A thought for Sunday: Trump is stomping all over the GOP’s message
A thought for Sunday: Trump is stomping all over the GOP’s message
If the Congressional GOP had their druthers, they would probably like the autumn mid-term narrative to be about a strong economy, low unemployment, a tax cut, and a big increase in military funding. In vulnerable districts, they’d like to run on local issues, as would GOPers running for state and local offices.
But I knew that was never going to happen, because Trump wants the spotlight to be on him and him alone, 24/7 and always.
So it was inevitable that he was going to stomp all over whatever narrative the GOP wanted to tell, with controversey after controversy after controversy.
And look, according to Gallup, what it’s done to his approval numbers:
He’s right back at the low point he was last December before the tax cut brought the country club wing of the GOP back home. His high point was the summit with North Korea’s Kim in June. But this was immediately followed by the disastrous Helsinki summit with Putin, and recently by a very unpopular nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the US Supreme Court. After last week, one almost wonders if the GOP is aiming to get exactly zero votes from any woman anywhere.
This isn’t going to change in the remaining five weeks before ethe midterm elections. Trump is going to keep on creating new controversies, stomping all over any othe news. He will ensure that he is the only issue on the ballot, for races all the way down to dog catcher.
The tell here will be watching how many GOP candidates put POTUS on their “please don’t help” list. I expect a lot more rallies this month; he clearly loves doing them as part of that “me me me 24/7” thing he has going on.
Here in TX it’s clear Beto has Cruz scared. The attack ads are saturating every TV channel and GOP operatives have been identified stealing Beto signs from people’s yards even in deep red areas.
I’d wager cash money if one of Trump’s rallies comes anywhere in the state of TX Cruz is likely to be “unavailable” on the stage due to “previous commitments” or “needs to be in DC for Senate votes”.
Ah, the strong economy myth that basically is a BLS illusion due to its poor methods of data collection leading toward data collisions and confusion among the data.
Oh yeah, withdrawal from the USMC now. It is worse than the TPP’s “NAFTA renegotiations”. Lesson for Jim and others that post on here, yes, Trump can make it worse.
And now I see this happened. https://www.timesrecordnews.com/story/news/local/2018/10/02/cruz-rally-organizers-scramble-more-space-wichita-falls-mpec/1498222002/
Apparently don jr appeared with Cruz so maybe he is tying himself to trump. Or desperate. A poll today has him behind by 3 points.
Here is a story indicating that Cruz will appear with Trump later this month: https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news-campaigns/410027-orourke-not-interested-in-obama-endorsement
So I apparently misread either Cruz or Trump’s popularity here. But the general flavor of Cruz’s campaign smacks of desperation. Quite possibly wishful thinking on my part but I can’t help believing that Beto O’Rourke has a genuine chance to win the TX Senate seat.
Which would be great, but I hold no illusions regarding the kind of democratic senator he will be. He wouldn’t be caught dead speaking to a labor convention for example.
He’s got my early vote and I hope he wins if for no other reason than the optics: Deep Red TX elects Democratic Senator. And win or lose I am confident he is making the GOP spend a lot of resources here they probably didn’t plan. As if that were a limitation but anyway….