Delaware Liberal

The October 11, 2016 Thread

Delaware Dem

PRESIDENT
NATIONAL–NBC News/WSJ–CLINTON 52, Trump 38

NATIONAL–PRRI/Atlantic–CLINTON 49, Trump 38
NATIONAL–NBC News/Survey Monkey–CLINTON 51, Trump 44
NATIONAL–Rasmussen–CLINTON 45, Trump 38
NATIONAL–Politico/Morning Consult–CLINTON 42, Trump 37
VIRGINIA–Roanoke College–CLINTON 45, Trump 36
NORTH CAROLINA–High Point–CLINTON 43, Trump 42
WISCONSIN–Loras–CLINTON 43, Trump 35
PENNSYLVANIA–Susquehanna–CLINTON 44, Trump 40

Body Language experts had some interesting reads on the debate on Sunday:

A body language expert said she was worried that Donald Trump might physically assault Hillary Clinton during Sunday night’s presidential debate. Janine Driver — a former investigator with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — said Trump loomed and lurked behind Clinton in response to her power move. “Look at what happens, Hillary is going to his side of the stage,” Driver said. “She’s standing in front of him — what’s he going to do? Sit down? Go to her seat?” Clinton effectively prevented Trump from interrupting her by standing in front of him, said Driver, president of the Body Language Institute and a frequent talk show guest.

“That’s her power move,” Driver said. Trump tried to lower his stress by pacing around behind Clinton, but she said his movement was also “a pre-assault indicator.”

Matt Yglesias says Republicans are realizing they are wrong:

But what Republican Party leaders — from formal party leaders like Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell to lesser elected officials and quasi-party people like the Chamber of Commerce — should be learning this weekend is that they were wrong.

Not that Trump made a mistake and he needs to apologize, but that they made a mistake and need to apologize. The evidence was there, in spades, all along for anyone who wanted to see. But partisan and ideological incentives made them not want to see. The audio is vivid and stark and cuts through that fog of wishful thinking and self-deception. The people whose eyes its opened shouldn’t be demanding apologies from Trump, they should be offering apologies for their role in letting him get much closer to the White House than he ever should have.

18,000 at Hillary’s Columbus event yesterday.

Josh Marshall:

[On Saturday], after I watched more of the heckling [of Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney and Joe Heck by Trump supporters] and saw Trump fixing on the same as a show of support for him, it occurred to me that the presidential race’s impact on Congress could be dramatically greater than we’ve imagined. This isn’t a matter of people being so deeply outraged about the tape. It’s more structural than that. The party leadership, at least as of last night, is in the midst of abandoning Trump. They’re not quite there yet. But they’re close. They probably saw overnight polls crating on Friday. I’ve seen various reports of private campaign polls registering this as a first response to the tape. It’s worth remembering that even 10% of Republicans moving away from Trump would show up in a big way on those reports. But seeing those polls, retreating to their own instinctive suspicion and in many cases hostility toward Trump, they didn’t give a lot of immediate thought to where the bulk of their voters stand. This poll makes pretty clear – as the booing and heckling did anecdotally – that they’re with Trump.

Some problems have no real solutions. The GOP’s relatively strong performance over recent months has been rooted in their ability to keep Trump and Anti-Trump or at least Non-Trump factions living under one roof. Not happily or comfortably, but still united behind one candidate and one list of congressional candidates. Given all that has happened that’s actually quite a feat.

That no longer seems possible now after the release of the tape. Key embattled senate candidates have already rejected Trump. For them there’s no going back. If Ryan and Co continue on their current path of cutting ties, that seems likely to spur an open and massive conflict within the party on the eve of the election. For anyone in a competitive seat, that’s going to create an impossible task. If the party is split down in the middle over Trump, how do a congressional candidate avoid sizable drop offs of support from one side or another in that conflict? I don’t see how you do.

Roxane Gay at The New York Times writes:

Hillary Clinton is dealing with a unique challenge — having to stay sharp with an incompetent opponent. She managed to remain on message throughout the debate. She offered several specifics while always clearly demarcating the difference between her and Mr. Trump. She demonstrated grace under pressure. And in the end, when asked to say something positive about her opponent, she reminded us of just how much she outclasses Mr. Trump as a political candidate. She complimented his children despite how easy and satisfying it would have been to say the truth — that no, there is nothing commendable about Donald Trump.

Yeah, she couldn’t have done that. The media would have taken her apart.

I have been making this point for a year: Hillary is the most transparent candidate to ever run for office. We know everything about her. We have read her emails and now we are reading her staff’s emails.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) says he will not pull back his late endorsement of Donald Trump, despite the release of a video showing the GOP nominee braggin about sexual assault, Politico reports. Said Cruz: “I am supporting the Republican nominee because I think Hillary Clinton is an absolute disaster. Now my differences with Donald, I have articulated at great length during the campaign. And I tried all my might.”

True on both counts (that I am a liberal sharing a George Will column, and that Trump can be a chemotherapy for the GOP, but only if the GOP has the courage to accept the treatment, and that is: cut the racists and the religious right loose by telling them you don’t want their votes).

“Top Democratic strategists are moving to capitalize on the extraordinary events of the last several days, now believing they have a real shot of retaking the House majority after a slew of Republican lawmakers renounced their support of Donald Trump over his lewd comments captured on video,” the Washington Post reports.

“Democrats are working quickly to ensure that no Republican lawmaker who has ever expressed support for their party’s presidential nominee can easily separate themselves from Trump following his 2005 comments about groping and kissing women in unwanted advances.”

Priorities USA, the leading super PAC trying to elect Hillary Clinton, “is preparing to expand beyond the presidential race and potentially run television ads focused on a handful of competitive Senate races,” CNN reports.

“According to a source familiar with the plans, Priorities USA is currently producing television ads to potentially air in Senate contests in North Carolina, Nevada, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania — all competitive races that are also battleground states for the presidential race.”

First Read: “You have a good chunk of the party criticizing Trump and demanding him to drop out of the race, and you have the other part (especially Trump’s supporters) fighting back. Thirty days before a national election, that hurts voter and volunteer morale, it dampens turnout, and it all makes it harder to win races up and down the ballot. When it becomes every politician for himself or herself — we saw this play out with Republicans in 2006, and with Democrats in 2014 — it usually doesn’t turn out well for that party.”

Washington Post: “Trump’s turbulent campaign, on display here at Sunday night’s second presidential debate with Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, has damaged far more than his own White House prospects. It threatens to diminish an entire generation of Republican leaders who stood by him and excused his behavior after attacks against women, the disabled, Latino immigrants, Muslim Americans, Syrian refugees, prisoners of war, Gold Star parents and others.”

Said GOP strategist Steve Schmidt: “There is nobody who holds any position of responsibility who in private conversations views Donald Trump as equipped mentally, morally and intellectually to be the president of the United States. But scores of Republican leaders have failed a fundamental test of moral courage and political leadership in not speaking truth to the American people about what is so obvious.”

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