Electability: Who Does Best Against Hillary or Sanders

Townhall ^ | 02/18/2016 | Rich Galen

[SeekAndFind]

• The establishment wing of the Republican party has been banking on the fact that once voters begin to focus on who can win in the Fall - electability - then they will see the folly of voting for Donald Trump and will turn to Marco Rubio, John Kasich, Jeb Bush or, Ted Cruz.

• The problem with that - one of the problems - is this: The Democratic field is so weak that Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, or John Kasich beats either Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders. Or, at least fights them to a tie. The only break in the pattern is Cruz vs. Sanders as the chart below shows. (The poll only tested the four Republicans listed).

• According to a USA Today poll the head-to-head match ups look like this:

  Trump - Clinton: Trump 45-43
  

  Trump - Sanders: Trump 44-43

  Cruz - Clinton: Cruz 45-44
  Cruz - Sanders: Sanders 44-42

  Rubio - Clinton: Rubio 48-42
  Rubio - Sanders: Rubio 46-42

  Kasich - Clinton: Kasich 49-38
  Kasich - Sanders: Kasich 44-41

• The point is, electability is not an issue in the GOP field. According to this poll, whichever of these four candidates comes out of Cleveland as the nominee has an excellent shot at winning the election in the fall.
• Another poll released yesterday was the Wall Street Journal/NBC poll that showed Ted Cruz with a two percentage point lead over Donald Trump

• The results are here (the first number is the latest percentage, the number in parentheses is from January's poll)

  Cruz - 28 (20)
  

  Trump - 26 (33)
  Rubio - 17 (13)
  Kasich - 11 (3)
  Carson - 10 (12)
  Bush - 4 (5)

• In this poll, Cruz gained eight percentage points while Trump lost seven - a 15 point swing. As the pollsters said there is no way to tell whether these results are the beginning of a new trend, or are a "flash-in-the-pan" that will readjust next month.

• Keep in mind these are national polls and we don't have a national primary. We don't even have a national general election. The November election will be fought in 51 individual elections (the District of Columbia gets 3 Electoral votes).

• On the other side of the aisle, a CNN survey shows Bernie Sanders has pulled into a tie with Hillary Clinton in Nevada whose caucuses will be held this Saturday.

  SIDEBAR

  The Democratic caucuses in Nevada and the Republican South Carolina primary are this Saturday. The Republican caucuses in Nevada are onTuesday, February 23 while the Democratic South Carolina primary isSaturday, the 27th.

  END SIDEBAR

• If Sanders wins look for the Clinton team to point out that these are non-binding caucuses (on the D side) which is true, but will hardly soothe the sting of losing a state in which Clinton held a double-digit lead a few months ago.

• Hillary Clinton and her campaign are showing signs of panic. Hoping Sanders would get laughed off the stage hasn't worked, so now Hillary Clinton appears to be trying to shout him down.

• Clinton's volume on the stump now reminds me of a garage band that has turned the volume knobs on their guitars up to 11.

• Getting back to that WSJ/NBC poll, Ben Carson is hanging in with 10 percent of the vote. I don't know this for a fact, but I'm willing to bet a pretty expensive lunch that the Cruz team is looking for a way to convince the Carson team that it is time for Dr. Ben to get out of the race.

• It is likely that a high percentage of Carson's voters would gravitate to Cruz helping him to consolidate the Evangelical vote and maybe open up some daylight between Cruz and Trump.

• At four percent in the national poll, Jeb Bush looks like he's about done, but it will depend upon how he fares this Saturday in South Carolina.

• The betting line is for Trump to win going away and if he does, there is probably no room for Bush to stay in the race. But, should Cruz and/or Rubio upset Trump, then the race becomes roiled enough for Bush to stay in through the March 1 Super Tuesday races and take his chances.

• It looks like the races for the nomination are going to be close on both sides, and the race for the White House might be even closer.

  Lad Link: Here's The Lad's (@ReedGalen) surveys the landscape including the effects of Justice Scalia's death, the FBI vs Apple, and the possibility of a third party race by Michael Bloomberg. Click HERE.

• On the Secret Decoder Ring page today: Links to the WSJ/NBC poll and the USA Today poll. Also, the permanent link to the primary and caucus calendar.

  The Mullfoto is a wistful look at a long-time shop in Old Town forced out of business because it couldn't compete with the Internet.

[MNJohnnie]

At this point in 2004 Bush was 12 points behind Kerry.

Pure idiocy to try and argue about “electablity” based on polls 9 months before an election

[Lurkinanloomin]

Does everybody remember how electable McCain and Romney were?

It was a stupid argument then and it’s a stupid argument now.

[Fester Chugabrew]

Dog catcher.

[TangledUpInBlue]

Bernie will not get the nomination because he can’t win and the Dems know that.

Trump would be able to beat Hillary and so would Rubio. I know a lot of Dem/leaning people that are just aching to find someone other than Hillary to vote for. Rubio would seal it for them.

No one else would beat Hillary. Write it down.

[Kipp]

Pure idiocy to try and argue about “electablity” based on polls 9 months before an election

True.

[cuban leaf]

If we lived in a sane world, your barista could beat Hillary or Bernie.

This nation is getting exactly what it deserves, as do all democracies - eventually.

[VanDeKoik]

Carter and Dukakis led by massive numbers.

Oddly enough the same people that keep repeating this meme about electability 9 months in the future, are the same people that tell us to not trust the polls for a primary 2 days from now.

[Buckeye McFrog]

the hidden nugget: Bernie is a stronger candidate in the general election than Hildebeast.

[cuban leaf]

Yep. We are going to be in a very different world in November.

[fireman15]

The poll is also an outlier at this point... we will know in a couple of days if it had any predictive value as to which way things are going.

[Mr. Mojo]

Ben Carson is hanging in with 10 percent of the vote. I don't know this for a fact, but I'm willing to bet a pretty expensive lunch that the Cruz team is looking for a way to convince the Carson team that it is time for Dr. Ben to get out of the race.

Yes, but it'll be more difficult to get Carson's supporters after what happened between the two in Iowa. Cruz should've stayed away from Carson like the plague -- he didn't need those email flyers to beat him in Iowa. But he sure needs his supporters now. Bad tactical move.

[TexasCajun]

If based USA Today readers, I see why Kasich & Rubio do well.

[GOPJ]

The NBC WSJ poll was a fraud... they overweighted on section of the Republican vote... intentionally throwing it off.

The fraud helps the GOPe... I suspect that’s the poll that was sited here.

[Sooth2222]

"the hidden nugget: Bernie is a stronger candidate in the general election than Hildebeast."

Does the poll ask what percentage of Bernie's supporters support him because he's not either Hillary or Trump? And what percentage of Bernie's supporters (outside of Vermont, and outside of the clouds of marijuana smoke) understand what a crazy moonbat he is? And what will they do when Hillary inevitably steals the nomination with her superdelegates?

What I take away is that a Republican seems to be more electable than a particular Democrat who has been on the national stage for almost 25 years now.

[GOPJ]

The NBC/ WSJ poll was a fraud... they overweighted one section of the Republican vote... intentionally throwing it off.

This poll fraud helps the GOPe... I suspect that’s the poll that was sited in this piece.

NBC also doctored tapes some time back... always consider the source.

[Sybeck1]

What states can Cruz win if he is 20 points behind in deep red SC?

[Parley Baer]

“According to a USA Today poll”

Of course the date of the USA Today poll is not given. Trump will crush Hillary.

[SeekAndFind]

RE: What states can Cruz win if he is 20 points behind in deep red SC?

If it is the general elections against Hillary? I am DEAD SURE that he wins in SC.

Let’s not forget, Trump is currently at between 35 to 39% in SC. Which tells us that 61% are NOT for Trump.

Should the GOP field be cut down finally to either Trump or Cruz or even Rubio, ALL THREE OF THEM will beat Hillary in SC.

NY is another story. Trump has the best chance of beating Hillary int hat state ( but I still doubt it ).

[Mr. Mojo]

And what percentage of Bernie's supporters (outside of Vermont, and outside of the clouds of marijuana smoke) understand what a crazy moonbat he is?

There are a lot of crazy moonbats in our nation nowadays, thanks to the ubiquity of moonbattery in academia. Most of Bernie's supporters nationwide know exactly what they're getting. They're just too ignorant to know how destructive their own views are.