Heck, I'm sick of this thread already! LOL
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I have read, in more than one place, that the suspicion is that Pence will take a stab at running against Trump.
That's a great point. It's like drafting a handcuff runningback in fantasy football. They'd never beat out the starter under normal circumstances (and no one will come remotely close to beating Trump in a primary if things stay the same), but if they get injured you're in great position.
I think Kasich might run. I also think the GOP establishment will forget their Marriage of convenience with Trump in a heartbeat if the going gets tough. Kasich would be the best bet for the GOP to hold the rust belt if Trump drops out. None of Kasich, Romney or Pence will inspire the masses though. Haley is the strongest candidate now imo but I think she has her eye on 2024 and won’t oppose Trump. But if he drops out, she’s the best bet to hold the establishment and the hard core Trumpers together.
The strongest Dem candidate is not running - Michelle Obama.
Just so we are all clear, Donald Trump's approval rating within the Republican Party is supposedly higher than any GOP president in history. Something like 85-90% of Republicans love him. The talk that they will cancel the entire primary schedule and just declare him the nominee is not some idle chit-chat, it could really happen and I doubt many GOPers would complain. All of us speculating about Romney, Flake, Kasich, and the such are likely really off base...
...unless something significant happens (like if some random 74 year old former FBI director were to publish a report with some interesting findings perhaps) that causes Trump's support to crumble. Until that day, I think we are guessing at something that has only a small chance of having any impact on the race.
-Jason "the notion that Pence would run against Trump is laughable... not gonna happen. Pence has been so vocal in his support of Trump, how would he even begin to make that turn?" Evans
Check Gallup's polls (and scroll down to "Donald Trump Job Approval by Party Identification").
-jk
That may be but my understanding of what skews these numbers is that the percentage of voters who identify themselves as Republicans has been shrinking. Not sure how that plays out in the primaries but someone might think he has a better chance of bringing independents back into the fold and give it a try.
Just because they approve doesn’t necessarily mean they want him re-elected:
https://www.thegazette.com/subject/n...-poll-20181203
Although presumably, a very liberal Democratic nominee might not give them a real choice.
The converse is also true. Just because they disapprove doesn’t mean they don’t want him re-elected, given the options. Can’t discount that dynamic. Trump’s base was very motivated in 2016 and likely will be again. But there was another piece: a large group of voters that disapproved of him personally but still voted for him anyway.
The question then is what happens to those voters that disapprove of him personally in 2020? Will the alternative drive them to do the same in Wisconsin, Pa, and Michigan as it did in 2016?
Because policy-wise, Trump has largely delivered on the mainstream conservative agenda: tax cuts, Supreme Court nominees, roll backs on regulations. It seems there’s plenty to be happy with for R’s, even if they strongly dislike the man himself.
Point being: I’m with Jason. I just don’t see a challenge from the right happening (notwithstanding something extraordinary from the Mueller investigation), and I’m not sure approval/disapproval ratings are a reliable gauge of revealed voter preferences anyway.
The biggest question is not how much a voter dislikes Trump, it's how much they dislike Trump compared to how much they dislike the Democratic alternative. We answered this question in 2016 with regards to Hillary.
The Democrats would be well served to find a moderate Democrat in the mold of Liebermann or Nelson that will appeal to those who dislike Trump but will see him as the lesser of two evils. Unfortunately, moderates don't do well in primaries. Maybe with more "open" primaries and an electorate trending more and more independent, a moderate candidate could make a push?
I would like to point to the new girlfriend/boyfriend effect. In basketball we might know this as freshman potential. Yes, I know I'm mixing metaphors and genders here, but bear with me.
In 2016 Hillary was the old known interest and Trump was the new interest with unlimited potential. In 2020 Trump will be the old, known one. That romantic longing for the new can be significant.
Countering that would be the "my team" effect where a voter would stick with the team regardless of specific candidate. We all know this is significant and decreases the number of "swingers."
How will the swingers swing this next time? At this point I don't have answers, but I expect it won't be at all like a Hallmark movie.
Lieberman? Hahahaha. Democrats would get absolutely trounced at all levels with someone like that at the top of the ticket. They'd lose dog-catcher elections.
Democrats nominated a moderate last time. She lost. I don't think it's about where a candidate falls on the left/right spectrum, but whether the candidate can capture peoples' imagination. Look at the candidates that have actually generated excitement and brought people to the polls - I think that's the likelier model going forward: overcoming the systemic biases against voting by generating significant excitement to actually vote. Nelson and Liberman ain't that. Someone like Beto is.
I apologize, I wasn't suggesting they run or that their personalities were a good fit to running.
On second thought, the Republicans did try it with McCain and that didn't end well...though in his defense, as you said he was up against a candidate that generated excitement and brought people to the polls.
Unfortunately for his dozens of national supporters, Joe Lieberman probably killed his chances in 2020 yesterday, when he formally registered as a foreign lobbyist (for a Chinese telecom).