Folks:
About 1.5 years ago I wrote “Why bother to read news about the 2016 presidential election?“:
The media seems to be gearing up to get excited about the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Pew Research, however, shows that 48 percent of Americans are Democrats and just 39 percent Republican. If we assume that those who aren’t affiliated are roughly equally likely to vote for either party, we should be able to predict the result of the 2016 election: 54 percent Democrat; 45 percent Republican; 1 percent Other. (For comparison, the 2012 election was 51/47/2.)
Learning about Republican candidates would seem to be completely pointless. If there were some serious primary challenger to Hillary Clinton perhaps that would be worth studying, but after the primaries the election should be essentially over.
If the above analysis is correct why do people bother watching TV or reading news articles on this subject?
Was this analysis correct? A CNN article on the latest polls says
In the NBC poll, Clinton has 48% support compared to 37% for Trump, 7% for Libertarian Gary Johnson and 2% for the Green Party’s Jill Stein. In a two-way race, Clinton leads 51% to 41%.
In other words, the needle does not seem to have been moved at all despite all of the energy expended by Americans on Facebook and elsewhere. Nor are things much changed from Mitt Romney’s 2012 prediction that a minimum of 47 percent of Americans wouldn’t find it in their interest to vote for a Republican candidate.
[Separately, note that CNN presents as fact its interpretation of Donald Trump’s recorded conversation: “The NBC poll shows Trump could have paid a steep price for the ‘Access Hollywood’ tape that showed him bragging about sexually assaulting women…”]
Related:
- “Citizens for a Planned Economy” (the natural conclusion regarding what Americans want based on listening to what successful politicians promise)
- Hugo Chavez: Great politician; poor administrator (our hemisphere’s most successful politician)
If the GOP had run a centrist candidate, say Kasich, then turnout could make all the difference.
But the GOP has a lot of trouble with ventrists now because of the unholy alliance with tea partyers and others who just want to burn it all down.
For the time being, the GOP has no hope in presidential politics.
Also, at least in much of the south, party registration numbers can be misleading. A lot of registered Democrats vote Republican, but not v.v.
Raleigh,
It has nothing to do with being “centrist” (whatever that means) or not. You still think politics is about idealogy? That only happens in countries that share a single ethnicity. The Democrats (along with their idiot allies, the Republicans) have succeeded in electing a new people. The Republicans are the white party, and there aren’t enough whites to get them elected anymore. The democrats are on their way to being the PRI of the U.S., a single party rule in which whoever pays off the most interest groups gets the next term. Welcome to Brazil North.
The Republicans lost the Asians:
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/vietnamese-americans-are-no-longer-a-lock-for-the-republican-party/
Why bother to follow the election campaign? Because Donald Trump is extremely entertaining, that’s why. (Between elections, everybody wonders why SNL still exists. In an election year, though, they’re pure gold.) The campaign has also demonstrated the weakness of the Republican Party, both in nominating Trump in the first place, and then being unable to prevent him from attacking his own party.
Faced with the Democratic advantage, Trump’s strategy was to turn out low-propensity voters, people who don’t usually vote. As voter participation was only 57.5% in 2012, it wasn’t a crazy strategy.
At this point Trump looks to be down seven points. To make a comeback, he needs three things: (1) a polling error of four or five points in his favor, (2) a strong performance at tomorrow’s debate, and (3) unexpectedly high turnout among his supporters.
mr. t says: “I love the poorly educated.”
This is the man Republicans want to be President of the United States. A man who spent years trying to convince people President Obama was not born in the United States. This after two hospital birth notices announced his birth August 1961.
If you multiply Hillary’s flaws and short comings by 1000, she would still be choice. I’m not Republican or Democrat. I’m a pragmatist.
The last time the GOP won, there was no internet, for all intents & purposes. No myspace, no gawker, no gootube, no twitter, no facebook. Phones couldn’t do anything. Web developers were fleeing the dot coms for set top box jobs. You could dump your home internet service comfortably. The new ways to spread information in the last 12 years might explain the shift. Gone are the days you could remotely campaign on smaller government. The GOP needs to become more like the Australian liberal party to have any chance.
j crossfire,
Tell us more about the Australian liberal party.
Hillary has been running an anti-Trump campaign moreso than a pro-Hillary campaign. If you turn on the TV most news time seems to be about 4:1 Trump:Hillary. It seems that Trump’s free publicity that won him the primary is backfiring now.
it’s interesting how supporters of each candidate are convinced that their party will win. Just like more than half of people consider themselves better than average drivers .
However there is a clear Howard Stern effect
Researcher: The average radio listener listens for eighteen minutes. The average Howard Stern fan listens for – are you ready for this? – an hour and twenty minutes.
Pig Vomit: How can that be?
Researcher: Answer most commonly given? “I want to see what he’ll say next.”
Pig Vomit: Okay, fine. But what about the people who hate Stern?
Researcher: Good point. The average Stern hater listens for two and a half hours a day.
Pig Vomit: But… if they hate him, why do they listen?
Researcher: Most common answer? “I want to see what he’ll say next.”
this chart seems to be in agreement:
http://i.imgur.com/KLpuVE3.png
Why do people bother watching TV or reading news articles on this subject?
Simple: it’s a great starting point if you wish to signal virtue or vent anger. And most people want to do that.