Posted on 08/30/2015 9:07:14 AM PDT by LS
Today, many reporters and political observers are scratching holes in their heads wondering how Donald Trump not only has maintained his lead in almost every state, unbroken, but has now done the politically impossible and reversed his "unfavorable/favorable" numbers.
Except "reversed" doesn't quite explain the astounding (to some people) inversion of the numbers. As Washington Post's Chris Cilizza gasped, Trump went from 27% favorable/63% unfavorable in the May Des Moines Register poll to 61% favorable/35% unfavorable in the latest poll. But it's not the only one. Several other national and state polls have mirrored this tectonic shift.
Pollsters and focus-groupers, like Frank Luntz, are befuddled.
It would be breathtaking under normal political circumstances. But in Trump's case, it merely reflects an absolute, total failure on the part of the media elites and the consultant class to understand those "unfavorables" all along.These numbers, after all, were the pundity's and the GOPe's ace in the hole against Trump. After all, they claimed, regardless of how many polls Trump led in, he was "unelectable" because of his "high unfavorables." Next candidate . . . .
Their claim would be true of any other candidate---Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Hillary Clinton, or even Ben Carson. But with Trump they always concealed something else.
Let me digress with an illustration. My son used to love WWF. He collected all the toys, and one of the main WWF characters was a fellow named "The Undertaker." He got roundly booed (yes, I attended a WWF event and noticed plenty of accountant and lawyer types there too). People "hated" the Undertaker. If there had been a favorable/unfavorable poll at a WWF event, the Undertaker would have been 10/90. Yet people actually loved him. They knew he was playing a necessary role. They paid good money to see him. Later in Hulk Hogan's career, he briefly shifted over from the role of hero to villain. I'm sure his unfavorables similarly zig-zagged until he again became a hero.
People, used to "reality television" and "The Apprentice," loved to give The Donald "unfavorable" reviews, but still loved him. They ALWAYS knew his scowl was an act, that his supposed egotism and narcissism was part of the show. Once it became acceptable to cheer for the Undertaker, they did it.
While not to the same degree, the presumed "unfavorables" with Hispanics will show much of the same shift, as is already apparent in polls of GOP Hispanics, where Trump wins 35-40% as the first-place candidate.
But there is something else as well. What has allowed people to cheer for the Undertaker, to "come out" as favorable to Trump? It has a great deal to do with his constant touring and speachmaking to live audiences. He speaks from the heart, never using notes or teleprompters. He takes every question---yes, even from the rude Jorge Ramos. I'll repeat, unlike the defensive and elusive Hillary Clinton, he takes every question. He tells a different personal story at every event. Through these events, people have seen the "real" Donald Trump. When he says, "I'm really rich," people turn to each other with an elbow jab or wink. It's part of the Undertaker's act. They know it, and Trump KNOWS that they know it.
What is most troubling is not that the drive-by media and consultants and GOPe class are so shocked by the shift, but that after more than two full months of hurling dung at the Vibraniam Man, it not only doesn't stick but it flies back at the attacker. (For those of you who don't know, Vibranium in Captain America's shield repels energy).
Let's hope the consultant class continues to think Trump's unique ability to radically flip the numbers came from some super-secret strategy. They will search for that like the Seven Cities for the remainder of the primary season.
Yes!
A nephew despised him (then) with a hilarious passion LOL!
I’ll buy that....Trump and The Undertaker are two of a kind
Could be that the early polls were projecting to tamp down the ground swell. Well, that didn’t work out for the commies now did it?
Agreed!
The whole matter reminds me of the ATT fiasco after their breakup.
After ATT managed to outperform all their daughter companies post-breakup, they became abusive to their customers.
Seems the wizards of smart forgot the reason they were so big was because so many people chose to do business with them instead of inferior providers. As they too became inferior providers, their market share reflected that fact. So much so, at one point they were considering getting out of the consumer market, completely.
Personally, I think the numbers flipping comes from people changing their minds about how serious Trump is about what he's saying.
The media soon to get frantic. The brainwashing is not working anymore.
More and more people, on both sides of the equation, are getting wise to the Authoritarians’ game. No amount of spin will put that anger back down. They can only hope to direct it away from themselves.
Hmm. Extremely interesting! It raises a couple of logical questions for my next philosophy seminar:
Can a non-actor be so good at acting that he fools the real actors (i.e., the MSM) into thinking he's actually an actor?
Or will the MSM's real actors be so perceptive that they'll know he's "just acting" the part of being a skilled actor, as opposed to his truly BEING an actor?
PS: Best not to say it would depend on what the meaning of "be" might be. That would be too much like a Clintonesque cop-out.
First of all, it doesn’t take much to fool the type of people who make up most of the talent pool of the MSM these days. They’re not the sharpest knives in the drawer.
Secondly, they’re so wound up in the artificial virtual moral universe they’ve created for themselves they don’t know whether to excrement or go blind. There are so many arbitrary rules about “who we must love” and “who we must hate” and “who we must ignore” and “who we must suppress” that they literally don’t know whether they’re coming or going. Trump doesn’t play along, so he can cut through all that.
Bflr.
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