Hillary Clinton Gets Her Post-Convention Bounce, Takes Back The Lead In The Polls

Hillary Clinton appears to be doing very well in the wake of the first round of post-convention polls.

Donald Trump Hillary Clinton 2

In the short time period between the Republican and Democratic conventions, a handful of national polls appeared to show a positive bounce in the polls for Donald Trump. Depending on which poll you looked at, Trump’s numbers jumped between four and six percentage points to the point where he was leading Hillary Clinton in the RealClearPolitics poll average for the national race. As I noted in a comment to James Joyner’s post about those polls, though, it was probably advisable to wait until after both conventions were over to determine the real impact, if any, that the conventions may have had on the race. In part, this was due to the fact that the amount of time between the two conventions was so short that it would be hard to get an accurate measurement of the impact of just the Republican convention. With both conventions over, we’re likely to see a new round of polling coming out, and that will tell us a lot about the post-convention direction of the race. Well, the first round of that polling is out today.

First up, there’s a new national poll from Public Policy Polling that puts Clinton back in front with a five point lead and also shows some signs that the Democratic National Convention may have helped her at least a little bit in overcoming her favorability problems:

PPP’s new national poll, taken completely after both party’s conventions, finds that Hillary Clinton emerged with a much more positive image than she had a month ago. Donald Trump meanwhile is just as unpopular as he was before the conventions.

Clinton’s net favorability improved by 9 points over the last month. She’s still not popular, with a -6 net favorability at 45/51, but it’s a good deal better than the -15 spread she had at 39/54 a month ago. The gains are particularly attributable to Democrats increasing in their enthusiasm for her, going from giving her a 76/15 rating to an 83/12 one. Trump, on the other hand, is at a -22 net favorability with 36% of voters seeing him favorably to 58% with a negative one. That’s barely changed at all from the 35/58 standing we found for him in late June.

Clinton leads the race with 46% to 41% for Trump, with Gary Johnson at 6% and Jill Stein at 2%. In a head to head just between Clinton and Trump, Clinton hits 50% and leads Trump 50-45. A month ago Clinton led 45-41 in the full field contest and 48-44 in the head to head so there hasn’t been much change. But not much change is good news for Clinton. We’ve been writing for months that this race is shaping up pretty similarly both nationally and at the state level to the margins Barack Obama won by in 2012- not a huge landslide by any means, but a solid victory. The conventions have passed without any change to that big picture, and that leaves Clinton as the favorite going into the final three months.

It’s also important to note that most of the remaining undecided pool is very Democratic leaning. They give Barack Obama a 55/33 approval rating, and they’d rather have him as President than Trump by a 59/10 spread. If they ended up voting for Clinton and Trump by those proportions, it would push Clinton’s lead up from 5 points to 8. But they don’t like Clinton (a 4/83 favorability) or Trump (a 2/89 favorability). A lot of these folks are disaffected Bernie Sanders voters, and even after the successful convention this week they’re still not sold on Clinton yet. She and her surrogates will have to keep working to try to win those folks over and if they can the election enters landslide territory.

(…)

This election is never likely to turn out to be the sort of landslide for Clinton that some expected a year or 6 months ago because Trump voters just hate Clinton too much for that to ever happen. For instance on this poll we find that 74% of Trump voters think Clinton should be in prison, to only 12% who disagree. By a 66/22 margin they say Clinton is a bigger threat to the United States than Russia. And 33% think Clinton even has ties to Lucifer, to 36% who say they don’t think so, and 31% who are unsure either way. Against that set of findings it’s simply not very likely that many Trump voters will be moving into the Clinton column and that’s why although she’s certainly the favorite the chances of her winning a double digit victory are pretty minimal.

Second, Clinton has a re-taken a lead outside the margin of error in the CBS News national poll:

Hillary Clinton has received a bump in support after the Democratic convention and has now pulled ahead of Donald Trump.

Forty-six percent of voters nationwide say they’ll vote for Clinton in November, while 39 percent say they’ll back Trump. The race was tied last week after the Republican convention. Clinton led by a similar margin in June.

Clinton got a four-point bounce after her party’s convention, compared to a two-point bump for Trump after his convention.

When compared to previous Democratic presidential nominees, Clinton’s bounce is similar to those President Obama got in 2012 and 2008, but short of the 13-point bounce her husband, Bill Clinton, received in 1992. In 2000, support for Al Gore rose 10 points after the Democratic convention, but he went on to lose a close race that fall.

When leaners are included – voters who are undecided when initially asked their vote preference but lean toward a candidate – Clinton leads Trump by six points.

Clinton also retains her lead when Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson is added.

Voters who back a candidate remain firm in their support. Nine in 10 Clinton and Trump voters say their minds are made up about their candidate.

In the wake of the Democratic convention, positive views of Hillary Clinton have risen five points among registered voters, from 31 percent a week ago to 36 percent today. Unfavorable views of Hillary Clinton have dropped six points: from 56 percent to 50 percent.

Over half of voters continue to hold an unfavorable opinion of Donald Trump. Although Trump received a slight bounce in his favorable rating after the Republican Convention, now just 31 percent view him favorably – similar to what was recorded before his party’s convention.

After the conventions, Clinton has expanded her lead with women, but she still trails Trump by a large margin among men. Clinton continues to get the support of more than eight in 10 Democrats and has seen an uptick in support among liberals. The race among independents is even; Trump led among this group last week.

Finally, the new CNN/ORC poll shows Clinton with a seven point post-convention bounce:

Hillary Clinton emerges from her party’s convention in Philadelphia with a restored lead over Donald Trump, having earned a 7-point convention bounce, according to a new CNN/ORC Poll.

In a two-way head-to-head matchup, Clinton tops Trump 52% to 43%, and in a four-way matchup including third party candidates Gary Johnson and Jill Stein, Clinton leads 45% to 37% with Johnson at 9% and Stein at 5%.

Besides improving her standing against Trump, Clinton’s convention appears to have boosted the share of Americans who think her policies will move the country in the right direction (from 43% before either convention to 48% now), while Trump’s right direction number held roughly steady following the back-to-back political gatherings in Cleveland and Philadelphia.

Further, a majority of Clinton’s backers now say their vote is more to show support for her than to oppose Trump, a sharp shift since early May. Back then, 48% said their vote was one of support for the former secretary of state, 58% say so now. While Trump also improved his numbers on that metric, his voters are more evenly divided, with 47% saying they’re backing him to show support and 50% saying it’s more to oppose Clinton.

More of Clinton’s backers also say they are certain to support her come November: 44% of registered voters are Clinton supporters who say their mind is made up, while 36% say they are solidly behind Trump. Only about 16% of voters say their minds could change in the 99 days left between now and Election Day.

Clinton’s convention appears to have helped her reverse the damage done to perceptions of her honesty during the GOP convention, but she did not improve those numbers compared with where they stood before either convention. Overall, 34% say they consider Clinton honest and trustworthy, up from 30% after the GOP convention but exactly where that figure was in a poll conducted before either convention happened.

Clinton made more progress on several other measures, however, with 50% now saying she’s in touch with the problems of ordinary Americans, and 48% that she will unite the country and not divide it. She gained three points — a change inside the margin of sampling error for this poll — compared with a poll conducted before the Republican convention on having the right experience, running for the good of the country rather than personal gain and as someone you would be proud to have as president.

On each of those measures, Clinton fares better than Trump, except when voters are asked about their honesty. Thirty-five percent say they see Trump as honest and trustworthy, just about even with the former secretary of state.

On the rest of the attributes tested, the Democratic convention appears to have wiped out the significant gains Trump made on several of these measures, including being seen as in-touch with ordinary Americans, someone you’d be proud to have as president, running for the good of the country rather than personal gain and uniting the country rather than dividing it.

(…)

Clinton’s convention, despite regular interruption from dissatisfied Bernie Sanders delegates inside the convention hall, also appears to have bolstered Democratic unity overall and strengthened her position among Sanders’ supporters. Among Democrats and independents who lean toward the Democratic Party, 84% now feel the party will be united by November, up from 75% before either convention. Those who say they would rather have seen the party nominate Sanders now split 69% for Clinton, 13% for Stein, 10% for Johnson and just 3% say they’ll back Trump. That’s a 5-point improvement for Clinton (inside the margin of sampling error for this subgroup), an 8-point dropoff in the share who say they’d back Trump and a 7-point increase in support for Jill Stein.

Republican Party unity, meanwhile, has faded some compared with a survey immediately after their convention. While 73% said they thought the GOP would unite by November in a post-GOP convention poll, just 66% say the same now.

The Vice-Presidential nominees, meanwhile, remain largely unknown:

Tim Kaine’s favorability rating among registered voters rose from 31% before the Democratic convention to 39% after. That’s a bit smaller than Mike Pence’s increase after the Republican convention (his favorability rose from 26% before the GOP convention to 39% after), but those gains have faded some as just 29% of registered voters say they have a favorable opinion of Pence now.

In other polls conducted by the Los Angeles Times and the University of Southern California, Trump has a four point lead, but this is down substantially from previous numbers from this tracking poll that showed Trump with a seven point lead. Additionally, a tracking poll from Reuters/Ipsos gives Clinton a five point lead while the Rasmussen tracking poll gives her a one point lead  In the RealClearPolitics average, all of this leaves Clinton with a 3.9 point lead over Trump in a head-to-head matchup, a 3.0 point lead in a three-way race that includes Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson in which Johnson is averaging  7.5%, and a 2.6 point lead in a four-way matchup that includes Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein which shows Johnson averaging 7.0% and Stein averaging 2.0%. Clinton does slightly better in the averages at Pollster for both the head-to-head and three-way matchups, likely because, as I’ve noted before the Pollster average includes several polls that RealClearPolitics does not include in the calculation of its average.

In any case, after taking all of these post-convention polls into account it does appear that the Clinton has benefited far more from her convention than Donald Trump did from his. This isn’t entirely surprising given how the two conventions went, but given the fact that this election is likely to be as closely fought as the battles in 2008 and 2012, it could end up providing Clinton with important momentum. This is especially true at this point since we will shortly be headed into a two week period when political news is likely to be crowded out of the headlines by coverage of the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and the fact that August is typically a month when many Americans take vacations as we get closer to Labor Day and the start of the school year for most school children. That’s not to say that Clinton and Trump won’t be campaigning during this period, of course, but it’s also likely that many Americans won’t exactly be paying a lot of attention to the Presidential election for the next several weeks and that it won’t be until after Labor Day that this changes. For that reason, if Clinton heads into this period with a solid lead in the polls as now seems apparent, then it’s likely that it will last until the campaign begins its final swing in September. Between that and Clinton’s Electoral College advantage, she could be heading into the final phase of the campaign in very good shape while the Trump campaign continues to search for a strategy while at the same time dealing with a candidate who seems intent on going off message whenever he feels like it. That’s not a recipe for success, and it’s beginning to appear that the Trump campaign knows it and knows there’s very little it can do about it.

FILED UNDER: 2016 Election, Public Opinion Polls, US Politics, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. ltmcdies says:

    Trump new strategy… start whining that general election is rigged….
    http://time.com/4433984/donald-trump-general-election-rigged/

  2. CSK says:

    My guess is that Trump’s continuing obsessive trashing of the Khan family will lead to even more drastic drops in his polling numbers.

  3. CSK says:

    @ltmcdies:

    Well, we knew all along he was going to do that, didn’t we? I still think it’s possible he might bail completely. I speculated that he might develop a mystery illness that would prevent him from running, but not from playing golf or proceeding with his other activities, but now he doesn’t need that excuse, does he? He can just claim that the debates are rigged (which he already has) and that the elections are rigged, and quit.

  4. Pch101 says:

    As I recall, about one-third of the national polls during the 2012 election went against Obama.

    This one promises to be a nail biter.

  5. DK says:

    Maybe the scrutiny on the Republican nominee’s missing taxes vis a vis his debts with Russian oligarchs and Russian mafia have forced Putin to briefly cut ties with Paul Manafort till the scrutiny blows over, and instead focus on puppeteering Julian Assange/Wikileaks.

    So the Trump campaign is now winging it without Putin’s marching orders — and coupled with the fantastic Democratic convention, that is bad bad news for Agent Orange. Hillary is up 6-9 points just from the convention bounce. The Khan meltdown bounce should put her up double-digits. Maybe even higher now that Trump advisors are publicly smearing Papa Khan as a terrorist agent of the Muslim Brotherhood, conservative media is pushing the insult that the Khans are unintelligent dupes “tricked” by Hillary and spreading conspiracy lies that Khan is corrupted by financial ties to the Clinton Foundation, and Agent Orange himself is now citing Khan’s opposition to religious profiling to imply he’s a terrorist sympathizer.

    Whomever first came up with the idea of having Khzir and Gazala Khan appear in prime time at the Democratic convention deserves a big big raise. You knew conservatives would take the bait, but who knew they would take it so long and so hard?

    Pennsylvania and Colorado now look solidly blue, with Georgia and Missouri now tied, and Hillary within striking distance in Texas. By the time Republicans figure out that the proper response to Khan is silence, the damage may be so great that Hillary breaks 400 electoral votes in November. You can tell Agent Orange is in his death spiral, because Putin’s online goons are going insane.

  6. Bob@Youngstown says:

    OT, but I’ve been eager to ask:
    How are hacked emails authenticated ? If I understand this correctly, the assertion is that HRC’s server was surveilled and emails duplicated prior to the server (or it’s back-up) being wiped and/or dismantled. This is what DT is asking the Russian’s assistance.

    If those emails are recovered and presented to Wikileaks (or whomever) in printed form (as opposed to digital files) how can anyone establish the authenticity. And who would be testing – Wikileaks???

  7. Bob@Youngstown says:

    Since I’m OT, same question applies to tax returns. It seems to me that I (or Donald) could fill out a tax return full of bogus data and present that as “my actual tax return” . How can anyone check it”s authenticity?

  8. Gromitt Gunn says:
  9. michael reynolds says:

    @Pch101:

    Nope. I’ll bet you a nice bottle that Trump doesn’t get within 5 points of Hillary after this. And frankly, I think he’s going to start dropping off a cliff. People are finally beginning to notice that Trump isn’t just ‘politically incorrect,’ but is in fact, mentally ill.

    I think he’ll increasingly be a laughingstock. There are two editorials in the WaPo today speculating on his mental illness. In fact I worry now that the tide will ebb so quickly that he may resign from the race, leaving the GOP – I assume – with the blockhead Pence. Better a blockhead than a fwcking out-of-control nut.

    The GOP is on the edge of electoral armageddon. If I were calling the election today I’d guess 55-35-10. And we are quite likely to take back the Senate.

  10. Kari Q says:

    @Bob@Youngstown:

    You have confused Hillary’s server from the time she was Secretary of State with the servers that were hacked. Hillary’s personal server is not functioning, and there is no confirmation that it was ever hacked.

    The servers that have been hacked are Democratic Party campaign servers, unrelated to the one that held Hillary’s emails that were subpoenaed. The FBI, by the way, recovered all of those “missing” emails that Republicans talk about.

  11. Pch101 says:

    @michael reynolds:

    I would love nothing more than for Trump to go down in flames and to suffer a humiliating popular vote defeat in November that is so embarrassing that even he wouldn’t attempt to spin it.

    But I place low — not zero, but low — odds on that outcome. I do expect him to lose, but I expect the national popular vote to be closer than it should be.

    Trump will be the anti-Islam candidate, and that will probably help him more than you’d care to believe. Pew’s survey of US attitudes toward Islam would suggest that he’s not foolish to play that game — many Americans are wary of Muslims, and not all of those wary Americans are Republican.

    http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/07/22/muslims-and-islam-key-findings-in-the-u-s-and-around-the-world/

    As part of that, I expect that the national popular vote polls may prove to be a bit more inaccurate than usual, for there may be a small segment of the population that will vote for Trump but won’t admit it to a pollster.

  12. SKI says:

    @Bob@Youngstown: @Bob@Youngstown: reminder: the FBI recovered most if not all of the “missing” emails – the ones the attorneys’ algorithm had determined were personal and not work-related. But because it was a talking point for months, Trump keeps repeating it.

  13. Jen says:

    He’s now making noise about being worried that the general election will be “rigged”–he certainly is proficient at sowing the seeds of discontent.

    OT, but I find this piece jaw-dropping. How did this man get through college? I think I’m going to need to see the long-form high school and college transcripts. This appears to be evidence that if one is wealthy enough, actually learning anything in school is optional.

  14. Kylopod says:

    @Pch101:

    for there may be a small segment of the population that will vote for Trump but won’t admit it to a pollster.

    Possibly, though I heard this argument back in December, and it didn’t turn out to be true in the primaries. (Trump did not overperform relative to the polls as a whole, and in several cases he underperformed.) This is just a variant on the old “Bradley Effect” theory, which is one of those dime-store theories that pundits love to chatter about but rarely actually pans out.

  15. James Pearce says:

    @Pch101:

    Trump will be the anti-Islam candidate, and that will probably help him more than you’d care to believe. Pew’s survey of US attitudes toward Islam would suggest that he’s not foolish to play that game — many Americans are wary of Muslims, and not all of those wary Americans are Republican.

    If you were a liberal, you might understand why many Americans may be “wary” of Muslims, but don’t actually want to oppress them in the manner Trump suggests. (Hint: Civil rights.)

    @michael reynolds:

    And frankly, I think he’s going to start dropping off a cliff.

    I saw a poll the other day that showed 25% of conservatives are currently supporting Hillary Clinton. The way things are going, I don’t see that number going down.

  16. cian says:

    @Pch101:

    I take your point and it is one to be reckoned with, for sure, but I can’t help feeling you are missing the big picture by concentrating all your attention on that small corner. And it is a small corner as most American’s understand that while the threat from Islamic extremists is real and a danger to all, no one man can change this reality and one who offers only war will in the end be rejected by the majority. But more than that, what the Trump/Khan fracas shows is someone who makes really bad decisions, who is easily distracted and utterly obsessed with himself and how he is perceived. What you see as clever politics is in reality just more prove that Trump would be a bad leader and one easily outplayed by other leaders on the world stage. A majority of the country already sees this and, trust me, that majority will grow.

  17. Kylopod says:

    @James Pearce:

    I saw a poll the other day that showed 25% of conservatives are currently supporting Hillary Clinton. The way things are going, I don’t see that number going down.

    I guess more than anything this election is a test of just how hyper-partisan we as a nation have really become. The conventional assumption is that almost all of those disgruntled conservatives will “come home” on Election Day. (Of course, it’s important to realize that not all self-described “conservatives” are partisan Republicans in the first place–a significant percentage of Democrats call themselves conservative.) Trump’s candidacy is putting that assumption to the test. And Hillary has made it part of her strategy, to attract enough Republicans so that Trump loses the buffer of support that Republicans usually can count on from members of their own party.

    What amazes me a little is that hardly anyone seems to notice she’s running on perhaps the most progressive platform in decades (since before even her husband ran, in fact). The Bernie-Bros won’t give her a lick of credit, and meanwhile all those center-right outlets were praising the convention as “Reaganesque,” while Trump himself attacked her as beholden to Wall Street. That’s a pretty impressive trick, if you think about it. What happened to the whole “Dems are all Stalinists” rhetoric that we normally hear every four years?

  18. C. Clavin says:

    @Kylopod:

    a significant percentage of Democrats call themselves conservative

    Me, for instance. Nothing about today’s Republican Party is Conservative. They want to burn the house down so they can bask in the glow. That is, by definition, not Conservative.

    The big thing about this bounce is that it cuts at the heart of Trump’s main selling point…that he is a winner. He has never been ahead in any aggregate polling, or with the serious forecasters like Nate Silver or Sam Wang. And with this bounce it’ll just get worse for him. You can’t keep selling yourself as a winner if you are demonstrably not one. Jenos and JKB may buy it…but they’ll buy anything. And there aren’t enough uneducated white guys like that to win a National election.
    Then there is the problem with his daily errors.
    Putin is not going into Ukraine…oh wait…he’s already there.
    The incredibly stupid Kahn attacks. Paul Ryan is now under yyuuuge pressure to withdraw his endorsement.
    Now he’s whining about a rigged election? And lying about the NFL and the debates.
    Gadzooks…I can’t wait to see how he f*ck’s up today.

  19. Pch101 says:

    @cian:

    I can’t help feeling you are missing the big picture by concentrating all your attention on that small corner.

    I’m simply describing the Trump campaign strategy. I’m not “concentrating my attention” on Islam, Trump is.

    it is a small corner as most American’s understand that while the threat from Islamic extremists is real and a danger to all,

    If Trump can use his Islamophobia pitch to improve his standing by just a couple of percent, then that has the potential be enough to win to election. It does not need to convince everyone in order for it to be effective.

    (I don’t expect him to win, but this angle probably provides him with his best opportunity to try. to win.)

    Trump has few other options because he does not have the money or staffing for a ground game. It’s probably his only issue that has the potential to win over a fair number of Democrats and independents. So this anti-Islam routine is probably going to be a dominant part of his campaign strategy.

  20. C. Clavin says:

    @Pch101:

    If Trump can use his Islamophobia pitch to improve his standing by just a couple of percent, then that has the potential be enough to win to election.

    The only way Trump wins is if there is a significant terrorist strike between now and then, and Clinton completely botches the response.
    Trump praying for a terrorist strike. Sad!!!

  21. CSK says:

    @michael reynolds:

    I think he’s setting the stage to bail. First he claimed that the debates with Clinton would be rigged. Now he’s saying the election itself is rigged.

  22. CSK says:

    @Jen:

    How did he get through college? By cheating, paying people to take his exams for him, and buying his papers from a term paper mill.

    He probably speaks slightly better than the Times article indicates. But his fans like poor grammar and diction, because it’s “authentic,” not hoity-toity, as Sarah Palin would say.

  23. Kylopod says:

    @C. Clavin:

    He has never been ahead in any aggregate polling, or with the serious forecasters like Nate Silver or Sam Wang.

    Huh? He was ahead in RCP’s averages a few times, including just last week. And a few days ago, for just the briefest of moments (you could have blinked), 538’s “polls-only” forecast had him at a slightly higher than 50% chance of winning.

  24. Pch101 says:

    @CSK:

    Trump can’t quit now. That would make him a loser.

    A better plan:

    1. Run for office on a shoestring
    2. Lose election. Claim the system is rigged
    3. Pledge to fight said rigged system with the new Trump TV network or similar
    4. Profit (he hopes)

  25. Bob@Youngstown says:

    @Kari Q: @SKI:

    Thank you both. however I’m still interested in how authentication is possible for “stolen” emails and/or tax returns.
    any ideas? (Still OT, please excuse)

  26. al-Alameda says:

    The Clinton/Kaine surrogates should continue to demand that Trump release his tax returns, all the while suggesting that Trump is not a billionaire, and probably has extensive debt obligations with Russian banks and oligarchs. Force him to deny it.

    Now, I have no illusions, no reason to believe that Trump will release his returns at all, but the point is to cause Trump as much discomfort as he causes everyone else.

  27. dmichael says:

    I genuinely would like to know how any sentient adult with average or better intelligence would vote for Trump. At my age, LiIy Tomlin’s quip that “while I try to be cynical, I just can’t keep up” describes me. I understand that there is a significant segment of our population that is racist and anti-muslim. I recognize that some are misogynists. But how does that get them to vote for someone who is patently a narcissist bully and chronic liar who provides them with NO explanation of how he is going to do what he promises? With all the talk of polls, is there any doubt that 40 or more percent of the voting public will vote for this threat to our system of government? Help me out here.

  28. James Pearce says:

    @Kylopod:

    What amazes me a little is that hardly anyone seems to notice she’s running on perhaps the most progressive platform in decades

    Might as well. If she wins, she’s going to have a mandate. The Republicans have basically given it to her.

    @Pch101:

    Trump can’t quit now. That would make him a loser.

    The only way Trump avoids becoming the biggest loser in American history is if he wins the election and his presidency is a success.

    If he quits….loser. If he loses….loser. If he wins but can’t live up to his own hype….loser.

  29. al-Alameda says:

    @dmichael:

    With all the talk of polls, is there any doubt that 40 or more percent of the voting public will vote for this threat to our system of government? Help me out here.

    Exactly right. I generally believe that the system is now hardwired at about 40% (R) / 45% (D), with about 15% kind of in play, with an advantage to Democrats because of demographics.

    But, the Democratic advantage is this and perhaps mercurial, because if their constituencies don’t show up at the polls, all bets are off.

    Then there are the unusual things that can blow everything out of the water – ‘black swan’ events like a sudden attack or new war, or perhaps the sheer appalling-ness of either one of the candidates. Trump is appalling but this is probably mitigated by the fact that Clinton’s negatives are nearly as ‘appalling’ as Trumps.

  30. Kylopod says:

    @James Pearce:

    Might as well. If she wins, she’s going to have a mandate.

    I’m sure, though, that when and if she wins, we’re going to quickly start hearing stuff about how “she doesn’t really have a mandate, she just lucked into getting a terrible opponent.”

  31. grumpy realist says:

    @dmichael: You, because you are a rational individual with street smarts, understand “trust but verify.” Trump appeals to a) the gullible who otherwise would be answering Nigerian spam mail, b) the desperate (yeah, I know he’s a crook, but maybe, just maybe, I can get something from him before he starts the rest of the scam), and c) the nihilists who hate the situation as it is and are willing to try ANYTHING just in order to have something change. (They’re also the same people who end up crushed in the rubble, but as long as everyone else gets crushed in the rubble as well, they figure it’s a success.)

  32. Mikey says:
  33. Just 'nutha ig'rant cracker says:

    @cian:

    What you see as clever politics is in reality just more prove that Trump would be a bad leader and one easily outplayed by other leaders on the world stage.

    In electoral politics, these two phenomena are not mutually exclusive no matter how much they should be.

  34. JohnMcC says:

    I think that we here don’t understand (I tend to forget it from time to time) that Mr Trump actually thinks he’s winning. Or perhaps I should say that he cannot imagine that he will not win this election. His imagination does not extend that far. It also seems to me that he will be completely sincere in his belief that the election was stolen from him after he does lose. It will set him off on quest to find the horrible people who did that to him and there will be enough people who agree with him to make it a fabulous grift opportunity – a buy-one-get-one-free deal for him!

  35. Pete S says:

    @grumpy realist:

    the desperate (yeah, I know he’s a crook, but maybe, just maybe, I can get something from him before he starts the rest of the scam)

    This is the group that is truly scary. I know there are a large number of people who really believe Trump is genuine and honest. (I may or may not be related to some by marriage). But there also seem to be a group who know that he is lying most of the time, but have somehow convinced themselves that Trump is running a con on everyone else but is being honest when he says what they want to hear. These people are going to be disappointed no matter what happens, since Trump is going to A)lose B)quit or C)win but do absolutely nothing for his loyal followers. What are they going to do then?

  36. Concerned UK Citizen says:

    @DK:

    “…… agent orange……. ” hilarious!

  37. Concerned UK Citizen says:

    @<a href="#comment-2108852

    Someone in another thread wondered when DT would start to insult even his own supporters……. that day has come with the treatment of the lady with the crying baby.

    I can't imagine what she must have felt like being called out in front of all those people, TV camera's etc.

    He just can't help himself…….

  38. DrDaveT says:

    74% of Trump voters think Clinton should be in prison, to only 12% who disagree. By a 66/22 margin they say Clinton is a bigger threat to the United States than Russia. And 33% think Clinton even has ties to Lucifer, to 36% who say they don’t think so, and 31% who are unsure either way.

    If these polls are accurate, defeating Trump will not solve the bigger problem. That’s a terrifying proportion of American adults who are irreversibly brain damaged and/or dangerously insane. Someone less obviously flawed than Trump will step up to become their new Messiah.

  39. Just 'nutha ig'rant cracker says:

    @Pete S:

    What are they going to do then?

    The same thing they did after they voted for Nixon, Ford, Reagan, HW Bush, Dole…

  40. DrDaveT says:

    @Bob@Youngstown:

    I’m still interested in how authentication is possible for “stolen” emails and/or tax returns.

    For the emails, authentication is impossible. If you don’t find them in situ, you have no way of knowing how they might have been edited.

    For tax returns, the IRS holds the official version, and can compare what is published against what was filed.

  41. Bob@Youngstown says:

    @DrDaveT:
    Thanks,
    emails….. that’s what I suspected
    Tax returns… need to have the IRS to participate in authentication.

    I believe that the IRS is forbidden by law from even commenting on anyone’s tax return and the “release” of a presidential candidate’s tax return is not required by law. That would seem to be an ideal environment for a candidate to “release” a fictitious return. (just don’t tell Donald)

  42. DrDaveT says:

    @Bob@Youngstown:

    I believe that the IRS is forbidden by law from even commenting on anyone’s tax return

    Not exactly. They are forbidden to release any “return information” without taxpayer authorization. If Trump were to authorize the IRS to release his return info, they could do that (and you could be confident that it was accurate).

    More obscurely, if Trump were to publish something as “his tax returns”, and the IRS disagreed, the IRS could in theory call him on it — but only with the approval of the Joint Committee on Taxation, a nonpartisan Congressional committee with a staff of PhD economists and accountants:

    Internal Revenue Code section 6103(k)(3): Disclosure of Return Information to Correct Misstatements of Fact:
    The Secretary [of Treasury] may, but only following approval by the Joint Committee on Taxation, disclose such return information or any other information with respect to any specific taxpayer to the extent necessary for tax administration purposes to correct a misstatement of fact published or disclosed with respect to such taxpayer’s return or any transaction of the taxpayer with the Internal Revenue Service.

  43. Bob@Youngstown says:

    @DrDaveT: Thanks again,
    I just knew that some of the super smart OTB commenters would know.
    Sorry for the Off Topic.