US President 2016 - the Great Horse Race

[Sarpedon]

Yup, how dare she nominate supreme court justices after she won the election by a mere 8 points?

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

It looks like Trump has decided not to pivot, but to go on being Trump. He has a new team and his new campaign CEO clown is from Brietbart. He's going to double down on his Trump act with his new yes man urging him on. Meanwhile a new Monmouth poll shows Clinton forging ahead in Florida by 9% points. Wheeeeee!

Ya, I don't see much point behind a campaign shakeup. Trump ignoring Person B instead of ignoring Person A doesn't deal with the heart of his issues which revolve around him being Donald Trump.

That'd be Person C instead of Person B. Lewandowski was the first one.

It may be along the lines of the old George Burns quote about how doctors were telling him to quit drinking and smoking, so he just kept finding new doctors until he found one who didn't tell him that. The Briebart guy may be telling Trump that his style is awesome and he needs to keep doing it more.

What bothers me is that Trump names some asshat from a right-wing online media website to run his campaign. Granted, that may actually be an improvement in some ways from Manafort, but it isn't a comforting trend to establish.

The next few months will be even more entertaining than the campaign has been so far and it looks like Clinton isn't going to need to interrupt her beach vacation until November 9th when she'll be nice and rested to start her transition.

The transition has already begun. PM Trudeau is supposed to meet with her later this week to try and get started on the "Bieber Protocol".

 

[Elixir]

Wow...just read about that. Bannon-Brietbart WTF? So Trump is going to win, by making sure he corners 99.98% of the right wing National Enquirer crowd...while ignoring the middle? Yeah, go for it... Maybe Alex Jones can be named head of his transition team.

The mind boggles. Trump reading pre-digested talking points from a teleprompter makes him look a little different; more boring, less likely to inspire the rabid irrational hate that is the fuel driving his acolytes. What are they hoping???

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Yup, how dare she nominate supreme court justices after she won the election by a mere 8 points?

The possible fear could be she gets 48 or 49% due to a healthy Johnson result, which means no plurality, which to Republicans would mean the Republicans have the mandate... again.

 

[marc]

Trump's best ability was selling his image. He did that very well.

Yea, but now his image has been plastered everywhere in HD, really bringing out the little details like bigotry, misogyny, poor business record. Some images just don't hold up in HD. :sick001:

 

[George S]

I think Trump is a clown.
I think Hillary is a liar who has sold out to contributors. The Clinton Foundation took the contributions in and the then, quite coincidentally, she as Secretary of State changed policy. No connection, folks.
When I had a DoD Secret clearance I knew that revealing said secrets accidentally or through negligence was as bad as willfully transmitting it to the enemy and had the same consequences. Clintons live by different law from common folk. As Comey said, anyone else who does the same in the future, and is not a Clinton, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
___
There is no good choice here. Time to vote libertarian ... Gary Johnson. Then Hellary will get in. So wait, I have to vote against Shillary, so I have to vote for a man who talks so fast his brain can't see what he's saying.
Arrrrrrrgh. Canada ho?

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I think Trump is a clown.
I think Hillary is a liar who has sold out to contributors. The Clinton Foundation took the contributions in and the then, quite coincidentally, she as Secretary of State changed policy. No connection, folks.
When I had a DoD Secret clearance I knew that revealing said secrets accidentally or through negligence was as bad as willfully transmitting it to the enemy and had the same consequences. Clintons live by different law from common folk. As Comey said, anyone else who does the same in the future, and is not a Clinton, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
___
There is no good choice here. Time to vote libertarian ... Gary Johnson. Then Hellary will get in. So wait, I have to vote against Shillary, so I have to vote for a man who talks so fast his brain can't see what he's saying.
Arrrrrrrgh. Canada ho?

The Clintons appear to have sold out to contributors the most, but the idea the White House and Congress hasn't been bought for and paid by Contributors is obviously a false one.

Clinton does stuff that helps her take from the top. But the up coming 8 years is much more than the 8 years. It is about the actions taken that affect the years after that. The Supreme Court is the biggie. Corporations are people, bribery is free speech? We need a court that isn't bought out by right-wing theology.

Also, do you think that Putin will respect an American leader with such small hands?

 

[Horatio Parker]

Sam sez

Clinton is overperforming Obama in 14 out of 16 states, the significant exceptions being deeply Democratic Maine and New York. Overall, the difference is a median of 5.8 +/- 1.4% (estimated one-sigma SEM).

This is very similar to the picture in July, before the conventions. I wrote then that Trump needed to recover disaffected Republican voters in red states. At that time, his red-state leads were smaller than Romney’s 2012 win margins by a median of 9.3%. Hillary Clinton’s blue-state leads were smaller than Obama’s wins by 1.9%. The difference was about 7%, similar to the value of 5.8% given above.

Recall that the popular vote margin in 2012 was Obama 51.1%, Romney 47.2%. If Clinton’s strong performance were to persist until the election, 12 weeks from now, the popular margin would end up at approximately Clinton 54%, Trump 44%. If we assume a disaffected 6% go to other candidates, that leaves Clinton 51%, Trump 41%, 8% Johnson/Stein/McMullin.

http://election.princeton.edu/2016/08/16/clinton-runs-5-8-points-ahead-of-trump-in-red-states/

 

[Shadowy Man]

Prior to this election cycle, I though Trump was a loud-mouth bore, but basically rational and a decent businessman.

I guess you weren't paying close attention to his birther phase. I heard him calling in to a news show saying that he had sent people to Hawaii to dig into Obama's story and "you wouldn't believe what they're finding!" He's a pathological liar, and it was evident then.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Prior to this election cycle, I though Trump was a loud-mouth bore, but basically rational and a decent businessman.

I guess you weren't paying close attention to his birther phase. I heard him calling in to a news show saying that he had sent people to Hawaii to dig into Obama's story and "you wouldn't believe what they're finding!" He's a pathological liar, and it was evident then.

We just didn't know at the time, such lying would help him win a party's nomination. Especially not the "Party of Lincoln".

 

[Elixir]

Prior to this election cycle, I though Trump was a loud-mouth bore, but basically rational and a decent businessman.

I guess you weren't paying close attention to his birther phase. I heard him calling in to a news show saying that he had sent people to Hawaii to dig into Obama's story and "you wouldn't believe what they're finding!" He's a pathological liar, and it was evident then.

It's even more evident now. But incredibly, it's working for him (at least with his base of morons). I saw a Dem strategist talking about how he'll do in debates: "The problem is that Trump says stuff that is not true. What do you do? Spend the rest of the debate trying to set the record straight while he says even more stuff that is not true, or disregard the lie and move on?"
It's definitely a dilemma, as so many of the electorate will swallow the lies in one gulp and the rest will, if you don't take him to task, wonder if there's some truth to what he says. But if you do take him to task, you appear to be derailed into a "nuh-unh"/"uh-huh" sideshow... or trying to prove a negative like "you never sent anyone to Hawaii, and they never found anything".

 

[KeepTalking]

I think Hillary is a liar who has sold out to contributors. The Clinton Foundation took the contributions in and the then, quite coincidentally, she as Secretary of State changed policy. No connection, folks.

What policy did Secretary Clinton change as a result of contributions to the Clinton Foundation? Please be specific.

As Comey said, anyone else who does the same in the future, and is not a Clinton, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Did he really? When did he say this, and exactly what did he say? My recollection is that he said that no reasonable prosecutor would have brought charges against her.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

I guess you weren't paying close attention to his birther phase. I heard him calling in to a news show saying that he had sent people to Hawaii to dig into Obama's story and "you wouldn't believe what they're finding!" He's a pathological liar, and it was evident then.

It's even more evident now. But incredibly, it's working for him (at least with his base of morons). I saw a Dem strategist talking about how he'll do in debates: "The problem is that Trump says stuff that is not true. What do you do? Spend the rest of the debate trying to set the record straight while he says even more stuff that is not true, or disregard the lie and move on?"
It's definitely a dilemma, as so many of the electorate will swallow the lies in one gulp and the rest will, if you don't take him to task, wonder if there's some truth to what he says. But if you do take him to task, you appear to be derailed into a "nuh-unh"/"uh-huh" sideshow... or trying to prove a negative like "you never sent anyone to Hawaii, and they never found anything".

What she should do is point out first thing that Trump has lied. A lot. About everything. And then remind Trump he will be relentlessly fact checked by the press. And put the press on notice to do a thorough job of it.

How many Pants on Fire and Four Pinocchios will Donald spew tonight?

 

[Elixir]

How many Pants on Fire and Four Pinocchios will Donald spew tonight?

If you think you know the answer, there's money to be made. Right now, Predictit offers 3:1 odds that Trump will not earn 8 or more "pants on fire" ratings in August... and 90 cents will get you a buck if you bet that Hillary will earn as many as ONE. Eleven cents earns you a dollar if she gets 2 or more. That alone says that everyone knows that Trump lies his cheeto-face off. But his fans don't care...

 

[blastula]

Easy money for Politifact writers.

 

[Keith&Co.]

What she should do is point out first thing that Trump has lied.

That was my thought.
WHATEVER he claims, ask "Is this like your claim X? That turned out to be a lie. Or is it like your claim Y? Z? Did you ever pony up evidence for claims R through W? "

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Ready for your head to spin.

New Monmouth Poll:

President: Trump (R) up 11 pts
Senate: Bayh (D) up 7 pts
Governor: Holcomb (R) up 1 pt

 

[beero1000]

Ready for your head to spin.

New Monmouth Poll:

President: Trump (R) up 11 pts
Senate: Bayh (D) up 7 pts
Governor: Holcomb (R) up 1 pt

To be clear - poll has Trump up 11 pts in INDIANA.

Minor details...

 

[MarkW]

Ready for your head to spin.

New Monmouth Poll:

President: Trump (R) up 11 pts
Senate: Bayh (D) up 7 pts
Governor: Holcomb (R) up 1 pt

From a Democrat's perspective, this isn't bad at all. Indiana is far from an important state for the presidential race--it would be nice to win, but Clinton can easily win without it. Evan Bayh has always been very popular in Indiana, so if the margin in this poll holds up, this should be a likely Democratic pickup, and the likelihood of Democratic control of the Senate next January is a lot greater. And the governor's race is, at least, still up for grabs. It would be nice to win this one.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

Breaking News:

Donald Trump throws the election.
http://money.cnn.com/2016/08/17/media/trump-ailes-bannon/index.html

Now, Trump appears to have brought the echo-chamber's influence to its apotheosis: The outside media influencers are on the inside, driving his media strategy through formal channels (in the case of Bannon) and informal channels (in the case of Ailes). The people who laid the foundation for Trump's success are now helping to call the shots.
"Talk radio, Fox News and the conservative web sites created space for an outsider like Trump to storm the GOP citadel," Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times columnist, told CNNMoney. "Now Trump, having tried -- not very hard -- to kiss and make up with the GOP establishment seems to be reverting to the media guerrillas who initially gave him the microphone and the push he needed."
Stephen Hayes, a columnist at the more establishment conservative Weekly Standard, wrote Wednesday that in hiring Bannon, Trump "is choosing to end his campaign living in the alternate reality that Breitbart creates for him on a daily basis—where everything he does is the best, where everyone who questions him is an idiot or a traitor... and where, truly, Trump alone can fix it all."