGreenDC) April 28, 2016
From the Politico article:
More than 60 percent of the American public has an unfavorable opinion of the Republican Party, an increase from last fall and the highest that the party’s negative rating has been since 1992.
Sixty-two percent of Americans have an unfavorable impression of the GOP compared to 33 percent who view the party favorably, according to a Pew Research Center study released Thursday. That’s a more negative image of the party than in October, when there was a split of 58 percent unfavorable to 37 percent favorable…
Pew found that the falling image of the GOP mostly came from people who identified as Republican, 68 percent of whom had a favorable view of their own party versus 79 percent in October.
In contrast, 88 percent of Democrats have a favorable view of their own party. And more independents – 37 percent to 28 percent – have a favorable image of the Democratic Party compared to the GOP…
Keep calm and GOTV on!
.@POTUS: "Even my aides can't explain my rising poll numbers. What has changed? Nobody can figure it out." #WHCD pic.twitter.com/t0j3qeRYdR
— Fox News (@FoxNews) May 1, 2016
? Martin
We’re a lot more tribal now than we were in 1992. I think this election is for Clinton to lose, but it’ll be a lot closer than it ought to be.
Villago Delenda Est
Faux Noise: Unable to read between the lines, and detect pretty obvious (at least to me) snark.
Mary G
Those numbers look pretty good, but given the American public’s attention span, anything can happen in the next six months. The Republicans can’t seem to get their feet out of their mouths.
EconWatcher
Call me stupid (I probably deserve it), but I was genuinely shocked to see Jon Huntsman jump on board the Trump wagon. I wasn’t a fan, but I guess I thought there was some shred of sincerity in Huntsman’s earlier campaign to restore maturity and civility to Republican politics, and I would have thought, if nothing else, that a patrician sense of distaste would have prevented this. But I guess he thinks Trump has a chance in the general, and he wants something. (SoS? Maybe even VP?)
Also, I agree with Martin: I believe the election will be closer than current polls suggest. Much like Obama, Clinton cannot afford to come across as angry (as unfair as that may be), and baiting opponents is Trump’s singular political talent. She was great in front of the Benghazi committee, but her inner Zen has failed her a number of times with Sanders, with far less provocation than she’ll get with Trump.
Yutsano
@Mary G: Six months is an eternity in electoral politics. To wit: in May 1988 Michael Dukakis had a 12 point lead over Poppy Bush. We all know what happened from there.
Side note: fuck you very much Tad Devine.
NotoriousJRT
Donald Trump (and Ted Cruz for that matter) are the whirlwinds from the winds of bigotry and victimization that Republicans have been sowing since Nixon. I hope the coming apocalypse consumes them while leaving the rest of us untouched and ready to move forward. But, then I remember that their ideology cannot fail; it can only be failed.
When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?
Ruckus
@NotoriousJRT:
Well if they’ve come this far without the benefit of learning how wrong they are, I doubt that any learning will take place. With the possible exception of trying to figure out how to double down once again. And maybe if enough regular people get a fucking clue to not vote for them, again…….
eclare
@EconWatcher: My worry is a terror attack close to the election. Bombings in Madrid in 2004 happened three days before the election.
cokane
given current status, clinton should win in a landslide. just pray to fsm theres no terrorist attack or economic crisis
EconWatcher
@Ruckus:
I’m going to have to disagree: The Republican Party is changing, right in front of our eyes. They’re doubling down on the nastiness, yes. But would you have believed me if if I had told you four years ago that the Republican nominee in 2016 would be someone who says that George Bush lied us into the Iraq War? You can fill in many more examples on free trade, etc.
The ideology of the Republican Party is up for grabs this year, in a way it has not been in a long time, and I’m not sure the longstanding model of getting the rubes to vote for plutocracy will survive this election. Of course, I’m not sure the Party itself will survive. But things are definitely changing.
amk
hillz 54-46. you heard it here first.
Amir Khalid
@eclare:
@cokane:
If such a crisis happens after the conventions, Obama has a precedent to draw upon: It happened with the 2008 economic crisis. He can invite Hillary and Donald to DC and brief them on the crisis, as George Walker Bush did with him and John McCain. It would be entirely legitimate; the next president will have to deal with the aftermath of any such event. It would then be up to Hillary and Donald to show who deals with crises more like a President. (My money, were I a betting man, would of course be on Hillary.)
bystander
With those numbers, why do we still have these knuckledraggers controlling both Houses? I want rid of these jerks.
(I’m in Rome, and I’m learning a lot about how to deal with political enemies. I’m thinking we give all the repubs a free cruise on some Listeria-infested ship with faulty wiring. We can combine poisoning with fire, and outdo Claudius’s wife.)
Ruckus
@EconWatcher:
Would anyone have believed you if you told them the 2016 gop nominee would be drumph? Yeah I didn’t think so. He has, without really changing anything about the ideology, completely upset the apple cart. And yet look how many are now getting in line to endorse this, I don’t know what to call him, asshole is probably the most accurate. Yes some are still hanging their hats on the alien in a human suit, with his running mate, the martian Cruella De Vil in her human suit. Which by the way neither of whom wear them very well. But never mind that, I was talking republican politicians, they will become extinct before they will learn. Some of the people who vote for them will at least figure out not to vote for them, even if they can’t bring themselves to leave the party. They seem to have a much higher threshold for lying cocksuckers and stupidity than John has and I think that will stick with them. It has so far. And I don’t see anything that will raise their awareness. I mean I know people who still think that GWB is a great man and is our best president to date. They are not changing any time soon. Maybe if all the republican reps and senators were to go out on the national mall, go on TV and tell everyone it has all been a joke and then set themselves on fire like monks. That might get some of them. But the news would report this as a testament to the resilience of the conservative movement even after the live broadcast of them saying it wasn’t. And who would they believe, their lying eyes and ears or faux news?
? Martin
@srv:
What does Italy inviting police from China have to do with sovereignty? Every US ally sends troops to the US to train. Does that undermine our sovereignty?
Villago Delenda Est
@? Martin: /rolls eyes
srv is a idiot.
I attended military branch school with Egyptians, Lebanese and the odd Colombian. This was over 35 years ago.
You’re absolutely right. This is boring routine, nothing to get excited about. Unless you’re a paranoid jingoistic nutcase, like Drumpf.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@amk: I initially read that as hillz 54:46, and thought, “Man, there are a lot of chapters in the Book of Hilary.”
Viva BrisVegas
@Villago Delenda Est:
I’m just amazed that there is more than one Italian speaking Chinese policeman.
amk
@Villago Delenda Est:
what the lying pos troll didn’t say is that it’s a reciprocal arrangement.
infovore
@? Martin: It is worth including a link to the source. As that article also notes:
These officers function as interpreters for both language and culture. Similar arrangements are also common at big international events like soccer matches.
opiejeanne
@bystander: In Rome there is a little museum full of statuary, floors. preserved murals on walls of Roman’s houses, and Livia’s Garden
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yeah – we had some guys at USAFA – I remember one from British Honduras (now Belize) and another from Venezuela.
raven
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class: Here’s my old man at Amphibious School Graduation in 1961.
NotMax
@Villago Delenda Est
NotMax
Code fail. Fixed for clarity. (No edit function.)
@Villago Delenda Est
Juan Valdez’ weird brother, Hilario?
@Yutsano
Pinning success of a campaign on Devine inspiration is a rocky road indeed.
;)
Randy P
@opiejeanne: I enjoyed Latin class in school. Though I didn’t have good study habits and have lost most of my memory of the language, I always had a fascination for the history and the daily life of Rome. I’m currently reading Mary Beard’s SPQR, and a friend of mine has written a book on the subject too.
OzarkHillbilly
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class: Fort Leonard Wood is crawling with foreign nationals for US military training.
Mustang Bobby
@Villago Delenda Est:
I think I had a date with him. Yeah, “odd” just about covers it.
raven
@Mustang Bobby: Steady in the ranks. . .
Mobil RoonieRoo
Redstate is on suicide watch these days and it is a blast to read. Schadenfreude-huffing at its finest. If you are bored it’s a riot to read.
Mustang Bobby
@raven: Vs. nervous in the service…
satby
Where’s our fresh new morning thread? It goes with my coffee.
I’d like to believe the high negatives for the Republican party is because of how batshit they’ve gotten, but a good chunk of those negative ratings are from people who think it hasn’t been conservative enough. So they will find a more appealing Nazi to put up for election next time and carry on. And the people they fuck over will continue to vote for them.
rikyrah
Good Morning ?, Everyone ?
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@raven:
Heh-note how gaunt the officers were, how old the captain was, and the awesome mustache on the chief at the right. And I’m guessing that the foreign sailors are Filipino, by the devices on the head covering.
Randy P
@Mobil RoonieRoo: The disarray and schadenfreude may continue into the general election when they focus their sights on the Democratic candidate. But I’m not counting on it. So best to drink up the tears now while they’re in the peak of their season.
satby
@rikyrah: Good morning rikyrah. Did you see my reply to you about St. Barnabas a day or so ago? My old grammar school, and the parish for my house in Chicago (that my son owns now).
Mobil RoonieRoo
@Randy P: I agree. I’m going to be sad when they put away their razor blades. But I have to wonder when that will occur. I’ve been surprised by the depth of the Redstate hatred for Trump. If they can keep me entertained by the end of the convention, I’ll count myself lucky.
Baud
Whoa. All the arrayness is disorienting.
Iowa Old Lady
@opiejeanne: That museum was close to our hotel the last time we were in Rome. I’d never been in it before and those garden murals are gorgeous!
Kay
This is an amazing map. Clinton could lose VA, OH, CO, NM and NH and as long as she wins FL she still wins.
It’s too scary to put all the chips on FL so she wouldn’t want to do that, but she has states to spare :)
Kropadope
@? Martin:
She could win 75/20/5(to write in Bernie Sanders), take all 50 states, and that’s still closer than it should be.
Mustang Bobby
@bystander: When in Rome, check out the monument to King Victor Emmanuel. It looks like a giant Olivetti typewriter carved out of white marble.
Kropadope
@Kay: Is Wisconsin still a sure bet?
Baud
@Kropadope:
Fixed. Otherwise, truth!
sherparick
Republicans become frustrated with their party because Obama is still President and they, despite all their promises in the last 3 elections, have not been able to undo it. Further, the pure obstruction and do nothingness, constant votes to repeal “Obamacare” signifying nothing just appears to “losing” to them, and since Trump’s basic appeal to the white, male, authoritarian is that he will stop all the “losing” and start winning, this group, egged on by the talk radio set and Faux News, hates the losers that are the rest of the Republicans. But they will still come out to vote for the Republican they detest on grounds of tribal solidarity.
Kay
@Kropadope:
I don’t know – I haven’t seen any polling but Obama won it relatively easily w/Ryan on the ticket.
It’s not that big anyway- she could replace it with IA + NM or OH or NH+ CO, or VA or any of several combos that include NV! There’s just a lot of spare states on that map.
ItinerantPedant
@Kropadope: I wouldn’t consider it that. I live here and Waukesha County might as well be Nuremburg.
debbie
@sherparick:
Like it or not, nothing will draw conservatives to the polls more than Hillary Clinton. I’ve heard so many local interviews with conservatives who, as much as they hate Trump or Cruz, will vote for either just to keep her out of the White House.
debbie
Also, Terry Gross will be interviewing Larry WIlmore about the WHCD on Fresh Air today.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: That’s what most pre-law students said in math class.
Kropadope
@Kay: You’re right. I noticed a few states on there that she was likely to win marked red, but I didn’t notice that were were quite so many.
msdc
@EconWatcher:
The good news is, shooting his mouth off and alienating women/Latinos/Muslims/millennials/humans is also his singular political talent.
Patricia Kayden
@? Martin: I agree with you. I don’t see a path to victory for Trump given all the demographic groups which view him unfavorably. There just aren’t enough White males to put him in the White House.
My cynical side feels that Trump is purposely destroying the Republican Party knowing that he will never be President. He has systematically taken down his Republican opponents in the most disrespectful ugly ways possible. Pretty much all of them have been subjected to his name calling. “Lying Ted”, “Ugly Fiorina”, “Child Molester Ben Carson”, “Corrupt Rubio”, and “Low Energy Bush”. It’s amazing.
Joel
The national polling aggregate is somewhere between +7 and +8 right now, depending on your source. Apparently that’s more predictive than I would have thought. At least in recent elections, where polls are conducted much more frequently than in the past.
raven
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class: MY old man was one of the officers. Enlisted tin-can sailor in WWII with 25+ landings under his belt. I wonder what they taught him?
Snarkworth, short-fingered Bulgarian
@opiejeanne: Thank you for the link, Opie. Now I want to go to Rome.
debbie
@Kay:
Kay, all that red on your map frightens me. I have to run to work, but I can’t help thinking Dems are being marginalized.
Kay
@debbie:
God, it wasn’t intended to frighten :)
That;s a good map! I don’t know how you guys turned it into a bad map.
Okay, you’ll like this. 2/3rds of Ohio wants charter schools regulated. They noticed. It took 15 years but the near-daily headlines finally sunk in.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@OzarkHillbilly: The German military has a base at Dulles Airport (outside DC).
OMG! Obama let us get invaded by Germany!!111
Cheers,
Scott.
J.D. Rhoades
@sherparick: You think they’re pissed now, wait’ll they see what happens if Trump becomes President and he can’t get Mexico to pay for the wall, can’t mass deport 11 million people, and China laughs in his face over trade deals.
Matt McIrvin
@debbie: That map isn’t intended to be a picture of the election as it stands; it’s a hypothetical pointing out that as long as Clinton has Florida, she could have an otherwise lousy map that looks slightly worse than Kerry’s in 2004 or Gore’s in 2000 and still win the election.
Several of the states that Cilizza marked red are states in which Clinton also has a strong lead; they’re not even purple. There’s no reason at the moment to think she’s in danger of losing New Mexico, New Hampshire, Virginia, or even North Carolina.
NotMax
@Randy P.
Should you have the time, you might well enjoy this.
More info at the Google Plus community.
BillinGlendaleCA
@efgoldman:
They will if the Republicans have any say in it.
J.D. Rhoades
@EconWatcher:
My biggest worry about Clinton is complacency. She seems confident that Trump is is awful that progressives will just fall in line if she demands it.
“I’m not the other guy” is not a winning strategy. Didn’t work for Kerry against Dubbya, who was truly awful.
gogol's wife
I think Hillary is a much more savvy politician than Dukakis. And Trump is no George H. W. Bush. (WWII hero, head of CIA, Vice President, for starters. And not a raging lunatic. I’m not a fan, but please.)
BillinGlendaleCA
@Matt McIrvin: The ‘Ghost of Tim Russert’ continues to say: “Florida, Florida, Florida”.
gogol's wife
@J.D. Rhoades:
She can win without the “progressives.”
OzarkHillbilly
@BillinGlendaleCA: And if they ever get to vote, they’ll vote Dem.
satby
@J.D. Rhoades: Dubya was awful to sentient beings, but to Republicans in that election he was their “war President” and a “good man”.
Trump is neither of those things and half the Republican base hates him. They may vote for him, or they may just stay home or vote down ticket only.
NotMax
@NotMax
Bad linky due to FYWP vagaries. Attempted fix
Kay
@Matt McIrvin:
Republicans are horribly gloomy here. I don’t know why they always fall for the idea that winning a GOP primary means the person is competitive in a state. They’re like “Trump is very popular in NY!” It’s like saying ‘Clinton seemed to be well-liked in that South Carolina election!”
I’m getting a big kick out of how they treat Trump like he’s from another planet It’s a temperament mismatch- they don’t approve of all that bombast and over-the-topness.
Matt McIrvin
If people are freaked out by Cilizza’s map, they should take a look at this one I just made which just gives every state to the winner of the most recent Clinton vs. Trump poll I can find, using 2012 data to fill in holes. I’m bending over backwards to be generous to Trump here: most polls show Clinton ahead in NC but the most recent PPP one has it tied, so I marked it tied. And I saw a really old poll somewhere (from last fall, when Trump was doing much better nationally) showing Trump leading in Colorado, but really there are no recent polls there; I gave it to Trump anyway.
Anyway, that is much closer to what the electoral map currently looks like. Clinton leads with 360 electoral votes, which is more or less Obama 2008-scale, though the map is different.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@debbie: “ABC” (Anyone But Clinton) is a real thing out there. And we have to remember that even the most landslidy land slides usually has around 40% on the other side (1964 was 61.1% to 38.5%).
I think Team Hillary knows that they can’t count on Trump handing the election to her. I think we’ll see a lot more videos like the one released when she announced – the nice grandmotherly woman who isn’t a monster, etc. It won’t help with the hard-core ABCers, but it will help keep that fraction small.
But huge blowouts do happen, and the GOP candidate is so ridiculous that this should be one of those blowout years. But, unfortunately, the lizard brain rules politics, not the analytical brain.
It would be wonderful if it was a 73%:27% election – wouldn’t it be great to have all 9 of the GOP Senate seats flip? But even that wonderful result would only give Team D 55 seats (counting Bernie). Flipping the House would be great too, and would almost certainly happen with that kind of wave. Ah, to dream…
We need to make sure that we do what we can to create the future we want…
Cheers,
Scott.
NotMax
@gogol’s wife
Historically, vice president is not a plus. Many sitting veeps ran for president but before Bush, the last one who was successful in doing so was Van Buren.
Distinctly recall articles (many by Republicans) about Bush at the time he was appointed ambassador to China, all saying in so many words that he was given the post to get him the hell out of D.C., where he was disdainfully viewed as an ineffectual, annoying prig.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@NotMax: Lots of people on the GOP side continued to hate HW for a long time. “He’s a wimp” had long legs.
Cheers,
Scott.
Matt McIrvin
…and if you grant her NC, Colorado and Utah (which I admit is really unlikely, but recent polls show her ahead or tied there), you get 390 electoral votes. I suspect that is Clinton’s ceiling or close to it; some Democrats are dreaming of flipping Texas but I suspect not in 2016.
Randy P
@NotMax: COOL!
Thanks so much for that, I had no idea such courses existed. Definitely signing up.
Matt McIrvin
The usual players aren’t doing 2016 state poll aggregation yet, but here’s a guy who is trying to do it now:
http://electiongraphs.com/2016ec/
His map is generally more Republican-looking than mine, because he’s averaging the last five polls, but he puts no expiration date on them (Trump was doing better in the head-to-head last fall), and where there are no polls, he uses the historical data from the last several presidential elections as proxies. So where there’s only one poll, elections like Bush vs. Kerry 2004 and Bush vs. Gore 2000 are still part of the mix. His best-guess projection is still Clinton 338 (about like Obama 2012).
Paul in KY
@Yutsano: Dammit!!! We should have won that one! Good point though about how things can change.
Paul in KY
@EconWatcher: I would not have believed you if you had told me in 2012, that the GOP nominee would say that.
Paul in KY
@Kay: I want Ohio!
Paul in KY
@J.D. Rhoades: That’s why I think she still would do well to have Bernie as the Veep nominee. Of course, ole Bernie is making that harder & harder as he continues to shoot his mouth off.
rikyrah
@Kay:
270 TO WIN is a fun site.
The Thin Black Duke
@Paul in KY: No offense, but I think Bernie as Hillary’s VP choice would cost her more votes than she would gain.
rikyrah
@Kay:
they have a track record. They see the proof and they understand it. You can only scam for so long, Kay.
gvg
I was just looking for good maps that show how the population votes. I know that the maps tend to look more red than blue because Republicans tend to get the big land/small population areas. Then they act all shocked that they don’t win and claim cheating. I am assuming that will happen again so I am looking for good displays.
I also found the purple election map and dot density maps
and 3D
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: That map is almost the same as the 2000 counterfactual in which Gore takes Florida. It’s slightly worse, because Gore won Iowa and New Mexico.
Bill
@bystander:
Combination of gerrymandering and the fact that the Republicans remain popular in some parts of the country.
shomi
Buh..but Wrong way Cole says we should fear the Drumpf. That he will ‘pivot left’ (TM Cole) and people will just buy it despite the fact he is still a world class ahole. Also MarkyMux who thinks Sanders is totally awesome and realistic in his pony promises said something similar and so did DougJ when he is not thinking of ways to mention Applebees in his posts. So how can you argue those facts when such reasonable people with such an impressive track record of always be wrong about everything always say that Drumpf is a formidable candidate.
Also don’t forget the Clinton zombie lies from 15 years ago that will come up again. You can’t forget about them because they never worked 15 years ago so of course we must fear them too. DougJ is like totally right on that as well of course like he always is…..NOT.
bystander
@opiejeanne:
@Mustang Bobby:
Thanks for the tips!
opiejeanne
@Iowa Old Lady: On our last day in Rome we walked to it from our hotel, on a road behind the right-hand section (as you face it) of the “Republica” buildings.
Itinerantpedant
@efgoldman: Janesville and such are part of purple Wisconsin. You have deep blue Milwaukee and Dane Counties. Deep DEEP red Ozaukee, Waukesha, and Racine, and then you have reddish rural Wisconsin and blueish LaCrosse and Eau Claire. It’s way more a toss up than the results of the last two decades suggest. And Walkers finally gotten his VoterID law OKed.
pluky
@Viva BrisVegas: for policeman read intelligence officer
Matt McIrvin
@shomi: Trump is obviously beatable and starts out in a weak position; it doesn’t mean he’s not worth taking seriously. The downside risk alone is so tremendous that it’s worthwhile to not just try to beat him but to run up the score.
Paul in KY
@The Thin Black Duke: I don’t really see that myself (no offense given or taken). Why would someone who was already going to vote for Hillary not because she made the tactical decision of getting Bernie on the ticket?
He works for her like Dick Cheney worked for Dubya, in that no one wanted to off Dubya, because they’d get Cheney. No rightwinger would off Hillary, due to the commie becoming President. Also, he brings the idealistic young’uns (IMO).
Gus
@? Martin: I agree. I think the odds of Trump getting elected are disturbingly high. Not 50/50, but way too close for my comfort.
debbie
@Kay:
You’re right, anything showing the bogosity of charter schools is very cheering. Kasich’s continued aimless wandering along the campaign trail isn’t helping his pet causes either.