Wednesday 9 November 2016

Donald Trump's very tight margin of victory

http://static2.politico.com/dims4/default/59556d6/2147483647/resize/1160x%3E/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fstatic.politico.com%2Fa8%2F12%2F2c19681c46d185d4cc7385aa5175%2F20160128-donald-trump-3-ap-1160.jpg
Hillary Clinton - 228

Donald J. Trump - 279 
 270 to win.
A pretty impressive margin at first glance. Democrats are wiped away.  And a very similar rerun to Brexit. 
Wrong polls: Hillary was 5% ahead in polls and still  95% certain to win on betting markets at midnight.  
PaddyPower had foolishly paid out on her victory weeks before the election.
Misinterpreted data. Exit polls showed 'the economy' and not 'immigration' was the most given reason for voting which is seen as good news for Hilary Clinton. 
Why would that be good for Hillary? It was obvious that the question asked was being answered as 'jobs' and not 'the wider economy'. You only had to watch two minutes of those being interviewed. 
Group think assumptions.  Latino's, black Americans and women are all voting Democrat.  
Why would Republican women, suddenly start voting for Clinton? The level of female support for Republicans is around 36-37%. That didn't move. And why would it?
 
Received Wisdom - The Democrat's ground game and Clinton's superior election experience will ensure more turnout for her than for Trump.
 Which ignored the near empty Clinton rallies and the Farage/Corbyn level of mob attendance at Trump ones. Why wouldn't those people be enthused to vote. As at Brexit. And for much the same reasons.
 When will they learn. eh? Probably going to need a le Pen presidency before it really sinks in.

228 - 279 is very impressive . Trump has the Whitehouse. Both Houses of Congress and the Supreme Court on his side. If he wants to build, he can build a wall.

The surprise and scale of Trump's unexpected victory has meant that people have overlooked one quite important point. he very, very nearly lost.

Florida - An absolubte, no question, must win Trump state, was won by the Republican with 4,605,515 votes to 4,485,745.  out of  some 9 million votes the winning margin was 119,770.
The seats that took him to victory, and made sure the Democrats could no longer win were Wisconsin and Michigan. And the ultimate surprise, Pennsylvania. A 'swing state' that has not swung since Bill was greeting interns at the White House
 Pennsylvania . Trump - 2,912,941. Clinton - 2,844,705. - a decent 68,000 majority. however The 3rd candidate had 112,000 votes.
 Wisconsin.  Democrat voting since Ronald Reagan left office. 1,409,467  Republican. 
1,382,310 Democrat.
27,157 victory margin. The 1% !

Michigan.  Democrat since Bush the elder fell from office to usher in the other Clinton, has had 5-15% democrat margins of victory since 1992.
2,279,210 - Trump. 2,267,373 Clinton. 
4.5 million votes. Margin - 11,800 votes. A Gordon Brown zero % win level of victory.
 Those 3 states, just a few thousand homeless voters down the polling station, and that would be a Clinton presidency under their hybrid, first past the post system.

So a Remoaner style argument of  a tiny majority for Trump from people who didn't know what they were voting for could conceivably be made quite convincingly. Especially if the assumption that third party candidate votes should have gone to Clinton is made, however speculatively.
That would explain the damaging, unexpected, and in the words of Margaret Beckett today 'Horrifying and terrifying specter of Donald Trump in the Whitehouse.'
And would conveniently ignore the facts that the Democrats had a very unpopular candidate who took months and months longer than expected to lock down her own nomination. 
Had 30 years of political baggage, stored in a closet with more skeletons than Vincent Price and more scandal than a Profumo romp. 
Who couldn't get out the vote, even among Hispanics and women who had been subject to constant Trump abuse and or threats of deportation. Even going as far as promising to build a wall to keep them out once he'd booted them from America.  
Who never managed to explain why she deleted 30,000 yoga class reminders on her private email server or where her millions of dollars mixed  in private-government-charitable companies came from.  
Who offered nothing more than a status quo, third term Obama, with a bit more war. Who refused to even debate concerns on immigration or the direction of the economy. 
Who exuded a sense of elitist entitlement. Of self virtue and self righteous preaching and ivy league disdain for any opposing illiberal views.
Who seemed to believe should be President of America because she was a woman.. and had waited a heck of a long time.. and it was her damn turn!
 Someone so unpopular that a rich TV host could come from nowhere. Say anything he liked, no matter how discourteous or outrageous. Stand for office without even the support of his own political party. Alienate half of America and have western democracies debating in parliament whether he should be banned from ever entering their countries, and STILL beat her..
That might have had something to do with it.

24 comments:

Blue Eyes said...

People are saying "Clinton won the popular vote"! Or, at least, some people who are trying to have the referendum result ignored are saying "Clinton won the popular vote"!

Blue Eyes said...

As to your point, I find it incredible that Obama's legacy is such that Americans enthusiastically elected a candidate like Trump. He makes John McCain look like a well-informed liberal. And yet the voters gave him a Republican Congress to deal with.

What will he do? Scrap Obamacare? Cut taxes to the bone? Do all the Tea Party small government stuff? He has an opportunity to reform that few presidents are given. Obama had that chance and totally blew it.

Y Ddraig Goch said...

Fair enough, Trump's victory was a near thing and the electoral college worked in his favour ...

and yet ...

Romney utterly failed to win any of those rust-belt states, losing by clear-cut margins.

And he did this despite enjoying the full-scale, whole-hearted support of the Republican party establishment.

Trump's victory wasn't just over Hilary Clinton - it was also over the GOP hierarchy, almost all of whom opposed him and supported her.

Nick Drew said...

worth going back and reading some of Scott Adams' stuff, if my earlier recommendation didn't hook you

http://blog.dilbert.com/

Electro-Kevin said...

"Alienate half of America and *have western democracies debating in parliament whether he should be banned from ever entering their countries*, and STILL beat her.."

Only because our countries are afflicted with 'progressive' Lefty politicians and their psychophantic celebrities and broadcast media too.

Only this morning a BBC reporter was virtually saying it better be 'soft' Trump if he's to have any chance of quelling the Millenial rioters.

I'm actually ashamed of the BBC and press such as The London Evening Standard in their treatment of the President Elect. They do not speak for me nor my country but you'd really think so.

dearieme said...

I can't believe that Beckett said "specter".

CityUnslicker said...

she meant Spectre DR, like in James Bond...

Also my take is the polls were right - 80% of the time with this vote spread Clinton would win. Just the piling up of votes in NY and LA did for her, much like London does for Labour in the UK.

Steven_L said...

Not many swamps in ny or la, 'drain the swamp' clinched it.

Bill Quango MP said...

Just seen that our Political Betting friends ( available from our sidebar), have also spotted this spear tip of the Trump victory.
But they have drilled down into the historic voter numbers. This reinforces my conclusion that it was more a case of a weak Hillary than a powerful Trump that allowed him to win.

Crooked lost tens of thousands of votes compared to Obama, in Ohio, Wisconsin and Michigan. Trump does just slightly worse than Romney did in 2012.
Pennsylvania is a big trump surge and a modest Clinton fall in vote share. Thst allowed the Donald in.

So, Trump won because Hillary lost.
And there doesn't appear to be too much if the Lynton Crosby genius behind it all. Clinton, the establishment candidate for the anti-establishment age, was just not very popular outside the liberal bubble.

,

Bill Quango MP said...

Also , if you see Bloomberg today, Sarkozy is explaining that France would have to work with , and embrace, the upstarts of Britain and America. He is trying to position himself as the figure who can upset the old order and bring prosperity again to France.

I don't think anyone has yet told him that he actually won't be the anti establishment candidate in that election.

Anonymous said...

Anyone looked at Trump's tweet history?

Feb 7, 2013 -

Michael Steinberg - "If you hate America so much, you should run for President and fix things"

Trump - "Be careful!"

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cw2WwpUWQAEEWii.jpg


It serves the Dems right IMHO for dropping the popular candidate in favour of the paid-for candidate. When you think Hillary could only pull a few hundred to hear her speak, when Trump and Sanders had overflowing stadia, you realise Goldman and Citibank weren't paying that money for her oratory when she addressed them. They were paying in advance for favours. Open corruption that the media glossed over.

We'll soon see what her speaking fees are like when donors know she has no political future, she'll be lucky to get expenses!

Electro-Kevin said...

Three things from this post:

- "Clinton was so disliked ..." Well, she was the establishment.

- "Trump did not have the support of his party..." Well, they were the establishment

- "Foreign govenments considering barring Trump from visits..." Well, they are the establishment


We are over analysing here. This talk of how fine the the majority was; it is a shocker that anti politics has risen from (apparently) nowhere to such a size, in all states (and, moreover, in key states) that it has managed to defeat both the Democrats AND Republicans in open election, causing 'liberal' rulers across the 'free' world to recoil and express their disgust either openly or via the press/broadcasters that are pyscophantic to smug celebrigentsial progressivism.

This is a HUGE win. This is not a small one, so that Clinton/Remain may say "Ah - you've got to listen to us, your margin is a minor one and on another day..." This is a rout. The peasantry have broken free of the shackles of Political Correctness and breached the heavily fortified citadel.

Please don't give the Left any quarter or wriggle room. The spoilt brats have had it all their own way for too long.

The win was through the underestimation of popular feeling. Why was it underestimated ? Because the hated Political Correctness (of which Hillary is High Priestess) intimidated most voters into silence (as with Brexit.)

The more politically incorrect Trump got the larger the stadia he had to book. There is probably a correlation here.

Anon at 1.45 makes an extremely good point. That Clinton was being paid not to speak but for future favours. Though probably not conscious of the fact it is that sort of assumptiveness that riled many Americans.

This win is like me beating Hussain Bolt in a race. Hussain Bolt and everything he did would be nothing after that.



Electro-Kevin said...

This win is like me beating Hussain Bolt in a race by .03 of a second. Hussain Bolt and everything he did would be nothing after that.

Bill Quango MP said...

Its not really a fine line and talk of a minority of voters.This isn't Remainiac central.

Just pointing out that as much as its about very enthused people coming out to vote for the new, its also the disillusioned ones staying at home that lets the change candidate in.

This could be significant.

At present Corbyn is like early Trump or Farage. According to polling 'most' people outside his 15% ultra loyal base don't agree with a word he says. His policies are incoherent. His team are incompetent. his rhetoric only appeals to a very narrow band of ignorant, long haired, hippy losers.

I do not believe Corbyn can be doing as badly as polling suggests. labour's floor is around 33%. It can't sink below that unless someone is stealing those voters to somewhere else OR they decide not to vote for anyone at all.

So Corbyn might be a trump, at the start of a left wing Syrizia style people's movement that catches everyone by surprise, and takes him to power.
Or he could be a Hillary. Inspiring none but those already predisposed to vote for him.

The way things are running, it could be a very foolish move to right him off. Only takes a bad -brexit and the usual Tory sleaze scandals and he is in.

Anonymous said...

Mind, BQ, Syringia got to power in Greece, won a referendum on saying 'balls to the ECB', and having won an overwhelming mandate, proceeded to cave in and crawl to them. Varoufakis had a nuclear option plan and their quisling leader chickened out, under what threats I don't know. I could see Corbynistas doing the same thing, to be fair, it's one thing (for example) supporting the IRA from a distance and another when it's your head (or your family's) on the block.

A thought - isn't Hillary the USA's Gordon Brown (although Brown wasn't corrupt)?

The obvious next candidate in 2008, sunk by a smooth-talking younger challenger with better visuals, a deal is struck to make the loser the next candidate when the leader steps down - and that deal is adhered to?

That's why the DNC (probably helped by some Clinton cash) cheated Bernie out of the nomination, although Bernie was a much more inspirational candidate. It was HER TURN, just like it was Gordon's.

Electro-Kevin said...

It's our time. Not Corbyn's. This is the difference. And (Like Americans didn't want Republicans - they wanted Trump Republicans) We don't want Conservatives - we want Brexit Conservatives.

I actually think May (and most Tories) would prefer Corbyn to Hard Brexit but a surprising majority disliked Corbyn enough to vote a referendum promising Cameron. I suppose he could get in by default but by-default is not what Trump did.

He stormed it.

He is a political superstar. He fills stadia. He utterly stormed it and this was no shimmying in by a grey and insipid bit of Politifilla. (Polyfilla) How many stadia do you think Corbyn could fill ? I bet Farage could, however and we might well get to see it if Remain carry on as they are.

I am disgusted at our media's continued focus through the Clinton perspective of this outcome. And the acceptance of rioting and rebellion against democracy - this is the first truly lunatic behaviour in the whole thing and, because it's Democrats doing it, it's understandable by the BBC.

You would think Trump was Hitler. The London Evening Standard is a shocker to me. I left London 10 years ago having lived all my life there and The Standard was like the reliable sister to the Daily Mail. Yesterday it was like reading the bloody Guardian, cover to cover.

An utterly childish rag in my view.

Electro-Kevin said...

No-one is scared of saying they vote Corbyn in public. They are scared of saying they vote Farage - including me.

ivan said...

This might throw some light on why Trump did so well and Clinton so poorly.

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-trumps-rise-that-no-one-talks-about/

Bill Quango MP said...

very interesting Ivan- thanks.

Nick Drew said...

Kev, @ This is a HUGE win. This is not a small one

Drew's 8th Law of Politics: A narrow victory is more significant than a landslide, which betokens little more than that everyone knew what the result was going to be and piled in behind the obvious winner

(BTW, Corbyn can fill stadia, but it's different

BQ, @ Corbyn might be a trump, at the start of a left wing Syrizia style people's movement that catches everyone by surprise, and takes him to power ... The way things are running, it could be a very foolish move to right him off. Only takes a bad -brexit and the usual Tory sleaze scandals and he is in.

agreed: but it wouldn't be Corbyn, who is a mere cypher, sitting silently at the committee table eating crisps as we are told - we'd be getting McDonnell, and no mistake

Anonymous said...

As for Hillary winning the "popular vote", it is a well-known feature of American politics that in areas controlled by the Democrats the Party machine can stack up votes where there ain't no voters.

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