Posted on 02/03/2016 3:46:42 PM PST by Kaslin
Former frontrunner Donald Trump came in second in Iowa for many reasons, but the biggest one is that he is widely disliked by most Americans.
A national survey by the respected Gallup Poll, which was ignored by the news media, found that Trump is the most unlikeable presidential candidate in either party in decades.
Trump is known for many things, his wealth, his gigantic ego and braggadocio, and his nasty insults of people he does not like. But most Americans have known him as the presidential candidate who led in all the polls for the GOP presidential nomination. Not anymore.
That was laid to rest last week by Frank Newport, Gallup's editor-in-chief, in an analysis he titled "Trump's Negative Image."
"Most political and media commentators have at this point installed Donald Trump as the GOP front-runner," he wrote last week.
"But this narrative tends to obscure the fact that Trump is the most unpopular candidate of either party when the entire U.S. population is taken into account -- and that he has a higher unfavorable rating than any nominated candidate from either of the two major parties going back to the 1992 election when we began to track favorability using the current format," Newport said.
"At this point (two-week average through Jan.27), 33% of Americans view Trump favorably and 60% unfavorably."
It the unfavorably that Newport focuses on, comparing it to the other presidential candidates in this election and past elections.
"Hillary Clinton currently has a 52% unfavorable rating among all Americans, while Jeb Bush is at 45%, Chris Christie 38 percent, Ted Cruz 37 percent, Marco Rubio 33 percent, Bernie Sanders 31 percent and Ben Carson 30%," he writes.
But Newport was curious to know how Trump's dismally unfavorable ratings "played out in the context of previous elections." So he went back compare them from 1992 to the current election.
"The bottom line is that Trump now has a higher unfavorable rating than any candidate at any time during all of these previous election cycles," he says.
And this conclusion "takes into account the fact that unfavorable ratings tend to rise in the heat of a general election campaign as the barbs, negative ads and heightened partisanship are taken to their highest levels," he adds.
Bill Clinton's highest unfavorable rating in 1992 was 49 percent in April and July of that year. President George H. W. Bush, his opponent, came closer to Trump's rating in October 1992, with a 57 percent unfavorable from Gallup.
Texas Gov. George W. Bush's unfavorable "never rose above 41% before the election" in November of 2000.
Barack Obama had a popular image throughout 2008, with an unfavorable rating no higher than 37%, while Sen. John McCain's unfavorable score was at 44 percent.
When Mitt Romney was running against Obama in 2012, they both had negative 48% ratings.
So the question is, can a presidential candidate who is seen as so unfavorably by a large majority of Americans -- 60 percent of them -- be nominated and elected by the majority of the Americans.
Right now, that seems in question in the GOP, with the narrow, come-from-behind win by Texas Sen. Ted Cruz in Iowa, with this large caveat.
Cruz, who has served in the Senate just a little more than three years, won Iowa's caucuses as a result of his support from the state's large, religiously evangelical community. But that's not going to be the case in a lot of other states.
Ask former governor Mike Huckabee of Arkansas and former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum who have both won Iowa's GOP presidential caucus before, but never went on to higher office after that.
Florida Marco Rubio's hopes were kept alive with his come-from-behind third place showing, the result of his strong performance in last week's Fox News debate.
Rubio dominated much of that event thanks to Trump's petulant decision to snub the show because he didn't want to subject himself to Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly who has strongly questioned him about his disrespectful and insulting treatment of women over the years.
Trump maintained that skipping the Des Moines' debate wouldn't hurt him because he was the program's biggest draw. Apparently, Iowa's voters thought otherwise.
But there was something far more important to Iowa's voters: their concern about the decline in religious values, according to entrance polls conducted at voting places.
The two top issues on which voters said they supported Cruz had to do with their beliefs as "born-again Christians" and that he was someone who "shares my values."
A recent Pew Research Poll found that many religious voters said Trump was among "the least religious" of any of the candidates.
His supporters, on the other hand, said he appealed to them because he "tells it like it is" and that he is "from outside the political establishment."
Recent polls have shown Trump with a significant lead in New Hampshire in the 27 percent range, followed by Cruz, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, former Florida governor and Rubio virtually tied at between 10 and 12 percent.
This means the GOP presidential campaign will likely last a while longer until one or more of the candidates can begin to show some broader strength in the key primaries to come.
After next week's New Hampshire contest on Feb. 9 comes the Nevada caucuses, and then the pivotal South Carolina primary, followed by Super Tuesday on March 1 where a dozen caucuses and primaries are at stake.
By that time, we should know the answer to the question
Gallup raises: Can Trump still win even though 60 percent of Americans don't like him?
“Thank you Mr Pollster man, I will say I support Trump while you give my details to La Raza to firebomb my house”. THank you Mr Pollster Trump is evil.
Flak = over target!
People rely on Facebook and late night comedy for “news.”
Trump can make his case directly to the American people as Reagan did.
All conservatives owe Trump for taking the heat and bringing up issues the RINOs didn’t have the balls to address.
And this, my FRiends, is why Donald TRUMP (PRAISE BE TO HIS NAME!) will never be President.
I think we’ll see who America really hates in the next several weeks.
I thought Gallup got out of the polling business because they weren’t sure they could get accurate results.
Fox trash talking Trump 24/7 what do you expect?
Trump has the highest poll numbers for 6 straight months.
Trump has by far the biggest crowds
Trump has the most Twitter, Facebook followers by far.
Lets see if Trump wins NH , SC and NV and how many vote for him.
I remember Reagan was going to blow up the world, and was so stupid, an actor, too old, they didn’t like him either.
They thought Reagan was too conservative.
All BS
Yep. Mr. Trump or Mrs. Clinton. And all that entails. Got my fingers crossed America figures out Right from wrong.
And the more Trump continues with the petty personal attacks and doesn’t stick to the issues or going after the Democrats, the more people will dislike him. 60% of the vote in Iowa went to Carson, Rubio and Cruz for a reason.
But he lost IA.... a state he was expected to win.
And now he wants a re-run there.
That’s not something you expect from a confident front-runner.
Trump has made a lot of enemies and has almost no friends.
Don’t be fooled by his rallies.
Mittens drew good-sized crowds in the 2012 general election campaign.
He still lost.
Tonight on FNC’s “The Five” Dana PeRino referred to Donald Trump as “Public Enemy Number One” and went on with the “Cruz-Dirty-Tricks/Marcomentum” meme Fox News has been pushing all day.
The GOPe/Media will decide who the Republican candidate is because - Why propaganda? Because it works.
This is nothing he can't over comb.
In the 1992 example cited, the candidate with the high unfavorables was G.H.W. Bush - and the only reason Bush lost was the third party bid by populist saboteur Ross Perot. I am not a Trump supporter, but this flood of “polling as news” is obviously designed to undermine his candidacy. If they destroy Trump, Cruz will be next in their sights.
I heard Trump likes to bulldoze old ladies houses and he personally aborts babies on 5th avenue
I wholeheartedly agree. If he had stuck to doing that he would have won Iowa in a walk. The bickering between him and Cruz help neither but I think in Iowa it hurt Donald more.
Cruz is already in there sights, they wanted him to win Iowa because they can still say that they (the media) are still in control.
Iowa was a power play between the media and Trump
If Trump won, we would have won the narrative that the establishment media was garbage.
But we lost, we like the establishment media telling us who to vote for, what to think, etc
Rubio is looking better and better. And once we elect him, the question of birthright citizenship will be answered once and for all.
Babies love the Trump & Trump loves the babies.
But he fires bad people like dogs.
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