It looks like things are looking very bright for Trump tonight. To me, the election turns on the extent to which Trump has brought about an electoral realignment around a nationalist/populist agenda of protectionism, anti-illegal immigration and strict regulation of immigrants from countries dominated by Islamic extremists. The key, as always, involves the movement of the white working class.
I have always fought for the white working class, even back in the days when I was a young Marxist socialist, http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2016/10/an_alexis_de_tocqueville_for_our_time.html Coming from a poor family, I was a Democrat deep into my twenties. I think I was among the first to bail on the Democrat party, however, once I figured out its hostility to young white men like me back in the mid-1980s.
Affirmative action was one of the first big hints that Democrats did not care whether I lived or died. Since then, I think it is safe to say that hostility to young whites has increased astronomically since then, even at places like Williams College.
Early signs seem to indicate that there is a surge of white working class voters, a lower than normal turnout for African-Americans and reasonable hope that the Hispanic voters who are turning out are not lock-step in line with Hillary. I do not think, for example, that Hispanic voters will be too pleased to realize that the Clinton crowd is into the whole spirit cooking nonsense.
Trump is ahead in the best poll in the business, IBD/TIPP, which shows Trump ahead by 2 points. See, http://www.investors.com/politics/trump-holds-2-point-lead-over-clinton-as-election-day-arrives-final-ibd-tipp-poll-results/
Their model is weighted by the extra enthusiasm of Trump voters and low enthusiasm for Hillary among Democrats. I’m certainly feeling quite confident this afternoon. As I predicted earlier, the high level of undecided voters in this election would soon come to an end and those undecided voters would most likely break against the incumbent, i.e. Hillary Clinton.
As for the electoral college, Hillary’s advantage there is actually quite slender and should easily be breached by a higher popular vote for Trump.I guess I’m cautiously bullish on Trump there too. I’m giving him FL, NC and OH. I just don’t think Republicans can ever win in PA. I would love to see him win in MI, but I don’t think he has the votes. I feel like NV is lost. I put him over by giving him NH. I’m expecting 265 electoral votes for Hillary and 272 for Trump. Here’s what my map looks like:
One of the most amazing bright spots for Trump today is that The Democracy Institute, the only public poll to correctly predict Brexit, published a poll on Monday showing Donald Trump leading Hillary Clinton by five points.
According to their press release, in the survey conducted Nov. 3 to Nov. 6 with 1,390 likely voters, Trump leads Clinton 50 percent to 45 percent. The results have a 2.5 percent margin of error.
The bottom line for me is that the size of the victory, for either Trump or Hillary, matters a lot in terms of setting a mandate for the next president. A big victory for Trump would show a significant electoral realignment. The same would be true for Hillary.
I wish I could be more confident about Trump’s chances, but I’m totally flummoxed by polling right now. The polls showed Romney winning and I totally believed them at the time, as did the Romney campaign. Now, I have less confidence in polling. I’m afraid people don’t even answer their cell phone or landline any more unless they recognize the phone number. Maybe there are going to be better, more reliable ways to predict voting behavior in the future?John C. Drew, Ph.D. is an award-winning political scientist.
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