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Wednesday, August 10, 2016

"... Republicans must 'lose the primary to win the general' election. Trump did the opposite; he lost the general election to win the primary. And he clearly still doesn't understand that." Of course not-- he isn't a deep thinker.

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The central malfunction of Donald Trump’s entire campaign, in one quote
By Aaron Blake, August 9, 2016

Donald Trump is losing badly — so badly that The Washington Post's Stuart Rothenberg says he needs a miracle to win the presidency.

But don't tell that to Donald Trump.

"I certainly don't think it is appropriate to start changing all of a sudden when you've been winning," the Republican nominee told Fox Business's Maria Bartiromo on Tuesday morning. "I mean, I've beaten many people, and now we're down to one. And we'll see how it works out, but I think it's going to work out well."

It isn't the first time Trump has made this point. But the quote is worth noting now because it exposes the central conceit — and malfunction — of Trump's entire campaign: that he will win no matter what the media or the polls say.

Of course, he's had reason to believe that. After all, the media and the polls said he couldn't win the GOP primary, and he did. Ipso facto, Trump is a winner and the media is always wrong. So when we suggest he might need to change it up, he won't. And even the media, Rothenberg notwithstanding, is generally reluctant to tell him otherwise, for fear of getting burned a second time.

But all of that obscures a key fact that has defined Trump's campaign: It was always geared for May, not November. His success was tied to timing, not genius. Now he's a primary season candidate in a general election world. The factors that make Trump even marginally competitive right now — rank partisanship, and the fact that Clinton isn't exactly a world-beating candidate in her own right — have very little to do with the candidate himself.

The reason Trump won the GOP primary is because he was willing to go places other candidates — more concerned about their general election fates and political futures — wouldn't go. Muslim ban? Mass deportation? Pulling out of foreign agreements and free trade deals? Trump took far-right, hugely populist and even arguably unconstitutional positions that other Republicans knew would severely compromise them for the general election. He said things that alienated women, minorities and Muslims because that didn't matter as much in the GOP primary.

Trump was focused like a laser on the win, and he wasn't politically experienced or humble enough to grasp that how you claim that win can be just as important come summer and fall.

This is also the problem with much of the criticism of the media during the 2016 campaign. The media was accused of aiding and abetting Trump's rise in the primary. Watchdogs wondered, Why isn't the media being tougher on Trump? Clearly if Trump was winning, the media wasn't doing its job.

But the media was doing its job, and Trump was winning the primary at the expense of his November electability. Trump was speaking to a large portion of the GOP electorate that doesn't care how many times the media tells them Trump said something offensive, false or utterly impractical. For a whole host of reasons, starting with conservatives' strong belief in the media's liberal bias, the media scrutiny is and was a badge of honor for many Trump backers.

And yet, even as Trump effectively claimed the Republican nomination, a June Washington Post-ABC poll showed 7 in 10 Americans disliked Trump. Post-convention, the boost in support from members of his own party has reduced that unfavorable number all the way down to ... 63 percent. Other polls this week show as few as 26 percent of Americans say they like Trump.

Trump deserves some credit for winning his party's primary, of course. Even when others tried to play the game like he did — Sen. Marco Rubio making fun of Trump's small hands comes to mind — they just couldn't out-Trump Trump. Trump provided the GOP base something no other candidate either could do or was willing to do. It was savvy, in the moment.

But what he was doing was blindingly simple. In a call for moderation, primary rival Jeb Bush said in December that Republicans must "lose the primary to win the general" election. Trump did the opposite; he lost the general election to win the primary. And he clearly still doesn't understand that.
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