90% of Republicans support Trump right now. I wish your optimism wasn't misguided.
Then perhaps this will
cheer you up:
Only 66% of Republican voters "strongly approve" of Trump, not 90%. Even if you throw in the "somewhat approve" (which you shouldn't, as that indicates a fence sitter and thus a potential swing), it's only at 88%. Remember, that's 88% of
26% of voters. 38% describe themselves as Independents and 31% are Democrats.
In regard to the question of whether or not the country is headed in the right direction:
Only 72% of Republicans, down from 78% from those who voted for Trump in 2016. Iow, the trend is down, not up. And, again, that would then translate into 72% of only 26% of all voters.
Now look at the Independents. 66% think the country is going in the wrong direction (you include the "not sure" in that, because if you felt it was going in the right direction, you'd clearly indicate that).
In regard to approval among Indies, only 19% "strongly approve." That's a whopping 82% who are on the fence to one degree or another. Even if you throw in the "somewhat approve" you only get 35%. From the
PEW piece I posted previously in regard to Independents:
70% of [Independent] GOP leaners approved of [Trump's] job performance during his first two years in office.
From 70% down to 35% among the largest segment of voters!
Right now, victory in 2020 hinges on monster level turnout
No, it really doesn't. We had "monster level" turnout in 2016. It was nearly tied with 2012--Hillary garnering almost as many raw votes as Obama did--which was the second place record-holder. The top was 2008.
But no one should ever be using the two top record holding elections as a base for comparison. Regardless, hers comes in third.
I
really need to write a dissertation on the bizarre binary thinking block on "winning."
That aside, there are supposedly some 200 million registered voters now, so do the math. Of that about 140 M actually voted. Something like that. 38% are Indies; 31% are Dems; 26% are Repugs. So that's 36.4 M repugs that will actually vote. Out of them, only 24 M "strongly approve" of Trump. Likewise, there are 43.4 M Dems who we know will pretty much ALL vote against Trump.
In regard to Indies, we have some 53.2 M. Out of that, only 18.6 could vote for Trump again (that includes "somewhat approve" just to hedge). So that's a total of 55 M Repugs and Indies that might vote for Trump.
But that's up against
78 million Dems and Indies that will likely vote against Trump.
I think we can get there, but I don't think it is settled science.
Well, it's politics, so it's never settled even after the vote as we have abundantly witnessed time and again. But we're talking about real numbers here and a finite amount of voters, with the largest group now constituting people under 50 for the first time in forever apparently.
And they are primarily college educated, so the whiskey tangos are
finally death rattling.
So, again, the only way--the ONLY WAY--that Trump could possibly win is to cheat again, so we should literally all be focused on exclusively seeking out the tell-tale signs of that activity. Nothing else matters, including who our candidate is (other than someone obviously bad).
And that's a good place to start, in fact, because whoever starts emerging as the front runner this early in the game is going to have Russian digital fingerprints all over them. Just as they did in 2015, they will push for the candidates they think they can weaponize to destroy the other stronger candidates to beat Trump and then once the weakest is in the chute, so to speak, they will simply turn their canon around and start destroying him or her.
My guess is Sanders, because they already targeted him and all of his supporters and they are rabid enough and myopic enough and narcissistic enough to think that they couldn't possibly have been manipulated, which will make them even easier to manipulate and far more difficult for us to find that manipulation, because they will all be screaming cover noise any time it's pointed out.
They are, essentially and effectively, the deplorables of the left. Not in ideology; in idiocracy.
Buttiegege might be a tempting target, but I doubt even the Russians would think they'd have much success at making him the nominee. More likely they would target someone like Warren. It's the same game plan as Clinton. She's been heavily vilified already on the right and Trump already tramp-stamped her with "Pocahontas" etc.
Biden is too old school and has too many bona fides, but unfortunately he's also too far out of the game as a result, so he'd be difficult for them to weaponize and/or turn their canon once in place.
The other clues to follow, of course, will be anything out of Trump's mouth as it relates to the Democratic field and/or anything that relates to things that just stand out as being particularly off. I know that's a broad net, but then, that's always been deliberate, so it will be things that are specifically worded and repeated to break through the other constant noise he spews.
So, Warren and Sanders will be boosted no question. Which means it's like looking for a black hole; so long as you know the general direction you can look at the effects around the area to confirm what is otherwise difficult to see directly. We know those two are prime targets that Trump could easily beat and the Russians could easily weaponize as they've already done with (at least) Sanders.
