So far, it HAS worked:
"It was all a con ... It nearly worked."
So far, "nearly" can be left out. Trump IS the President, and, frankly, it appears likely to me that he'll be re-elected -- if he doesn't die or become too unhealthy to run again.
It doesn't have to be this way, but it WILL be this way if the Democratic Party doesn't start winnowing its Presidential candidates, real soon. So far, the Democratic Party seems to be counting on Trump dying, becoming too unhealthy to run again, or being impeached and convicted.
Possibly one of those 3 things will turn out to be true, but I sure wouldn't want to rely on that. If I were running the Democratic Party, I'd get my ducks in a row ASAP. At the least, that will require delivering a harsh message to would-be Democratic candidates who don't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting the nomination. Some would-be candidates won't take "no" for an answer, of course -- that's what primaries are for -- but many should be given the unwelcome message without further delay. For example, should Seth Moulton really be allowed to consider a run? Joe Biden?
25
Yes, it does look like white suburban women, and rurals switched against Trump.
But democrats would be wise to recognize that this shift is temporary; it does not reflect deep seated change in attitudes. I.e., white women - suburban or otherwise - will vote almost entirely republican if they are anywhere except the coasts. Once key constituencies that drunk deeply from the opiate of MAGA, particularly in the rust belt, and nursed their grudges and hatred back into life - it is unlikely to die anytime soon.
Democrats - please work on redistricting and gerrymandering if you must, and avoid trying to win back the MAGA crowd. And, if possible, stay united and at the center (instead of deep left). Cheers.
35
The fact that millions of Americans still support Trump shows how far we have fallen, but nobody likes to admit that he was snookered.
61
We've been hearing the meme that Trump is beginning to lose his grip for 3 years now, and it's lost all credibility.
25
All presidents prior to Trump have said they are the leader for all Americans. This president has stated his hatred for democrats and has signed legislation that punished states that have voted for democrats. Never before has a president stumped against a party like this one has.
Democrats should run on this. He is not everyone’s president. Those are his own words.
74
The most important thing I take away from this is the importance of Democrats not working with, but working against republicans. Gerrymandering political districts that they now control is crucial. We must do what is necessary to marginalize republicans until such time as they are no longer a threat to this country.
:)
31
Single payer National Health cover
should be the norm. This nonsense
about not wanting “the government’’ to run health care is only because most Americans haven’t lived in a country with a well run national system until they qualify for Medicare. The best way forward is to seriously start the discussion about what is going on in other countries.
Many governments, and Australia is one of them, require people earning over a fixed amount to also have private health cover that covers private hospitals, to take the pressure off the public system, but everyone can use it and does because it is cheaper. The cost of the public system is 2% of your Tax Due added on top of your annual tax bill. For that your doctors, laboratory, and radiology costs are covered. If one of those charges more than the set fee, you pay the difference out of pocket.
Everyone uses the government run Emergency Rooms. You don’t get a bill when you leave. All GPs work in the public system, all Specialists work in the public/private system and everyone can choose a public or private hospital.
If you choose a private hospital your in hospital doctor services are still paid by the government system and your private insurer pays part of the doctor’s bill and you pay some of it.
The key to the whole system is TRANSPARENCY. Prices are published by ALL providers and Medical school is cheap.
As for the people who really don’t want a any government program, if you like your insurance company, you can keep it.
51
Now I fervently hope Democrats don't shoot themselves in the foot. They should capitalize on their upward blue wave in 2020. Their win has already started in-fighting about who should be the Speaker of the House. Pelosi should step down not because she is a woman but she has had a good inning. The Republicans are watching with glee. Who knows but the misogyny seed might have been planted by them. No matter Democrats should not self-immolate. Problem is the cerebral Democrats seem to lack plain common sense.
12
2020 will all boil down to whether the voters that have been conned by Trump will accept the reality that they have been had by a professional grifter. Acceptance takes a lot of guts and grit as it would mean you accept that you are mentally inferior to the con man. Thus, most victims of a con will deny and deflect and double down. Read the comments about how great the economy is by the very same people who don’t have a single stock in any market. They know the tax went entirely to the 1% but would gladly trumpet that it was a win for them.
Another thing to note is that there might not be an election in 2020. All it would take is for Trump to postpone it in the name of safeguarding democracy and Mattis and Kelly, sworn to protect enemies foreign and domestic, will gladly enforce the it as proven by the recent troops deployment to Mexican border.
16
My faith in America is beginning to be somewhat restored.
13
Some of us have known since long before the GOP Convention in 2016 that the Emperor-to-be at the time had no Clothes. The "Emperor" still has no clothes. Like George Bush said, "Fool me once....."
16
"For Mr. Trump, this setback will be corrosive, unless he decides to acknowledge the “shellacking” and starts to actually “drain the swamp.” Don’t hold your breath."
He is incapable of this; don't even waste time looking for it. Instead, be ready for obfuscation and lies that all this is "fake" news by the democrats trying to sink his presidency. The dems may be doing this--but they don't need to lie. They just need to explain in plain terms what is happening. Let's see what Mitch McConnell does about attacking the three entitlements to pay for the tax cut. Any move by that man (a traitor born and bred) in that direction should make for riots and demonstrations in the streets. Don't forget, the retirees have lots of free time on their hands to organize...
27
The midterms were reassuring. First place it's obvious we Americans love and believe in our democracy - the turnout was huge.
But secondly the strong Democratic results indicate that Americans are sane, decent people. We haven't bought wholesale into Trump's racist, xenophobic lies.
The troubling results were in Georgia and Florida, both because of voter suppression but also because Trumpian candidates won there. And that's disgusting especially considering how low they went to win. Kemp in Georgia should and will be sued.
The good news was, two African Americans darn near won in the deep South. Both look to be strong candidates with great futures, maybe on a national level but certainly, both will strengthen democracy in their states.
And Texas. Thank you Beto O'Rourke!
46
"So it is no surprise that more than half of white working class men now believe that Mr. Trump is “self-dealing” and corrupt."
It is unfortunate that it has taken this long to realize that a corrupt businessman, who never really made his own fortune and failed badly, was not going to help the working class. Unfortunately, not only have our trade partnerships been turned upside down, but now our farmers and other workers are being hurt by Trump's naive approach to trade and jobs. "Just wait" he tells the soybean farmers while their harvest sits in wait.
Meanwhile, our standing in the world is diminished and we're thought of as fools, hate groups have been emboldened and deaths have resulted from it, oppressive immigration policies are weakening the country, and the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.
The damage of Trump will take a very long time to reverse when we finally get rid of the scourge.
35
Outstanding overview. Thank you!
6
I am aghast at the national debt level of our federal government totaling $15.8 Trillion dollars? Please know that this was also a key factor in the midterm elections. Our country is actually BROKE!!! Thanks a lot Pres. Trump!
15
Trump ran as a working class populist. Remember infrastructure? A bigly campaign point. Once in power GOP tax cuts replaced infrastructure. Trump went along for the ride including not demanding one of his campaign promises, removing the carried Interest loophole.
We still do not have an infrastructure bill. Sorry GOP fools us once shame on you. Luckily Americans won't let themselves be fooled twice.
14
Based upon the title of the article I thought it was going to be about Trump displaying some new version of melting down. This story at least has a happy ending.
2
What "grip?" He won the presidency by a hair, and despite being an obvious fraud. The silver lining is that he is so awful that there may end up being a lasting dent in Republican voters who will switch back to the Democrats. I am not betting on this, but we will all get a sigh of relief when the buffoon is gone.
38
Re: "It isn’t just white suburban women who switched to Democrats. Parts of rural and white working class America peeled off too..."
I, (visually), resemble the Charlottesville anti-semites , with their 'Jews-will-NOT-replace-Us!" vulgarity;
...I NEVER vote for Republicans!
I'm NOT ashamed of my 'race', (aka: 'species'!), but I'm 101% of ashamed of those few who self-label as 'White Supremacists'!
One MIGHT hope that 'Trump, et-al' is an unusual feature of the Republican party but he's actually an example of limited, 'tactical' success for / by Republicans, who're using any / everything, (especially 'religious_faith'), as a means to achieve / maintain / protect their corporate_profiteering - related government / society!!
One IS, (uncomfortably...), reminded of that 'Star_Trek' species called: 'Ferengi'!
(See URL's: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferengi#Religion; and... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferengi#/media/File:Ferengis1.jpg)
1
Democrats can win even bigger if they adopt sensible positions on immigration and defense spending. Right now it seems to be a completely purblind approach of 'come one - come all'. This is ridiculuous. They need to acknowledge at some point that illegal immigration affects the lower middle class the most. Loss of opportunity in construction and wage pressure due to illegal immigration more than the 'Southern Strategy' is what motivates the GOP base to vote Republican. Dems should stop reflexively calling white lower middle class voters racist. Drive around to any new housing project and you will rarely see white males working on anything, from roofs to floor to interiors. These were all good paying jobs from which White males were fired and into which were hired hispanic workers who crossed the border. It is silly to call the White resentment towards hispanics due to loss of opportunity as 'racist'. Progressives need a proper and rational plan to address illegal immigration. We need to jail every construction company CEOs and Senior Executives when they have been found to employ illegal immigrants. We need a drastic change to our foreign policy in Central America and stop demonising elected leaders who are socialists.
14
Everyone understands the expression 'Our President should lead by example'.
So, when fair minded individuals hear a lie coming from President Trump and it's part of a pattern of lying that's been in place for over two years, they had to decide whether or not Trump's 'honeymoon' period is over,
That is, whether or not 'times up!, and the notion Trump just needs time to get adjusted, to get his feet we, has come and gone. The notion of, 'Well that's just Trump being Trump', has come and gone.
And now that they know a few things about Trump, one being Trump's familiar'Etch-a Sketching' away accusations of his bald face lying by simply claiming 'fake-news' is really just a ruse, and thus, they'll need to act in a fashion with some meat on its bones.
And what better way to accomplish this than speaking one's mind by voting for individuals they believe will lead by example, speaking 'the truth, and nothing but the truth.'
The time for accepting Trump's lies, exaggerations, and spins as being truthful is over.
232
This commenter has it right:
"...good as turnout was, the good guys STILL didn’t come close to fully showing up..."
The Democratic Party did retake the House, but its gains (just under 40 seats) didn't even come close to a record (for example, Republicans picked up 63 seats in 1994). Though the Democratic candidate won a few close races (for example, Sinema in AZ, Evers in WI), the Democratic candidate lost several close ones (for example, Gillum and Abrams in the FL and GA governor races, Nelson in the FL Senate race).
Do you think Gillum and Abrams and Nelson feel that voter turnout was as high as it should and could have been?
5
This article is about trumps grip on the body politic. But it is his grip on sanity that is really starting to show. Pence is starting to take over now that trump is busy with mental fantasies. So now we will have a backroom White House and Marie, sorry. Melania may soon have more in house power than the donald.
13
"Nearly EVERY category of women rebelled."
Oh dear, "grab em by the____" Donald, will not like to hear this.
And now even white working women are turning away from this non-stop lying, repugnant human being? How very shocking.
Let's see...perhaps the measly $4.50 extra in woman's weekly check didn't quite live up to DJT's promises about his tax cut bill.
Trump's "Tax Cuts to Benefit Trump and Already Filthy Wealthy Friends" was such a giant financial windfall for only the 1%, the Republicans were too embarrassed to talk about it during the mid terms .
So Trump lies, consistently, about tax cuts:
"This is not going to help me, believe me."
“This is going to cost me a fortune, this thing, believe me,"
At the same time he lies to us, the middle class, Trump boasts to his rich friends at the Mar-a-lago:
"You all just got a whole lot richer!"
Yep, and those poor immigrant children separated from mothers who are STILL imprisoned in cages?There is not a mother in this country who can stand to think about, for even one minute, the constant anguish these young children feel not knowing if they will ever see their parents again.
And our "I really don't care, do you, " First Lady proved she sincerely DID NOT CARE because you she never said another word and did absolutely NOTHING about reuniting these traumatized children who are still in cages.
"Be Best" Melania?
What an insult to the american people.
32
Trump made his fast and furious campaign stops in places where he was safe (Red States). That tells you all you need to know. Trump fears facing the general public because he knows that most Americans abhor an administration that separates babies from their parents at the border, bans Muslims, attacks defenseless immigrants, denies a right course for DACA, and attacks the media as the Enemy Of The People, while tweeting untruths daily. Americans don't love liars.
26
I found an "old" clipping yesterday (yes, a clipping) from, I think, 2015
it was about a county in Ohio where the avg wage had decreased by some huge amount during Obama's terms
I don't think Trump's victory was all about race
OTOH, it was abt stupidity: that white working class thought trump was good validates Kerry's remark about who joins the army
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/us/politics/cambridge-whos-who-trump-brand.html
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=2621654&page=1
2
Poverty has been eradicated.
North Korea has been neutered.
More jobs than we can stand.
The Supreme Court plays on Trump's team.
And tax reform will bury your grandchildren.
Congratulations, America!!
4
So there needs to be a mid-term shake-up in Trump's lying, misogyny, homophobia, narcissism, and racism?
When you stop laughing let me know. It seems almost pointless to suggest any change... Trump is incapable of change. His mind is frozen in Leave It to Beaver and he's Fast Eddy.
13
Let’s assume for a moment that Trump is a Machiavellian demagogue as opposed to a blithering idiot (one can be politically smart even if unable to read a book or operate an umbrella...)
What does his politics say about what he believes?
Trump turned out people to vote in 2016 who’d never voted before. Political pundits saw that as a rural urban divide (partly true, but correlation error). How Trump appealed to the forgotten man raging against the coastal elites. Blah. Blah. blah.
I don’t think that’s the case.
Trump was appealing to the darker vision of America that he holds. Pundits were confused why he wasn’t reaching out to win voters but practicing a politics of division.
Maybe that’s because that is Trump’s view of America. In the cocoon that he inhabits of Mar-a-Lago and the crooked business enterprises. He believes that he can turn out enough voters who are racist, misogynistic, xenophobes and bigots to win.
Even in 2018, he ran a mobilization campaign (the caravan is coming. Fear for your lives and security) not a persuasion campaign (the economy is doing well and so stay with stability).
It’s like Gillum said: it doesn’t matter that he’s a racist. The racists think he’s a racist.
Trump continues to hope that America shares his bigoted toxic prejudiced way of life.
Turns out he was wrong. But, we can’t rest on our laurels. There’s a significant chunk of America that shares Trumps views and should concern us.
Let’s stay energized and vote Trump out in 2020.
31
I agree, but it seems to be working:
"Could not have conjured up a more sinister and spiteful action ... than the elimination of SALT ... deductibility"
I presume this commenter is referring to the $10,000 "cap" on SALT deductibility.
It's working, at least here in CA. In the past month, I've talked to several SFers who are planning to move out of CA -- to North Carolina, Arizona and New Mexico. Maybe none of them will actually move, but many CA residents will move out of state. All three of these people cite the $10,000 cap on SALT deductibility as one of several reasons they plan to move, though all three emphasize that SF has just become "unaffordable" for multiple reasons.
2
The problem in 2016 wasn’t just Trump. Hillary was a stupid choice for the Democratic Party to elevate. Bernie would have driven Democrats and independents to the polls in droves with excitement. I, and so many others, walked to the polls in 2016 with an incredible lack of enthusiasm, and cast my vote obligatorily for a tired old politician who felt like she was owed the Presidency. The other side generated legitimate excitement, along with those who teetered on which candidate was lesser of two, and pulled the lever for Trump. The 2018 election is more representative of what the 2016 election would have been if it were Bernie vs. Trump.
8
@Adapt To A Crowded World bernie was and still isn't a Democrat. Real Democrats were not going to vote for him in the primary even before he decided we would.
How stupid is it to think that you can just walk up unknown and ask to lead the party?
12
@Adapt, "To A Crowded World"
You have a point. But Hillary Clinton represented a solid and centrist choice that should have appealed to a wide electoral range: from very left all the way to middle, and a bit into the right.
Election outcome was determined by a combination of multiple factors, including:
- Comey,
- political ads sponsored by foreign governments and dark Super-PACS of billionaires,
- low-IQ electorate (see, Pepin county, Wisconsin),
- and GOP false propaganda.
Con me once, shame on you.
Con me twice, shame on me.
At any rate, the outcome of the 2016 election has been that the MOST vulnerable Trump supporters have probably gotten worse off. And they deserve it!
14
Republicans DO NOT have America's back...
OUR backs!
10
Obama lost more House and Senate seats in his first midterm and was handily re-elected.
I know the NYTimes needs to fill pages, but please fill them with more pertinent/entertaining materials.
Trump will be president until Jan. 2025.
5
@Senate27
Bad analogy, bro.
Check out popular vote for the House of Representatives in 2010 and 2018.
The only reason Dems did not get like 80 votes is the extreme gerrymandering that affected maps after the 2011 redistricting.
Also, Obama won FEWER states in 2012 than 2008.
So, 2020 is going to be a MUCH closer election, and borderline states that Trump won (WI, MI, PA) are definitely up for grabs by Dems.
If there is any hint of recession between now and June 2020, you can forget Trump.
15
I don't think Trump wants to be president after 2020 any more than he wants to be the president now. C'mon, he works at it, about two hours a day at the most. The rest of his time is spent either in amusement, like golf, or ego stroking activities like his rallies. He filed his re-election papers what, the day after inauguration? that was about stockpiling money. You know he's skimming that for things he shouldn't be, that's how he operates. It will pay his legal bills or his children's legal bills, it's a slush fund. The only way I could see him seriously running again is to avoid indictment, if it turns out the courts rule that a sitting president can't be indicted.
14
@Susan A sitting president can be indicted. No one is above the law in the USA.
4
Beginning?
Trump will play The Race Card in 2020 and bring The Racist home. My hope is that the Good People realize Trump only wins when people don't vote. There are more Good People in America than The David Dukes of the America. Vote Vote Vpote
11
Haven't read it yet but have to write this, Beginning?
2
Trump is not BEGINNING to lose his grip, his awareness of reality has been absent throughout his entire life. Today he gave himself an A+ when Chris Wallace asked him how he measures up with presidents like FDR, Abe Lincoln, George Washington and Ronald Reagan.
What an insult to even the most uneducated white rural voter! How stupid does he think Americans are? They voted for someone that they were told would support them; someone who understands them. The closest Trump has ever come to actual work is tying his shoes (which he can't do any more because he is too fat) and since when has anyone from a fly-over state had a private jet, multiple golf clubs, a fake "University", MANY mega million$ bankruptcies, three wives, God-knows how many prostitute mistresses and is a narcissistic sociopath pathologic liar?
If THIS is the fake human that you want to represent you, do you wonder why those of us who have true concern for our country pity you?
26
Reading this I’d have to say that there sure aren’t even enough non-white-women to bother mentioning them.
I’m white and felt really uncomfortable reading this editorial that erased, by omission, all but the “majority” “race”.
NYT is your bias showing? Why restrict a report on Trump’s falling support to only “white women” when the article’s title implies across the nation as a whole.
5
He never had a grip, small hands
12
Even hicks are getting hip to the fact that Trump is a fraud. He ain't bring'n back coal mining jobs or manufacturing jobs , the Saudis aren't our friends and we can't live behind walls like the Israelis.
11
To our evangelical citizens who back Trump even after separating mothers from their babies, demonizing migrants fleeing violence and poverty, stealing from the poor to give to the rich, cozying up to racists, lying incessantly, insulting not just his rivals but even those who work for him...at long last, have YOU no shame? Isn’t it time to Make America Moral Again? MAMA.
14
BEGINNING to lose his grip?
10
“Pollster shorthand for the working class”. Don’t you just mean “euphemism”? It’s not like it’s any shorter than “without college degrees”.
2
Tiny hands and short fingers don't bode well for his grip, or the drip, drip, drip of his red-handedness.
5
Could not have conjured up a more sinister and spiteful action by red-state GOP Senators than the elimination of SALT (state and local tax) deductibility...
And – now understand why blue-state Democrat Senators stood by like potted plants as this happened...
Blue state, red state, green state, purple state GOP Congresspersons got completely nailed by this...
How could any GOP rep in California – where the income tax tops out at 13% - not have seen this coming...
For clarity, can’t make this stuff up – here’s a typical view of a typical red-state GOP senator...
“...If I am fortunate enough to be selected by my colleagues to serve as Chairman, I will push for the appointment and Senate confirmation of highly qualified conservative judges to the federal bench...Finally, I will continue to seek common sense, bipartisan solutions to major issues facing our nation...
So – after stuffing the bench with socially conservative judges – we’re going to seek common sense, bipartisan solutions to major issues...
Like what – who to name our next aircraft carrier after???
PS
Amazing to watch the Dems come to their senses, as they realize that Pelosi is the only one with the chops to serve as leader, in a key leadership role...
Yet, the unqualified rest of them are already barnstorming – telling us why they should be President...
Jonathan Gruber, my apologies – I must be every bit as stupid as you said I was...
Though I can’t speak for the rest of us...
4
"Working people are not fools"
All evidence to the contrary?
Anyone who couldn't tell in 2016 that Trump is a “'self-dealing' and corrupt" con man IS a fool.
Maybe the temptation to demonize immigrants and Latinex, bash black people, oppress Muslims, and "own the libs" was stronger than common sense.
13
It is a one-liner by now: Trump is a pathological liar and malignant narcissist with a spineless, greedy GOP that is morally bancrupt hiding behind him. No more analysis needed.
The remedy is to VOTE them out. A very good start was just made, let's keep it going.
13
The New York City born and bred ignorant immature intemperate insecure lying corrupt misogynist immoral bigot aka Donald Trump living off of his Daddy's money never had a grip to lose. Trump is a selfish cruel narcissist by nature and nurture.
Trump has nothing in common with the working class regardless of color aka race. But the white working class loves Trump's white supremacy and prejudiced nature. They vote against their socioeconomic class and for their racist caste.
14
Are we tired of being lied to YET?
Trumpty Dumpty needs a great fall.
7
racists approve of trump. that is the core of his appeal.
9
"Working people are not fools..." Really? You could have fooled me. Speaking of being tired of the PC police, I'm tired of the PC of not being able to hold voters accountable for their stupidity and foolishness. What would you call a person ho votes for someone who is now lying to them an average of 30 times a day? I call that foolish. These same people whine endlessly about being forgotten and oh, being left behind by the economic recovery and wanting to "drain the swamp", etc., yet who is one of their go-to targets for their venom, mocking, and hate? Sen. Elizabeth Warren, one of the strongest advocates for working Americans and also one of the most active at calling out the abuses of working Americans by Wall Street and corporate America. Ask them why they hate Pelosi with such fever. They can't say. Sorry, but those things are both stupid and foolish. The fact is, far too much of the American electorate now is foolish..and yes, stupid (and ignorant). Oh, they just loathe the whole liberal PC thing, but let's see if they like the no-PC movement when it's directed at them. My experience has been that they don't like it at all and get their feelings hurt quite easily and in fact do not like being told "like it is."
15
Donald is both malevolent and incompetent. After two years, this is evident to a wide swath of the American populace.
Women still do the lion’s share of child rearing in this country, although that is changing. I can tell you that raising someone who behaves like Donald is every mother’s nightmare. He is so obviously a completely incompetent human being in every respect. No wonder women of every stripe are turning against him—he’s like Damien in the Omen.
17
‘’Beginning’’ to lose his grip?
2
Vote blue everyone in 2020.
7
"Trump is BEGINNING to Lose His Grip " ?!!!
2
A wise commenter:
"Trump may not even be the nominee in 2020 due to possible impeachment and/or health issues. Is Pence a given if it is not Trump? Who knows?"
If Trump is alive, healthy and not impeached (all likely, but not assured), he's a "lock" for the 2020 nomination. If not, Pence? Maybe so, if Pence already is President at the time, but otherwise Pence won't even make the short list.
2
“The Democratic wave exposed Mr. Trump’s vulnerability and suggests a less polarized country.”
Statements like this is why Trump cries fake news.
The Democratic waive was not one. In 2010, the first election following Obama’s impressive 2008 win, the Democratic Party lost 6 Senate Seats and 63 House Seats (both numbers net).
The Democratic wave, well, lost Democratic Party 2 net Senate Seats and gained only 32 House Seats.
That means the waive was 31 House Seats and 8 Senate Seats smaller than 2010. If that is a waive, what was 2010? A biblical watershed event?
And face facts; that is the biggest waive the modern Democratic Party can muster with DONALD TRUMP as President?
The Democratic Party needs a message, and a good one. Fast. We cannot be the party of micro aggressions, free stuff for everyone or for excuses for the unsuccessful. We have to be the party of equality before the law, fair treatment for workers and a clean planet. Else in 2020 Trump will thump Senator Harris by Reagan like margins.
2
@EWG
FYI. It was a Blue Wave that swept the Republicans out of the House. Next.
12
Probably so, but ...
"The bottom line is Donald Trump is a black swan event."
Unless the Democratic Party comes up with a strong candidate in 2020, "black swan" Trump is likely to be paddling around for an additional 4 years.
Though Bernie Sanders made it interesting in 2016, Hillary Clinton was always destined to be the nominee. Just the opposite was true for the Republicans, who had 17 contenders. In 2020, the reverse will be true. Trump has a lock on the Republican nomination; already I can see as many as 15-20 Democratic contenders. But I'm not seeing any DP contender that stands above the others, and each of the 15-20 sincerely believes he/she has a strong shot.
Undoubtedly that will change, at least somewhat; I don't foresee a repeat of the 1924 election, in which Calvin Coolidge waltzed to victory after the Democratic Party struggled at the convention to come up with a nominee. But it's starting to look close. The Democratic Party better start getting its act together, ASAP.
6
It appears that a sizeable group of Americans don't want economic growth, especially helpful for the low wage earner. Liberals and Progressives must miss the good old days on <2% growth. Just how they will explain their voting position to those losing their jobs will be interesting to see.
1
@leaningleft
Must be nice to have such blatant selective memory. Obama left Trump a legacy of +3% growth which Trump credits as his own.
Will your selective memory be in play when the treasury runs dry from trump's plutocrat tax cuts?
13
Trump has no interest in governing as his treatment of the transition in Fear and the Fifth Risk shows. His interest is in PR. If we have no nuclear war stopped by Mattis or attempted coups during his term due to disasters we will bel lucky. Trump shows how well the country can function without an executive of any degree of competence but is politically savvy. Its amazing given his qualities how robust the government is.
2
Trump’s spends his time and efforts on elections but he only considers what a minority of the citizens want to hear and neglects governing for all the people. Those with who he is concerned are continuing to support but most others are becoming concerned about both how he conducts himself and what he is and is not doing in terms of policies and leadership. He is turning disagreements between Americans into conflicts and international relations into an arena for predatory nations where small countries have much to fear. Quite simply he appeals to fear and loathing to motivate his supporters and make all other mistrust him.
For the first time in many decades the Presidency has become so weak and incompetent that the need for the Congress to lead has become existential for or republic.
Given the fear of Republican elected officials towards their constituents, the Congress has failed to step up. That has given Democrats many electoral victories. If the Democrats stick to providing good governance and can provide leadership, it can continue the favorable in 2020. If they try to indulge themselves in bringing longed for leftist policies and legislation, they will lose their initiative. The fact is that a lot of the National conversation has been dominated by conservative propaganda for four decades. The perspective of the nation towards all issues framed by conservatives needs to be shifted to the middle, again.
4
The Democrats should take advantage of this vote shift and mount a two-year campaign running as one party. A national political campaign, running on common threads around the country: affordable healthcare that treats all conditions as an illness to treat, not as a condition upon which carriers may charge more for and profit from; decent work with living wages, not wages that ensure poverty; affordable housing and education; and unobstructed access to the voting booth.
For the next two years, I would rather hear coverage of such a campaign instead of the trump campaign and his divisive messages that are tearing our country apart and dividing neighbor against neighbor The Media has a significant responsibility to contributing to the coverage of divisive messages, too.
I am are tired of hearing endless coverage of one man whose ego is spreading like a vile dark cancer across this nation and around the globe.
19
"We will have great climate. Very great. Bigger than any of the other worlds. Much bigger. Big, and very great. We will be the envy of all the other worlds. Our climate will be huge. Huge. And great. Very great." - Donald Trump
13
As more and more voters see the light ( even among the edges of his base support) more and more people will realize that the emperor never really had any clothes.
It was all a con,a trick and all smoke and mirrors aimed solely at dividing the country through hatred and lies.
It nearly worked.
12
It's already begun, Mr. Greenberg, because we are out here every day organizing to make it happen. Even deep in red semi-rural territory, we are not giving up. The American people are bigger and better and kinder than the most common media tropes make us out to be. We will stand down this hatred, and come out better for it.
18
Obviously, this is no quick 50-yard dash, but a nonstop, grueling four-year marathon against an illegitimate, viciously amoral competitor who will do anything above and beyond the law, including conspiring with sworn enemies of this country to crush our democracy. Yes, we’re already halfway into it and yes, the next two years will be exponentially more difficult to maintain our thus far attained momentum with the will, strength and passion to win this civil war once and for all.
Take nothing for granted.
Voter suppression and gerrymandering are designed to steal every vote from us while fake news is constantly being created and spread to galvanize the opposition’s base and lie to those who are undecided.
Every day between now and the next election will be tougher than the day before. That’s what we can expect and that’s what we shall overcome.
Pace yourself.
14
A quick reply. You write so beautifully. I have traveled to Latin America at least 25 times in the last 30 years. Despite terrible social problems, Latin American society is warm and deep. I have witnessed the very best of humanity. I certainly consider myself fortunate to have been born into our beautiful, wealthy country. I have learned over the years how wonderful the Latin immigrant population is. I thought my Mexican-American acquaintances would be upset. I would describe the attitudes I have heard as more fatalistic. The basic idea is that politicians are a low lot anyway, so the current outrage that threatens our government is nothing new. If Trumpsters could only see the resignation in the eyes of US Hispanics that is far outweighed by the joy of giving their children a new life. I have taught the brilliant children of immigrants at the university. I am hard-pressed to think of one Latin-American student who wasn’t a model of courtesy, enthusiasm and intelligence. I hope that the profound revulsion that I feel at seeing our fellow human beings mistreated as they come to our storied shores seeking a better life becomes generalized and that we scour our government of this criminal plague.
6
I hope Dr. Blasey Ford reads this and takes some comfort. And all women don't forget how Trump mocked her the day before the Senate vote. Vote Democratic again in 2020.
15
It would be helpful to have a gauge of how many voters cast ballots for Democratic candidates because they were concerned that Trump and his congressional sycophants have undermined our democratic process, or until 2017, our values as a country built on immigrants and/or have told too many lies.
Trump's grip on fear mongering, divisevness and hate is still too strong. He is increasingly flailing in his desperation to maintain this grip, but we see it daily and it remains disconcerting.
3
Trump lost his grip on reality long ago, and never had it on the truth and integrity.
8
I hope it’s true that Americans who care about our country and each other - men, women, Democrat, Republican, Independent, etc., etc. - see Donald Trump for the charlatan that he is.
He’s not fit to be President and doesn’t care to become fit. He cares more for his hairdo than honoring our dead in the battlefields of France. He sends thousands of our soldiers to the southern border without a real purpose and forgets about them after the election.
I hope people who voted for him hoping he would keep his promises to them realize that he forgets the promises very shortly after he makes them.
It’s the only glimmer of hope I have for the country I love.
10
Sophistry. It’s not the embrace of diversity and immigration that gave Democrats this victory. This was a backlash against Trump and a Republican Party which promotes hate, sells legislation and antiregulation to the highest bidder. Being soft on immigration does not produce votes anywhere in the West. That is a completely false reading.
2
The republicans won 63 seats in the off year election in 2010. It's not a surprise that the dems did so well this year, despite what all the pundits say.
Was Obama as bad as Trump? Of course not.
Trump is terrible, thats a given. But the dems should not get so giddy or they risk losing in 2020.
4
Add the people in the article to things Trump has lost his grip on. In my best New Yorkese it is evident that the elevator doesn't go to the top floor with Trump. Now we must pray he does not toally lose it when Mueller holds him to task.
6
Senate races will be much more Dem friendly in 2020. We must continue and strengthen our resistance efforts.
6
I disagree with the President on many issues. Such disagreement used to be tolerated in America, which is supposed to be a free country. But because of the way the President talks to and about those who disagree with him, I do not trust him to protect the interests of me and my family. In fact, I am convinced that the President and his supporters actually despise me and my family, and that they think the only way to make life better for themselves to to make life worse for the rest of us.
27
Trump has already raised $100 million for 2020, but his main reelection committee has spent more than $32 million, at least $11 million of which has been at Trump properties. It's not hard to envision him taking the money and running for a bank instead of the White House. His stupendous ego demands that he go out on top rather than endure an ignominious defeat. It's also not hard to envision the GOP's financiers realizing by the end of 2019 that they're throwing good money after bad.
7
Even without Mr. Greenberg's sales pitch for the Democratic Party, this article should serve as a warning sign for Republicans to think hard about alternatives to Trumpism as 2020 draws closer. Either Mr. Trump must change his pitch to something more positive, (which may not be possible), or he must face primary opposition which contrasts a better approach to the world with that of the angry, bitter vision espoused by the President. This would be contrary to most political thinking, of course, but he is not an ordinary presidential incumbent, and the traditional 'hands-off' approach need not apply. I must also say that the analysis in this article underlines the terrible campaign conducted by Hillary Clinton in 2016. All the Trumpian elements that many voters rejected this year existed in 2016, it was her failure to take proper advantage of them. This should serve as a warning in case she pops up as a moderate compromise choice after what might be a tough and divisive Democratic primary fight for the presidential nomination in 2020.
2
I hope for the beginning of the movement for a greatest America without Trump and his ilk, in recalling Churchill's statement: "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."
9
One major factor that does not show up in the voter shift charts is the fact that the Republican party is shrinking. So a 5% change in a smaller party affiliation is actually more than 5% overall. Some surveys show that the "IND" party is now the largest one.
5
@Warren Lauzon
"IND" voters aren't able to vote in the Primaries of several states -- something many of them forget to take into consideration.
6
Yeah...and it was predicted that the republicans would lose so bad in 2016 that the party would disappear for years and years. How'd that work out?
Majority of posters are just talking to themselves, and oblivious to the rest of the country and their issues.
Democrats were unified on health care but gave candidates freedom to shape their messages to their districts, so the message of a Conor Lamb was quite different from progressive candidates in safe Democrat districts. As the Democrats move from total opposition to the necessity of advancing a programme, any dissonance in this area will be more obvious.
The Democrats' economic message is or should be more appealing to working class and rural whites, but a heavy emphasis on identity politics (not an expression I like but it will have to do) and social issues like same sex marriage and transgender discrimination will risk alienating these voters and pushing them back to the GOP.
As for the GOP they have a much harder series of problems beginning with the powerful perception that they only exist to help the 1%.
4
And, after all the hyperventilating by Democrats, where is the Democrat candidate that can credibly run for president?
America automatically reelects presidents unless (a) they've really messed up, and (b) there is a very safe alternative. Trump has certainly messed up (and will continue to), but there's not a single leader in the Democratic party that can stand up and make the case that they'll be a safe alternative.
8
@KCox
Unless you are clairvoyant, you're just putting the cart before the horse -- besides, 2020 is till two years away.
4
@KCox
Maybe you were turned upside down but my life and business were very stable under the eyes of President Obama and VP Biden. He may be on the older side but I'd take mental and emotional stability along with a lifetime of experience anyday over the current insanity.
9
@KCox: What are you talking about? There are many excellent and credible candidates for the presidency among Democrats!
8
I would simply like to ask, as a middle class midwestern self employed businessman, why myself or any other reasonable midwestern business person would favor the likes of a trump?
He is working as hard as possible to destroy the one thing that has kept me financially and medically sound since the inception of the ACA. His administration is not defending U.S. law while not defending the ACA in the Texas lawsuit against the health care program.
He has literally wiped out my business with his tariffs. I sold out just last week. Who wants to fight this insanity from a business standpoint? I might as well step up to the crap table at the local Indian Casino.
Donald trump is destroying this country in many ways. Younger people see the social and environmental destruction as critical. We all do as well. But from the business side of things, using midwest soybean markets as the example, trump is standing knee deep in a barrel of gasoline smoking a cigar.
I would simply assume from the ag standpoint there are more than a few business people who are simply waking up to the fact that they've been had by a professional grifter. Happens all the time.
46
The GOP could not have become the so-called Trump's Party unless the Republicans had no plan --other than to (1) block anything that Obama wanted to do, (2) eviscerate or repeal anything that Obama accomplished; (3) pass a tax bill that was a tax cut bill, not tax reform; (4) block DACA and any immigration reform; (5) load up every federal judiciary with conservatives young enough to serve for 20-40 years -- and, why ----to make abortion illegal and allow even more unlimited campaign contributions and repeal more regulations intended to protect all of us; and (6) threaten and maybe succeed to reform social security, medicare and medicaid.
Nothing on that list makes should make anyone wake up in the morning and feel great about their federal government.
Unless they believe that their personal lives will be better if abortion is illegal, and the wealthy and corporations pay less in taxes, and screwing anyone less fortunate who needs help with the bare necessities of life makes their lives better.
And, I have to say this. Social Security and Medicare are not "entitlements" in the sense that they are gifts not earned.
I had my first job at age 14 -- it was legal to work part-time. I paid into Social Security and Medicare for 50 years.
And, the GOP wants to mess around with my Social Security and Medicare? And my 91 year old mother's Medicare and Medicaid?
How could anyone who is in even a 10% similar situation as I am in vote for any Republican?
37
@Alexandra Brockton
You could vote Republican if you were brainwashed 24/7 by lies, distortions, and disingenuous misinterpretations. Not to mention hate toward the minority poor, inflamed by Reagan's "welfare queen" slander and goosed continually ever since.
The average Republican today is carrying a burden of misinformation that is almost impossible to counter: up is down, and day is night. But racism makes it easy for them to spot and scapegoat the "villains" in their own lives.
If older and lower-class white males have not soared to prosperity and solvency under Trump, why it must be fault of immigrants --- certainly not the fault of Trump's uninformed policies-by-fiat!
I don't believe there is any way to curry the loyalty of such cult members. Abandoning or watering down traditional Democratic support for the poor and for minorities, including gays, would sell our soul without bringing succes. We can't "move closer" or "reach out" to racist, paranoid whites with a fondness for fundamentalist religion and conspiracy theory. These people are a write-off until and unless somehow deprogrammed. I fear that only a national emergency could do that. And given Trump's incompetence and dementia, we would be virtually leaderless in such a circumstance. They would only turn on vulnerable people and blame the usual scapegoats, as the Germans did the Jews after WWI.
11
From the article:
"On Election Day, a stunning 54 percent of those who voted said immigrants 'strengthen our country.'"
I have no doubt this is correct. It's certainly how I feel. But the question is different:
WHO should decide which Immigrants stay here?
Should the immigrants themselves decide (i.e. open borders)? Or should the US government decide?
The vast majority of Americans answer this question:
"The US government should decide."
Most Americans are eager to have our legislators weigh in on this, provided only that their solution stops short of "open borders." And the vast majority of Americans would fault the Executive Branch (i.e. Trump) if it simply ignores some Congressional directive on the matter.
But I'm not seeing any Congressional directive on this -- other than from "open borders" proponents, whose view on the subject is clearly not consistent with the majority American view.
Can we Americans be told how each major party feels about this? I understand that getting laws passed isn't likely, since the two houses of Congress are controlled by different parties. But can we at least have an unequivocal statement of each house's preference? If either party feels (as I suspect is the case) that the Executive Branch should decide but that its discretion should be restricted, let's hear what the proposed restrictions ought to be, not simply: "Our borders should be open." Responsible politicians say they're not for open borders, but what ARE they for?
5
You need to drill down on this a little more analytically. What does “open borders” mean? It’s a meme championed by Trumpers about what they think Democrats want. The implication is that with an “open borders” policy, the U.S. would not control its borders and would allow anyone who wants to enter our country to do so. I’ll bet you cannot find a single prominent Democrat who advocates for that position. Democrats believe that we should allow people to come to our country who have special talents, or are interested in filling jobs Americans don’t want, or are close family members of people who are already here. The Democratic position on immigration resembles that of the Chamber of Commerce, the staunch defender of Republican causes.
9
Thankfully, the Democrats are stronger. The dialogue seems to be changing. Yet, about the only thing we can count on 100% is that the 2020 election will be chaotic and unpredictable. It is hard to put much faith in many of the pundits or pollsters.
Trump may not even be the nominee in 2020 due to possible impeachment and/or health issues. Is Pence a given if it is not Trump? Who knows?
Will the economy still be booming at the present rate or might the results of a prolonged trade war hurt? World events might have an impact in 2020. Events in North Korea, China, Russia. and the Middle East, and others could all play a disruptive role. Will continued catastrophic natural disasters finally bring climate change to the forefront as the leading cause?
One promising thing I take from this article is we are finally beginning to accept people from other cultures and appreciate their contributions to our society.
Maybe it is wishful thinking, but Kasich and/or Bloomberg could be impactful surprises. Just maybe the Democrats will come up with a strong message and a winning candidate who is not yet on the radar screen.
In any event stay tuned, there will be more changes
5
It’s true that Trump can still do a lot of damage to the Supreme Court. So we can look forward to increased corporate power and diminished civil rights. One reason the Democrats didn’t take the Senate is that Republicans had only 9 seats open while the Democrats had 26. Gaining one or two seats was not a major accomplishment. The people turned on Trump and because Trump will not get better with time, his political position will deteriorate. My 2 cents.
10
While Rome was burning Nero, sitting from his vantage point in the safe haven of his hilly terrace was re-engineering the new city he would be able to build upon the ashes.
The similarities are striking reading mr Greenberg's brilliant quartering of the American electorate,projecting statistically supported gains for 2020.
Do we ever learn from History? 2020 is remote ,numbers are made to be used to defend anyone's theories,and Rome is burning (literally actually in some parts of the country) right now.
6
All encouraging statistics for democrats but too much enthusiasm should be tempered by the fact that there was no viable 3rd party candidates involved in the mid-terms.
5
@TR
No offense. But haven't you learned anything from the 2016 presidential election? -- That's why Bernie Sanders had to run on the Democratic Party ticket.
There is no, and will be not be such thing as a "viable 3rd party candidate", until this country legally recognizes a Third Party.
Don't waste a vote. That's how we ended up with Trump.
19
@TR
And thank God for that. 3rd party hacks gave us donald trump. That pretty much says it all.
3
Politicians in general and Members of Congress in particular are learning what major college football coaches have learned - namely that if they do not produce, they will be replaced.
Gone are the days when a politician can simply sit back and live off their reputation a la Bobby Bowden. Gone are the days when they have 4-5 years to build a winner, just ask Univ. of Michigan fans.
As a head coach, you have to keep the Alumni, Boosters, Administration and team happy - a tough task.
As a politician, you have to keep your donors, your constituents and your party leadership happy - an even tougher task these days. And likely to become even tougher for Republican politicians as they try to appease the past while trying to look towards the future.
3
People can identify an authentic person from an unauthentic person when they see one.
With enough time, the real person can be seen. Sincerity and honesty show through. Politicians have a horrendous problem of trying to please huge numbers of people regarding many different policies rife with political, financial and practical results and implications. A large percent of people can accept compromise if it is presented with rational thoughts and justifications.
The current president has few communicative and interpersonal skills, little knowledge and no sound life philosophy or "authentic" personal or life values that the mass of people can relate to.
Democracy can win and it might be turning in that direction in this country. Finally.
7
And the Democrats did this despite GOP gerrymandering. I wish all analysts would acknowledge in every column the huge advantage that GOP gerrymandering gives Republicans. For example, in North Carolina, the GOP got 50.3% of the Congressional vote and 10 of 13 seats thanks to gerrymandering. In Ohio they got 52% of the vote and 12 of the 16 seats thanks to gerrymandering. In Wisconsin I believe that the Democrats got slightly more than 50% of the vote and only 5 of 18 seats. Who knows how many seats the GOP stole through gerrymandering in other states? The five GOP hacks masquerading as Supreme Court justices will not outlaw political gerrymandering. I doubt that the majority of Americans realize this. Hence, reporters should write it again and again.
20
@Historian
Not one word, anywhere in the media. I think the word is , complicit?
2
The big lesson from this election is that the Democrats were successful through local engagement. The huge growth in the number of new voters and newly-engaged voters explains a very significant portion of the Blue Tsunami which crashed over the Trump administration on election day. The key to greater success for both political parties - if they choose to apply themselves to it - it personal engagement with people who have not been voting when they had the right.
The average size of each House district at the moment is around 720,000, making personal engagement with constituents by a House Rep virtually impossible. For sitting members of the House, the key to this engagement is in their Congressional staff allocation - at the moment capped at 18 per district. Reference to the actual population makes this number obviously unfair.
While House members currently have one staffer for every 30,000 people in their district, the member from Montana has only one staff member per 60,000 residents. This is so unfair as to be undemocratic. The disparity between districts across the country is not split along party lines - it's quite surprising actually when you look at it: https://preview.tinyurl.com/y7rmtr92
Keeping in meaningful contact with the adults in a group of 30,000 Americans is a challenge for one person, it is simply twice as hard if the tranche is double the size. Perhaps this move would be a good nudge towards equal District populations - which would be even better!
4
Republican and Democratic candidates are pretty much alike on policy. Any Republican candidate is going to offer immigration reform, welfare reform, cuts to government spending, trade reform, 2nd Amendment protection, judicial realignment and jobs. They all promise jobs, don't they? So, you're not getting anything special with Trump that you wouldn't get with some other Republican. But, with Trump you get all the rest, and that's where many people are starting to draw the line. If he runs in 2020, he very well could lose to some other Republican who will give voters what they want policy-wise, but without the arrogance, ignorance, pettiness, vindictiveness, lying, insulting, bragging, and graft that you get with Trump. The country is worn out with him, but not necessarily with Republicans. It would be interesting to see what would happen in an election where Trump is not the candidate.
110
@Ms. Pea No, the two parties are not alike on policy. The parties differ on climate change, on the importance of environmental regulation, on health care, on a woman's right to choose, on funding of Head Start, school lunches, on a myriad of other issues. The Republicans have done untold damage to this country at home and abroad.
176
@Ms. Pea, thank you, but . . . Trump was not a candidate in the recent election. His policies were. They've become the policies of the Republican party. As @JaneF points out, those policies could hardly be more different from those of the Democratic party.
77
@Ms. Pea-I don't mean that the two parties are alike on policy. I mean that Republican candidates are pretty much alike, and so are Democratic candidates, as far as policy goes. No need to lecture about how different the two parties are...
9
It is offensive to constantly read about the impact of college educated "white" women in the suburbs. Do the pollsters just assume that there are no college educated black, Latina, and Asian women living in those same suburbs? We too are part of the same voting bloc. Come up with better classification to include us all.
13
@Helena: I believe they categorized "college educated white women" in this (2018) election because a majority of white women voted for tRump, compared to non-white women in 2016. This is to show that many of those women switched their votes from republican to democrat and in this election, it was primarily college-educated white women who switched from republican to democrat.
4
The one word that best describes Donald Trump is the word "fraud". This word, "fraud" was used quite frequently even by his Republican primary opponents, and especially by conservative journalists in 2015 and 2016, but is now rarely used. Why? Trump has been a fraud his entire life. All of his business and personal relationships come down to fraud. Trump's relationship with the truth and facts is defined by his fraudulent nature. This why Trump can boast about draining the swamp while appointing some of the most crooked appointees ever, and boast about never touching a hair on entitlements while trying to get a bill passed that would have severely damaged medicaid.
Trump is not a con man, as this would require sophistication and guile. Trump is a buffoonish, if not oafish fraud, and nothing more. Perhaps some of his base is now seeing this, and some of those are getting tired of his immature boorish fraudulent schtick.
8
It has always surprised me that people will vote for highly destructive individuals when they feel they are not being listened to by the government. It is their own home and country that will be most damaged these low intelligence, low moral individuals when they are elected.
Perhaps people are seeing the destruction happening so quickly that they are rushing back to their senses.
8
“Trump is beginning to lose his grip” has been said repeatedly since before the polls and the MSM predicted a landslide Hillary victory, a rejection of Kavannaugh, and a mid-term blue tsunami “wave”. The fact that Mr. Greenberg is a pollster pretty much says it all.
2
Yes it’s true. Trump has gotten steadily worse with time. His grip on America is based only on fear. The election showed that this is wearing thin. His only hope is to start a war.
3
We remain a self confident multi ethnic, multi cultural society, if you doubt that well just check out our military.
8
@11b40
Either that, or come check out New York City...
2
Actually, the average American voter may not be stupid but they sure as heck weren't smart. For those of us who knew that Trump was incapable of running anything larger than his family owned real estate business ( One that declared bankruptcy three times.) it's been hard, waiting for the rest of our country to wake up. One can only hope the new Democrats in Congress realize impeaching Trump is a waste of time. Our efforts must be focused on continuing to drive a "Never again." vote two years from now that is so lopsided, the spineless Republican leadership that led their party over the cliff are forced out of power. Then the GOP will have a chance of finding out that the real base of political success in America is moderation.
11
We need to be able to follow the money—and if we get a chance to do that—then the foolishness of people throwing their support behind Trump will come into focus. I say “if”....because it’s not clear that DC corruption won’t allow Donald to dance out of town without paying a price for all the mayhem he’s exacted on our world. That’s been his modus operendi since Daddy gave him that little loan.
What’s behind the curtain: A massive influx of Russian oligarch money laundering. Who knows who buys, who rents, who sells and where the money comes from? In the world of condominiums going for $2-4 million a crack the side deals are as endless as the wealth flowing from the Soviet implosion. Like manna from heaven....a failed boy who can’t control his impulses from one bankruptcy to another finds a financial fountain of youth and never looks back. Then with confidence, throw your name on the side of the airline/plane/coptor/building/fake school/steaks/wine/.....and keep cashing the checks. Own it. Brand it. Get a TV show like Oprah and then create a network out of the FOX coverage when your bid for President fails. Just one problem....
7
We all must address the walking, babbling, mess of corruption -MR. Trump. There is a power in words.
5
Trump is zelig, a place holder.
So was Obama, Bush I, Clinton, Bush II, Reagan...because America is a perpetual arrested development teenaged male, demanding the keys to the car without first learning how to drive.
1
Make sure everyone votes - here’s my story:
I live in a retirement community where the residents do vote. We have many here who are members of the working poor however. Before Election Day I tried to urge especially our black workers to vote. On Election Day I ran into one young white male member of the Facility Crew and asked him if he’d voted. He sheepishly said: I lost my wallet last week.
A lost wallet meant a lost voter ID. Another resident asked him if he was still driving. He sheepishly said “yes”. She told him: “I don’t like you driving without a license.” Then I asked: “Is is the money to pay for the license?” He hung his head and said: “Partly.” My response: “I will pay for your license. Let’s go to the DMV right now!” It was around 2:30 in the afternoon. I told him: “Tell your boss you’re going to vote.” (I already knew that apparently the retirement community believed it was the law to give people time off to vote. I knew that because I’d spoken to one black person who lived pretty far from work and spoken to his supervisor about giving people time off to vote. She had looked into it!)
I met up with the young man by his car where he went to get what he hoped was enough proof of his lost license - his vehicle registration. We we lucky. We made just about every green light. The parking lot was not full. A short line greeted us when we got inside.
That made my day! I didn’t ask how he’d vote. But I suspect he’s a liberal, like me.
12
@TheraP: How awesome! Reading your comment just made MY day! Very inspiring...thank you.
4
BEGINNING? He never had a grip. ONLY a GRIPE that he distributed to the willingly duped!
7
Beginning to lose his grip? Most of us had already realized that this monster had long ago lost his grip on everything from truth and reality to sanity and morals. Every time he opens his mouth— whether it’s to claim climate change is a “Chinese hoax,” Russian election meddling is being conducted by a “400-pound guy on a bed” or California would have avoided forest fires if it had “raked leaves in the Finnish style,” he only reenforces his image as unhinged, unfit and unable. His thousands of “misleading” statements further solidify his standing as a “misleader,” in other words, rather than one who effectively leads his people and country, one who misleads us at every turn. For those who are just starting to see Trump as “losing his grip,” I can only say, “Get a grip!”
6
The 'wave' was small enough for a toddler to body surf. White working class women still voted Republican in larger numbers than for Democrats. My opinion that white women are the basis for our problems is still valid.
White women vote for billionaire losers, they close their ears and minds and have 'faith'. They are the danger to Democracy.
@Mogwai
White women vote on issues related to education, crime and national safety. So do a lot of black and asian and latino women. It's just that more white women openly admit they also vote on the basis of conservative religion, not so much black, asian and latino women. More white and asian women also are in long term marriages, which means they are influenced by a husband, not so for the higher numbers of unmarried and single mother black and latino women.
@Mogwai
Exiting Republicans are 235 seats; and after 2018 House vote, Democrats have 232 seats with another 5 still in play (according to web site as of today).
Democrats achieved a 7.7-point advantage over Republicans in total House votes.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2018
In 2020 Senate race, about 2 Republican incumbents for every Democrat will need to win to maintain leadership. In 2018, it was the Democratic incumbents facing that uphill battle and it looks like Republicans will only increase from 51 to 53.
That's a blue wave, Mogwai, and another coming. I fail to see your justification for blaming white women, whether they voted Republican or not, in 2018. You just read that their numbers fell significantly from 2016.
Shouldn't you be focusing your ire on that white male demographic that stubbornly remains in Trump camp, to their detriment?
3
In re women: Trump speaks in the voice of every abuser, bully, street harasser and party creep we’ve ever known. The hate and fear and disgust we feel is visceral. Sometimes I get quietly amused that privileged and previously secure older white male employees of his, like Jeff Sessions, may be experiencing a new power dynamic they’ve never lived before, but more than schaudenfraude, I hope it could ultimately lead them to a more empathetic worldview.
No thanks, generally, though to every man who tolerates his malevolent persona because of tax cuts or immigration enforcement or “negotiation skills” from business (hahaha as if) or whatever dumb rationalization they keep front of mind.
tldr: He’s a monster and damsels these days can and apparently must slay their own ravening beasts.
8
What is the surprise here? Our "President" was "installed" by ancient laws that override democracy. He lost the last election too- more people voted AGAINST him than for him. He has WON NOTHING except near universal contempt for trying to trash the constitution, belittle those who do not worship him and cram repulsive toadies into public offices to corrupt from within and without. The body politic rejects the disgusting infection? Flush him.
10
Trump, apparently an authority on forest management, was spewing his litany of falsehoods yesterday as he surveyed the California fire damage. The thought of another two years of that kind of garbage sure is unsettling. Hopefully, the House will be able to contain his lunacy, and the Dems will get themselves together enough to mount a formidable presidential campain.
8
What a terrible analysis of data. First of all, you have no idea why people voted for this person or that person. You just, based your assumptions on your own biases, assumed it is because of Trump's "misogyny, whatever, whatever". Most election surveys indicate the key issue right now is health care. Second, your framing this as a resounding defeat is absurd. Trump did about as well as any president has done in his first midterm election since WWII. And finally, the idea that who people choose for their representatives and senators is directly linked to who is president is a stretch. "All politics is local." Obama took a shellacking. Trump did not. He got thumped a bit, for sure. But characterizing it as a shellacking is just silly.
3
Actually the article specifically discusses motivations. Well, it does if you read it.
And as for the claim that really, this wasn’t so bad...39 House seats? Senate losses, sure, but far less than expected given the map? Seven governorships, including Wisconsin and Kansas? A couple hundred flipped State legislative seats? Three states voting to expand Medicaid? Orange County—ORANGE COUNTY—goes solid Blue? Trump’s numbers crash nationwide?
Oh, I have a question. Who ran around the country yelling that all these elections were really about him? Because it sure as heck wasn’t Obama.
3
The more often he speaks the more often he delivers a garbled, meaningless sentence. It exposes his disorganized mind.
10
For purposes of National Security, Trump will take away the right to vote from women. And minorities. And poor people. And anyone who is not a White Christian Man of Property. The Senate will support him and block any laws, being filled with WCMPs, as will his SCOTUS. Besides, how many divisions does the SCOTUS have anyway?
2
I’d like to think that General Mattis, Secretary Pompeo, Melania, Ivanka, Kellyanne Conway and other powers-that-be-in-the-White-House have already instituted suitable measures to insure that no loose nuclear footballs are lying around the Rose Garden while he’s "losing his grip" politically and mentally.
3
@A. Stanton Let us hope, but that cast of characters seems to be lost in their Trump trance. But I, too, hope that the powers that be in Trump's inner circle are able to hide the nuclear football when he is raving. I am with them on that agenda.
1
In view of the fact Trump lost the popular vote by 2.5 million, I don't believe he ever really had a grip on the majority of voters.
I enjoyed your vote analysis but his entire Trump scam occurred on election day 2016. As far as his ardent supporters go, they can hit the showers. Most Americans are sick and tired of this obnoxious and incompetent man.
9
With voting comes hope.
5
We are starting to see math a reality kick in after both were skewed in 2016. Throw in an electoral college process that allows someone to become president in spite of losing the popular vote by over 30 million votes and you get what we have in DJT.
Fact is he never wanted to be president. He owed a debt to putin and to pay it off he ran for office to sully the race and ruin the almost certain presidency of one HRC.
DJT never wanted this.
It looked to hard
It takes away from his golf game
He would have to read
He would have to learn
He might have to reveal his tax returns
It meant working for someone else ( the American people) which he has never done in his entire life
I would not worry about a “run” in 2020 from DJT so him losing support now is not news or anything really surprising.
It’s time for the Dems to legislate.
Create legislation that matters to a majority of Americans across this country.
DJT is working himself out of office, he will not need our help and the midterms showed it- clearly!
5
@Is_the_audit_over_yet Let us hope, but people get weird when it is time to vote or Mr. Trump would not have one in the first place.
Outside of the fantasy world of the NY Times, Trump seems to be the most popular president in memory.
3
@mrmeat
Sorry. It's only in the fantasy world of those who voted for Trump that he's the most popular president in memory.
7
The 2016 election was the Democrat's to lose, and they lost it. 2020 is even more important than 2018.
It was reported that Oprah's "spirituality advisor" was testing the waters in Iowa for 2020. Good grief! Play right into Trump's hands, why don't you?
For the country's sake, pick someone who can win.
1
Beginning to lose his grip? DJT has never ever had a grip on reality or any semblance of rationality, which means he’s been a raging lunatic his whole life!
6
We want a country where ALL people are important and cared for.
tRump does not fit in the American mold. He's simply too self-serving and too self-preoccupied to make good decisions for this nation.
Let's move onto a new phase, forget tRump, but not the lessons of a foolish narcissist, indebted to a russian mobster.
4
Congrats, but it's a long way of saying that dopey white men, Millineal bros included, still voted for red Trump. It's not the gender, but the culture.
4
Whadda ya mean 'beginning' ?
2
The first election I voted in was Nixon v McGovern, and I knew Nixon was a crook, watched him defeat McGovern in a landslide and then go on to Watergate.
I've seen elections come and go -- I was sure disappointed in GWB, thought he was a buffoon and a terrible president, and it galled me, even before he got us into two useless wars and destroyed the economy. But I accepted that he was my president, even though I didn't like it, and events sure proved I was right.
But Trump is not my president. He is not morally or intellectually fit, and appears to be some combination of marginally mentally ill and perhaps in early dementia. Worse yet, he is encouraging and pandering to white-power neo-nazis, and is a pathetic Putin wannabe.
Trump is the first president whom I have seen as an existential threat, particularly because of his Republican enablers.
I pray for our nation, and I pray even more for angry fools who think that Trump has any intention, let alone competence, to "Make America Great Again."
10
The national Democratic party had better pay attention as they prepare for the 2020 election and not throw all their eggs and money into the presidential basket, but support every single Democratic candidate from Senate and House on down to the governorships. And for heaven's sake, let's pick a presidential candidate who is closer in age to the younger generations, not the one on life support!
All Democratic candidates need to campaign early and often in all parts of their districts/states, not just the larger cities. We need to get out the vote.
We lost sight of what losing the Senate meant and are now stuck with a Supreme Court that will bite us in the rear many times for at least a generation. Democrats have a lot of work ahead.
4
What I saw in the last election, hate spreading over all !
1
A blue wave indeed, here in Maine the only lone Republican left in power on the federal level is Susan Collins. She should retire, she stands no chance in 2020. The State legislature is now 2/3 Democrat and we have elected more women, including Janet Mills for Governor in 2018. This is the beginning of a take over and it will not finish until the dimwit in the WH goes to jail, hopefully soon. Go Dems, keep persisting and resisting, 2020 is getting really close.
13
Trump is losing his grip in another sense. He is losing his grip on sanity. HIs fantasy about people leaving the voting polls going out to there car, putting on a wig and changing their clothes and coming back in to vote a second time is bordering on schizophrenic delusion. Many schizophrenics in the midst of their psychotic break with reality begin to perceive other people as imposters or improvised, in disguise, etc.
Just on the level of reality, people who just voted would have to sign in again to vote, in disguise or not. The records would show they just voted and turn them away. This is just one example of a really crazy idea coming out of Trump's fevered brain. These illogical, irrational, delusional ideas are comg with greater and greater frequency.
His severe narcissism is another symptom typically found in people who develop schizophrenic psychosis. With the loss in the election and the Mueller investigation closing in his thought process shows he is cracking up. Everybody knows how emotionally unstable he is and all his mental pathology is getting worse and worse.
He sent troops at great cost toward the border at great cost to taxpayers for an imaginary invasion. Even lay people are recognizing he is off his rocker. He is losing his grip more by the day. Americans don't want a nut bag like him as president. This will become more and more evident in the polls.
8
Why is has taken America so long to wake up to the fact that the president is an unapologetic con-man is a deep mystery that will keep the historians busy for some time to come.
His overt misogyny and racism fools no one and hopefully the awakening will continue until this beast is shown the door.
8
@Plennie Wingo
What on earth makes you think that most of America hasn't woken up to what this president is about --Or did you somehow miss the results of the recent midterm elections?
Besides that, he didn't even win the MAJORITY of votes to be elected in the first place.
If this were a boxing match (and it is) I’d say the republicans are on the ropes.
5
I liked the post from the guy who worked hard in Michigan CD 1. Beyond the really nice job of detailing what happened, he also ended with one of the really important points: good as turnout was, the good guys STILL didn’t come close to fully showing up.
No, it’s not just voter suppression. It’s indifference and laziness; I can’t prove it, but I betcha that Florida and Georgia would look very different today, if those numbers had been up another 10%.
3
Am I missing something?
The Republican Party does not acknowledge reality here, that the Democratic Party picked up many seats in the House, enough to give the DP control of the House.
But is the RP the only "denier" here? If you were Stacey Abrams or Andrew Gillum, would you be satisfied with the turnout of anti-Trump voters? How about if you were Bill Nelson? Clearly the turnout was enough to beat Scott Walker in WI, and Martha McSally in AZ, but obviously not enough in other close races (such as the governor races in FL and GA and the Senate race in FL).
For those who like to "get real" every now and then, the 2018 midterm was good and bad for both parties. The DP did very well in the House, while the RP did very well in the Senate. As for governorships, the DP picked up several, but lost the two highest-profile races, in GA and FL.
That's reality.
Many held their nose while voting for Trump, and he managed a very narrow victory. Now he has a track record that doesn't match a lot of his campaign rhetoric, so it's not surprising that some of those people don't like what they see.
But Democrats will ultimately need a compelling candidate to win in 2020.
5
If you just look at the men and women: the republicans held their base and lost only 1pct relative to 2016. But the democrats won substantially more.
Blatant corruption and disruption of decades of norms, erosion of liberty, and un American values such as stealing kids from their parents and deportations without due process have angered a lot of people. It may rile up the Trump base but will only disgust most of us. And people didn’t protest vote this time for a third party (although we came close to that in AZ).
3
To me, the lesson of 2016 was that Donald Trump, while facing an historically unpopular candidate, in a scenario in which the opposing party typically has an advantage (following a 2 term incumbent), still barely eked out an electoral college victory. And even that came only after the Russians, Wikileaks, and the James Comey letter raised his vote totals enough to hit 46%. And even Jill Stein and Gary Johnson did their part, increasing vote totals more than enough to provide for the margin of victory.
The bottom line is Donald Trump is a black swan event. His election was predicated on a series of events that are quite unlikely to be replicated. In addition, his behavior and mismanagement are constantly displayed for all to see. Already we see voters turned off. This factor will only increase, even though he will always have 30 percent or so of the truly deplorable.
This does not mean Dems can lay back and take it easy. For one thing, Trump can try a “wag the dog” scenario or something similar. I’m just saying it’s not as heavy a lift as people are suggesting. A reasonably popular candidate and a crackdown on social media posts by Russian trolls will take them more than halfway there.
4
For me, it was transparent all along who and what trump really is. It was obvious his promises were false and obvious he appealed to people who love to hate. I don't know why when all this is right there for everyone to observe, people actually ever believed him.
6
Donald Trump has boxed himself into a paradox of his own making. Through slavish obeisance to his base, which is slowly catching on, he has painted himself into a corner. If he fails to deliver on his promises to them, he will lose even more of them than he can afford to.
Like so many of his failed business projects, his presidency started out with a loud bang, but as the masses caught on to the joke, his fortunes have begun to dwindle.
History may repeat itself with his presidency, with his moral bankruptcy precipitating his political bankruptcy. One can only hope that he doesn't bankrupt the entire country in the process.
7
All of this, plus the thousands of soldiers languishing in boredom at the border, missing a Thanksgiving with their families for a political stunt. This will be the final straw for some military families; there will be divorces. (Trump is so good at tearing families apart.) Trump supporters like to think of themselves as supporting the troops more than other Americans, but you cannot honestly claim to support the troops if you support a Commander in Chief who abuses them.
7
The decline of Trump will have everything to do with voters not knowing who he was/is His presentation is quite different than his reality, and deception is everything. Now I am not surprised he got so many women to vote for him. I was then, but it's only been a matter of time. He has zero interest in responsible honest women.
4
It seems a lot of people assume Trump will be the GOP presidential candidate in 2020.
Maybe that wont come to be.
2
“Working people are not fools...”
I beg to differ. They remain the ‘the voting base’ for the Republicans, notwithstanding the reality that the Party exists to service the 1%. They vote based on lies from Fox News, or whatever ‘truthiness’ their small education and world view adhere to.
They are stuck in the economy’s lower echelon because of their culture, their circumstances and an unwillingness to change. To paraphrase Obama, they cling to their guns, religion, alcohol and opiates (and soon marijuana). They refuse to move to where there is opportunity, or they messed up their lives so badly that moving is impossible.
I write this as one whose origins would have had me among them.
6
Your typical Democratic candidate for Congress is a likeable person familiar with the district. As opposed to the 2016 presidential candidate.
It is amazing to me that the "mainstream media", while noting that Trump lost big in 2018 still posits him has a strong candidate for 2020 and frets over who could possibly challenge him.
He won by the slimmest electoral college margin in 2016 and lost the popular vote by 3 million. Half of his cronies are in jail or headed there, he's a hot mess.
.. so explain how he looks good going into 2020, please, pundits?
4
“Democrats had won the national congressional vote by a margin greater than that of the Tea Party Republicans in 2010. In fact, Democrats overcame huge structural hurdles to win nearly 40 seats.”
The 2010 Republicans took 63 seats from the Dems. Look it up.
2
@Ed Watters, reread the sentence you quote.
2
Trump never had much of a grip in the first place, since he never learned how to be commander-in-chief of our armed forces nor how to be president of the entire country instead of cult leader for gullible red states. And whatever economic gains he now claims credit for are being eroded by his mishandling of trade and foreign policy. His tax cut for millionaires and big corporations gave them $470 billion to spend on stock buybacks, but it did not raise wages while adding $2 trillion to the deficit. Unemployment may be low but only because some have to work three jobs to make ends meet. The stock market is now falling due to worries about higher interest rates and Trump's trade wars. Canadan and Mexican retaliation for his tariffs on steel and aluminum wiped out whatever good could come from a renegotiated NAFTA. The escalating trade war with China has slashed U.S. agricultural experts by a whopping 98% in soybeans alone and 32% in pork. Big corporate farms are now getting a $12 billion bailout financed by our tax dollars, while smaller family farms are going into debt or out of business. And Trump's photo op with Kim Jong-un not only failed to persuade him to give up his nuclear weapons but actually encouraged him to build more nukes. Many of Trump's original supporters are beginning to realize that they were conned. Hopefully, some of his Republican enablers in the Senate will realize it too.
376
@Christy
"Many of Trump's original supporters are beginning to realize that they were conned. Hopefully, some of his Republican enablers in the Senate will realize it too."
Unfortunately Republicans in the Senate know trump very well, and they're not worried about the trumpian cons, but they're terrified of the right-wing base and its potential to primary them out of office.
42
@wanderer:He's a lousy politician which maybe many want. They can't even give him any credit for peace in the Korean peninsula and why should NK give up its only deterrent when there is no US/NK agreement yet?. The tax break he wanted he didn't get but lowering the corporate tax from 35 to 21%. What is the corporate rate in Canada? 15%. Unless you are for sanctuary cities and open borders then one must support his logical immigration policy else why have borders?. We were paying a total of 76% of NATO's yearly budget to protect the EU now I think that's nuts but maybe you think it's fine?.
1
@wanderer He has an iron grip on the Senate. Surely they recognize his ineptitude, but are too threatened to disobey.
12
I think this just shows that the 2016 vote was probably more anti-Hillary than pro-DT. Was this due to the Russian/Republican misinformation campaigns, misogyny or Clinton-fatigue?
4
@Brassrat I haven't seen a breakdown of Trumps voters -- of who actually voted for him, but I believe that misogyny and Clinton Fatigue were major factors in the election.
College educated men appear to me to have been a major factor in Trump's winning of the Presidency. I was stunned to hear the very well educated men in my life admit that they were planning to vote for Trump. I thought that they were too smart to do such a thing.
1
I think you should stop doing this. Reading omens, interpreting quite isolated and recent events as harbingers of a liberation to come.
As things stand today, Donald the Magnificent is President of the United States. And, as far as I can see, the Democratic party is nowhere near formulating a coherent and convincing alternative to Trump and the GOP's policies, priorities or behavior. Nor do they have a face, someone that the party, its voters, bit also and more importantly, those millions of American citizens who are yearning for an alternative to the excessive partisanship and polarization, can believe in. Unless and until that happens, you're still toast.
2020 has already started and the Republicans are more likely than ever to fight dirty. "Their" Senate and "their" Supreme Court will do their utmost to divide the Democrats and to drive them to impotent rage. As the rifts are there for all to see, that won't even be very difficult
Stop seeing false dawns and get to work!
3
You failed to mention the details about the "border wall" issue. Trump promised that he would make Mexico pay for the border wall. Now his minions know that their taxes will be paying for it.
Also evangelicals have less reason to vote for Republicans now. They have the anti-abortion Supreme Court that they wanted.
1
The election results are a testament to the powerful propaganda machine AKA the American mainstream media in portraying the President in a negative light 99.9% of the time.
3
There used to be movies where the megalomaniac bully would rail to a large crowd of followers, but, by the by the last scene, the crowd is down to a half dozen or so who one by one walk away, leaving the bully railing to no one. Maybe that is what’s happening here.
3
● Funny really. At every turn the biased media and see the end of the Trump's government.
Wishful thinking, more women are onboard as Donald's supporters than those biased articles want to ignore.
The President is a great position for a second term to 2015.
1
This is stunning. Apocalyptic, even. 6 charts show Democrats are back on the rise.
I would be interested in a chart that showed White married women and single mothers . And maybe add White college educated men and maybe similar charts for Americans of color.
If this really was a random poll, you would have to exclude a lot of respondents, just to get desired charts.
1
What Trump needs is more journalists like Greenberg; if anything strengthens his presidency it's articles like this one. There's no red or blue wave and accepting that is the first order of business. in the analysis- it's not that support for the man Donald Trump is growing stronger so much as it is that the dislike for liberal progressiveness becoming more and more apparent. People are weary of the anti-American hypocrisy of the left.
2
Anything built on a faulty foundation, such as Trump's hate-filled and combative political bluster, eventually will fall. Nature and karma are much stronger and wiser than Trump ever will be.
4
The Trump Party welcomes these messages. Sleeping soundly the Democrats woke up to the nightmare we are still living through. The rescuing of Democracy needs more caffeine not sleeping aids; it is way too early to feel 'swell' because polls seem to suggest progress. You know the Chinese, the Russians and most worrisome: all our allies do not depend on election results as they fully realize the danger facing the United States.
3
Trump lost huge.
Thank you, American women. Thank you, American suburbs. Thank you, rural America. Thank you, working class Americans.
The liberation of America has begun.
2
The highest off-year turnout in a midterm election in 50 years! If things keep going this good it won't be too much longer til half the people bother to vote. Them's Super Bowl numbers!
"Mr." Trump is the polite way of addressing this corrupt mess. never president. There is a power in words.
4
Interesting column but you forgot to mention the massive impact of Russian meddling in the 2016 elections. But wait, there has been no reporting of such meddling. So, was the Trump administrations successful in eliminating any meddling efforts? That can't be. Or did the Russians forget that we had a midterm election? Or was it all political spin all along?
Well maybe Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, Alex Jones, Jerry Falwell Jr, Trump Tweets, and the GOP no longer define reality for 40% of America, only 36%. Moving down, but sooo far to go.
3
It's hard to understand why white women, or women of any race, would vote for Trump or any republican candidate. So it's nice to see that white, female voters are slowly starting to see the light. Maybe we have Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal to thank for that. Trump behaved sleazily and from the republican congress we heard crickets.
3
"white women without a four-year degree (pollster shorthand for the white working class)"
The expression "working class" to mean a person without a college degree is misleading. That person may not be working for one thing. For another, I worked hard for 41 years after getting my degree. Do I belong to the "non-working" class?
Pollsters, if you want the person on the street to understand your data use unambiguous terms!
No Hillary, no Nancy. There has finally been progress, time to let the future of the Democratic Party take shape.
The Republican leaders, above all McConnell, demonstrate their extreme contempt for the American people by continuing to back the mentally unstable Trump. They are first and foremost servants of their wealthy corporate owners who want absolute control. No American who cares about the future of our nation can stand with Trump and his Republican anti-patriots.
4
I understand that, the way the math works in states with growing metropolitan areas, the effects of gerrymandering weaken during the course of a decade. The greedier the gerrymander, the more pronounced the effect. Details and fine points matter. Get too greedy and things can even backfire on you by the end of the decade.
Apparently Dallas County is a good example of how this can work out. The Texas Tribune has a piece on this. https://www.texastribune.org/2018/11/07/dallas-county-republican-gerrymander-backfires-2018/
2
From Mr. Greenberg’s lips to god’s/Allah’s/Buddha’s ears, as the multicultural, patriarchal-busting version of the saying goes. The moves towards fascism and authoritarianism seem to have lost some momentum, but the danger is clearly not over. Stay awake. And let us all work to restore the Voting Rights Act and to dismantle voter suppression and political gerry-mandering.
3
Given Trump's outrageous words and behavior, which would get regular person punched out in public, I'm shocked that so many Americans are still devoted to him.
2
The President said that the loss of life and devastation by fire in California was “sad”; I guess he would have thought it was tragic if a Trump Tower had been destroyed.
2
An in-depth analysis, and it gives me some hope for the nation. A large part of my political anxiety stems from seeing certain demographics initially support this man. If it took two years for people to wise up to this con artist all well and good.
On to 2020, and let's hope the country can survive another 24 months of this president's lack of leadership and the Republican Party's hypocrisy. My fingers are crossed, my checkbook is open to support Democratic candidates, and my hopes are high that soon we can vote these bums out of office.
361
Its imperative that our voting majority seeking Trump's ouster as a necessary precondition for the survival of American democracy do all the right things between now and his exit from the White House, whether in 2020 or earlier. These include avoiding the unrealistic blandishments of the so-called progressives on the left and preventing any of them from becoming leading candidates for the presidency, continuing to mobilize women, millenials and minorities and emphasize the vital need for ALL of their votes going forwards, and expelling sympathetic politicians with major flaws in personal or political behavior.
In a nation mesmerized by the celebrity and non-stop showmanship of this president, it's sometimes hard to tell just how low the bar for civility has fallen, but the midterm elections and the recent Press Conference blowout appears to be a good start.
The only problem is, after months of Donald Trump goading the media, Democrats, the electorate and anyone else who disagrees with him, it's hardly surprising the battle lines have been drawn.
At this point the only thing clear is that he thrives on picking a fight -- and after two sold years of this and more unfulfilled promises than he can shake a stick at, it's no surprise that Americans are starting to see through the veneer and leaving in droves.
Trump once said: " I love the poorly educated", but in the end that might not even save him.
12
Hindsight is 20/20.
The Con Don and their Robber Baron brethren - corrupt to the core - are destroying OUR governments at all levels 24/7.
Those who were fooled into voting for him must turn off fox so-called news, hate radio and other "conservative" programs, unsubscribe from hate social media and get out there to join
WE THE PEOPLE in fixing the egregious damage he is doing to OUR United States of America.
No more excuses. Time is running out. The Con Don has proven he will stop at nothing to get his way and it is the very worst way for 99.9% of us.
24
House Democrats have three things to focus on now. Address problems with access to health care, address voter suppression across the country and expose the Trump family's financial dealings, their impact on our policies and how much of our tax dollars are funneled into Trump businesses to support Trump family visits to their various golf courses or political summits held at places like Mar-a-Lago. I suspect the numbers will be eye opening.
41
"The new Republican House caucus is 90 percent white men; nearly half of the new Democratic members will be women."
This is a clear message to women -- if you want a Congress that will represent your views, your choice is obvious.
On August 18, 1920, the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote was ratified. The centennial anniversary in 2020 would be a great time for women to fully assert their power, as voters and as candidates, to put us back on the path toward forming a more perfect union.
29
@Curt M.
Not black women. Let's be cognizant of our "white privileged " mindset that can sneak into our dialogue when we really don't want it to. Hear what your saying and agree, but let us not forget black women that didn't get that privilege until the '60's.
2
I am still a pessimist in these dark days of our democracy.
"It ain't over 'till it's over", said a wise man long ago.
5
@Stan Carlisle, then work for the best outcome--action is the best help for depression.
12
This analysis is interesting but I would be careful about how Democrats apply the conclusions. Some of these points make Democrats sound like the party of women and multiculturalism. That's true but that's not why Democrats won the House in 2018.
Most candidates didn't run on issues of gender and multiculturalism. Many candidates simply represented these groups in their own identity. The actual Democratic platform was almost universally healthcare, healthcare, and more healthcare with a side plank dedicated to voters rights.
I think the lesson for Democrats is most swing voters won't vote against gender and multiculturalism. However, these aren't the issues that motivate them. Clinton never really had a platform that wasn't identity based. She lost. Democrats need to give voters some positive issues and messaging independent from identity politics.
I will agree the rural shift is surprising though.
24
@Andy -- Excellent observations which pollsters consistently appear to miss in their blind vision that politics consist only of elections and statistics:
[ " Most candidates didn't run on issues of gender and multiculturalism. Many candidates simply represented these groups in their own identity. The actual Democratic platform was almost universally healthcare, healthcare, and more healthcare with a side plank dedicated to voters rights." ]
4
@Andy - People who talk about “identity based” politics usually mean it as a criticism of people other than white men. I wonder how many voted against Clinton because of their own white male primacy, “identity politics”?
3
"Democrats had won the national congressional vote by a margin greater than that of the Tea Party Republicans in 2010. In fact, Democrats overcame huge structural hurdles to win nearly 40 seats."
Can you imagine what it would look like of gerrymandering and voter suppression were not present? I think we would have what looks much more like a representative democracy.
Thwarting suppression and reforming gerrymandering should be a high high priority for the democratic party over the next term(s).
35
People say a healthy economy is a boon to Trump. But "the economy" is an abstract concept. Unless we personally feel flush in our own wallet, then what do we really care about GDP, which is something most Americans don't really understand anyway. Wages are flat. People are still largely struggling to make ends meet. We are NOT doing better, by and large, at the micro level, even if things are booming on the macro level. I think that's why Trump will not do so well in 2020.
21
@C--Part of the problem is that people don't understand the role the president plays in the economy, which is very little. Whether the economy improves during an administration is largely due to luck. The Federal Reserve Board has a large impact on how monetary policy is conducted, and the president does appoint the Chair and members of the board. So, in that regard the president can have an effect. But,the president alone can’t determine fiscal policy. That requires Congress. And, the president can do very little to make companies hire more workers, or lower gas prices, for example. Trump promises a lot, but actually can't do much to improve the lives of his supporters. They keep hoping, though.
14
I think you’re going to fund that Trump’s trade wars are going to significantly affect the economy. So will his crack down on immigrant labor. The problem with Trump is that if he can find a way to ruin something, he will.
2
Bring on the day when enough voters realize that Donald is all talk. When he said "Make America Great Again" it wasn't a promise, it was a command. With him out of the picture we will be in a better position to make it reality.
31
@Bob He was out of the picture for the 8 years of Obama.
1
In 2020, if the Democrats don't run a candidate that can win a NATIONAL ELECTION using ELECTORAL COLLEGE rules, then we will have 4 more years of Trump. It is that simple.
24
@Bill: Depending on what the House finds in its planned investigations of Trump & Company; and Mueller's own findings, even,if Trump wins in '20, don't rule out the possibility that his second term could be a lot shorter.
7
@Bill, and if the party can avoid being split between factions who will not compromise as people sometimes must in order to stand together with a diverse and huge base of voters.
3
My biggest hope from this election is that it promote the habit of voting in midterms (all elections) in a bigger percentage of our people.
Had democratic voters not stayed home in 2010 we would not see the gerrymandering and the suppression of votes that we have seen this decade.
Dems need to run on being the party of the New Deal and keep reinvigorating that New Deal for every up coming generation. Time to stop building America only for the 1%. Time to share the wealth among all of US.
Now let's get to work.
67
@Bob Laughlin Well said; also time to stop building America for illegal immigrants.
To understand what motivates voters to support someone like Trump, it helps to understand the level of tribalism that exists in the Trump culture. It will NOT be corrected by improving the economy for these supporters. The "us against them" way of looking at the world is ingrained. Unfortunately, Trump's success has insured that the Republicans will repeat this strategy over and over.
15
I agree that Republicans in the South and Midwest will repeat this strategy. But it is failing badly elsewhere. The party is losing representation in the West and is being obliterated in the Northeast. It cannot grow its influence with its current strategies.
15
@Big Mike: the way less "us against them" thinking, cutting off their noses to spite their faces philosophy only hurts them and relegated them to wallow and not get ahead. So sad for them and our nation.
2
@Big Mike Mikey, the fact that people are "set up" for tribalism, or predestined to be sensitive to the tribal dynamic is world wide. It's a people thing not a republican thing. If any political party in the US is more tribal than the other its the Democrats. The republicans are actually much more willing to stay home and go to work while the Dems are less likely to stay home and want to "go somewhere and march" or " lets protest". This dynamic has been strengthened by the college campus progressive professors to some extent. AT any rate- just saying you are wrong- mistaken, etc. The conservatives of the USA are very tolerant people until you start telling them stupid stuff like women can be men if they feel like or men can be women one day but then be a man the next when their feelings of "who I am" change. This kind of galactic misinformation has doomed the progressive movement.
Perhaps the only one not seeing this as a clear rejection of Trumpism is Donald Trump himself. Let us not forget that these historic gains in the House came at a time of having the most GOP gerrymandered congressional districts in history.
34
When I read these statistics I cannot help but remember that a lot of Bernie Sander voters either decided to vote for the 3rd Party candidate or Trump. A one time happening. These are the voters who turned out and voted mostly straight Democratic tickets this time around.
And then add the Republicans who also voted Democratic in this election and I think the seeds have been sown for a Democratic victory in 2020.
Health Care and the lack of economic progress for so many voters were the deciding issues in these races.
These will be the issues that will decide the Presidential race in 2020.
29
@Jean What happened in 2000 with Gore/Bush started this vote thing (protest) and now it's over. I knew voters who rejected Gore because they claimed he was not environmental enough.....
2
I have seen articles attributing part of our problem to the inequality of representation caused by the structure of the Senate. Senators represent states, not people, so low population states have inordinate political influence, equal in the Senate to California. Not being a lawyer, this looks like an internal conflict in the constitution between the prescribed structure of the senate and the equal protection clause. Am I missing something?
29
@HM It's just written that way. It does not make any sense legally, but consider the year. The United States Constitution is a property document, and it's not being allowed to be a living constitution.
12
@HM Thank you for your honesty. You ask a question we should all ponder. Our founders designed a constitutional representative republic to ensure many rights including states rights. The form of government was not a democracy in the strictest sense to protect against the tyranny of the majority. It also allows for modifications to expand those rights to all citizens- 14th amendment included. Posters (Mr Greenburg in his article) often reference popular vote as though it should supersede other constitutional provisions and protections. Some might argue protecting states rights is outdated in today’s modern society. I would strongly argue the opposite. The mountain of federal debt (and rising cost to service) and unfunded entitlements should encourage all citizens to prefer the states as laboratories to tackle benefits and taxation with varying models. Our current trajectory is unsustainable, defaults will happen. State governments will be better prepared to tackle the problem (sooner because of debt limitations) and fail in some cases. Better to learn at the state level. Finally beyond fundamental rights, citizens deserve to have a choice on what level of benefit/taxation they desire and can afford. Federalism is our best defense against a federal legislature (and media) that hasn’t understood or been honest to the coming fiscal challenges our country faces.
2
I always thought it was done intentionally to balance the House of Representatives, which was supposed to be based on population and could, therefore, be subject to the political whims of the majority (otherwise known as mob rule). Didn't some of the founding fathers believe that the common man shouldn't have too much say in decisions affecting the country and so created the US version of the House of Lords in the Senate as a check? I still think that is a good idea. What might work for you today, could easily work against you tomorrow.
3
What's particularly striking about the midterm results is that they come in the context of an extremely strong economy, with record-low unemployment. While midterms seldom turn out in favor of the incumbent party, the state of the economy also has a meaningful effect on the perception of incumbents.
Conventional wisdom holds that the incumbents receive more credit than they deserve when the economy is doing well, and too much blame with things are bad. So, if Trump is unpopular and Republicans lost the house vote by between 7 and 8% with unemployment at 3.7%, what happens if economic growth stalls or reverses? 2008 offers a few clues.
Since about 6 months after Trump's election, I've held the view that one of two things would happen: Someone would lock Trump's twitter account and force him to stay on script during public appearances, and his popularity would climb, or the current economic expansion would run out of legs and his popularity would tank. The first one clearly isn't happening, and the present economic cycle is getting a little long in the tooth....
If the present expansion keeps on trucking for another two years, Trump has a chance in 2020. If not, 2020 could be historically ugly for Republicans.
12
@John
The so-called strong economy is an illusion, the stock market due to correct, taking the U.S. economy with it again - as occurs every decade now. Those jobs gained are still mostly part time, low wage, no benefits, no health care, no longevity and no security. Most Americans remain on their own, struggling and disconnected.
27
@John Do not worry. Do you not realize we cut off our money supply for the federal government with the tax cut? It's just a matter of time. We are broke, just like when Reagan did it in the 1980's. There likely will not be four years.
9
@John So basically you're hoping the economy goes bad so your team can win. Can you not see what you're saying? Wow, the economy is roaring along and people are employed and earning higher wages. But let's get rid of the guy who helped make this happening. Let's hope people/families/minorities suffer so they'll elect our guy/gal instead.
Despite some disappointing losses in a few high profile races, notably Florida, Georgia, and Texas, the American people delivered a resounding rejection of Trumpism in the 2018 midterms. Despite having to compete in a "rigged system," on an uneven and heavily gerrymandered playing field, the Dems gave the GOP an even greater shellacking than they themselves took during the "Tea Party Revolution," of 2010. We aren't out of the woods yet by any means, but I think right-thinking Americans have reason to hope after the blue tsunami of 2018.
37
We need to remember that Trump won the swing voters who were never going to vote for Hillary. Today, those voters have buyers remorse. As long as the Democratic Party puts forth a middle leaning candidate 2020 will be decided by the Independent voters and no more DJT. One and done.
42
And who might be the middle leaning Democrat who will be able to defeat Trump? I've just given it some thought, and I can't come up with a single example.
1
Trump and Republican tinkering with Obamacare did enough damage that people can see it in their budgets. No longer a meaningful mandate, risk corridors gone and various other bits of sundry sabotage, and premiums throughout healthcare, whether you're in the individual market or group insured, are going up. And benefits are being clawed back. And if they'd fully gotten their way it would be much worse. And still they want to dismantle health reform, when in reality it needs beefing up if we want to see better coverage at lower cost.
38
@Chicago1 How absurd. It was Obama and the democrats that skyrocketed premiums and deductibles. Not Republicans and not Trump. Dismantle health reform? How absurd. There is no health reform. There has been zero improvements in health or health care since the implementation of Obamacare. This is utopian fantasies that democrats/progressives still swirl in. There is no such thing as health reform. When democrats talk about improvements in health care, all they're talking about is who pays for it. There are no improvements. It is a ruse. No one has been able to be legally turned away from a public hospital for decades. No one has been legally denied coverage for true pre-existing conditions for decades. This is a ruse, a lie. If you by your own choice did not have insurance, got cancer, and then decided to go sign up, yeah, it didn't pay. Just like if you wrecked your car and then went and signed up for insurance it wouldn't pay. But this Jimmy Kimmel joke that your baby born with a heart defect wouldn't get medical care is an absolute lie. My entire family works in health care. They deal with these cases every day. It's just an absolute lie predicated on the ultimate goal of socializing medicine. If you think that will lead to improved health care, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn I'll sell you.
It seems to me that some people *believe* they're voting with their wallet because they've been promised a financial benefit in the form of lower taxes or more jobs or better prices for their crops, and some *believe* that they will benefit financially when those "takers" are denied the "free stuff" that is stolen from the pockets of hard-working "real" Americans. It's hard for them to see the consequences of those kinds of promises. So they're all for more jobs--until they realize that they've got to work three of 'em to make a living. They like the idea of tariffs that protect the price of their produce--until they discover that nobody will buy at the higher price. They love the notion of lower taxes--"taxes" having been made out by the Republicans to be nothing but a way to give "free stuff" to undeserving riffraff--until they find out that FEMA won't have the funds to help them after that drought/flood/tornado/hurricane. And they feel empowered at the thought of making those Europeans pay their fair share of their own defense--until they find out that an agreement to do just that was made under the Obama administration and that our allies, far from feeling punished, are simply stepping around the Current Occupant and making plans without us. The realization is dawning that the only ones "winning" are the ones who made those phony-baloney promises.
52
@R Nelson Except, overall, wages are up under this administration over the last. Which, hypothetically, means they work less to earn that money. Also, employment is up, which means more people have more money to buy the things they need. Means you both have a job, or your kid has a job. As for underserving riff raff, I'm not sure about that. But I'm wondering why Big Bird needs public funding since Sesame Street products are a multi million dollar industry. Just one example. Taxes are important. But unfettered taxation is by its very nature going to result in wasteful spending. Somebody needs to come along every once in a while a reel things in a bit. The federal government is by its very nature an inefficient leviathan. It should be as limited as possible. State and local government are much more equipped to provide services than the feds.
1
One has to be careful when using statistics, raw wage numbers may be up, but you haven't factored in inflation. I think the adjusted numbers are much less favorable. Do some research
6
Myself, I wonder whether Trumpists are ohysically incapable of reading a simple graph, or are too afraid to take a gander at one.
Yes, unemployment is down to what, 3.7%? Having dropped from 4.6 in the last two years, in a good economy? And under Obama, it dropped from at least 9.6 to that 4.6, starting with a gawdawful economy, and TRUMP’S the genius?
No, wages aren’t rising significantly more than they were between 2012 and the start of 2017. Take a look; show me where I’m wrong. And prices are up, so...
GDP, all the rest: better, but pretty much either rising as they were pre-Dunderhead, or following established trends. It’s simple to see; why won’t they?
Oh, and let’s talk deficit and debit. Now there’re two curves that spiked since Trump. Hey, didn’t the Tea Party howl endlessly about that stuff? How come that died down so fast?
5
Mr. Greenberg, I always enjoy your op-ed and look forwards to seeing your byline..
Your analysis is good news and Democrats like me surely need some good news. However, I find it difficult to conclude that is losing his grip on white voters. Here, in Minnesota CD1 we lost a tough election and in my opinion there were three factors that worked hand in glove to produce a narrow victory for a Republican candidate who lost in 2016.
The first factor is that the Democratic incumbent chose to run for Governor and he won.
The second factor was a Trump rally here in Rochester on Oct 5. In the weeks before the rally, my Dan Feehan sign was the only yard sign on the block. The morning after the rally three Hagedorn signs appeared.
The third factor the huge wave of dark money sponsored negative ads. I don't watch TV at home but a few days before the election I spent the day in a hospital waiting room while my daughter was in surgery. The TV in the family room was on CNN and there so many negative anti-Feehan ads (at least 4 or 5 per hour).
I worked as an Election Judge on Nov. 6. The turnout of blue collar and older white voters was impressive. The turnout of white collar voters was not nearly so impressive. Overall the turnout was very high. Hagedorn, the Republican candidate lost Rochester but still picked up enough votes here to win the district.
Trump matters, it's all about turnout.
14
A too-rosy assessment!
Some 45% of Americans worship the New York City con man, and are not amenable to reason!
Democrats need something more specific than inclinations toward addressing the fundamental issues of immigration, health care, and tax reform.
Will no liberal think-tank, or member of Congress, ever draft a comprehensive proposal to any one of the fundamental issues? Are we to quarrel forever over abstract inclinations and notions instead of debating written proposals?
14
@AynRant: The still relevant 2016 Democratic Platform contained very specific policy proposals and goals and plans how to get there. That would have made an excellent starting point for a national debate on fundamental issues, were it not that the mass media opted for reporting on sensational things Trump said and did, and Hillary's emails... Remember that Democrats always have to clean up the economich mess Republicans leave behind, and are quite successful at that, without causing damage to the social safety net. So they must be able to do something right, in addition to having "abstract inclinations".
31
@Anna Well Said. It is infuriating to see this continuing criticism of the democrats not having specific proposals, when they do. I agree, the very superficial media coverage is a big part of the problem.
7
It’s not the drafting of legislation that’s at fault or missing. It’s the obstructionism of bills drafted. The villain here is Senate leader Mitch McConnell.
Mitch has singlehandedly refused to let discussion, debate or votes on positive issues proceed through regular channels. It’s entirely political. No help for the country or the people.
He has choked our democracy. He needs to go!!!
5
Even if the change is as dramatic as Mr. Greenberg suggests, we won't be represented in Washington accordingly until serious steps are taken to undo the gerrymandering of congressional districts and abolish the electoral college.
48
@LoboSoltero
Repeat after me: Citizens United, Citizens United...
2
I think that a lot of political analysts continue to miss the reality that a significant chunk of the votes that put Donald Trump in the White House in 2016 weren't votes FOR him--as much as they were votes AGAINST Hillary Clinton.
At this point, I have lost count of the number of people I've spoken to since the election who have admitted to me that voted for Trump in the belief that he was the lesser of two bad choices--and Democrats who said the struggled to vote--albeit unenthusiastically--for Clinton. (Full disclosure--I include myself in the category of Democrats.)
I think the results of 2018 need to be interpreted through a lens that recognizes the Democrats benefited from not having the second most unpopular major party candidate in modern history at the top of the ticket--combined with a growing recognition among some segments of Trump 2016 voters that they bet the wrong way on which candidate was the lesser of two evils.
24
@Doug Johnston How about proportional distribution of electoral college votes?
3
@Doug Johnston They say that because if they said they like Trump and were voting for him, democrats would immediately start calling them racists or some other such derogatory term. As long as you, as a party, keep moralizing and denigrating the people across the aisle, you're not going to win over any voters. Democrats have become what Republicans used to be. They view themselves as morally superior. It was toxic for Republicans and it will be toxic for Democrats. People just have different values. They just have different ideas of what is fair. They have different ideas of both what the "greater good" is and how to achieve it.
@Doug Johnston. I, too, heard voters say their vote for Trump was more a vote against Hillary, who has been so successfully, if unfairly, in my opinion, demonized. I think, too, theirs were votes against the establishment in general, the dysfunctional congress so corrupted by money, the endless, hideous wars ending in defeat or stalemate, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, and much more. But I agree they bet the wrong way on the lesser of two evils. Even Trump's most devoted fans must cringe at his total lack of dignity.
2
I was delighted to see Maine was part of the Blue Wave this past election. If Maine was a test for the country, where we had Paul LePage as governor, who was Trump before Trump, clearly we came to our senses and swept the GOP out of office. We now have the majority in the state's House and Senate and a female Dem governor in Janet Mills. The icing on the cake was this week, with the success of ranked choice voting and the win by Jared Golden for Congressional District 2 against Bruce Poliquin, a race the GOP invested in heavily. Maine split its electoral votes in 2016. It looks like we will probably vote blue in 2020, too.
28
What kind of category is “white unmarried women”? Don’t all these women fall into one or the other of the other two categories? I have never seen male voters categorized by their marital status. This notion that women will vote differently because they aren’t married presumes that women who are married vote the way their husbands tell them to vote. I suggest that categories of working versus non-working women would be far more elucidating (not to mention respectful).
26
@Dee Klein whether it makes analytical sense or not to also split men into married and unmarried categories depends on whether they vote differently, as is the case for women. As for the insights that may be gained by looking at the marital status of women, it probably can also be captured by other factors such as age, income, education, geography, and religion.
As for what is more "respectful", whether the Times presents the analysis in this way or not,successful political analysts and pollsters are going to use what ever variables available to them which have predictive power. Some would feel that using the concept of "race" is disrespectful, but no meaningful analysis of American voting could be done without it.
1
@Dee Klein, wow--good point! It slipped right by me, but how obvious once you see it...thanks!
1
The non-working women who happen to be mothers will definitely not find that categorization respectful.
2
Will the Democrats seize the opportunity for 2020, or throw it away? Or, indeed, will the GOP see the light and start moving towards sanity (and courage)?
10
Note for Democratic voters-
Do not feel sanguine about the 2020 Presidential elections. A weak Democratic candidate and an independent GOP candidate like John Kasich running against Trump can and will skew the election. Imagine how his campaign message will play in Middle America: The moderate saving the country from the two extremes.
12
@David A. That's a great idea. Run Kasich against Trump. It will split the Republican Party. I'm all for that.
15
@Stephen Cochran Except that the "split" will be about 95-5; Kasich has already demonstrated that Trump owns him.
4
@David A.: I don't see how this affects the general election unless Kasich beats Trump in the Republican primary or runs as an independent--- both highly unlikely outcomes.
In the end, only one Republican will run against the candidate put up by the Democrats. Base Republicans have eyes only for Trump and judging from the past two years, he can do almost anything that would sink another politician and still retain their adoration.
No. Barring a major national catastrophe, it will be Trump in 2020.
4
I know that I'm virtually alone in my opinion that Trump's '16 victory was a fluke occasioned by the convergence of a number of largely independent and highly improbable events that were unlikely to be repeated in 2020, but these data are somewhat consistent with that theory.
Encourage the bulk of Democratic candidates to judiciously take bold progressive stances on issues that Americans tend to care most about; allow those in more conservative locations to be more moderate; lock James Comey, Maureen Dowd, and Vladimir Putin in a closet; and encourage Trump to just keep being himself, and we'll have a Democratic president in 2020.
47
Trump lost the popular vote by 31/2 million votes. The problem is with the electoral college which gives small, rural states and communities an big advantage. We need a national vote to avoid this travesty in the future.
80
@Hugh McIsaac
The electoral college gives everyone a voice in the elections.
Otherwise just hold national elections in New York and California.
1
@mrmeat: The electoral college gives small states a substantially bigger voice than large states. For example, California with its 14 million votes cast in 2016 is worth 55 electoral votes; that's approximately 1 electoral vote for each 250,000 voters. Contrast with Wyoming: with a total of 255,000 votes cast the winner there receives 3 electoral votes--- for just about the same number of votes! Thanks to the Electoral College system, a vote in Wyoming is worth three times as much as a vote in California.
That's not fair. You want to continue a winner take all electoral system? Fine, but make it fair and proportional. California and New York voters are American citizens too and deserve just as much of a voice as Wyoming voters.
5
Where, one wonders, do white working class males get the idea that the Republican party represents the interests of them and their families?
77
@John
Unfortunately for many, their support of GOP is rooted less in economic interests, which they consistently vote against, and more in fear of others, which Trump only intensifies.
66
@Concerned MD
This I'm sure is true. As Raymond Aron the French philosopher and writer said about 60 years ago the lesson of this century is that men's passions are more important than their interests.
26
You’re asking for logic where there is little or none. When you believe - without a shred of evidence - that someone who doesn’t look or talk like you is somehow getting advantages that you believe you’re entitled to because your older brothers, your father and their friends and their fathers had them, then by golly you will vote for anyone who promises to get it all back for you. It is the illogic of resentment, and it is extraordinarily powerful.
5
...the charts in the article are dizzying - voters in America are wish washy at best - and provide no clear indication of future voting preferences. They were moved to vote for Trump because of frustration with Obama and the Democrats. Back and forth - Bush to Obama to Trump - who’s next - whoever it is, it’s another inside the Beltway politician that has no interest in the material issues (poverty, national debt, education) facing America - their only agenda is getting elected (or re-elected).
10
The majority of US Americans are not at all served by the Republican Party. The GOP expansively lost the moral and ethical high ground. Which they only ever had superficially. Mislead Evangelicals are slowly coming to understand the real Jesus.
Why do we call them the GOP? Grandiose Old Poofs? Maybe they call themselves that because they thought GOP could be mistaken for GOD?
11
The presidential candidate that is capable of instilling a good feeling in our country will get the votes to win. Trump is too negative and incapable of laughing and admitting he is human. The reason Ronald Reagan was so popular was not his policies but his ability to charm people Republican and Democrat!
1
"Trump Is Beginning to Lose His Grip"
Beginning, you say?
37
"Beginning to lose his grip?"
That's the definition of a day late and a dollar short.
Trump let the dogs out on Inauguration Day.
21
@Yuri Asian
63 million bigly American voters did that in Nov. 2016.
Inauguration Day Jan. 2017 was the denouement.
Abusive behavior toward any and all minorities came home to roost as did total disregard for more than half the population. The emperor was revealed to have no clothes.
The 2020 election my well reveal he has no throne.
36
It looks as though the American people are waking up, however slowly, and realize how brutish and obtuse the bully in-chief is, however sinister his mastery as a liar and crook he may be. Who would have thought that his triad of 'fear, hate and division' as a candidate would by his modus operandi once in the White House?
28
Trump has indeed 'lost his grip.' On sanity.
And while America is slowly regaining its grip, it can't happen fast enough.
When this aberrant president is either taken out in cuffs or turned out in the next election, this entire country will need to reflect for a long time on how hate and bigotry overcame our collective better nature. We will also need to figure out how and why the republican sycophancy--er, I mean Congress-- failed to protect us as they are charged by the Constitution (their interest in which begins and ends at the Second Amendment)
67
I agree. I’m just adding that I,too, was saying “Congress” at times. I need to correct myself to say “Republicans in Congress.” I think it’s important we make that distinction. And hopefully the new House will also make that clear.
It’s easy right now to talk about the strong partisan divide, but there really is no equal comparison of the behavior of Republicans to that of Democrats. Most Democrats are trying to do the right thing for the people of this country. I know there are selfish politicians everywhere, but that is not typical of the Democrats. The problem is the Republicans who cheat the retain power to enrich themselves, their donors, and large corporations. We need to change laws to ensure every person’s vote counts equally.
13
@Lkf
The entire country also needs a long, hard look at all administrations and every election since the mid-1960s that unleashed endless economic, social and immigration woes onto the middle and lower classes. The seeds of everything that have come to rotted fruition were planted over the last 50 years.
Of course it did, any decent people on earth would have recoiled from a party embracing such an unethical and malignant narcissist. Not reigning on his autocratic tendencies and going along with his blatant, done-in-the-open obstruction of justice wasn't smart though.
19
Working class are "not fools"? Frankly, they are if they believe Trump has any clue about how to accomplish what he's promised. I say, let's be honest about them. They won't believe anything that Trump labels "fake news" anyway, so why not call it as it lays: Trump is making fools of them.
52
Isn’t the expression lies , filthy lies and statistics. Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades Until the Democrats are able flip Texas or Florida, Trump has shown that he outmaneuvered the Democrats again.
1
@Ronnie The Dems flipped Trump states in many statewide elections, and they have won the Presidency multiple times without winning Texas. Florida by making 1.5 million felons eligible to vote, (and the continuing demographic changes of young minority voters replacing old dying Republicans) they should be able to net the numbers needed to make Florida more reliably blue.
Trump cannot lose a grip he never had. You cannot have a grip of anything if your long-term strategy is to 'wing it'. You can neither have a grip if you play both sides of every argument. Neither can you expect to have a grip if you have no allies, or if your only support comes from those who adore you for being a racist, insulting bigot with no idea about anything -- not even how ordinary people buy their cereal!
You cannot possible argue that Trump has a grip on anything -- or can ever have a grip of anything -- when these are his words:
"You gotta take care of the floors. You know the floors of the forest, very important... I was with the President of Finland... he called it a forest nation and they spent a lot of time on raking and cleaning and doing things and they don't have any problem."
Finland!
Or:
"I have a strong opinion. I want great climate, we are going to have that and we are going to have forests that are very safe."
He's about as educated as Canute, just more delusional.
And yet, despite this nonsense, from the Republicans? The usual Crickets.
47
@James Devlin
Yes, and hurricanes are wet: "This is a tough hurricane, one the wettest we've seen from the standpoint of water".
It's even worse when you consider that many people like him because he "talks like one of us"....
2
The 1% is not paying their share and the GOP is offering no solutions. Drug costs, potholes, everything structural failing, and no reality to allow functional outcomes adds up in voting booths. There is "no there there" with Trump, the GOP and all the malicious GOP "think" tanks, blabbering lying radio/TV hosts, and dirty tricksters.
28
@poslug
The bottom 40% isn't paying anything, let alone their fair share. The upper 10% pays most of taxes and funds everything around the country. They just also get a pantload of business end runs around what would be 80% of their income, while the middle and upper middle get stuck paying more than their fair share. The whole system is dysfunction, not just with regard to the super rich.
Its completely over for Trump people. In Florida and Georgia, the crazy right JUST eked out wins, by the skin of their teeth. You would have expected these to be easy win states. Next time even these nutty states will be going blue big time. 2020 is the death knell for the Republicans in every sense of the word.
28
@Tom
Without playing to the 100+ million immigrants and 20 million illegals, Democrats would not have come close on those and other states. This was the end game to Democrat/Johnson's 100% repeal of existing U.S. immigration law, replaced with policies that caused the problems the U.S. has had ever since, including the destruction of the lower and middle classes.
1
I will be sold on the conclusions this op-ed puts forward, if and only if, conservative, Republican-leaning columnists for Salt Lake City and Baton Rouge newspapers and Fox Network.
It's important to not typically believe in ideas whose effects would make your life better.
1
@john clagett, it takes a lot to overcome the voting shenanigans of the republicans and the allure to some of the madness on the right. It doesn't take unanimity, however, nor conversion of the Mormon church or such. It takes enough of a majority to leave the deluded true believers in the Trump cult behind, that's all. And in central Oklahoma, I now have a democratic representative in the US Congress, first since 1975--and first woman ever. It's coming, the wall of right-wing power is crumbling. And we who know the stakes won't stop till it's down.
1
America is just fed up with Trump his cronies and the GOP,
for degrading and destroying American values and causing
very deep conflicts that are manufactured to retain and hold political power.
Moral poison is destroyed by the Vote of the People.
25
Pride goes before a Fall. (Hillary equaled hubris.) The Dems have done lots of damage to ordinary citizens -- try to transfer your IRA funds and see what restrictions were put on this in 2015!!! and assume that everyone is PC....and that illegal immigration is OK -- and never succeeded nor will they try for Universal Single Payer healthcare. Hospital mergers = higher medical cost, Chas. Schumer's West Coast fund raising-- is this for the party??, Amazon in NYC-- where is the transparency? Trump was no gem and I am glad he will be blocked... but the Dems lost their way pre-Clinton I. Who are they/we running in 2020?? I prefer Kerry to Biden along with Warren/Oprah. That's the next step.
3
@Make America Sane
As always we must choose the best of a bad lot. There are no Lincolns, FDRs, or Trumans anymore.
Reality TV vs reality. You can fool some people all of the time, but you can fool the rest only some of the time.
8
trump lost his grip on reality years ago. he was just manipulative enough to catch the American electorate in a frustrated, angry mood and was able to manipulate this into a win. The last 20 months have shown how ill prepared and greedy this loser is. His fans now have buyers remorse and have thrashed the republican party a good one.
The anger is now directed at the correct culprits, republicans and their elite rich puppet masters rather than immigrants and people of color. If the Dems offer up a 100 days of policy reform truly directed at the common man, the republicans are toast.
23
Trump is the worst President we have ever had and the mid-terms reflect how poorly he has served and why he is so incompetent. The President serves the country and he does so because of laws not because of any personal authority nor by winning an election. Neither he nor his supporters understand this. The Executive Branch owes service to all the people whether they voted for the President or not. That’s what a government of law is all about. Trump focuses all of his actions as President to please his supporters. He neglects the needs of all others. That is why he is so divisive and why his support is diminishing.
26
Dream on ! I advise to shake these hallucinations off and think harder how rural America feels connected to the democratic party as well
6
@AO, in Oklahoma and elsewhere, the rural towns are shrinking, continual tax cuts have closed their schools on Fridays and their hospitals permanently. And everywhere, corporations and industrial farming are closing out the rural life. As with their appeals to older whites, republicans' strength with rural folks rests on a declining number--this one declining fast. But even they are not so quick to defend Trump now. More silence, fewer shouts.
1
"Trump Is Beginning to Lose His Grip"
Please, don't say this about our President. He is not beginning to lose his grip.
He never HAD a grip to lose.
Remember that Christmas present you used to get from your Grandma? You know, the one that no one liked, and you ended up using it for a doorstop? Right, it was a fruitcake.
THAT is our President. And it's unconstitutional for a fruitcake to have a grip. Just ask Grandma. SHE knows.
11
There has been an article with this headline every other month for the last 2 years.
13
@Dave Fedoroff
perhaps they did some good !
1
“When you are tasked as politicians are with being all things to all people, all the time, it becomes increasingly impossible to be true to yourself, let alone anyone else.” RGM circa 2018
2
no justice, no peace and no rest.
4
Yeah, yeah.
Losing his grip. Right, just like Bill Clinton (54 House seats lost in 1994) and Barack Obama (64 House seats in 2010)
Dream on.
7
“Working people are not fools, and Mr. Trump promised them a Republican president who would never cut Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid; who would repeal Obamacare but provide “insurance for everybody”.
The catch is the GOP will gut Obamacare and never replace it. That will make for many sad faces in the White working class group. C’est la vie suckers.
13
The Democratic shift in rural areas is pretty amazing at 13 points. I do think that rural voters tend to be treated as a monolithic group when in fact, they are very aware that tariffs may mean losing their family farms and at least some know that the ACA Medicaid expansion is the only way that healthcare is even affordable or accessible in a state like Georgia. They also know their neighbors better and help each other out.
In Georgia, Brian Kemp with an agriculture bachelor's degree ran an appalling ad with his big pickup truck claiming that he would drive around personally and "round up" immigrants as though they were animals. The vision of a white man "rounding up" brown families in a truck and driving them off somewhere conjures up images of Nazi trucks "rounding up" Jewish people, or Klansmen "rounding up" black people and driving off with them to one of those public hangings that the Mississippi Republican woman(!) senator enjoys so much that she wants to be on the front row.
I profoundly hope that most Americans still share our common values that all are created equal. The narrowing Trump Republican demographic is squeezing out many of those "best people" he likes to boast about. Who is left?
18
@smb
I saw in the Atlanta paper this morning that Kemp says that his first priority is cutting taxes, which are already low in Georgia. Not fixing the flawed election system that made Georgia a laughingstock this year.
2
"Trump is beginning to lose his grip".....when did he have it?
10
If I know my Dem friends on the left, the overreach and infighting will start on Jan 1, thus ushering in another 4 years of Trump. The Dems are great at protesting but need some work with actually keeping the train on the tracks. They have a chance to prove their competence here. Please don't blow it.
11
@Mark
The Democrats did a great job of keeping the train on the tracks during the election campaign. While the Republican leader kept talking gibberish the whole time.
“Will this shift of white women be durable?”
Of course not, because we Americans — whatever our gender — have the attention spans of gnats. Any populace whose polls swing so drastically left and right, like a cheap electoral metronome, lacks the kind of solid ideological foundation and moral compass that produces lasting change. Even if Trump and the GOP are routed in 2020, rest assured Americans will, once the damage is finally repaired, be easily manipulated into showing our fickle and clueless colors once again, and vote in the next generation of *even worse* right-wing lunatics.
Ex-Con Don Jr. 2032!!!
9
@Johnny
I believe in the women of America. I can see that determination in my wife. They will continue on this path until it succeeds.
1
@Johnny Sorry to disappoint you but it's very likely that Don Jr. will still be living in prison in 2032. Treason... specifically federal political election treason is a serious crime. True... his father is responsible for the mess with Russia but just wait... true to Trump's narcissistic form. Don Jr. and Jared Kushner will be assigned the job of sacrificial lambs.
2
Outrageous liar, outrageous denier, and outrageous complainer. Only a psychologically dependent, "MAGA hatter" can fail to see Trump as a volatile salesman. The other Republican voters, mainly along for the Trump ride for the sake of The Party, are now confronted with the 2018 House loss and a Senate squeaker.
Given Trump's 2-year decline in approval rating, I hypothesize that the 2018 women-voting-Republican have a lower percentile of MAGA hatters - than in 2016.
If so, Trump's pre-election shows of outrageous rhetoric - achieved its evermore-disturbing audience responses, despite a SMALLER POOL of female "devotees".
Trump is an act, a sad, old and tiresome act - with his dumb chants - ever-dependent upon his pool of devotees to recreate his illusions of overwhelming popularity.
2018 results are in; 2020 Senate races are 2 Republican incumbents for every Democrat; and 2020 Cirque de Trump is sure to be a re-run. Donald J. Trump is certified LIABILITY.
5
How can Trump be loosing his grip he got two bad GOP governors now in Florida and Georgia. I am amazed at the number of votes that the culture of corruption got in those states. Their supporters must be simply dumb to want more failed economic policies and be one of these days permanently under water with there support of coal and fossil fuels. You will reap what you sow.
7
In 2020 the Democrats will have to show what they have done.
They will have nothing to show.
What people will see:
1. Unseemly fight over leadership with an old woman slapping away young sharks.
2. No legislation that Trump did not approve and got credit for.
3. House attempts at subpoenas that will not be ruled on by the courts for years.
4. Trump daring the Democrats to shut down the government and the Democrats bowing to his demands so as not to have the vast government work force on its back.
5. A big ceremony with lots of Hispanic children and families at the White House to celebrate changes in immigration laws.
1
@True Observer
you will still be wearing your rose-colored glasses when they put you in the ground. You see the surface, you don't see the tide of history.
Trump is not a "man child" folks. He is an old man who a
is exceptionally greedy an dishonest.
That is no a spoiled child...he is grown and capable of fooling a lot of folks into thinking he is wealthy.
He is not. He is flat out broke.
12
While everything you say is basically true there are also two other factors that are true. You cannot predict history and the lure of a demagogue is strong.
The distaste for Trump was half the reason for the democrats strength. The other half was they addressed issues especially in the midwest that Trump was either wrong on or he demagogued.
The ran on universal health care, common sense immigration laws, fair trade not free trade, no corporate welfare, infrastructure, job training, reigning in Wall Street etc.
Unlike Hillary (except in extreme liberal districts), they did not run a female identity obsessed, never met a Wall Street banker, war, trade agreement I did not like.
Women hate identity obsessed candidates as much as men. They voted against the republicans because Trump is a women hater and bad for the country not because he is not identity obsessed.
If they follow this advice, the democrats have a great chance of winning all three branches in 2020. If not, they will very likely give Trump another term.
5
Political identity, like religion, is learned early through the family and in the community. While the republican leadership and control over redistricting and voter registration roles play a part, it is the early identifications that are enduring. There are devout Catholics despite the evidence of a corrupt leadership that facilitated child molestation. Many republicans relate to Trump the same way as some Catholics might relate to a pope. Not the one they like, but it is the one they have. The core republican values of self-reliance, free markets and small government remains appealing to those who grew up with those values as defined in contrast to democratic values and goals cast as socialist, liberal and big government controlling outcomes. Many of the red states are sparsely populated and community resources are few. Self-reliance is a cultural value and often necessary to survive. The ugly truth is that the values of each party does not actively influence people when they are in office to do what is right for the country. They cow tow to the political and financial interests that got them in office. The American people, while not very patient, can be pragmatic. The gerrymandering and voter suppression is offensive to most people outside of the party leaderships. There have been states that have voted to take the redistricting out of the control of the party leadership. Things are changing slowly, hopefully there is time.
9
It's no wonder we saw so many "WOMEN FOR TRUMP" signs at the POTUS rallies. And as photos of those events show, these woman reveal an uncanny resemblance to one another, as if drawn from central casting.
Many of the women voting for POTUS admit to fantasizing about being groped by him. Not all of the women, but many of women. Many of the women. Not all of the women. How many I don't know, but a lot of them. This I can tell you. Believe me. A lot of women. Believe me. A lot of them.
2
The midterms were a disaster for the Republicans and they know it. Let’s not overlook the fact that O’Rourke, Gillum, Abrams and others all lost not to ideas or policies, but to the margin of voter suppression. The Republicans know it and will redouble efforts to lock in 2020, pundits need to pay attention, not be fooled.
17
We have heard these forecasts before: The new gender-rainbow coalition will sweep aside the demographic which is the Republican party. Not to worry, Rightists, out of the 100 ambitious Democratic candidates for the Presidency will be a ticket of perfect diversity {for the 14th district of New York}. The bulk of the states with their Senate seats, electoral votes and Judicial appointments will defy such rosy-eyed optimism.
3
@Lar
We have heard that the world will end forever, and here we are. There are still flat earthers, but here we are. Here's a fact. There are more folks against Trump than for. In the long run that is what counts. The Dems have to face the fact that they have to include the 30% who do feel left out, even if they are mostly white racists.
2
It was a welcoming trend, but it still is a bleeding wound on this country that we're continuing to talk about "Trump's hold." All the wealthy bankers and businessmen who voted for him on the assumption that he was one of them and would put gold in their pockets. And maybe they were right. Most everyone else who saw a vision in his ridiculous "Make America Great Again" were either ingenuously assuming that big, Mussolini-like gestures and fighting pronouncements were the sign of true power. Or they were seeing that he would pull the rocks away and let them emerge from their cesspools of hate and bigotry and back into the sunlight. They, at least, were right. Promise fulfilled in that corner. And they'll continue to support Trump-like candidates into the 22nd century, while we talk endlessly about college-educated women and suburban voters. It's too late to slide those rocks back again, I'm afraid.
3
The title of this article is hilarious.....surely it is clear that Trump never "had a grip" on any of the real issues. FYI, those of us outside USA borders look on with incredulous laughter. While the USA news has become the object of scorn and laughter, the people of the USA are in my experience largely as kind and good as anywhere else in the democratic world, just woefully unaware. I urge the citizens of that country to look outside their insulated borders for a take on how the world views this ongoing soap opera.....start with the BBC or Guardian or CBC or a translation of Le Monde or Suddeutsche Zeitung
9
@fwww
It is easy for someone from a country 1/10th the size to see our problems. Try actually living in our country and coping with them. We are in a 2 or maybe a 4 year time period that is awful. It is a result of too many years of a big chunk of citizens being ignored. But we are not as stupid as you think. We know what Europeans think of the current situation, but they also know it is temporary.
Trump's appeal to his wish fulfillment supporters finally has crashed and now is a source of embarrassment to the whole GOP establishment. Women have divorced themselves from his persecution of them and the cruelty in handling immigrants seeking asylum. Previously ignorant, uneducated rural folk can clearly see his incompetence and greed. His own cabinet comes and goes in clouds of suspicion. His bellicose position on race, on his democratic foes, foreign leaders and international affairs have severed American influence and friendship around the globe. How anyone can support him continuing as before is incredible. Liars and cheaters will soon find their come-uppance. 2018 was just a start.
4
The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated........ Twain. Trump is not beginning to lose his grip and he is not isolated or depressed. Trump is as euphoric and confident as he has been since his inauguration. When the press points to the loss of grip of Republicans on the house he quickly points to the gains in the senate. The senate is more representative of the electoral college and the senate victory secures his reelection like it or not. If the state of the union is the way it is and the USA winds up the wars in which it is heavily involved currently, I will say Trump will begin to regain his grip.
I disagree with Greenberg, a democratic pollster. Trump won in 2016 as the lesser of the 2 evils who was going to be the jobs and secure borders president. In 2020 he will win for being the known devil instead of an unknown one. I am not though quite sure as to why Trump favors Pelosi as speaker. He should be neutral and let the congressional democrats duke it out. It would be very democratic if the democratic party elects their own speaker and allow other senior congresspersons throw in their hat. My preference would have been congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard from Hawaii but Congresswoman from Ohio Marcia Fudge would be a good speaker and the 1st African American (AA) woman to be speaker. Without the AA support the dems would just not have been able to take over the house. The dems should not take the AA for granted in power sharing or come 2020 the AA vote will be peeled.
3
@Girish Kotwal
" I am not though quite sure as to why Trump favors Pelosi as speaker. "
Republicans have brainwashed their followers into hating Pelosi (even though I have not heard a single legitimate complaint against her ) so she makes a good scapegoat for Trump's failures.
It’s quite obvious why Trump “supports” Pelosi for speaker. His base despises her because she has been demonized for years by the right wing in much the same way as Hillary. Pelosi becomes an easy target and another chant at Trump’s rallies.
For me, the biggest change, post election, is that I no longer cringe when Trump lobs his attacks and insults at the press. Instead, I laugh out loud. His performance, the day after the election, was all jabbing fingers and huffing puffery. All along I’ve wondered whether he was capable of giving a substantial, reasoned answer to any question of policy. Now that I understand he cannot, all I can hear is the sound of a barking dog.
7
@Sandra Lee
When Trump complains about people being "rude and insulting" the day after the election, I thought he was talking to himself.
1
To the credit of those who voted Trump in 2016, he did promise the world re jobs, industries, and the "swamp". However, the facts of the matter are that he merely replaced the swamp with a cesspool; he generated a few jobs at the expense of others; and he "helped" manufacturers by raising their costs via tariffs on their raw products.
All this has occurred whilst he has simultaneously cheapened the office of the President, insulted long time and loyal allies, and attempted to divide the country, like no one before him, for his own benefit.
The so-called "base" aren't stupid, and they can all read, and they all understand sufficient US history to realise that they've been played.
Mr Trump's charade is becoming harder to conceal.
11
@A. F. G. Maclagan
An excellent summary of what is happening. We will get rid of this guy, but what will come next? He has exposed some deep problems,mainly caused by the growing income inequality. That has to be addressed, but I see no one in the opposition coming forward with some answers.
1
@A. F. G. Maclagan writes, "The so-called "base" aren't stupid, and they can all read, and they all understand sufficient US history to realise that they've been played."
Yet, Trump's job approval today is 43.2%, in the same 42%-46% zone where it's been most of his presidency.
(https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_trump_job_approval-6179.html)
And as Greenberg points out about the 2018 election, "Mr. Trump and his party maintained their principal base with white working class voters."
The base may not be "stupid" but they are certainly gullible. Judging from the dozens of standing room only crowds at Trump's 2018 rallies as well as the closeness of many races, almost half of the country still believes in Trump.
1
Republican gerrymandering and voter suppression, still failed to stop a Democratic triumph, just like the Republicans' dear leader Trump goes bankrupt even when he cheats.
Don the Con's casinos went belly up even though he did not pay workers, constructors, and architects. Trump "University" went belly up although it was a fraudulent operation.
The Russian oligarchs saved Trump (at least until Mueller nails the traitor for collusion) but Russians fell short to deliver a Republican Congress to Putin's marionette.
11
Beginning to lose his grip??? trump lost it years ago. The sad thing is that so many Americans fell for his con game.
8
@EthicalNotes I agree with you but I would credit Vladimir Putin as the primary creator of this "con game". Trump is just his stooge working the political rallies.
1
I don't think the NYT will ever get it. Most people think that demonizing immigrants, or any group of people, is wrong. But you folks don't make the distinction between legal and illegal immigration. You would be hard pressed to find most people in favor of illegal immigration or open borders, no matter who is pushing this. Illegal immigration leads to people being exploited, wages staying depressed and the creation of enclaves where immigrants try to re-create the cities they left. Legal immigration leads to diversity, robust workforce and economy, and newcomers who embrace their new homeland -- and people who welcome them.
3
@GMT
" Illegal immigration leads to people being exploited, wages staying depressed and the creation of enclaves ."
However, Trump does exactly the same thing. Trump is more of a threat to the US then all the illegal immigrants put together.
1
First, do no harm? He hurt us for his own ego.
3
Even with hostile foreign governments trying to fool angry, guilible Americans, and Fox News creating a slick but false narrative, the only sure way forward for the GOP is preventing women from voting.
Instead of worrying about felons, immigrants, gang members, find a way to stop women from voting. Lock 'em up if you have to. At least until Republicans have a candidate who doesn't offend women.
1
He's losing his grip in more than one sense. He's looking seriously ill, haggard and wan, and is increasingly paranoid and incoherent. Great. Now we have to contemplate the zombie theocrat Mike Pence, an artifice if there ever was one. This should be fun...
5
The Dems got a massive victory in California without gerrymandering.
4
The nation’s floccinaucinihilipilification of both celebrity and high office are the consequence of the inculcation of office with pathological celebrity "stable genius" and attendant "creative genius" gadflies and their inevitable proclivity towards a proliferation of transnihilations.
1
The authors says white working class men are not fools. As proof he says:
"So it is no surprise that more than half of white working class men now believe that Mr. Trump is “self-dealing” and corrupt."
How could any more than 5% not see through Trump's self-dealing con.
Half still seems like a lot of fools.
And if Hillary had won and not showed her tax returns, they would all be saying lock her up.
7
As the great President Lincoln said, “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all the people all the time.” We see you Mr Trump, and we don’t like it.
6
The veteran Lucian Truscott a West Point alumnus has written recently that Trump's a neo-Jefferson Davis the president of a new Republican Confederacy only, and this is a cogent view. Trump's unleashed the suppressed racist in millions of white Americans. A racism never dealt with properly as the Spanish American war, WWI and II, Korea, Vietnam and Jim Crow got in the way.
Furthermore Trump's call for press decorum is the height of hypocrisy, he's the bull in the American China shop of etiquette. His call for press decorum is really a call for servility of the press so he can oppress his opponents. Trump's constituency is based on skin color supported by armed intimidation.
6
@EC Speke
" A racism never dealt with properly as the Spanish American war, WWI and II, Korea, Vietnam and Jim Crow got in the way."
Actually the reason that it was never dealt with properly was that Reconstruction ended too soon. According to a history book I read, a forgotten President named Rutherford Hays ordered it stopped while the traitors in the South were still in a position to seize power.
I also think the disgrace of Kavanaugh’s and Graham’s angry-white-man tirades and Dr. Ford’s measured testimony at Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings might have had something to do with it as well.
6
(...he never had it)
Mr Pence has rattled Washington by agreeing to a new joint Navy Base in the Western Pacific sans the US President.
Mr Pence bothered to turn up and assessed the situation with untethered language concerning China.
The APEC meet was not a love fest.
Papua New Guinea police attended an " intrusion" at the office of the Foreign Minister by Chinese diplomats concerning the final draft of the to be agreed statement.
The "Chinese diplomats" compliant with PNG Police left.
Mr Xi excluded journalists apart from the Chinese media from questions.
Reuters reports there is no agreement from APEC.
The me too movement is based on standing up to bullies.
Mr Xi may have crossed a line of hubris.
The south west pacific is not supplicant to China.
Chinese diplomacy is indelicate an quite vulgar manifested at APEC.
The concentration camps in China 's west are simply criminal.
Mr Pence is a messenger of the obvious.
Mr Xi may retire to North Korea;
His impact on the world is nought.
Mr Xi has really miscalculated as perpetual leader.
2
So which is worse, Trump?, Or a nation of fickle voters who had left their brains at home on their way to the ballot box? Shall we now be grateful to them for the destruction that their 2016 votes have wrought on our nation and the world during the past two years?
1
Why those two blocs were ever with the GOP is beyond me.
1
In my view, it was bad enough that anyone voted for Trump when he was running for president, but the fact that even one American voted for Trump and the Republican Party since he has been president is a terrible stain on the soul of our nation.
What this election revealed to me is that ignorance, hate, hypocrisy, and lies runs far deeper then I ever imaged. It will be years, if not decades, or not ever for the nation to recover from the damage Trump has done. The only silver lining in it all - if that is possible - is that Trump has helped reveal the true nature of today's republican party. He did not create this situation; he exploited what has always been there.
9
BEGINNING to lose his grip? Not if we’re talking about “reality.”
1
Its the Trump Show: all trump all the time. And, in the end, all shows get canceled because they become tired, stale, and boring.
7
Time to bring back the " grabber in the pelvic floor" tapes as this is the real reason women need to despise Trump. The world needs serious fixing regarding women in the workplace and job equalities in salary and promotion. Everyone understands that families require two salaries and indeed, women are working outside the home universally. As long as the President considers women a mere potato sack wearing bras and sporting pelvic floor wonderment, the inequality will remain.
3
@terry brady
"Time to bring back the " grabber in the pelvic floor" tapes"
It would be a good idea in general to replay Trump's most idiotic speeches.
His promise that a border wall wouldn't cost a thing because Mexico would pay for it.
The "religious" speech where he mis-pronounced the name of a BIble book and called a communion wafer a "cracker".
Reruns of his reality show in which he presented himself as a genius at hiring good people. Pair it with his tirades against Sessions.
All the cases where he denounced opponents as "treasonous". Pair it with displays of the Constitutional article defining treason.
The promise to rebuild American infrastucture.
Democrats need to unite with an inspirational message and stop this stupidity of progressive against moderate. Also a talent search for a charismatic presidential candidate, and NOT one burdened by identity politics. This is painful for me as a progressive to say. We should use the vote in Florida and Georgia as examples. The candidates for Governor brought out the Trumpet and racist votes, and the country lost the possibility of a true blue tsunami. Truly we must all hang together or we will all hang separately.
4
Trump can fool some of the people all of the time, but their votes won't be enough for him to win re-election in 2020.
2
During the run up to the election, Trump promised a massive middle class tax cut, ranted endlessly about the "caravan" and claimed that of course, pre-existing conditions would be covered. The second it was over, it was as if someone had flipped a switch, no mention of any of these chimeras from Trump, the GOP or even his toadies at Fox. Don't those voters who still went Republican realized how shamelessly they've been played? Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me 125 times and hmmmm, I'm beginning to suspect something's not right.
6
He cannot win over anyone now. Only further erosion of his base is possible.
By Election Eve 2020, Trump is going to be ranting and raving on a level unseen in our country.
That’s because he will know that he is about to be rejected and branded a massive loser. And that will haunt him forever.
Hallelujah.
3
One would have thought that the double whammy of tariffs and fewer immigrant workers would have switched more of the agricultural vote from Trump and the GOP. How much more will it take before they give up in disgust?
2
A trump promise is as good as a three dollar bill.
2
"Trump Is Beginning to Lose His Grip"
covers a wide swath of issues in the US and around the world.
1
I don't know about his grip on some of his followers, although I sense that's true. I think his actions over the Veteran's Day weekend also helped shine a light on Trump's true priorities which have nothing to do with caring about the military, Past or Present. But I think the election giving the house control to Democrats has him very worried. They will start digging where they were stopped before by the Republicans. This man & his administration are just enriching themselves through corrupt and unethical means, and it's blatantly obvious. And His past is just loaded with illegal & treasonous financial behavior. Watching the now infamous news conference after the election, Trump really started looking unhinged. And I don't mean the Acosta thing. Just his general behavior and actions. I have read that he is now also very depressed & withdrawn the last few days. This will only get worse as the Dem House settles in and Mueller gets ever closer. It's possible he could have a nervous breakdown, which I honestly would enjoy, I have to say. But it's also possible that he could do some crazy stunt like start a war with someone. Yea he's loosing his grip alright .. on reality. Although it was hardly there before.
9
"Trump Is Beginning to Lose His Grip"
Maybe so, but riddle me this.
When you have a badger cornered, who has the bigger problem you or the badger?
We're nowhere near the bottom of folly as to DJT.
2
I beg to differ. When, EXACTLY, did HE have a grip ???
Seriously.
1
Wishful thinking Mr. Democratic Pollster. Most Presidents lose some seats in the midterms.
This is promising, but until the Senate flips, we're still in world of hurt.
2
Everyone has a right to dream. Keep dreaming.
1
Although the results of the November 6 election showed us that the American people still have the ability to know right from wrong , what many of our citizens still don’t understand is how deeply Donald Trump is been compromised by Vladimir Putin. This is a more than egregious situation, it is beyond code red and it has already done extraordinary damage to the stability of our country.This is far more important than how obnoxious and toxic Donald Trump’s behavior is on a daily basis .
When Robert Mueller‘s findings are finally reveled we will know the full extent to which this president has been played ( and payed ) by this hostile foreign power , and we will at long last learn how truly corrupt this man is . And no amount of doublespeak by the current occupant of the oval office will be able to deter the American people from the truth.
America is hungry for the truth . It’s time for the American people to know the truth after a steady diet of lies lasting almost 2 years .
3
Yes, a lot of anti-Trump sentiment likely will have influenced voters; some of it was normal mid-term disappointment. But there was no individual Democrat to vote against- a “socialist,” a woman, a tax increaser. a supporter of abortion rights. That will be different in 2020. Democrats better choose their message and their candidate carefully because some of the mid-term gains may evaporate quickly if they don’t.
7
Trump's tariffs and the reaction by China's new policy of buying their soybeans elsewhere has really hurt soybean prices. The midwestern farmers know this I'm sure but are reluctant to switch their political allegiance. Too bad.
5
It appears from Mr. Greenberg's analysis that suddenly things are looking up for the Dems. They won the popular vote by 2% in 2016 and increased that to 7% in 2018 and it looks like that should only increase with 2 more years of the incompetent Trump in the spotlight. However, please beware - the only hope for Republicans in 2020 is to split the anti-Trump anti-Republican majority. Instead of changing their message or policy positions, they'll read the statistics in this article and conclude they must get these new Democratic voters to either stay home or vote third party in 2020.
They will spend inordinate amounts of time and money creating an "independent" candidacy to the left of the Democratic candidate whoever he or she will be. They will use social media to sow discord on the far left, claiming the Democratic candidate is corporate and a political insider, and they'll smear with swiftboats, emails, race-baiting or whatever conspiracy theory might help them. They'll resurrect the Bernie-Hillary feud and will create false narratives that the DNC once again undermined the far-left, regardless of the truth.
Prepare for divide and conquer. It's the only way a party representing the 1% & NRA, and offering an obviously unqualified presidential candidate can possibly win. Don't allow them to do it again - support the D no matter what. If the anti-Trump, anti-Republican vote sticks together, it will be a landslide in 2020.
13
May I correct one inaccuracy? Here in Ohio, Sherrod Brown (D) won by only 6 points. Not double digits. Ohio is now pure red, except for a few counties. Republicans control the Statehouse and the Congressional seats. Ohio and Indiana ( where the Dems lost a senate incumbent) are now a block of voters, growing old and meaner and hence more Republican. Here in Democratic Cuyahoga County where I reside, we send the most money to the Capital and yet our voices are dwindling. Until we can reverse this trend with exciting young candidates for office, we will suffer the consequences that apathy always brings.
11
These results ARE encouraging. However, until several other issues are addressed, the GOP, even as currently configured, may rise from the ashes. They include campaign finance reform, district gerrymandering, and term limits. The later, while important, is the least critical in the near term.
Continued funding by super donors and PACs, provide resources to even weak and extremist candidates. Beto O'Rourke showed that it's possible to raise campaign funds without resorting to groups who expect fealty for their money. It seems unlikely, if not improbable, that Citizens United will be overturned anytime soon. But more candidates should refuse to take big money and should be accountable only to their constituents, as the Constitution envisioned.
It's a travesty that Republicans won far less of the popular vote in many states yet retained representative majorities at both the Federal and State levels. While the Supreme Court has already declined to take responsibility to strike down gerrymandered districts, state courts have shown a willingness to take on this task. North Carolina and Pennsylvania are two notable examples where the state Supreme Courts have upheld speaks for rational redistricting.
Finally, term limits are needed to return to the original intent of political representation as a civic obligation, not a tenured profession. Per the financing issue, donor money goes to perpetuate people like Steven King of Iowa. We need to develop the next generation. Now!
12
It was interesting to see among other « reader comments » that some folks are saying the United States is « the richest nation in the world ».
Where does this idea come from ? Yes, in 1965, the United States was « the richest nation in the world », but now ?
The Chinese have 2.5 or 3 trillion Dollars worth of U.S. Treasury bonds in their central bank, maybe more, does the Federal Reserve Bank of the U.S. have the same ?
With a Federal Deficit of 17 trillion or so, what does this suggest ?
If the U.S. is so rich, why don’t they use some of that money to balance their budget this year ? Instead of borrowing another trillion.
Is life better in the U.S. than it is in Germany or the Scandinavian countries ? Per capita income ?
How about health care ?
Maybe I am wrong, and the U.S. is “the richest nation in world”, but I would guess not. And if it is, I would guess it is not by much. Not by any wide margin.
And with Trump, the vast majority of citizens are only getting poorer, I would say.
17
@David Martin
Maybe instead of guessing, you could use that Goggle thingy to look up actual facts.
Per Credit Suisse, total wealth by country, 2018: #1 US @ $98 trillion, # 2 China @ 51.8. Almost 100% more isn't a wide margin?
Your argument would carry more weight if you simply made the case that the US doesn't ACT consistently with being wealthy. But when you dismiss a fact, simply because it doesn't match your "guess", it diminishes an otherwise solid argument.
To suggest that the midterms were anything but a referendum on Trump is misleading. Because that’s what they were, in campaignjng for the midterms the Dems could focus on putting up candidates with local appeal (whatever that looked like). 2020 will be different. Next time the Dems will need to put up somebody with appeal nationwide—that is, with enough zing for a big majority of DEMS to get behind with gusto, for a big majority of independents to get behind with gusto, AND for a good number of Reps to get behind with gusto. In short, the Dems will need to put up somebody who can out-attention-get Trump, our muscle him, AND outshine him—no dog whistles, cheap shots or show-boating. It will be very, very hard.
6
@David
Yes, but a BIG part of that is getting the press to pay attention to the Dem and quit being utterly focussed on Trump's antics. Hilary's platform never got anything approaching the press attention paid to Trump's outrage machine. He'll use the same tactics again. The media has gotten wise to his shtick, but still feel obligated to cover whatever he says, 24/7.
@Datvid. Yes. We should be talking about the Dems, their platforms, their outreach to red America, their immigration policy, their leadership. We spent to much time moaning about Trump. We control our own destiny...
So this is why the Republicans now have 53 Senate seats and their losses in the House were actually below most of the Democrats at their midterm. Obama (-63), Truman (-55), Clinton (-54). Losing his grip--keep tell yourself that if it makes you feel good.
5
Trumpism was roundly defeated. Margin of defeat was lessened by voter suppression and gerrymandering, nothing else. Ask the Democratic majorities in North Carolina, Ohio, Wisconsin and other formerly governed by Republican states who got far more votes than Trumpian Republicans, but won fewer House seats. Free and fair elections would render the Republican Party an irrelevance.
9
@Jonathan The only way to gauge these elections while removing the effect of gerrymandering is to look at popular vote totals. Dems won national margin by about 7.5, a greater margin than that by which the R’s won in 2010 (6.8).
This was a wave election.
5
@Jonathan. The electoral math was against the Dems in the 2018 Senate races. Of 35 seats up for election, 24 were held by Democrats, 9 by Republicans, and 2 by Independents. Many of the Democratically-held seats were in very red states like North Dakota and West Virginia. In sum, there were a lot more vulnerable Democratic seats that Republicans could target.
But things are going to be different in the next two Senate contests. In 2020, 32 seats will be up and 20 of those seats are currently held by Republicans, only 12 by Democrats. In 2022, 22 Republican seats and only 12 Democratic seats are up for election. In 2020 and 2022, solidly Democratic states like Wisconsin will be voting whether to retain their Republican senators.
Democrats expected to lose seats in the Senate this year. Republicans will be vulnerable in 2020 and 2022. Four years from now, the Senate will likely have a Democratic majority again.
2
With Brexit likely headed for a second referendum, Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson discredited, and more and more evidence pointing toward a collusion between Putin, Bannon, and the Mercer's to get Trump elected - it only seems fair to give Americans another vote to decide who the president really is.
2
One would think the mid-term election is a good start, and it is, but you won't fix the electoral disease without addressing its root cause.
When our Supreme Law Givers gave nod and decreed that corporations are people that decision opened the floodgates for the monied elite and privileged to use their financial power as they thought best. And when they think "best" they think uniformly from self-interest, not national.
The money poured into the system like a tsunami and we now have a process whereby the few, from behind financial curtains which keep them opaque and hidden from the public eye, command the levers of power and rule the many. This is unfair and, even more to the point, gives further advantage to those few who need none.
Campaign finance reform needs to be addressed else all that is done to address the disease that has infested America's political process is merely cosmetic.
John~
American Net'Zen
12
@John - Even worse is that the Roberts Court gutted the Voting Rights Act. Massive voter suppression efforts in Georgia and Florida were what put the GOP politicians in office. These were not fair elections. Kemp purged almost 1.5 million Georgians (me included), and a current lawsuit has identified 340,000 who were incorrectly purged. Numerous other actions to suppress the vote in the old days (pre Roberts Court) would have been straight racist strategies absolutely unacceptable. Not accepting the very large Democratic Broward County's recount because it was TWO MINUTES LATE due to unpreventable power outages was an outrage in itself.
Voter suppression and electoral systems vulnerable to political malevolence and hacking are cancers on America's body politic.
6
Despite the giddy review here, Republicans' share of the vote among all women and all men dropped only 1%, respectively. The answer isn't really provided, unless we're to divine that non-Republicans decided, with so much at stake today, to stop throwing their votes away on third party candidates. And did non-white voters turn more to Republicans? Which is not what I'd expect, at all. Something's wrong with this picture and I don't know what.
2
The article repositions the post-Nov 6th news coverage, that initially claimed democrats had won only slightly. Now after the fog has cleared more than a week later, we see they actually won "BIGLY", at least in the House and Governors races.
The question is, what caused this and what will ensure democrats win in 2020 - across the land?
Mr. Greenberg's assessment is that voters caused this, especially those in the reddest of states and those with the bluest-collared of jobs.
I would disagree. trump lost so much because he disenfranchised the undecided "unaffiliated" voters. His message stayed on-course during the last few weeks, but that message was negative, scare-based, and anti-American. Unaffiliated voters swung because trump made it easy for them to. trump alienated and ostracized large swaths of the country.
I would say that trump and his posse now understand this, and are already changing their message. They are lying even more. They are twisting facts even more. They are confusing voters even more.
So 2020 will not be 20/20. trump's doppelgangers will experiment over the next two years, and will figure out ways to confuse and scare more in the red states. They know they cannot help their base. But they can certainly scare them into voting against their own interests.
trump will confuse "his" electorate. He will play dirty even more. We should not assume he is weakened.
Just as a rat cornered into a no-win situation becomes vicious, so has this trump.
2
If the democrats govern well in blue states like california,including in the rural areas, and leave the republican ruled red states further behind in standard of living, there is no reason to not believe that the party will do well in 2020 and the future. Democrats are the multicultural party. But women's representation is still far below 50 percent. Only 25 percent in congress are below 40. Minorities are also still underrepresented. Still, the party is moving in the right direction, and better representation will keep the party's base-women, young folks and minorities interested. Trump is the absolute worst for the country. He appealed to white people's worst instincts-hate,fear and prejudice towards brown and black people, and was taken to the cleaners, especially in california.
4
@observer Do women and minorities havesome sort or fock on logic? I keep dreaming you will wake up in a meritocracy. I guess not if gerrymandering equal gender and equal minority speak is the goal of a democracy. Look at the mess Canada is in with a cabinet chosen on gender alone.
@Francis Manns
The us is ruled by white old men, and an absolutely racist, corrupt, illogical, irrational, horrible and crazy individual who is in the oval office only because he is white. Look where that got us. Women and minority candidates that are better are being denied.
All politics is essentially emotional: Every single human being wants safety. Fear motivates: it's hard-wired. In our complicated modern world safety is multifactorial. If you are rich, you are safe. If you are "saved" you are safe. If you stay physically close to family you are safe. Republicans have exploited the "fear factor" very competently. But Democrats need to emphasize the reality that safety depends on a big safety net, needs to encompass all of America. Reagan sold safety as "morning in America". Trump sold safety to voters whose idea of safety was rooted in the past. Is our future challenging? You bet!! Democrats need to realize that safety means connection: Humans survived only in groups. Connect, connect, connect.
Get out in every county in every state and connect.
I don’t understand why it’s so hard for people to distinguish between LEGAL and ILLEGAL immigration. I believe the country benefits from immigration. I do NOT believe the country benefits from mass illegal immigration and open borders.
5
Implies Trump had a grip to begin with; he didn't. Lost the popular vote, won the Presidency on a technicality. He has a grip on his deluded base, his remote and the wheel of his golf cart. That's about it. He'll be gone in 2 years and counting.
2
While the gist of this article is accurate, along with some of its polling facts, too much information is skewed. Many people knew there was a blue wave on election night, with seven governorships flipping from Republican to Democratic and at least 26 House seats flipping as well -- on election night. And Donald Trump's approval rating was never 45%.
1
Regardless of the shifts of 2018 and whatever the result in 2020, trump has succeeded at "freeing" white supremacists and fomenting hate groups from the "burden of politically correct" behaviors tamped down for almost 40 years.
trump made it okay to stop worrying about avoiding offending someone, or disadvantaging minorities in favor of whites. Hate crimes are up over the past two years.
The question is: Does the shift that supported Democrats taking the House signal a social consciousness towards returning to civility and compassion, regardless of party?
1
Give the people real democracy, give them control, and they will love you forever. Don't try to foist your wiser ways on them. If you have wiser ways, give them the say and try to persuade them. They will be listening to you, dancing with the one who brung them.
So are we finally in Act V of our own special version of Shakespeare's Richard III?
1
I was a Bernie guy who never had a problem with Hillary, but this article makes it crystal clear just how many people did.
Democrats are starting to win because they are listening. I love that.
Now.... what to do about the Senate?
The President of Ohio
What a strange path Donald Trump has taken, what a deviation from past habits. Trump lived his whole life in NYC rubbing shoulders with the best and brightest, and he loved it. He loved being around showbiz people. Now he finds himself shunned by the very people he loved and hated in his own city, the city where he built his majestic Tower. There is no place in NYC that Trump can walk without a phalanx of security that resembles an army. He finds himself the President, yes, but the President of Ohio, and Indiana, the President of Alaska those are the places where he is popular. He finds himself the President of half States, half of Texas, half of Florida, the half’s, truth be told that before he decided to run for President he had not only never visited these places or people but never wanted to. Donald Trump at 71 years of age is by far the most hated man in America, and if you do the math he may be the most hated American ever. All his support is among one segment of the population, uneducated whites, the ones who never went to college, and among them a sort of Trump fatigue is beginning.
His one major accomplishments is Tax reform. About that tax reform, most working Americans ( better known as the working poor) received 40-20 dollars a week extra in their checks because of it, I hear tell come tax time they are in for a very nasty surprise. If that’s true, then Trump will no longer be President come 2021. He can then retire to..Ohio or Alaska.
1
Not really surprising - the sum total of Trump's "accomplishments" it to cut taxes for rich people. Other than that:
* Infrastructure rebuilding - nothing
* Help for opiate epidemic - not a thing
* Economic development for rural areas - nada
* Trade deficit - zilch
* Improved wages for blue collar workers - bumpkus.
Other than periodic ranting/tweeting, this has been a do-nothing presidency.
3
Abe Lincoln said it clearly in his 1858 debate with S. Douglas, ". . . . You cannot fool all the people all of the time." The ability to fool others---at which Trump is exceedingly good --- wears off in time. Obviously it did not last from 2016 until 2018. Lie after lie, undelivered goods promised and forgotten, make their mark. Promises to make life better in areas of health care, wage growth, small business prosperity, social net for seniors--all knocked down and broken because big business interests need their huge profits and the billionaires need their extra condo and yacht. Let us see when drug prices will come down and by how much; don't hold your breath. By 2020 only the real gullible will still vote for him or for the Republicans.
2
Don’t get carried away with the rather meager number of seats taken back by democrats. They took back fewer than Republicans took back in midterm elections under either Clinton or Obama. Stop engaging in wishful thinking.
2
"white women without a four-year degree (pollster shorthand for the white working class)"
It seems more like "working class" is pollster shorthand for "no 4 year degree".
I think you would find a lot of people w/ 4 yr degrees who find themselves to be workingclass (if that is the group where a break in the paycheck cycle leads to hardship)
@APS
Most people work for a living. "Working class" is an obsolete term dating back to earlier centuries in which rich people took pride in not working, or in following a "profession".
Is it any surprise that Republicans, whose policies are all about neglecting the future to maintain power in the present (ignoring global warming, piling on debt, weakening our institutions and alliances, pitting Americans against each other, polluting and privatizing), would tie themselves to an electoral strategy with only short-term dividends and without a discernable future?
Good riddance, I say.
Certainly, America gains from immigration. But which immigration? The immigration of entrepreneurs from south Asia, the middle east, east Asia, and eastern Europe? How about the immigrants who have turned California inner cities into gang battlegrounds? Not all immigrants are the same. And it's a shame that politicians from the Golden State have decided to protect the ones we really don't need.
Maybe they should take a tour of the mass graves south of our border.
1
Plenty of people voted for Nixon in '72, but when the buyer's remorse set in after Watergate, Dad quoted Lincoln: "You can fool all of the people some of the time."
1
The upcoming Mueller report and possible indictments should seal the deal. Trump will go even further off the rails. I think the Rs don’t get it yet and won’t get it until after 2020.
1
Interesting statistics. I often wonder, though, what Republican voters are thinking.
President Trump represents the low point of venomous rage of the far right slowly increasing for the past several decades. I perceive this rage as anchored in anti-democratic hate, as issues championed by the right seem to encompass the ends justify the means mentality rejecting democratic principles, the rule of law, democratic fair process, and American and human values.
Having lived a long time, I can summarize my direct experiences with conclusions regarding politics, but for those who will not or cannot, due to being much younger, one can just ask the following: What kind of people actually think “things” created by people are people, like corporations, or that “things”, like money, qualify for free speech? What kind of people think some Articles of and Amendments to the Constitution as originally written in the 18th century are even closely relevant to the inevitable changes in any society more than two centuries later? What kind of people celebrate the repeal of healthcare on the White House lawn, signaling certain, needless deaths for some and years of suffering for others? What kind of people applaud the inhuman treatment of refugees fleeing horrors most Americans cannot even imagine? What kind of people support a known, documented con artist and fraud as President ? What kind of people support a declared Nationalist, when Nationalism is inherently anti-democratic?
3
RIP GOP indeed. Mission accomplished for the so-called president.
1
"Trump is beginning to lose his grip." Nice double entendre. Encouraging results in the mid-term elections but America will not be liberated from suffocating polarization until it is liberated from Donald Trump and those of his ilk.
2
The nation does need a re-education. Thinking voters did not vote for Trump, there was ample evidence about the kind of man Donald Trump is.
Sure, the MSM did a lousy job, they kept up the demonization of Hillary and were without critic of Trump, his character and his crimes. But everyone with a brain could see anyway what character Trump is. No excuse," I did not know". Trump did not win the popular vote either, he lost the election and won because the system is rigged in favor of wealth and more profit. The electoral process is in need of real Reformation if it is not too late already.
1
Prediction: Fear not real patriots, Trump has no intention of running in 2020--never did. Granted, he will talk about it as a vehicle to legitimize spending campaign money on the rallies that fuel his ego. No, in the end he'll announce that he is turning over the reins to Pastor Pence after "the greatest four years in American history." Then it will be back to New York and Trump Tower's gilded halls, a book deal ("The Art of the Very, Very Bigly Scam") and a new TV show: "Naked and Afraid 2: My Not So Golden Years". We can only hope.
The takeaway on this opinion piece is that Greenberg is convinced the data supports the view that Trump is headed out the door. I have to agree -- but getting my view mainly from how Trump has responded to the GOP losses. He put all his 'stuff' into re-living the 2016 campaign -- and for the most part, voters turned the dial back in clear, visual fashion. Trump knows he cannot ever get back the delirious support of his minions. They are moving on; and he is tired. From now on, it's like quicksand for the Orange Kid.
There is no more room for 'tax cuts' for corporations and upper income people. There are no more people to get away with denigrating. His tax papers will quite likely be publicized. Trump's dictator type friends are less interesting every day. Trump's lies are less exciting news every day.
It's a slow process, as it should be. But no worry; it will accelerate.
1
I am not a political expert. I do not believe I know what the pundits know.
I have always seen Trump as a slimy snake oil-type, long before he ran for anything. After I found out that he was assisted by his father who was assisted by Roy Cohn, I knew I was right.
Trump is a symbol of the "ugly American" and represents everything about the USA that is dark and unpleasant. He is the object of our projections, plus and minus, in that we either love him or hate him or find him mystifying. That's telling in itself.
I think Mr. Greenberg is too optimistic about what happened at the polls. If everyone saw Trump as I do, as a crook, he would never have been elected in the first place. I also see the GOP as a group of people who have at their core only selfish motives. More money, more money and more money. We know, the ones with the most money win. Koch, Adelson, DeVos, Sinclair, Mercer, on and on.
The greatest disaster is FOX. Most of "the base" watches 24/7 and questions nothing. They go to their church and question nothing. They attend rallies where they are fed propaganda that they can't recognize as propaganda.
If Trump is exposed by Mueller (and that is a big if) he may still get away with whatever he did, and his sons as well. He likes being the Big (stinky) Cheese. So, be careful, Mr. Greenberg. Don't take anything too optimistically. Not yet.
1
Please dig a little deeper next time. State and local politics turned bluer as well. Seems a bit Washington-centric.
1
"beginning to lose his grip"??
After two years of pummeling away at Mr. Trump, non-stop, daily, in thousands, if not more, of editorials and op-eds (some op-ed columnists have written of nothing else for over two years), the best Mr. Greenberg, a Democratic pollster can come up with is that Mr. Trump is "beginning" to lose his grip?
The show has not yet even started Mr. Greenberg. Stay tuned.
And pollsters of any kind are a notoriously unreliable bunch.
1
You say that 54% of voters say 'immigrants strengthen out country". Actually, I would expect the percentage to be higher, since the vast majority, anyone who is not either native American or the descendent of a slave, is the descendent of immigrants.
Trump never had a grip - on reality. He’s a simpleton. His recent comments on the CA wildfires shows the depth of his ignorance by comparing Norway near the Arctic Circle to CA. The fierce fires are the result of drought and the Santa Ana winds that gust to 80 miles per hour and drop the humidity to close to zero. Yes - clear brush from residential areas, use a flame proof roof, and fire retardant materials - but stopping the winds? They are a force of nature. I hope the next election cycle will remove all Republicans from office in CA. Enough is enough.
2
@Barbarra
"I hope the next election cycle will remove all Republicans from office in CA. Enough is enough."
It's starting. Take a look at the Congressional delegation from Orange County, not a single Republican Representative, Democrats all. My, how things have changed. When I lived in Southern California and worked in Los Angeles, there were jokes about "Checkpoint Charlie" crossing into Orange County. It was that Republican.
1
This article gives us hope that all is not lost under Trump. Maybe there is still more better angels than people who want to take us to the darkside. Before we start celebrating we should look at the percentage of white women in Georgia who voted for Stacy Adams. Even with the star power of Oprah and Barack Adams lost almost 3 to 1 with white women. We are under a constant barrage about how to get white men back to The Left. The Left should start thinking about how to bring their wives also.
Donald Trump never really had a "grip" on reality. He's a mentally ill man suffering from the anti-personality disorder of extreme narcissism. He lives in his own highly defended world where he must be the center of attention who is constantly praised or else. And, America and everyone who is in Trump's orbit has had an overdose of "or else" from is Tweet attacks to those not bowing in loyalty, to his non-P.C. hate speech, to his constant degradation and humiliation of others who oppose him including those in his own administration, to his complete lack of empathy which is a hallmark of narcissism demonstrated over and over again from Hurricane Maria to the ongoing fires in California, and his constant lying to build his wounded ego up by blaming others for everything, and his outrageous claims of grandiosity and superiority. This is a autocratic man who is unsound of mind, temperament, and judgment who has already done immense damage to fundamental democratic institutions (like the freedom of the press and the rule of law) who if not soon controlled will do even more damage that may be beyond repair. The fecklessness of what used to be the Republican Party has loosed this monster upon us and the world. Let's just hope that his recent attempt to control the Department of Justice with his own "mini-me" fails before he completes his autocratic coup. The two months before there is a new Congress with Democrats in control of the House are when we are at most peril.
1
The question is not why rural voters are leaving the Republican Party.
The question is why did they ever go to the Republican Party.
With Reagan, the Republican Party has been nothing but trickle-down Reaganomics, tax cuts for the wealthy.
But the Republican Party came up with the Southern Strategy and gave us the artificial culture wars, abortion divide, same sex divide, and second amendment NRA divide.
I live among Trump supporters, NRA members, Confederate flags and evangelicals.
I have neighbors who still believe the Clinton's had Vince Foster murdered.
The NRA swore for eight years, Obama was coming to take their guns.
And all the evangelicals use birth control.
The billionaires are laughing all the way to the bank, literally.
1
A Rake's Progress is a series of eight paintings by 18th-century English artist William Hogarth.[1] The canvases were produced in 1732–34, then engraved in 1734 and published in print form in 1735.[2] The series shows the decline and fall of Tom Rakewell, the spendthrift son and heir of a rich merchant, who comes to London, wastes all his money on luxurious living, prostitution and gambling, and as a consequence is imprisoned in the Fleet Prison and ultimately Bethlem Hospital (Bedlam).[3] The original paintings are in the collection of Sir John Soane's Museum in London, where they are normally on display.
We're only getting started. Wait until the Mueller and upcoming House investigations reveal the truth about Trump and we head into a recession.
1
Americans fail to understand that it is ruled by two of the most undemocratic institutions of any advanced state, namely the US senate where 18 % of the population can command a majority of the seats and the slave era electoral college which denies one person one vote for the presidency. Then there is the complete absence of an independent national electoral commission to stop gerrymandering and voter suppression, which leaves the poor US as a fake democracy.
1
It is easy to blame Trump for the GOP election debacle but the truth is for GOP the chickens have come home to roost or their duplicity is finally being noticed. GOP candidates always pretend to be moderates during eclection but pivot to extreme ideology while governing - by helping corporations and enacting Christian Right focused laws. I think finally at least some who voted for GOP are waking up.
1
Things relating to Trump World are not yet settled in our great country at the moment, nor will they be for the next two years running up to the 2020 elections.
Soon the Mueller investigation should start revealing the depth and breadth of the Russian influence campaign and the Kompromat, indictments dropping like candy from a cheap pinata: The the obstruction of justice and the lying that followed election to cover up the truth, perhaps even Trump's tax returns showing years of business failures and shady practices. Imagine a whole shoe-store full of shoes dropping.
This may not sway any more of Trump's loyal minions, they can be incredibly and willfully ignorant, but will make the erosion that was just revealed, permanent. And then we have all those Trumpian Republican Senators coming up for reelection in 2020. Interesting times, my friends, interesting times.
2
As he said..."I'm not on the ballot but I am on the ballot". The blue wave was about him as well as his party .
2
The Democratic Party in 2018 performed better than expected. I have no doubt though that the upcoming 2020 election will be ugly & violent. In fact it may be one of our most violent in modern history. I do not say this lightly. Trump's inflammatory rhetoric has given license to many angry desperate people to consider & undertake violent actions . Trump never will admit defeat or making a mistake. With each passing day it becomes even more evident that he views the presidency as if it was another Trump acquisition. I am of the opinion that Trump is in part steamed because he considers that the AG, FBI et al should work for him not the people. I shudder to think of what could happen in 2020 if he loses the election. I strongly doubt that he will accept that result. Hopefully the Democratic Party will commit to implementing new ideas as an alternative to Trump's policies. It is all fine & good to investigate his activities but going after him via impeachment plays right into his hand. He will looking for a fight and perhaps nothing will lather up his base more than beating up on Pelosi Democrats. In the meantime McConnell will be packing the federal courts with extreme right wing judges. The Democratic Party has to get its act together and stop shooting itself in the foot. This is not a matter of which party "wins". It is a matter of whether a representative democracy with a diverse population can survive or continue the slide towards fascism.
1
In other words, you figured out what everyone else already, had, only a lot slower. Welcome to the now.
I for one never understood why any woman of any stripe would vote Republican. Hopefully this 2018 vote data shows those once lost in the fog of conservative hypocrisy are now seeing it doesn't pay to vote against their own best interests. A party that will not legislate for "equal pay for equal work" getting more than zero woman support should be grounds for a federal investigation.
Trumpian Republicanism has a one trick pony that has worked remarkably well so far, but is beginning to lose efficacy. Their appeal too victimization, to get their voters to identify with envy and ressentiment towards the coastal elites is losing traction.
Their technique of getting their voters to engage in psychological projection is Fox News' and The White House Channels' main propaganda tool. The pity party (and self-pity party) of the Kavanaugh hearings tipped many complacent women and young people into play. Who is the real victim here, they asked their viewers? And he squeaked through because enough of them bought the projection. This is called gaslighting, and Trump is a skilled master.
2
In fond anticipation of the holiday season Democrats everywhere are already planning their Thanksgiving feasts with all the trimmings and with Trump as the main dish. But could their hopes for the holidays be a bit premature? The bird is still alive and kicking and shows no signs of cooperating. The Dems had better be careful or they’ll once again end up with pumpkin on their face.
1
After two years of Republican control of all parts of the Federal government, average Americans are no better off. Health care and housing costs continue to inflate. Taxes are only increasing for average families. Wages are near stagnant. Nothing the government does is being done better. For goodness sake, we have posted thousands of our very best on the Southern border as a costly, ridiculous political stunt; demeaning to both them and their families. Congress, lead by religious zealots in the House, and blockheads in the Senate, seem locked in a battle with themselves. Our government has become unstrung and American voters are finally wakening.
2
Abe Lincoln said that "...you can fool some of the people all the time". That has become an excellent description of those who continue to support Trump.
1
While I don't think that this is the beginning of the end of Trump
It its the end of the beginning of Trump's influence
2
So Trump has achieved a dimension all his own, but in so doing he has become one-dimensional. He wears us out and so wears thinner by the day, and boorish. Almost every stunt he pulls he can only pull once and get the rise he so needs to garner attention.
Gee. Ya think people are finally realizing Donald is no more than a damaged ex reality tv celebrity who thinks he’s much smarter and more streetwise than everyone else but in reality is just another kid who could never live up to his fathers expectations even after being sent to military academy?
Bless the Almighty for goosing the Dems to win the mid-terms, otherwise I would be looking for a new back scratcher, since the ancient Chinese one made from red sandalwood smuggled from India that I have been using for decades has nearly worn out its five teeth as I tried to sooth myself from Trumpism. But as things improve, I may just send my old scratcher to Hong Kong for a restoration, hoping that the Trump thing will go away in a few months and most of us can become sane again.
Income inequality must be addressed.
If it isn't, I'd conclude that since there has been decades - long proof of increasing income inequality, no pol, not one, knows how to decrease it substantially ... or our pols don't care... or the corporate state has 90 percent of us by our throats.
( Watch to see what does not happen to Goldman Sachs since, as recently reported, it was again behaving badly - stealing?)
Good news for America. I am a DEM living in NYC so I think trump and the GOP are rotten and just about everyone I talk too feels the same. Its very hard for me to understand why anyone would give them a second look let alone vote for one. All that said I also realize different parts of the country have different priorities and culture and do support them however this shows there are good, decent, honest people in all America.
1
It appears that the "total" numbers for the shift are double-counting voters... combining the drop in Republican voters and increase in Democratic voters would seem to exaggerate the shift...
Where were the Russians in this vote? Did the power of the vote override their meddling? I wonder.
trump has never had a grip on reality. the only item he has ever been able to grab and he claims they were okay with it because of his celebrity, were the ladies by there private areas. trump is a runaway train and he is the caboose.
One of the factors that helped the Dems in 2018 was the fact that they did not make "identity" itself a campaign issue. It was pretty obvious that a given candidate was, say, a black woman. In fact, one of the most impressive victories was that of Lauren Underwood, in a district west of Chicago (IL 14th District) with a Republican incumbent. She is a young black woman and a nurse, who campaigned heavily on the health-insurance issue in a district that is 86% white, NOT on her gender and race.
This ought to be a lesson to all potential Democratic presidential candidates; health insurance, income inequality, and corruption are the main topics the get voters' interests. So drop the foolishness of such things as abolishing ICE, Medicare-for-all, and the emphasis on identity that doomed Hillary Clinton's campaign, and focus on what will defeat Trump.
Slow learners, but better late than never. Come 2020 he won't even be able to get the republican nomination.
The Apprentice started as a highly rated "reality" show. But that too lost popularity after a while. The Trump Circus is entertaining for only so long, and then an increasing number of people have figured out that it is only a Circus and a fairly disgusting one at that.
2
Trump isn't the problem, he is just the latest most obvious symptom, of the most warlike party, a long history, the party of "war at all cost" dirty tricks party, which for most of its history since the late 60s has determined that democracy is inappropriate, and kicked into overdrive by Newt Gingrich starting in the 1980s...that is the real functioning democracy-destroying force here.
And remember this is all before the Mueller report!
1
The end may be near, because distrusting your closest associates is part of the final stage of extreme paranoia.
It happened to Howard Hughes when he fired Robert Maheu, his closest associate for 15 years, because he believed Maheu had stolen money from him: an unsupported charge that cost him a legal judgment when Maheu sued him for libel. [Hughes ultimately overpowered Maheu with lawyers and won on appeal]
In 1983 Maheu chose me to help him write his autobiography and we worked together quite closely for over a year between my office in Los Angeles and his home in Las Vegas, and I can personally say that I have never had the pleasure of meeting a man with more personal integrity, and to this day cannot believe the lies that Hughes' power-hungry small band of attendants must have been told to keep whispering into his ear about Maheu, in order to unseat him and take his place at the table.
I see the same thing happening to Trump because of his failure to recognize and believe he's to blame for any failures - which will surely be increasing when the results of his actions on the tax cut, immigration, tariffs, and failed appointments catches up with him and will force him to start blaming people closer to him - and result in a constant series of White House 'shake-ups' in a crazed attempt to continually rid himself of the imagined 'traitors' around him.
Because of the huge number of victims, this tragedy will surely equal anything Shakespeare wrote.
GeneGrossman.com
1
Given the unofficial Republican platform a dispassionate observer would have to believe Trump is priming the party for total defeat. They reject every aspect of multiculturalism and ostensibly insult and objectify immigrants and nonwhites as virtual public enemies. Trump's ideology is starkly xenophobic, plutocratic and seemingly blind to human needs other than to groups and people he considers his political allies. He projects ruthlessness, egotism and cruelty as core aspects of his public persona. So the question is, how is he at 45 percent in the polls? His support should be confined to the neo-fascist far right. Yet, he still maintains a coalition of social and economic conservatives who reject the Democratic coalition for various reasons and see Trump as their bulwark. But as Stanley Greenberg ably demonstrates, the coalition is showing signs of weakness.
The strategy for the Democrats going forward is to keep pushing back on Trump, investigating him and his administration and exposing their unsavory deeds and perhaps illegal actions. Twin objectives should be reaching out to the margins of the Trump coalition, especially the white working class and rural voters while making sure Trump doesn't have a day off from his lies, evasions and cruelties.
1
Trump is the agent of his own demise. A perfect storm of disruptions resulted in his fluke election victory in 2016. Since his problems are a matter of basic character, and since he doesn't have any, he is causing his own defeat. It was inevitable. But since so many vultures swooped in to take advantage of his lucky fluke and make it permanent, we must never tire of trump's insane politics and pull away from them. We must end the entire trump crime wave in the next 24 months, and finish this nightmare forever. The end of the "suffocating polarization" will follow at a faster pace.
2
I think President Trump will be creative with his manipulations considering the strengthened Democrats.
Today he was pandering to certain Democrats that lost their battles through vote counting. He'd previously insulted them but today is calling them fine people. He's sleazy in his manner and I believe in his mind as well. In the next while he'll be trying to play to the Democrats I believe and perhaps will wait till he's looking like almost a decent person - then - the year before 2020 he'll look for proper opportunities to destroy them.
I hope to God that he is losing his grip and that the head of the Senate does as well. Watch out for “foreign adventures” over the next two months — always a good way for despots to use military adventurism to stir up support.
Even if Mueller finds nothing against Trump, the past two years have shown most normal Americans that Trump is totally ill equipped to continue in the job. He has already violated his oath of office, and the Constitution, and he lies about nearly everything he opens his mouth about. Sad. Very sad. A real loser — especially for the nation.
My dear Eddie,
Obama just brought the Nation out of the worst economic calamity since the Great Depression is all. A Calamity created by the Republicans to boot.
1
"Working people are not fools..." No, Mr. Greenberg, they're not. But they have proven to be very susceptible to the seduction of Donald Trump's nationalistic fever.
These folks say they don't want to lose the "safety nets"--of pre-existing medical conditions; Medicare; Medicaid; and Social Security. However, the president is still quite able to persuade many of these people that he'll take care of them. He gins up the raw hate. Good-bye to all else.
If "working people are not fools," Mr. Greenberg, why do Democrats continue to swim upstream in rural areas? It's the same, tired "voting against your own personal interests." And when these working class voters go to the polls, they last thing they hear before they pull the lever is "immigration" and "caravans" and "Chicago gangs" and "NFL players kneeling at games." Then they forget--or don't care--that they're walking down a long road toward financial ruin.
As for the wave of women who seemed to tire of being the boards at which the president has tossed darts (all of his life but self-revealed on the Hollywood Access tape), why couldn't their anger at Trump's sexist preening push Hillary Clinton across the finish line? What is wrong with a woman when a man says he'll play with her, abuse her, vilify her...and she says, "OK, Donald, please talk dirty to me."? Is it a lack of self-respect (for white, suburban women, especially) who are economically comfortable?
Or is it--finally--a dawning of who their real enemy is?
"Will this shift of white women be durable? "
Obviously, no one knows the answer to that question, but I think we are seeing signs that the GOP leadership think so. Since the midterms we have seen several leading senate Republicans attack new AG Whitaker and state the need for an AG that can be confirmed by congress. Huh? A direct rebuttal to a Trump outrage from GOP senators? Then there is the newly formed off-shoot of the Federalist Society with the laughably hypocritical moniker "Checks and Balances." Irony aside they, have gone on the offensive against....wait for it.....Donald Trump. Huh? The same people that a few short months ago were crowing about the great deeds accomplished with the help of that outstanding statesmen Donald J. Trump. What is going on? Well, in my opinion what we are seeing is the realization that the Trumpian fragrance of sweet success is mutating into a Trumpian stench of scandal and failure. So the GOP is beginning a careful retreat. A subtle withdrawl from Trump that they hope will not anger dyed in the red true believers and yet somehow win back white women, independents and other voters that broke free of the Trumpian strange attractor during the midterms. That is going to be a desperate balancing act: stroking Trump's ruptured ego with one hand while conjuring diversity, gender equality and financial responsibility with the other. Let us hope that voters don't fall back down that Trumpian rabbit hole.
1
People can only believe lies for so long. Eventually, "the truth will out." Whether people fell for Trump's bill of goods on the wall, "fake" better healthcare, or a so called great tax plan, the reality is a different story. Look around, and see the leader of this country who can't seem to get a handle on the fact that not raking the forests or that throwing paper towels does not improve human misery after catastrophes. "Tariffs are easy", as the taxpayer helps to supplement the farmer. Taking children from immigrants and throwing them in cages might pacify the "white working class forgotten men", but solving a problem it is not. The economy was already on the uptick when Obama left. Trump just threw the profits to himself and the rich. Trump was ready to get the Peace Prize for North Korea....and yet they still build a secret arsenal. You cannot tell me that voters don't see the White House as a failure. A very public, miserable, lie filled failure. Time to sweep up the mess.
682
@Edgar -
We can only hope this is so. I live in a neighborhood where I was glared at when I requested a Democratic ballot at my polling place during the primary. Around here, otherwise intelligent people are still deep in the fantasy of MAGA. They hear the "economy is doing better" and little else.
I feel there is a turnaround coming, but only for the swing voters. Most of my neighbors will scream foul when votes go the other way, and scream louder if Trump ends up where he belongs.
76
@Michael Roberts
Good stand MR. But you should not have to request a Democratic ballot though where you vote. I choose to put Democratic signs on my lawn in a neighborhood that leans for the GOP but that is my choice.
37
@Michael Roberts
'.. if Trump ends up where he belongs.'
Exactly.
If he did not have the advantage of executive privilege and power, he would most certainly be in jail. What a strange and unfortunate paradox.
50
How can he get the nomination again in 2020 based on all he has said and done or not done to protect Americans? He is indeed a laughingstock on the world stage and many continue to shake their heads regarding his supporter's supposed morality (such as the evangelicals) to support a lying con artist who does not even believe what he purports to believe (antiabortion, pro-family etc).
He cares only for himself or his family, or what it takes to get a win. Nothing more. If the evangelicals suddenly changed their stance on some serious issues, he would too just to get their vote. Wake up America!
448
@Maple23 He'll get it because, since Gingrich and DeLay, the GOP has been masterful at their real campaign: convincing the masses that "liberals" and Democrats are their real enemy. Their tactic of using bogus accusations to laugh endless and expensive investigations against Democrats and especially the Clintons just to plant in people's heads that "there must be something there" has worked (even a lot of Democrats "hate the Clinton baggage", of which there is none, actually). The GOP has masterfully distracted the voters from their theft of the riches of this country to be redistributed to the top 1% by massaging hate, fear, and ignorance, all while insisting they're the real Americans and just plum fraught with Christian, moral, and family values, see? Very cynical stuff, but it also explains why Donald Trump, a lifelong Democrat, successfully ran for president as a Republican.
62
@Maple23
In our state, you can vote in either primary. So long as you vote only for candidates of one party.
It’s a battleground state. And we’re in a Dem gerrymandered district.
You can be sure of my vote for the presidential primary candidate: Any R but Trump!
9
@Maple23: During the campaign and on into his presidency, Trump has exhibited a peculiar fixation regarding the rest of the world supposedly "laughing at" the United States. I won't here attempt to psychologize Trump and speculate as to why he is so fixated on being laughed at, but through his actions as president, he has at least this accomplishment: he has made his claims about the United States being laughed at come true.
46
There is also some optimism from the governor races with 7 seats flipping from Republican to Democrat. Since governor races are statewide, there is hope for future senate races as well. What we are seeing in rural flyover country is the slow (albeit very slow) realization that Trump is not helping. When they start to see that Republican representation in Washington is not helping either, there is a glimmer of hope.
2
The sleeping monster in the corner of the room, despite all the trends in favor of the Democrats, is the economy. After the Republicans have predictably raided the Treasury and run up the deficit for the next 3-4 generations, the Democrats will be left to deal with ALL the painful decisions. It will be a very different political environment when the economic RECKONING begins.
10
You can see, looking at the age, race and gender of Republicans in Congress, both in the House and in the Senate, that the Party can’t last much longer than 10 years. It is just not representative of who we are as a country (nor has it ever been, really, considering that we are a nation of immigrants). Republicans have managed to survive by fooling just enough people for decades to maintain the status quo. It took someone like Trump to inadvertently expose them, so he may actually end up doing some good.
10
What's really interesting to me is how the Republican Party keeps coming back from disaster. First we had the disastrous end to the Nixon presidency. The Democrats won big in the 1974 off-year elections, and then captured the presidency in 1976. But they lost 44 states to the GOP in 1980 and 49 states in 1984. The George W. Bush presidency was an unmitigated disaster, and the Republicans lost big in 2008. Yet they scored huge successes in the 2010 and 2014 off-year elections, and then won back the presidency in 2016. What accounts for GOP's remarkable ability to recover, despite being responsible for unpopular wars, economic disasters, and massive corruption?
Perhaps a hint is contained in Mr. Greenberg's piece. He lauds the fact that the Democratic Congressional delegation contains larger percentages of women, people of color, and LGBTQ folks than ever before. Diversity is good, but crowing about percentages gives the appearance of supporting quotas. Add to this the Democrats' addiction to political correctness, and add to that their love for taxes and spending and overregulation, and one begins to perceive why the GOP, which should have gone out of business years ago, is still a going concern.
We swing back and forth between two corrupt and dysfunctional political groupings. At present the Democrats are far the lesser of two evils, but it remains to be seen how they will handle power the next time it is given to them.
4
@Jon Harrison
The plutocrats that finance the GOP have more money than ever. They will resurrect their political machine in whatever form is required to keep Americans divided enough to keep them in control of the government.
9
@Jon Harrison: Your example is inapplicable. Jimmy Carter did not lose in 1980 to Ronald Reagan because of political correctness, support of quotas, and a "love for taxes and spending and overregulation." The Iran Hostage Crisis, the spike in gasoline prices and long lines at gas stations, and an inflation rate of almost 15% (accompanied by equally high interest rates on loans) explain Carter's high negatives going into the election.
1
Here in Virginia three Congressional seats flipped to Democrats and our Dem Senator Kaine won reelection easily. Gerrymandering was a factor here too and continues to skew our state elected officials. But voters here did not buy into anti immigrant rants and want a federal government that works to deal with the problems we have such as lack of affordable healthcare, environment, gun safety, and affordable college.
18
It was good to see GOP wannabe-Trumps like Repub Dave Brat lose, sending a message VA is not an ignorant Southern State. Now it’s up to the winners to show they deserved to win.
2
The Republicans went on about how the Democrats mishandled the Kavanaugh confirmation. For example, the Washington Post's Republican columnist Thiessen wrote an article titled, "Democrats’ treatment of Kavanaugh was depraved. America won’t reward them at the polls."
Surprisingly, this know-nothing still has his job.
At the time I thought the Democrats did it exactly right. They went straight at him and got right in his face, even made him cry.
That standing up for women was a smart strategy that shifted their votes away from the Republican Party. It was also the right thing to do, so let's see more of it.
Let's remember that the key to winning is turnout, and the key to turnout is passion and risk, not messaging. The Republicans know this. They have no message at all, but they do have anger and fear which gives them the turnout to win.
This is because humans are far more likely to go out of their way to vote against something, rather than vote for something - because revenge is a powerful motivator.
18
This is one way of looking at it. Trump is certainly a disaster, but has continuing support ... as Senate elections in the mid-term elections seemed to demonstrate. Another way of looking at the situation overall might to consider that Trump had success in 2016 General Election because of his Democrat opponent’s unacceptability to too, too many. What’s ahead in 2020 may well depend on whom the Democrats nominate. And so far that matter is far from clear. We surely do need leadership. Who can win the “game,” is definitely not the solution to that problem.
3
Trump lost the House in the midterms just as Clinton and Obama did before, but only by approx ½ as many flipped seats as happened during the Clinton and Obama adms. This is not quite the wave that was advertised.
In an ironic twist, it may actually help Trump win re-election in 2020, because it will better demonstrate the contrasts of the 2 parties.
Americans like checks and balances, that explains why Obama won the executive office but the GOP won the House and Senate (for 6 of the 8 years of the Obama adm). And this also explains the mid-term results in 2018. That is the real lesson.
1
@Philly
Please correct me if my observation is wrong but the 6 years of checks and balances, to which you refer, appears to have actually been 6 years of paralysis, by design. Is the frustration that that caused the populace not the reason for the push to upend the status quo? Is not the real lesson that it was the cynical refusal to do the work of the people that contributed in no small measure to the result. And indeed to the about face of this latest result?
9
@Philly The real reason was the lies and deceit spoken by the Republicans on health care in both 1994 and 2010 that a frightening electorate bought wholesale. And you can equally blame the results of 2018 on the reality kicking in that health care is better handled by the Democrats this time around.
1
@Philly
We do like "checks and balances," which is precisly why Trump lost the House, and it is why his monsterous takeover of our country will be defeated in 2020. No president has shown such disdain for the American citizentry as has Donald Trump, nor has any so blantently lied, cheated, harassed and abused us. That hatred will come to a halt in 2020. I have faith in the spirit of the American people.
1
While all of this is great news, it does not address the fundamental problems that prevent long lasting progress. Citizens United remains the law of the land which means deep pockets will reinfect the process when this batch of "shiny new faces" in congress face reelection in two years.
During their congressional tenure, the shiny new faces will encounter sweet talking lobbyists who actually write the country's legislation and offer "free seminars" on the complex issues facing proposed legislation.
In other words, nothing fundamental has changed so when people go back to their busy lives, it will be business as usual. We remain stuck with 50 different voting processes, the Electoral College, a gross imbalance in senatorial representation, Gerrymandering has NOT been outlawed, and legislation cannot be passed to fix these problems due to Gridlock.
So while we enjoy our 15 minutes of success, remember that Trump is still in office, republicans still control the senate, and thousands of lobbyists are planning to exploit the shiny new faces on Jan 3.
It's business as usual.
31
@Henry J
The key to change will be the Progressives who reject corporate donor payoffs and build their funding base from crowd-sourcing. If they vote against the people, we will vote them out.
Progressivism is very pragmatic and unsentimental. We do not believe in entitlement. If they don't produce, there are thousands more that will take their place.
1
Not surprising if that polarization might be waking up in the Republican party resulting in amoeba like division and replication within, creating a new centrist candidate that would run as the antidote for Republican exacerbated polarization, and sweep the ticket in 2020. The squashed rumor of Pence's loyalty could also indicate further Republican fault lines that will play out.
Dems need to be prepared for that can of worms. It may not be a simple dog mess to clean up after, and voters may wind up with too many choices, so a clear simple message may hypnotize voters once again.
3
Thank you for these glimmers of hope you have articulated with such a promising analysis. If We, Democratic voters, can find and nominate a truly compelling candidate in 2020, this half-filled glass of hope could overflow with a fact-based, mutually respectful and prosperous future for all. Yes, we can (do that again)!
27
Con men and grifters leave town after completing their sting Trump's con was getting elected His problem was that he had to stick around for at least four years
Trump is neither bright likeable or mentally healthy enough to continue his charade successfully
His overt misogyny racism ineptitude and gross personality deficiencies were eventually going to wear thin on the public causing them to reject him and the sycophantic GOP that backed him like puppets
I don't think Americans like to see their president laughed at by other world leaders at the UN Nor do they like to see him disrespecting fallen USA soldiers in France by not visiting a WWI cemetery in France because it was raining
The presidency is not a weekly TV show like The Apprentice where Trump could create the image of an omnipotent character
He can't stand up under the scrutiny of a 24/7 news cycle He has been exposed In Trump's case familiarity has bred contempt
102
@Martin I certainly agree with you. I believe a vast number of Americans are just as sick and tired of Trumps tirades, rants, and displays of unbalanced decisions as I am. When he is so blatantly slapped America's face by putting a coal lobbyist as head of our EPA, he showed his true colors of childish revenge in lieu of what was best for our country and our American citizens
6
@Martin
Re what Americans don't like to see:
But they don't HAVE to see any of these truths if all the watch is Fox News!!
2
As a retired member of the working class who has always been a Democrat it came as good news that at least some of the working class men have wised up to the fact that the republican party is not their friend. The republican party is the party of the rich and always has been. I do understand the anger of the men in the working class because the Democrats no longer make economic justice for workers, for example supporting the right to organize and join a union, one of their priorities. The Democrats focus more on identity politics nowadays. I would like to remind the Democratic Party and everyone else for that matter, that identity politics and economic politics are NOT mutually exclusive and they can and should fight for both. That seems to me to be a winning combination for the next election cycle.
86
@Tommy Bones
identity politics and economic politics are NOT mutually exclusive and they can and should fight for both
Great line!
15
@Tommy Bones
This is a fine summary of why Democrats' proposals are more favorable to working people than the GOP's from the standpoint of a real working voter. I hope Democrats remember to continue talking straight about this advantage in future elections.
18
@Joel...and so it's ALWAYS been. And you're absolutely correct. This continues to be an uphill battle for the DP unless it reclaims what has always been its core constituency. To their credit, the GOP did a masterful job beginning with the Southern Strategy at "converting" breadbasket Democrats with folksy rhetoric and country church "morality." Never mind those pesky details of top down political/economic philosophy. And that chicken flew a lot longer than anyone could have imagined. Fortunately, it appears that wave of populist psychosis might finally be receding, and there's signs average folks might be awakening from their 4-decade-and-running political existential crisis. Right NOW is a golden window of opportunity for the DP's reclamation effort. The game is theirs to win...or lose.
5
Greenberg's analysis is almost spot on, except that he misses the fact that the 2018 Senate election was a Democratic LANDSLIDE. Democrats won 24 of the races decided so far, the GOP only nine, with Florida still being recounted and one Mississippi seat going to a runoff.
Even if the GOP wins both of those to make it 24 to 11, Democratic candidates will have won over 2/3 of the Senate races, including 7 of 10 Democratic seats in states carried by Trump in 2016.
32
@Albanius: Only one third of the members of this atrociously malapportioned body come up for election in a general US election. This year, two thirds of those were Democratic seats.
The US founders made it impossible to transform the government in one election. It takes at least 3 elections over at least 6 years.
2
As much as I like hearing this narrative, one cannot help but detect the spin. Working people may not be fools, but they were being very foolish if they chose to believe the lies that Trump was telling them. Perhaps they were seduced by the promise of easy fixes. Or perhaps they believed that if anyone ended up losing out from Trump's "great solutions", it wouldn't be them.
What does it say about the fact that so many people were willing to believe a demonstrable liar - after all, he had spent years pretending that Obama wasn't born in the US? Perhaps it suggests something worse than fools.
194
@DebbieR: Apparently people were taken with Trump's TV management style, as popularized by "The Apprentice". It looked to me like chasing people through a maze with an electric cattle prod.
4
@DebbieR To be fair Trump would not be able to say the things he does and get away with it without the help of the right wing infotainment outrage machine of Fox and Limbaugh. They have created an alternate reality for over two decades. I thought the Iraq war would have done them in but I was mistaken....
11
The same happened with Brexit.
Boris Johnson even looks like Trump.
All lies and now the bill is coming due.
9
Trump and his party are in trouble. If the facts here are true then his base is eroding and he will need to grow it to survive the 2020 election. We need to take nothing for granted and begin working hard to defeat Trump and his party in 2020.
89
Trump has no party, except himself.
3
Compare performance of the Great Obama at first midterm to Trump. He had a worse performance in relative and absolute terms in the House, Senate, Governorships and Local Officials elections. Yet Greenberg was probably spinning tales of glory or explaining why no one else could have done better.
7
@edward smith Compare the US economy 2010 with now. When has a sitting president so calamitously failed to exploit the advantage of mostly positive numbers? The biggest worry is that his tax cuts will prove unsustainable because of the massive deficit – and given that they so significantly favoured the rich, he has no wiggle-room to undo them without upsetting his real base, his fellow plutocrats. But that is for the future, and elections are about now.
Trump chose to turn the campaign into a culture war and lost.
113
@edward smith: I don't recall Obama giving even one speech about the imperative for Democrats to turn out in census-year elections to avoid getting gerrymandered out of contention for the next decade, in the election of 2010.
9
@edward smith
Yes indeed he had a horrible midterm. After which the majority GOP vowed to never work with him. Your point?
1
Please remember that this is an opinion piece because Greenberg does act like his conclusions are fact. In reality, they are based upon surveys and exit polls by progressive leaning organizations.
As he notes, his conclusions are based upon surveys funded by "Women’s Voice Women’s Vote Action Fund and a study of the exit polls conducted for Edison and Catalist". These are Progressive/Democratic polls.
In fact, similar Democratic/Progressive leaning polls had projected an even race between McCaskill and Hawley in Missouri - while Hawley won by a substantial margin well outside the margin of error. Such polls projected Gillum winning in Florida - Desantis won by a margin well outside the margin of error.
After all, Mr. Greenberg is also a Democratic/Progressive leaning pollster, so we need to take his conclusions for what they are - they are political opinions. Polling is often used to try to manipulate opinion, such as Greenberg attempts here.
15
@Dan: I don't think so. Mr. Greenberg's numbers are based on sound statistical analyses of the election results. If there are 40 Democratic wins, Mr. Greenberg quantifies voting pattern of various segments of population that produced this particular result. His being Democrat or Republican plays no role in his analyses.
18
@Dan
At the top and bottom of this Opinion piece (in the Opinion Section) it says Greenberg is Democratic pollster etc etc etc. No where does he claim to be a neutral observer of election data.
Who knew; opinion pieces are written by people with opinions! Thankyou so much for that.
@Dan
Point taken. I wonder what the Right's polling data shows.
"Democrats cut the Republicans’ margin in rural areas by 13 points, according to the Edison exit poll and by seven points in one by Catalist."
The opioid epidemic is hitting rural areas even harder than cities. People with addiction have a really hard time staying employed, and then a harder time getting work if it means passing a background check and drug tests.
Safety nets become important to voters when they find themselves in need, and they might then question the policies of the party they reflexively voted for in the past.
So it wasn't really surprising when majorities in three GOP states voted to expand Medicaid.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/07/health/medicaid-expansion-ballot.html
Some rural areas are also expanding again (or at least not continuing to shrink) as immigrants move in and start adding to the local economy. And farmers, especially of produce, have been dependent on immigrant labor, whether legal or undocumented.
So the Republican Party's current polarizing rhetoric may be balanced against "The impacts of an enforcement only approach to immigration would be detrimental to the agricultural industry. If agriculture were to lose access to all undocumented workers, agricultural output would fall by $30 to $60 billion."
https://www.fb.org/issues/immigration-reform/agriculture-labor-reform/economic-impact-of-immigration
32
@b fagan basically they will run out of lies, and/or the lies will become so obvious it will become even more obvious than it is today. Trump = One and Done.
1
I will resist the easy joke about the headline, since it turns out that this article is about voting patterns, not psychology. While I am glad to learn that President Trump's poll numbers are slipping, I would be even happier if the Democratic Party figured out what it stands for and found a candidate capable of beating Trump in 2020. The Democrats seem to believe that not being Donald Trump is sufficient, but I think that the party needs to articulate an agenda that will actually put our republic back on track, reassure our allies, and, most important, make Americans' lives better.
91
@Chris Rasmussen Democrats can't figure out what they stand for because there are actually 2 stains with vastly different agendas. What we agree on is that we are 'liberals', which means believing that we all deserve respect, dignity, & civil rights, without regard to race, religion, national origin, gender or gender preference. Where we differ is in support for corporations vs. people, and support or lack of support for the military/industrial complex at the highest levels, & the endless wars, killing hundreds of thousands of people that that support entails.
41
@Chris Rasmussen
Have you actually listened to the Democrats speak about their priorities and what they stand for, or are you just parroting the GOP's false talking point?
Health care, infrastructure, and strengthening checks and balances. It's like a mantra. When asked about Trump, they always respond "Well, we do have to protect the rule of law, but let me tell you about Healthcare and infrastructure.
I seriously can't understand how anyone who is truly paying attention could say that they only run on being "not Trump".
150
One could argue that the Republicans suffer from the same affliction. Traditional Republicans like Mitch McConnell have a different ideology than tea party Republicans. They’ve fought internal party battles. The difference is that Republicans will vote for party over ideology while the Democrats apparently will not, at least based on the 2016 election.
14
I would find this article more credible if the author didn't say Trump has a 45% favorable rating. I have also heard 35% stated in the past week. The difference is larger than most of the Democratic improvement from 2016 to 2018. The difference is on the order of 20 million eligible voters, based on 10% of 200 million eligible voters.
Just what are the facts now that we have voter by voter election results that are not off by 20 million. Pollsters need to study the scientific method if they are to be given space in newspapers.
1
@steve That 45% Trump approval rating also struck me as unexpected. FiveThirtyEight has him at 42.5%, which would round up to 43%, so not that big a difference.
Much as I would love to see him sink to 35% that appears to be very much an outlier.
Anther commenter noted that Greenberg is a Democratic pollster and stated that the data he was working with came from progressive outfits.
But the somewhat higher Trump approval ratings undermines that argument.
4
@steve
You do know that polling is not a hard science, and that different pollsters use different methodologies..... don't you?
One poll says this, one says that. The author can use whichever he wishes, as long as it's factually correct.
If the mid-terms proved anything, it was that most Americans think Trump is not, and never will be, a class act.
This could be a liability in 2020.
38
@We'll always have Paris: Some truth here, but remember, most Americans have always despised Trump, or at least thought he was a dishonest creep -- and yet it didn't keep him from squeaking into the White House. Not to be morose, but it's something to keep in mind.
Even without Mr Greenberg's encouraging analysis it's been pretty clear since the election that Trump's political career has morphed from being just about everyone else's worst nightmare, to being his alone. With investigations of his administration just around the corner, and Mueller poised to bring his charges, this reader more than half expects TRUMP RESIGNS, PENCE SILENT ON PARDON to be the headline any day now.
42
@Leigh
He won't resign unless it's to go to prison. One can only hope.
2
This place is such an echo chamber. Here's hat it sounds like: The people know not what they do; Voters mean something else than what they say; We've all been bamboozled by the bad, bad Republicans.
There are three branches of government. Democrats sound like they are triumphant, or on the verge of being so. In a fairly predictable counter-cyclical outcome, Democrats eked out control of the House. For this sorry precinct, this is a time for self-congratulations. Enjoy.
In 1982, the press was portraying Reagan as basically pinned down by Tip O'Neill and crew. This 2018 "wave" is a very pale reflection of that. And that was nothing that came anywhere near to stopping Reagan from a vast remaking of the USA's political landscape.
But this 2018 semi-fizzle was an epochal change? ... absurd.
Trump is a major game-changer. Like it or not, he will appoint more Supreme Court justices. He will actually do some things legislatively (after two years of essential alienation from the Republican lawmaking apparatus). And he will continue to use executive power in novel ways that get a lot done.
Watching the constant gyrations to see "Hope" here makes it more fun.
8
@Weiss Man
I'm just curious - what do you imagine "novel ways that get a lot done" to actually do? Higher incomes for workers? Better health care? Legislation that supports people and not special interests?
I'm just looking for a few details here, not a vague "a lot".
65
@Weiss Man,
Trump is a pathological liar, who tells his supporters what they want to hear. Greenberg is wrong. Anybody who voted for Trump expecting him to make good on his promises was a fool to begin with. The only thing the man knows how to do is promote his brand and target his audience. His ignorance of the issues is vast.
28
@Weiss Man Democrats "eked out control of the House?" They're on track to capture 38 seats, which is a good deal better than the average Presidential midterm performance. And they did it in the face of 1) a good national economy with rising incomes and low unemployment and 2) an extremely unfair electoral map, thanks to partisan gerrymandering. In North Carolina, one of the worst of the worst when it comes to drawing unfair districts, not a single incumbent lost, Republican or Democrat, and all the GOP candidates won by a good deal less than 60%, while the Democrats won with 70% or more. The vote for the House in North Carolina was roughly split, which should have yielded an additional 3-4 seats for the Democrats. Other states are similar--Texas and Ohio for example. Without gerrymandering, this midterm cycle would have been an out and out shellacking for the GOP. You also left out the seven governor's seats taken by the Democrats, along with some 300 legislative seats. Oh, and several "liberal" ballot measures that passed in red states that expanded Medicaid and raised the minimum wage.
It's always dangerous to make predictions based on one election. However, in 2020 the GOP will either go with an extremely problematic incumbent (Trump, if he hasn't been impeached or decided to step down), or they will have to pick some odious right winger who will pass muster with GOP primary voters but who will rub just about everyone else the wrong way. Enjoy!
6
It is obvious that a clear majority of Americans support traditional American values. Like a free press. Like respect for women. Like an appreciation of new comers.Like respect for allies. Like support for cultural and racial diversity. Trump is on the wrong side of history. His shelf life will expire in 2020. And he cannot stop it.
202
@Milton Lewis agreed. he is one and done. My fear is : how much damage will he do before he is shown the door?
24
Today, some pundits on cable are already pondering the Trumpian "pivot" - look at how much better behaved he was in California, look how he praised Stacie Abrams and Andrew Gillam. It seems the loss of support that resulted from the "all-out vileness" campaign is so crystal clear, even he has had to inwardly concede that the majority of the country can no longer stomach Trump Unplugged. He is perfectly capable of "granting" money to California - (though not to Puerto Rico, of course,) while neither regretting nor apologizing for last week's rebuke of the State. No shame required in Trump world. Meanwhile, there are 5,000 troops languishing at the border, for nothing, two gubernatorial candidates have lost due to voter manipulation encouraged by him, a lackey has been corruptly installed as attorney general, a sadistic Saudi Prince is being cravenly protected - the list goes on. The danger here is that, meanwhile, the media will laud him as a changed and better man. The public, too, is weary of loathing their President and would most likely prefer to believe he isn't so bad and is capable of change. And that could lead to better polls. 2020 is coming. Desperately hoping the media won't, yet again, get Donald Trump elected.
81
@JCam I don't believe Trump can keep up the good behavior. His true nature always overcomes his short-term attempts to be nice. He couldn't even honor the American war dead either in France or at Arlington on Veterans' Day because his hairdo trumped decorum. Any pivot will be temporary. Then the worse angels of his nature will reappear. He can't help it.
67
@JCam-the media, bless their hearts, despite being called the "enemy of the people by Trump for the past two years plus, probably will fall for the "pivot" that he seemed to be displaying yesterday-which will probably last until today when more angry tweets will start up again. He cannot change who he is at bottom: a malignant narcissist manifestly unqualified to be POTUS. The damage he has done to our country and our relationship with allies will take years to repair. Mueller is closing in on the criminal enterprise that is the Trump administration. He cannot sustain a pivot: what we have seen for the last few years is the real Trump
3
@Linda: True, but the mainstream media is always eager to push a redemption story, they will amplify every hint of a return to normality, and slack off on the ongoing destructive buffoonery as it gets repetitious and boring. And the general public also wants to see the positive in people, given the slightest excuse. Or so it appears, sometimes...
1
"Beginning to...?" The fact is, as working and middle class people (who aren't racist and/or misogynistic) pay more attention to facts, they will realize that trump and republicans are not really interested in their well-being. They have NO plan to improve our health care system. They have NO plan to address the opioid crisis. They have NO plan to deal with gun violence. They have NO plan to rebuild our infrastructure. They have NO plan to protect our environment or address climate change. They have NO plan to increase the minimum wage. They have NO plan to protect Social Security. What are they actually good at? Cutting taxes for the wealthy and corporations, and stirring up fear about non-existent 'immigrant invasions' and 'massive voter fraud.' Trump and republicans are well on their way to losing their grip on the real issues facing our country.
129
@eandbee Yes, yes, Yes...but too many still vote their hatreds and fears...sorry to say.
5
In a screenplay about current American politics, Trump would be seen quietly talking to himself. Wondering, what and how far he could push the country to rebel against his policies, against the establishment, against the GOP. How terrible would he have to be? Essentially a "How to break up with your lover in 10 easy steps." I should start writing it now.
6
Part of the reason for the turn away from Trump and Republicans may be that more and more people are getting fatigued with Trump's ways.
25
@Iconoclast1956 They probably turned away from Trump because they're ready for Democratic Socialism. We need to push more Democratic Socialism. Not.
No, it's not that women merely "rebelled against Mr. Trump’s misogyny, sexism and disrespect for women." Female voters care more than men about a broad range of issues including corruption, education, healthcare, and the environment. Trump fails on all all fronts.
83
The recent electoral results notwithstanding, we will be a long time in recovering from the child separation and internment policies. While our economic and military power will enforce our will around the world, it will be some time, if ever, before we inspire the world again.
37
It isn’t enough that Democrats made gains in 2018. They need to deliver, or they become liabilities and fodder for Trump in 2020.
The real work begins now. 2016 shouldn’t have been lost, it was negligently given away. 2018 didn’t require a ton of heavy lifting, the GOP was practically begging folks to vote Democratic. 2020 will require reasons to support Democrats, not just voting against Trump and the GOP.
Get crackin’!
24
Time will tell if the Democrats are able to retain their control of the House in 2020. They have 2 Years to prove themselves. If it’s Pelosi politics as usual, they’ll sink themselves.
5
@George
Pelosi was remarkably effective, so politics as usual would ring true only with the right wing and they already hate Nancy Pelosi and nothing she does will change their minds.
1
@George
What are Pelosi politics? Getting the ACA passed?
1
@George Yeah sure, given how totally unpopular the ACA is and how totally popular the Republican replacement is. Funny to see how you're still workin' that "Pelosi is evil" line. Makes sense, given how well it worked this year.
1
Trumps greatest skill has been convincing the Working Class he is on their side. It may be the biggest con in American Politics. If people were educated about the real History of Capitalism and the exploitation of workers by Rich Americans they never would vote for Trump.
65
This is an interesting column. But the only person I'm aware of who has written a column about who *got* everyone out to vote, who actually did the work, has been Michelle Goldberg. We've had endless stories about Trump voters in diners. Now how about some about the Resistance that drove this wave?
41
Last vote count I saw was:
51.8 million votes for Democrats
46.2 million votes for Republicans.
But Republicans still control the Senate because of small states.
42
I noticed in many mid term campaigns, GOP candidates painted their opponents as "open border". This implies that there is free and unrestricted crossings at the border. I personally know of no one with this posture. Immigration reform, yes. All or nothing, no. It is where most people stand, and a question of degree.
67
@Steve
Another one was Democrats want to make America a socialist country like Venezuela.
They never mention how well those "terrible socialist" countries like Denmark and Germany, etc. are doing.
2
2020 will tell us more. It's another two years of Trump but it's also two years for the Democrats to try to accomplish something unless the Senate blocks their every move and it will because it's still run and controlled by the GOP. I would not put it past Trump to find a way to demonize every Democrat that's just been elected and for the GOP to egg him on. Worse, if there are no results because of the GOP I'm not sure that the Democrats will be quick enough to lay the blame where it belongs.
Trump and the GOP are playing worse than dirty politics. They are playing to stay in power, not to share, and to suppress as much of the vote of people against them as they can. In games like this decency is the first casualty. The next one is people's trust in the government and in their neighbors who don't agree with them.
The problems Trump and the GOP are causing are not just women's problems. They are problems for every human in the country. Whether it's about women's reproductive lives and who controls them or our ability to prevent large corporations from destroying our environment we, as Americans, have to agree that we expect our elected officials to work for us rather than their rich donors or the lobbyists and industry leaders who flatter them. We need to vote out those who will not work for us, will not meet with us, and who dismiss us because we have no money to line their pockets.
65
@hen3ry The Democratic controlled House will pass legislation that will be very popular: strengthening our election system, strengthening Obamacare, repealing the tax cut for businesses and upper income individuals, a real infrastructure plan (not a giveaway to businesses as Trump wants), legalization of the Dreamers, possibly comprehensive immigration reform (the bill that passed the Senate a few years back with a huge, bipartisan majority could do the trick) and probably yet more.
Then either the Republican controlled Senate or Trump himself will block every one of them. At that point Trump can demonize away but folks won't be buying.
6
...causing problems for every human on the PLANET.
1
Trump never had a grip. Everyone gave him way too much credit after the election, even setting aside the protests and people dry-heaving in the streets. He won by the skin of his teeth, and many who voted for him did so as a rejection of Hillary Clinton, who everyone thought would win. This protest vote against Clinton was expressed by many who either didn't vote, or voted for him. His win was a fluke, and we only worry about it because we're terrified, sensible republican, independent, and democrat alike, that somehow 2020 will be a repeat. The problem with all the hand-wringing is that it gives right-wingers lift.
63
As I white male California liberal, I relish this analysis. However, this New Democratic strength has to deliver the goods. Heading backwards to the same old same old will result in a disappointing two years and the tsunami will crest. All the while McConnell will try to make this a “two year aberration”. If Democrats try for good policies and can paint trump et al as useless tools of the 1%, their grip on power will strengthen.
87
@The 1% What goods have Republicans ever delivered except to the rich? All I expect from Democrats is legislation on taxes, infrastructure, health care, tariffs and immigration and stop Trump in his tracks. Let the Republicans obstruct the will of the people so we can be rid of them in 2020.
20
Amy Klobuchar/Tammy Duckworth 2020 :)
I agree that Democrats should work harder to reach rural voters, because in the end, everyone benefits from responsible Dem policies.
Polarization can destroy this country
68
Red,
I wish it was that simple.
Some people for a variety of reason are not strong enough to do what seems so simple and common sense. Get some sort of education/training, marry, have the number of children life affords you and all should more or less work out. I am as baffled and irritated as you are because against all common sense so many make bad decision after bad decision but I have also traveled all over the world. Nobody wants to live in a place without safety nets; frightened behind gates, worried your twelve year old will be kidnapped being cool walking back from school, going to the grocery store with a bodyguard etc.
I don’t know the answer but I have seen what does not work.
L
11
I was angry that the Women's March occurred after the inauguration and was holding my breath to see if their marching two years ago would amount to something. I could not understand why they hadn't mobilized and voted for Hilary? Thank goodness their resolve never wavered. They were serious, and got the hard work done. Well done Ladies.
142
@Sasha Still not enough are "woke." Their very numbers and serious feelings about courtesy and manners and statesmanship will carry us through.
1
@Sasha I have never felt more empowered then on that day marching in DC. There were plenty of men there as well, but the women were of all different ethnic backgrounds, ages and economic status. It was great and the Woman's March group has done sooooo much networking, partnering and work around the globe. This white rural woman can't thank them enough for providing a voice and a way for us to work together.
2
"But he mainly campaigned in states that he won by large margins in 2016. "
This observation is central. It suggests Trump determined the outcome of the election and we should focus on what his strategy is. When Trump is attacked in the press or his chances of reelection are in crisis, his donors and supporters are energized. They are panicking and they will not submit to a national humiliation in 2020. Trump engineered the illusion that he is losing the grip but it is a ploy. It's not dependent on Democrats feeling smug. It's about triggering fear in his supporters. Every household that supports Trump is talking about what they can do to save him and thereby, themselves from the humiliation of democratic defeat.
19
Max, what's the cause here and what's the effect? Did the Republicans do well in all the states President Trump campaigned in because his magic was so effective? Or, did he choose to only campaign in the states that he knew would give him the love, because that's where his supporters already were?
One of the errors President Trump tends to make is that rather than booking his base supporters and going after those lukewarm supporters who enabled his narrow victory in 2016, he instead continues to concentrate on his base. This increases the risk that the lukewarm will defect. And, he increases this risk by appealing to the base in a way that turns off the less-rabid. So when he says, "I'm a nationalist," that risks turning off his remaining Jewish supporters—or for that matter many other caring Americans—who interpret this as a shout-out to white nationalists.
But Democrats shouldn't look upon this as a free square. They still must do the hard work of making their own appeal to the drifting Trump supporters, using appeals such as economic issues rather than tribalism.
11
@Max & Max So you believe the Republicans lost this year on purpose? They may not want to "submit", who ever does? Doesn't mean they can win, now does it? Right now there are fewer households supporting Trump than there were in 2016. With absurd missteps like not going to Arlington National Cemetery on Veterans' Day Trump ain't exactly helping himself retain support.
2
In 2007, I strongly believed that Barack Obama would have won the Presidency because of my close contacts with high school and college students in the years preceding 2008. I also believed then as now that the coalition of youth, women, gays, minorities and immigrants was Obama's singular genius. Obama's victories signaled major changes in American politics: the denouement of racial/political rear-guard actions by opponents following the civil war and voting rights act of 1964.
Hillary Clinton was the wrong candidate at the wrong time for ensuring consolidation of Obama's hard won gains. In hindsight, Trump's candidacy was probably a necessary catalyst for a healthy majority of voters to finally become convinced that the politics of nationalism and race is a futile one that benefitted no one.
Just maybe, we have finally crossed the rubicon.
57
@Ian Quan-Soon
Excellent observation.
For the eight Obama years, the GOP was stuck in defiant positions that are now described as belonging to Trump. That defiance was rewarded with control over the three branches of government. Although Trump wants to make everything about his persona, and the GOP likes having him as their front man, he is a tool being manipulated by GOP leaders. As for the next election, the Republicans excel more at campaigning than governing, and cannot be expected to lose, even though the current wave seems to be against them. As for Trump, he will do as they command, and welcome their guidance since he has no mind of his own.
21
The biggest factor favoring Democrats is the death of personal responsibility and accountability among a majority of voters. Democrats pander to the "hands out" voter who claims victim hood in order to receive government benefits in one form or another. Now that over 50% of Americans pay no federal income taxes and receive transfer payments in one form or another, it's just a matter of time until Democrats control the federal government permanently. That will lead to economic collapse, and, perhaps from the ashes, Americans will return to the values of family, hard work, thrift and personal enterprise that have created the economic engine Democrats knowingly seek to destroy.
5
@Red
"Democrats pander to the "hands out" voter"
That is your Republican talking point.
Actually, Democrats are people who care about helping their less fortunate neighbors.
Republicans pander to their wealthy donors and have thrown us deep into debt with their tax giveaway to people who have more money than they know what to do with (one of the Congressmen who voted for the rich-man's tax cut went out later that day to buy a yacht), while making it hard for a born child with medical needs to get affordable health insurance.
314
@Red
What Republicans and Fox News doesn't tell you is that a lot of those who are receiving transfer payments are retired.
The baby boomers who hit their career peak during Reagan are now entering into their retirement peak.
Social Security and Medicare that they work and paid into for 40 or 50 years. Entitlements in the vocabulary of Republicans.
And of course there are children under 16 who also are not working though some Republicans would like to repeal child labor laws so we can be more like China.
One day you will want to claim those entitlement transfers. But do an Internet search on Ryan and McConnell already wanting to cut those.
On the other hand, Republicans cater to the wealthy with tax cuts for the billionaires.
And with people believing as you do, the billionaires are laughing all the way to the bank, literally.
236
@Red
You write unmitigated nonsense. The Republicans have a history of being poor managers of the economy. Sooner or later it shows up and Democrats are elected to clean up after them.
And please spare us the hogwash about "values" and "personal responsibility". The grotesque increase in wealth of the already wealthy has come at the cost of literally devaluing labor. It's not a "family value" when ever-increasing numbers of jobs don't pay enough to support an individual, let alone a family.
106
" 40 percent of moderate Republicans either voted Democratic or stayed home"
Can we PLEASE already stop using "stayed home" as a euphemism for "didn't vote"? In my state, all voting is by mail. Many of us stay home in order to vote! In addition, many people who don't vote are unable to cast a ballot because they are at work, and cannot leave. To use "stay home" to mean that someone didn't vote is inaccurate. I see no problem with just saying "voted Democratic or didn't vote at all" Or whatever.
53
@Syliva
Sorry, but I for one will continue to use "stay home" if I choose. In case you had not noticed, English is a very versatile language and frequently uses expressions as figures of speech that are readily understood as something other than their literal meaning.
Sometimes, pedantry drives me up a wall. Not literally, of course.
11
@Syliva That should be a Federal Program --to vote by mail.
1
The article does a great job of cherry picking facts when it comes to immigrants. If you ask, do immigrants improve the country, I am quite surprised that only 54% said yes. If you ask, do illegal immigrants improve the country, a large majority will say no. For the democrats to be successful on this issue, they have to continue obfuscating the difference between legal and illegal immigrants. For the republicans to be successful on this issue, they have to more clearly distinguish between legal and illegal immigrants.
6
@Rob-Chemist
And for America to be successful, we need immigrants, preferably legal immigrants.
Without immigrants, this nation will wither into economically, culturally and culinarily.
99
@Rob-Chemist
There are other ways to analyze the data and ask the questions: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/09/30/on-views-of-immigrants-americans-largely-split-along-party-lines/ . The views are mostly split on partisan lines.
The one point of strong agreement between both major parties is that the immigration system is broken and needs either major changes or a complete rebuild. It would be helpful for the entire nation if congress would take action on this strong and bipartisan consensus.
15
@JSK
There was a bipartisan immigration bill that passed the Senate in 2013, which would have passed the House too, and Obama would have signed it into law.
However, the Republican Speaker of the House, then John Boehner, refused to let the bill come up for a vote. Republicans apparently would rather continue to use immigration as a wedge issue, destroying many lives; hopefully, the issue will be turned against them. Then we can make progress
53
It should surprise no one that rural America shifted significantly away from Trump, as the betrayal of the trade war cannot be smoothed over with a government handout. I remember a somewhat Trump-like candidate from a few elections ago, Pat Buchanan, talking about winding down farm subsidies and pledging to replace them by, to paraphrase, "acting like a blocking fullback to open up foreign markets for American farmers".
Trump seems to want to make industries in his "coalition" dependent on his favor for continued success. Such a bargain is not going to play well in too many places.
31
This opinion piece makes no sense to me. This is not a Presidential election or a referendum. The number of seats that switched in the House is almost exactly the historic average for a mid-term election. The major message of this election is that America remains pretty much split down the middle.
Both Parties have challenges if they are to stay at parity. Democrats have to draw together toward the center and not split apart. Repubs have to expand their attractiveness in the suburbs and then among Latinos and Blacks.
These are not insurmountable challenges for either Party. I hope that they both succeed.
4
"The number of seats that switched in the House is almost exactly the historic average for a mid-term election. "
I don't think you see the difference. Because of jerrymandering democrats had to win by at least 4 points in this election. That is the biggest difference.
31
@Nathan. Unfortunately, you are deluding yourself. The Democratic gains in the House are like those of the Tea Partyers in 2010. The magnitude of the change is the greatest in a very long time.
12
@Nathan Not true.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/242093/midterm-seat-loss-averages-unpopular-presidents.aspx
“Presidents below 50% approval see party lose 37 House seats, on average
Seat loss has averaged 14 for presidents above 50% job approval”
Trump is unpopular in case you haven’t noticed.
2
I'm a 70 year old retired NY lawyer. I was born in Brooklyn, grew up in Queens, lived in Nassau County, retired to Florida, and am now in Phoenix, AZ. I'm a veteran and a life long Democrat. We are a racially and ethnically divided land mass. Indeed, the reason Obama won was not because white Christians and "tribal" white Americans became enlightened, but because our country collapsed economically; remember that Bush was never mentioned during McCain's campaign. For 2020, and assuming that Trump runs again, Democratic turnout in PA, MN, WI and MI will have to be massive in order to win the electoral college unless, of course, the economy collapses again, which no one wants.
And regardless of the outcome, and even if the Democratic Party should hold the House, obtain a filibuster proof Senate, and win the Presidency, liberal legislation will be struck down by the new Supreme Court, just as occurred with Roosevelt's initial New Deal legislation, until the hard right court majority loses its power. Despite this, Democratic control of the federal government would make us a much better country, both economically and socially, by means of federal budget appropriations, executive orders and the enforcement of the rule of law. It's what drives me to the polls.
291
If democrats win house, senate and presidency, they should add new supreme court justices. Republicans simply stole the court seats, they should not be allowed to reap the rewards. In addition, the statehood of Wash DC and Puerto Rico should be granted adding four new senators, likely democrats.
22
@RMW = Trump has no chance in Mn now or ever.
4
The tax bill was an electoral blunder too. Its primary beneficiaries were already Republican, as were many of its "victims." Look no further than California's Orange County which was once the bastion of American conservatism and is now bright blue. Capping the SALT deduction at 10k was a political hit in that many in the county pay north of $10,000 in property taxes alone. That reality reverberated across high tax areas all over the country and swung many voters over to the Democratic Party.
86
While these are encouraging signs, the Democrats are still too splintered and divided themselves. Being anti-Trump may be a popular starting point with their own base, but it will eventually leave most independent, centrist or moderate voters cold.
The next two years is the Democrats chance to craft a coherent narrative that can and should spell a vision and a viable alternative to the Republican scaremongering and depression laden menu.
That means laying off for identity politics, which can be a source of strength up to a point, but not an end unto itself, nor a replacement for the aforementioned narrative. Having a thousand parties with a thousand voices and causes pulling in a thousand different directions is surely a recipe for disaster in 2020.
24
Let's remember that Democratic mega-donors benefited just as much from Trump's tax cuts as did the Koch's. As long as the same boneyard is in charge, there won't be any raft of progressive proposals. Lackeys like Schumer and Pelosi are in their positions of power because they bring in the big bucks, and part of the deal is that they will slow-walk any progressive agenda. That was also supposed to be Hillary's mission, known as "incrementalism", before she blew it to the orangutan. This time Democrats banked on disgust with Trump to carry them over the line but eventually, you've got to put your money where your mouth is - and they better start scrambling for 2020.
1
A fascinating story develops when one reads this and then juxtaposes it with another story today from the Times dealing with the evangelical support of the GOP. Acknowledging the results of the last election, one of the evangelical leaders spoke for the need to fine tune the message for his followers.
I wonder if the leaders will ever realize it isn't the message that is the problem. It is the messenger.
66
NY 19th Congressional District went blue this time. This is a very rural district that has a very sick economy. Our young people are leaving for opportunity. This makes the unemployment rate appear to be low, but it's not something to celebrate.
I don't have a lot of faith that Antonio Delgado, the Democrat who won, has a clue about what the real problems are. Rural communities need to reinvent themselves or they will die. Traditional agriculture based on dairy farms is gone. The businesses that supported that industry are also finished. The housing stock is deteriorating. There's no reason for people to move here.
I think there is an opportunity for Democrats because Republican ideology can't address the challenges. The market is doing its job and the destruction of our communities is not creative. Given what I've heard so far, I doubt that Democrats even realize what the problems are.
33
Can you suggest a solution for Democrats can pursue. This is a hard problem.
1
This House victory can’t allow Democrats to take a victory lap but maybe a small fist bump. There is so much work to be done to defeat this guy in 2020, such as identifying a candidate capable of beating Trump in the general election.
As of today, we must assume he will win unless we get the right candidate in opposition. It’s too risky to have a mentality that any Democrat can defeat Trump.
147
@JT FLORIDA - Beautifully said. This is the question. For my money, no one looks more Presidential and Obamaesque than Corey Booker. Yet as a talking head on election night, Chris Christie opined that the Dems' best prospect would be Deval Patrick, given his executive experience as Gov of Mass and lack of association with the DC swamp (which would also taint Warren, Sanders, and Biden). What sayest thou all?
6
@John
As for me, I would love it if the Dems would just nominate someone younger than 70! And I'm 62.
Where's the next JFK??
8
@John
Deval Patrick was a poor governor of MA. Under his tenure children died in Dep't of Children's Service custody, parts of Big Dig freeway fell down and killed people, Courts and Probation dept. fell to pieces, huge scandals in housing agencies statewide...
This is part of why everyone loves our current Republican governor Charlie Baker, who just got re-elected by a landslide... he makes the "trains run on time". I am an independent who mostly votes Democrat, but I, for one hope incompetent (but affable) Deval never crosses the starting line.
3
grip? he's got no grip. he's toast and it's only a matter of time, not much, before he has to pick up his marbles and go home.
57
@Bob We can surely hope that happens! An end to the nightmare that is Trump. We must define who we are as a people---as a nation of immigrants ourselves--- a people dedicated to the ideals of fairness and democracy. Trump leans ever closer to fascism. Democracy is fragile. We have much work to do. Pick up our burden and do it with dedication, strength and gusto.
2
@Bob. I think he lost them, though!
3
@Bob
But there's Pence ready to step in without all the crazy..but with the same racist, bigoted, policies and tax cut scams that the GOP donors love.
2
America will be "liberated from this suffocating polarization" when America is liberated from the criminal 'structural hurdles' of Republican voter suppression, voter file purges, Jim Crow voter laws, GOP gerrymanders, and 19th century polling sensibilities that consistently rigs the vote to the rural, regressive, religious right.
Democrats won roughly 50% of the vote in North Carolina this month, their best performance in almost a decade.
But they won only three of the state’s 13 congressional seats — the same as in 2014 and 2016.
That happened because the blue Democratic wave couldn't overcome the country’s most extreme Russian-Republican gerrymander, a congressional map that Republican legislators stated on the record that they carefully crafted “to give a partisan advantage to 10 Republicans and 3 Democrats.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2018/11/08/how-gerrymandering-kept-democrats-winning-even-more-seats-tuesday/?utm_term=.043aecb88805
If you count all the suppressed votes from 2016, Hillary Clinton is the President, not the current Republican Thief-In-Chief.
Record voter registration, a 50-state strategy, progressive public policy, record voting and good candidates are what's need to wipe the Republican criminal syndicate off the face of the political map in 2020.
America is much more progressive and Democratic than we realize, but since Republicans can't stand democracy or voting, it's hard to tell.
D to go forward; R for a rigged vote.
1183
@Socrates
In a similar case for Alabama, the Republican candidate for governor got 60% of the votes.
And Republicans got six US House of Representative seats. 86% of the total.
the Democratic candidate for governor got 40% of the votes.
And Democrats got one US House of Representative seat. 14% of the total.
35
Democratic party should have a plan to fight gerrymandering. There needs to be an energetic leadership to lead party and fight on many of these fronts. However as it is shaping up, it looks like same old, same old.
30
@Socrates, here in North Carolina there were 12 contested Congressional districts, with one Republican running unopposed. In the 12 contested districts, Democrats outnumbered Republicans but could only prevail in 3 races. Our state districts are also gerrymandered, so our legislature remained in Republican hands even as Democrats mustered more votes at the state level. Of course Democrats did some gerrymandering when they were in power, but never to the degree pursued by the Republicans (who were aided by professional consultants and sophisticated GIS software). Democrats held between 6 and 8 seats in the previous decade; the Republicans now have a stranglehold on 10.
70
Another interpretation is that many voters turned out to vote for Democratic candidates who simply would not turn out for Hillary Clinton.
36
@E Holland, maybe. Or another interpretation is that this election is no longer a backlash against a black president, and is now a backlash against Trump. Or another interpretation is that people realized how important ACA provisions like preexisting conditions protections are to them. Or another interpretation is that voters were sick of the hate speech. Or another interpretation is that there was no polarizing figure to make up fake news stories about, which returns to your point.
6
@E Holland So not true, sir. She still won the popular vote by 3 million!!
2
The party that actually would do something for the average people and not the corporations could rule forever with huge margins in votes. The best friend of Democrats is the cruel and corporate slanted policies of the GOP and the opposite is also true. Every politician loves them some corporations and think of the people as those that must be fooled and manipulated. Unfortunately most people can be fooled and manipulated. I have been waiting for the awakening all my life but it never comes. I am left to believe that the people are mostly masochists who do not want to be treated with kindness and respect.
18
Trump will not self-destruct. He draws Democrats and the media into nasty, pointless conflicts to whip up his base and discourage the majority of Americans from participating. Stacey Abrams and Beto O’Rourke demonstrated, in spite of losing, that people respond to a progressive program and inspired moral leadership. The vast majority of Americans on both sides of the divide experience acute economic and cultural anxiety about their futures. Trumpers unite behind his white supremacy, sexism, and faked right-wing Christianity, while the opposition is a hodge-podge of professional class liberals and moderates, minorities, and other under-represented people. Democrats can peel away Trump supporters by advancing programs that help both their own base and Trumpers, while addressing minority and gender issues—Medicare for all, free college, a federal job guarantee in infrastructure rebuilding, treating undocumented immigrants as human beings with rights, ending the drug war and mass incarceration, supporting women’s health, ending militarist policies overseas.
46
"Trump Is Beginning to Lose His Grip"
I do believe Mr. Greenberg is understating this a tad about "beginning" a loss of grip.
Right after his inauguration and claims about the biggest crowd ever is when I knew we were in a lot of trouble. His incomplete sentences, inability to form a rational thought, his temper tantrums, and those incoherent god awful tweets at 3am.
I'm not sure he ever had a grip on anything.
648
@cherrylog754
Unfortunately, it's self serving comments like this that elected Trump. Snarkiness doesn't win elections.
@cherrylog754
He has a grip on how to continue most of his support, but, as this piece shows, some of that is eroding.
6
@cherrylog754
Not long ago the Times ran a story comparing Trump's statements and interviews from the past compared to his verbal nonsense today. He obviously has declined mentally.
30
Those in the "working class" --
My memory goes back to F.D.R. I was ill on the day he died and had stayed home from school When my mother, a school teacher, came home, I told her the news. She wept. She and my father (a high school dropout) were both "working people." Just about all of the folks I've known through a lifetime were also "working people." I'd even count the stage and movie stars, the musicians, artists, dancers and the wealthy mend and women I've known to be "working people."
Through the years many (sometimes most) "working people"
who voted cast ballots for Democrats. While some "working people" voted for Donald J. Trump -- and will persist in voting for him -- "working people" this time around continued to support Democrats -- only in greater numbers.
Just what are the differences between Trumpian "working people" and the rest of us?
Doug Giebel, Big Sandy, Montana
45
@Doug Giebel
Doug, I assume you are somewhere north of 70, maybe 80. I'm a tad north of 60 :)
My dad, a WWII Navy man born in 1921, was a "working class" guy. My mom didn't work ("outside the home" as they say, but worked plenty inside the home).
I think that he and many of his working class colleagues in the Mead paper mill or the other plants where we lived would be today's college graduates. But he was helping raise his 8 siblings and getting a job was more important than getting a degree, plus he had a good paycheck for the times, since all the money wasn't going to the 1% yet.
He was a Democrat born and bred (son of a coal miner), and he was smart. Many of his generation, who lived through the Depression, were happy to have a good paying job and two weeks a year of vacation. He could afford a house in the suburbs and a week at Myrtle Beach, plus a new car every 4-5 years.
And me, with my Ph.D, yeah, I'm working class, too, as a teacher.
Daddy would have never voted for Trump. He was way too smart for that.
The "Trumpian working people" are stuck in the 50s, I think. They're the ones who think government programs were great for white people, but rebelled when people of the color began to benefit from the help. That's my take.
26
@slim1921
We're both teachers, as my mother was a (genius) natural teacher, and it seems clear to me that the massive support for Trump shows how our nation's education has failed regarding curiosity, an interest in learning, a delight in enlightenment. I spent some years living in New York City and know what damage the Trump Organization has done there. For me at my regretful age, it is a time of profound sadness.
Thanks for your response.
dg
18
Yes and no. Democrats did well among particular groups and with an ability to Target candidates to specific districts. Whether they can beat Trump is a different question
5
Hopefully, voters will learn that integrity and character really do matter, regardless of location on the political spectrum. We are not looking for plaster saints, but Trump’s corruption is truly staggering. As a counterpoint to Michelle Obama’s view of pride in America, which I respect, i, with 22 years of military active duty, was never truly ashamed of my country, until Trump’s election. Yes, we made errors but our trend pointed towards doing better. We must take our country back from the corruption of unregulated greed.
418
@JSK "integrity and character really do matter." They have in the past and may again in the future if we in our nation return to our senses.
29
@Charles Burck In the very merry month of ‘may.’
Attempting to theorize the women's vote and the view of Trump between the 2016 Presidential election and the 2018 midterms is flawed. In 2016, many voted for Trump not because they were for him, but rather they could not come around and vote for Hillary Clinton. Trump was seen by many as the lesser of the two evils. These 2018 figures could very well be close to the 2016 numbers if Hillary wasn't ever in the picture. I'm not denying that some women of different backgrounds have turned against Trump, but I don't think it is to the degree that is being presented here.
3
@Steven Poulin, your theory is that these voters held their noses but still voted for him. Nevertheless, they supported him, however distasteful. I agree that many suburban GOP women turned against Trump in the midterms, but this means that their loyalty to the GOP no longer surpassed their distaste of Trump. I think that's important for 2020.
6
Trump faired better than the majority of past presidents during the midterm elections. This article seems to suggest otherwise, for whatever purpose.
8
@Don Q "Trump faired better than the majority of past presidents during the midterm elections."
Not true ... the size of the Democrat's House victory is the largest since Watergate and larger than the Tea Party victory of the Republicans in 2010. The outcome in the Senate was better for Democrats than expected. Given which seats were up in the election, a Republican gain of 2 or 3 should be disappointing to Republican party leadership. In 2020 the situation is reversed with more than twice as many Republican held seats than Democrat held seats up for election.
10
@Don Q No he didnt, and the Democrats had a much more limited field ot seats in play at due to polarization. They swept everything and all republicans have left are the boonies.
5
@Don Q Actually, Donald Trump lost more House seats to Democrats than any Republican president since the 1974 post-Watergate midterm elections.
4
The author has neglected to mention a ticking time bomb that should sink Trump, which is the trade war. Soybeans from the last crop are piled up on the ground. No place to store them as the grain elevators are full. Can't sell them. How are farmers going to make any money in 2019 if they haven't been able to sell what they harvested in 2018? Answer, they won't. We have seen interviews of several and they all say they still stand behind Trump. Give it another six months.
Manufacturing facilities are now under intense price pressure because Trump's tariffs have raised their input costs. They all have to compete in the global market. If their competitors can get cheaper input materials, then that gives them a huge price advantage on top of any reduced costs they currently enjoy. Give that another year.
People vote their wallets. Rural and red state Americans thought that Trump was going to fill theirs. He has not. After four years of hearing the words they want to hear, they are going to have to face the reality that their lot in life has not changed. These trends in voter abandonment of Trump will continue. However, at least one third of the nation will stand by Trump no matter what the financials are. They are the ones who are motivated by Trump's white nationalism. That's not a good thing, but that's what this nation has become.
1002
@Bruce Rozenblit People dont vote with their wallet. If that was true, outside of the 1%, they would never vote republican.
100
@Bruce Rozenblit You made many good points. The full effect of Trump tariffs on China have not been seen yet. American citizens have not yet understood that Trump tariffs on Chinese imports is a sales tax at the cash register for the average citizen shopper in America. The Trump "base" will not be moved even if they find themselves poorer and out of work. They will go to their country welfare office still proclaiming Trump helped them. There is no psychological reality to explain this phenomenon. Your are right, it is probably white nationalism. I wonder if these, usually white evangelicals or baptists, understand that their Jesus Christ was not a white person as depicted in many paintings from early christendom. He looked much like current ordinary persons in Iraq.
277
@Bruce Rozenblit
I cannot understand the assertion that people vote their wallets. It is manifestly not the case.
43
He is? First he was not on the ballot, it was not a presidential election, and the opponents had some success with socialist type opinions. And the headline is inappropriate, indicating some sort of mental difficulty. Typical of the NYT.
3
Trump WAS on the ballot. He said so himself. This election was in part a referendum on Trump. I think the results augur well for removing him in 2020.
452
@vulcanalex, what "socialist type opinions" had some success? Protections for preexisting conditions?
33
@vulcanalex
Trump said, "Make believe I'm on the ballot".
We did and voted Democratic.
25
Any woman who has raised a child recognizes the child in the Oval Office and is eager to see the end of this. The first step is electing some adults to counteract the overly-solicitous grandparents who have been letting the spoiled child have his way.
624
@Rocky
Remember when Republicans considered themselves "the adults in the room"?
17
@Rocky Mitch McConnell, who seems to be flying under the radar is the most egregious, democracy hating one of the lot. Not being held accountable in any way.
13
@Rocky I have a 3 year-old grandson who is offended by the comparison. He can't type yet, so asked me to comment.
11
In Trump’s head nothing is certain
Facts lie back of a Trumpian curtain
If there’s money involved
Bad facts are dissolved
If you follow them bankrolls are hurtin’
Murders are now so commonplace
A fact Heads of State must now face
Let’s not be dramatic
But far more pragmatic
Deals with murderers let’s not erase.
70
Even as someone who basically disdains every single thing this president has done thus far, I think the rebellion goes beyond Trump and involves the entire Republican party.
The bottom line, as shown in poll after poll is that the majority of Americans don't much like the lion's share of their policies, from top heavy tax cuts to allowing the NRA to actively fight sensible gun laws to battling Planned Parenthood and the ACA to threatening social services to their lack of support of education and refusal to deal with climate change that is already affecting huge swathes of the population.
It's not that the average person is secretly progressive; it's that the average people understand that they are living in 2018 and do not have the means or option of pretending otherwise simply because a fringe group of extremists and their rich and powerful enablers would prefer to go backwards.
710
@pixilated: That expression,"the lion's share", is widely misunderstood today. "The lion's share" isn't most of something, it's all of it, every little bit. That's how lions got to be apex predators.
That having been said, I agree that the lion's share of Trump's positions are repellent.
34
@George Moody. Thanks for explaining that distinction. In that context, the only person I can speak for is me. I hate the lion’s share of their policies, by which I mean all of them and it would only be slightly hyperbolic.
21
@George Moody Actually, lions don't eat every last bit. There's always a small amount left, even if just bones and tags of meat, for the smaller predators and birds of prey.
13
I'll discuss Texas. Texas at first glance would seem to be conservative, that isn't exactly correct. I believe native Texans such as myself tend to go for just right of center democrats , socially liberal/fiscally conservative (ok, I believe we have a responsibility to help those less fortunate.) Then there is the wave of Californians who have moved here that tend to vote blue. Austin, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio mid cities also vote democrat. I believe that if the election was based on this alone then democrats could win easily, however then we have to factor in the rural areas. These areas have been won over by the religious right, religion and politics are intertwined with the pulpit telling parishioners how to vote.
Beto O'Rourke broke the code to a certain extent, to win in Texas politics you have to speak directly to the person, you have to go to their church, coffee shop, speak to them and let them know who you are, that you aren't there to ruin their way of life, but make it better in some way. Yes getting rid of gerrymandering will help a lot, but democrats have to do the hard work and reach these people, speak in plain language how the policies will help them. Then democrats will start winning races
489
@Missy, your prescription for electoral success is (I'm not being disparaging!) old news, except to most politicians, including the DNC, who seem to think TV ads and big rallies are all that's needed. But many of those politicians lost, and the ones who did what you say did very well, including Beto.
65
@Thomas Zaslavsky I've seen politics in small and large city Texas. My take is that if a politician understands small town Texas politics, then you also understand Washington DC politics if you place it on a larger scale. A successful small town Texas politician will visit every church (mind you they only go on Christmas otherwise), every coffee shop, he or she will go to one doctor/dentist and send other family members to another, they take an interest in you as a person, they remember your name, you are special (until the election is over and they don't know you anymore.). When it is a tight race, you want to have the chief of police on your side as a friend to sit outside the bar your opponent is having a drink at to get them arrested for drunk driving when they come out. This is the case all the way down to the school board races...
56
@Missy Bless you my dear. Good analysis and most of us share that analysis. Texas is not monolithic in politics, although many persons, claiming to represent Texas, would like to project a different image which they have over the decades. Vote out the " good old boys" who represent the times of the Alamo and religious right groups and enter a better age in America. Texas can make a real difference in 2020.
68
Were it not for Republican gerrymandering and voter suppression, the Blue Wave would have been a tsunami.
1771
@MEM
The Democrats have massive power in the House, and Trump is living in fear and trembling as the truth and
facts that will come out during the House investigations.
Power is diminished with the light of publicity.
151
In my opinion, it was still a tsunami, and those candidates who “lost” due to voter suppression, such as Stacey Abrams, will thrive as the tsunami continues.
384
@Anna R She'll do even better work for our country by being the national voice for voting reform.
She's a terrific speaker, she has the perfect foil in Crooked Kramer and now she has an incredible platform to protect the voting rights of every American!
142
It's well and good but Democrats need to take this further by actually paying attention to rural concerns.
In 2016 during the elections when my co-workers snidely called middle-America fly-over country, that was the canary-in-the-coal-mine. While I voted Democrat like everyone else and was shocked when Trump won, my colleagues attitude disturbed me greatly.
Where is most of food produced? How are failing farms and consolidating agriculture not a concern? How is not having a diverse country of many productive states and cities not in our self-interest as a country?
The Democrat party MUST to be the party to advocate that they're the ONLY party that sets the ground rules. That means sharing the burdens and the spoils together.
59
@John, I'm somewhat ashamed of your coworkers. Even New Yorkers (of whom I'm one) should know better. But have some pity. The simple-minded slant of urban vs. rural and educated vs. uneducated,, though far from completely true, is so prevalent in most political analysis, it's hard to avoid being caught by it.
16
I'm from the east coast, and lived in Manhattan for several years. The people here in Iowa are a lot more politically savvy than your average New Yorker, both because of the generally better-educated population and because the caucuses are a quadrennial lesson in presidential politics. I say this even though the state went for Trump in 2016. In 2020, nominate for POTUS a moderate Democrat who understands Middle America (Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper would be an ideal choice) and Trump will lose...bigly.
28
@The Heartland
What, exactly, do Democrats,need to understand about rural America? And why should the country pay more attention to rural America than the rest of the country?
I hear this a lot, but rural America already gets an incredible deal from federal taxation and spending. My neighbors are paying way more than they are getting back and they have higher costs of living.
Rural areas are already over-represented and federally subsidized. What is the big complaint and what do you want us to do about it?
60
Here in Washington State, the economy is actually pretty easy to understand on a map. West of the Cascades, the economic drivers are primarily technology, manufacturing and construction. East of Cascades, it is primarily agriculture, more than 80% of which is exported.
Early season crop exports like cherries were totally wiped out by Trump's tariffs and late season exports like wheat are likely to follow the same path. The problems of technology transfer and theft that Trump is trying to solve with China through unilateral tariffs, are the same problems experienced by other countries. So naturally our farmers are unilaterally harmed by China's retaliatory tariffs.
So the economy east of the Cascades is taking a huge hit that will, in the best case, almost exclusively benefit the economy west of the Cascades. There is simply no upside for the east.
One would think this would lead to at least some questioning of the intense support for the GOP in the east, but the 2018 election results map looked just the same, deeper Blue west of the Cascades and solid Red in the east.
Red eastern Washington has only recently emerged from the devastating high unemployment of the Great Recession, which was typically twice as high as the west over the past decade. Its surprising that voters there continue to support the party that is about to deliver them into the next regional recession.
Its hard to understand.
784
Not to mention decimating the Mexican labor that the apple farmers and produce growers rely on. The voters that voted for Trump truly believed he would deliver them from the big bad boogie man that Trump made Obama out to be. And those voters just like sheeple followed the herd, safety in numbers, or a common hard line ideology at the very least, lulled into complacency by a con man that has never had a business that wasn’t funded by someone else’s money. Much less a successful business. Everything Trump has ever done has been gained at someone else’s expense literally, because for Trump it’s always been about the money.
By the time Trump is done the growing economy that was handed to him will more than likely be in a recession compounding the farmers problems in the Yakima valley and other farms on east side of the state. But isn’t this what they wanted, what seemed like a good idea at the time, but now isn’t, what does it hurt too much. But isn’t the pain now, going to be worth the massive gains we are all sure to get in the long run, aren’t trade wars easy to win. But isn’t this what they wanted, didn’t they want a lying, cheating, con man to fix all their ills, that were surely Obama and the democrats fault.
231
@Look Ahead
Eastern washington, like much of rural America, tends to demonize urban liberals while forgetting how much they benefitted from liberal programs of the previous generations, like rural electrification, hydroelectric projects, farm insurance, roads and highways, etc. These programs are paid fortaxes that are Disproportionately collected from higher population urban areas, in essence, a subsidy that transfers wealth from cities to farms. But liberals are easy to demonize and blame for the changes that rural residents see and are afraid of. The gop has been very effective at stoking and exploiting this fear of change and the liberals have largely ignored rural issues and their latent rural constituencies while pursuing more urban focused agendas. It will be hard for the Dems to gain ground in rural areas, but the dishonesty and corruption of the trump administration should make it easier.
393
Mr Look Ahead
Our farmers in eastern Washington are saying: "When does all the winning start?"
147
another article filled with numbers and claims and so on from a guy making a living selling this stuff.
Perhaps Mr. Greenberg did not notice who is in solid control of the Senate. It is the Republicans.
In this era of extreme gerrymandering and a Supreme Court likely to allow anything the right wants, articles like this are just a way of keeping his name in front of the candidates who need to hire a pollster. But is there any real meaning to be found? Nah...
13
@Mike T., you didn't pay close enough attention to the column. Mr. Greenberg is looking past who won, to how people voted. This strengthening or the Democratic vote, if it continues, is likely to pay off "big-league" in 2020.
59
@Mike T.
Perhaps Mike T. did not notice who is in control of the House. It is the Democrats.
Winter is coming.
10
@Mike T. This is boring. 26 of the 35 Senate seats up this time were Democratic, so a year ago people knew it would be virtually impossible for the Democrats to retake the Senate this time around. And gerrymandering has nothing to do with state wide races like the Senate. Voter suppression does, which is why the successful Florida initiative restoring voting rights to ex-felons was so important: Florida just turned Blue!
5
"In short, the Republicans lost badly in the House by running as an anti-immigrant party, while the Democrats made major gains as a self-confident multicultural party."
This piece gives me some cause for optimism after a rough two years, although the next two look even worse in terms of presidential storms and abuses of power.
But I like the fact that Democrats stopped apologizing for their beliefs--if national opinion polls are to be believed, a majority of Americans do want some sane gun controls, laws to protect the environment, laws to protect women's health privacy, protections for people of color and the LBGT community.
Most of all, they want decency and less polarization.
I have greater faith in the American people than I do in the corrupt politicians who pander to them as they continue to do the opposite of what people say they want.
1227
We do, no company ever founded in this country was put out of business because of taxes, or regulations. In fact for decades before Reagan allowed corporations to buy back their own stock, well before Nixon started lowering the corporate tax rates from the 70% range, corporations were still extremely successful. IBM, U.S. Steel. Xerox, Ford, have all been around for decades and they seemed to do fine, the Rockefeller’s, the Carnegie’s, the Henry Fords, of the world were hugely successful.
If we want our infrastructure repaired and maintained it has to be paid for, there’s an old adage, “You can pay now, or you can pay later. But the idea that the money will come out of thin air is, untrue. Republicans want to reduce taxes on corporations and the rich 1%, while making it easier for corporations to hide profits, and starve the government of money. Money for infrastructure, schools, healthcare, I believe that progressive voters understand that, but don’t trust the federal government with more money. But we can hold those we elect accountable, we’ve proved that this midterm and in past elections. In order for us to be the country politicians claim us to be, then we all have to pay for those things. Europeans have figured out, they would rather pay more in taxes, and have access to healthcare, safe infrastructure, a good education, one that isn’t monetized for the benefit of corporations. Because education, healthcare, are investments in this countries long term future.
399
@ChristineMcM Republicans had massive issues in the house, retirements and the typical mid term bias. Let's see if either or both parties can actually address our many issues. I bet unless Republicans can stay united they won't.
12
@James, thanks among other things for reminding me of the change in law that allowed corporate stock buy-backs. I believe there's something fundamentally dishonest about that; one reason is that it enhances the compensation of top executives.
174