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| Donald Trump and his new campaign CEO Steve Bannon |
The latest Quinnipiac Poll shows Hillary Clinton beating Donald
Trump by 51-41 in a head-to-head matchup, and by 45-38 if Libertarian Gary Johnson
and Green Jill Stein are included. The
headline on the Quinnipiac press release reads as follows:
CLINTON TOPS 50 PERCENT, LEADS TRUMP BY
10 POINTS, QUINNIPIAC UNIVERSITY NATIONAL POLL FINDS; VOTERS LIKE CLINTON MORE
THAN TRUMP – BUT NOT MUCH
I think the headline
does not delve deeply enough into Quinnipiac’s own figures. The press release notes that a “total of 44
percent of American likely voters like Clinton ‘a lot’ or ‘a little,’ while 47 percent
dislike her ‘a little’ or ‘a lot,’ and 8 percent hate her [55% negative]. A total of 35 percent
of voters like Trump ‘a lot’ or ‘a
little,’ while 53 percent dislike him ‘a little’ or ‘a lot,’ and 10 percent
hate him [63% negative].”
Given the fact that 55%
have a negative view of Clinton, and 63% have a negative view of Trump, Quinnipiac
suggests that things may be closer than they are. But I would posit that, in this environment,
voters who only dislike a candidate “a little” could end up voting for that
candidate, given the alternative.
If you look at
Questions 17 and 18 of the poll, a slightly more sophisticated picture comes
into focus. Only 41% of voters hate or dislike Clinton a lot, but 49% hate or
dislike Trump a lot. This is
key. No candidate is likely to get
someone’s vote if they hate or dislike the candidate a lot. And Trump is just short of so alienating
nearly half the electorate.
On the other hand,
the 41% who hate or dislike Clinton a lot is basically the irreducible percentage
of the electorate who could be accurately described as “yellow dog
Republicans.” (The term originated with
Southern Democrats before 1964, for whom it was said that they would even vote for a "yellow dog" if that dog was running on the Democratic ticket.) Any voter who is not in that “hate” or “dislike
a lot” group is a potential Clinton voter, given the views on Trump. And any
voter who is in the “hate” or “dislike a lot” group is, it seems to me, highly
unlikely to vote for a candidate that voter so despises.
I believe its is
quite unlikely that very many voters who currently dislike Clinton only “a little”
will be tipped into the “a lot” category. Their views of Clinton are already baked in, due to a quarter century of Republican attacks and Clinton's own missteps regarding her State Department emails. The new "revelations" probably will not make things any worse for her. But Trump is a newer commodity, and his recent antics
may tip a lot of people from the “a little” to the “a lot” or even “hate” category, now that more and more people are paying closer attention as Election Day gets closer. His attack yesterday on Clinton, calling her "a bigot" – a term even his Republican supporters decline to agree with in public – could very likely put him deeper in
negative territory, particularly when paired with Clinton's documented demonstration, heavily covered in the media, of Trump's history of bigotry and divisiveness, culminating in his recent appointment of Breitbart chief Steve Bannon to be his campaign CEO. It is noteworthy that the Quinnipiac Poll was taken between August 18 and 24 -- mostly, or perhaps entirely, before yesterday's seminal dueling speeches.
Trump is clearly doubling down on his slash and burn personna. Even his supposed "softening" on immigration is so vacillating that he alternately appears to be not changing at all, or doing a total flip-flop. So Trump may already be in check-mate, absent a radical change in the picture. He is certainly not likely to replace Steve Bannon with Steve Schmidt.
Of course, this does not mean anyone should take anything for granted, and, for Clinton to actually fulfill campaign promises, the Democrats must retake the Senate and, hopefully, the House. But things are moving in the right direction. It is pedal-to-the-metal time.
Trump is clearly doubling down on his slash and burn personna. Even his supposed "softening" on immigration is so vacillating that he alternately appears to be not changing at all, or doing a total flip-flop. So Trump may already be in check-mate, absent a radical change in the picture. He is certainly not likely to replace Steve Bannon with Steve Schmidt.
Of course, this does not mean anyone should take anything for granted, and, for Clinton to actually fulfill campaign promises, the Democrats must retake the Senate and, hopefully, the House. But things are moving in the right direction. It is pedal-to-the-metal time.
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