A few articles I’m reading over coffee this morning (Trump Will Never be President Edition):<\/p>\n
Now that Clinton and Trump have more or less locked up their respective party’s nominations, the horse-race coverage will turn to the general election contest. \u00a0Since the media has an incentive to make it look like a close one, get ready for\u00a0the “Donald Trump can win<\/a>” and “Trump’s path to the Presidency<\/a>” articles. \u00a0We’ll hear more about what an awful candidate Clinton is<\/a> and all the baggage she’ll bring to the campaign<\/a>. \u00a0Trump can pivot back to the center, they’ll say, and look more “Presidential” (whatever that means). \u00a0Much will be made of his record number of GOP primary votes.<\/p>\n Stay tuned, but I’m not buying it. \u00a0Pundits using the “record number of primary votes” line will forget to mention that Clinton has more primary votes that Trump in a cycle with higher GOP but lower Democratic primary turnout. Trump appeals to a single small – albeit very vocal – demographic group: angry white men. \u00a0He’s alienated every other group, and they’ll turn out to vote against him. \u00a0If you think Trump can turn blue states red, take a look at this interactive page at FiveThirtyEight<\/a>: \u00a0<\/em>“What Would it Take to Turn Blue States Red<\/a>.” \u00a0Play with this a bit and you’ll see that he could increase white voter turn out to 90%\u00a0and still lose unless minority voter turnout drops. \u00a0Anyone think blacks<\/a> and Hispanics<\/a> will forget to vote for a candidate who wants got an endorsement from the KKK<\/a> and would deport Latino families<\/a>?<\/p>\n Even if he did manage to turn out white voters in greater numbers it’s not clear he can match Romney’s 2012 level of support. \u00a0Evangelicals, for example, may not support Trump in the numbers they have in the past. \u00a0Evangelical leaders like Russell Moore<\/a> have openly called upon them to reject Trump<\/a> as “not the moral leader we need.” \u00a0Moore runs the policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, and holds some sway in that community.<\/p>\n Finally, if you want a sense of arguments Trump supporters make in Conservative circles, take a look at this blog post by Tom White<\/a> at Virginia Right<\/em><\/a>. \u00a0He makes a case that the US has moved to the left, and “will not elect an establishment Republican and they will not elect a Conservative.” \u00a0He (correctly, I believe) notes that conservatives “are simply too small a portion of the electorate to win nationwide or even statewide in Virginia.” \u00a0Trump, however, is an “enigma to the Democrats” who has \u00a0done something no Republican has done in decades \u2013 he has tapped into the anger that many people have at the failures of our leadership no matter the party.” \u00a0White believes that “excitement and support [for Trump] will only grow as Trump goes on the offensive against Hillary.”<\/p>\n Again, I don’t buy it. \u00a0Donald Trump is no enigma – he’s a well-known celebrity with a long record as a businessman. \u00a0Clinton will be able to show that he’s been happy to let government bail him out when his businesses failed, and that he’s part of the “sending jobs overseas” problem. \u00a0And while he may have tapped into an undercurrent of anger among disaffected whites, especially men, the source of this anger is racial resentment, not leadership failure. \u00a0Finally, it’s not clear what new attacks on Hillary would be effective in building “excitement” for a Trump Presidency. \u00a0Benghazi? \u00a0Ask Trey Gowdy<\/a> how that worked out<\/a>\u00a0for him<\/em>.<\/p>\n Hillary Clinton is not a naturally charismatic candidate. \u00a0She’s a policy wonk with a serious grasp of issues and a lot of experience with policy implementation. \u00a0She understands unintended consequences and how to apply lessons learned. \u00a0Clinton is not the Progressive voice I would prefer – yes, I’ve been feeling the Bern.. Imagine, for example, Bernie Sanders standing next to Trump during a Presidential debate, pointing at him, and saying “That’s the problem: billionaires taking over politics!” \u00a0Clinton can’t make the same Progressive case. \u00a0But no politician on the scene today can match her in a policy discussion, whatever the context. \u00a0Hillary Clinton is \u00a0a solid choice as a transitional liberal leader who can move policy to the left as the US becomes a more progressive nation.<\/p>\n Trump won’t win because the power of reactionary forces are fading. \u00a0Further, he and his supporters will alienate everyone in the country except each other and turn out growing minority and liberal constituencies, bringing the political shift to the left that much sooner. \u00a0Just take a look at the comments section at the Virginia Right<\/em> article linked above, or comments on any Trump-related Bearing Drift<\/em> blog post<\/a>. \u00a0Then look at how Trump has brought new minority voters to the process<\/a>. \u00a0He won’t turn a single blue state red and may even lose Utah<\/a>. \u00a0The real question: how badly will he hurt GOP candidates down ballot?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A few articles I’m reading over coffee this morning (Trump Will Never be President Edition): Now that Clinton and Trump have more or less locked up their respective party’s nominations, the horse-race coverage will turn to the general election contest. \u00a0Since the media has an incentive to make it look like a close one, get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[70,37,50,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-donald-trump","category-politics-and-elections","category-sunday-morning-coffee","category-virginia-political-blogs"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=242"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":244,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242\/revisions\/244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}