With the first presidential debate tomorrow, it's worth taking a look at the trajectory of the race between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. After the Democrat convention, Hillary got a big bounce in the polls. Real Clear Politics keeps a running record of most major polls both nationally and by state. States are rated as being for one candidate or another in gradations of "leaning", "likely" and safe. Those states where the margin is close are rated as "toss up". As of a month ago, the state polls were showing Hillary with 272 electoral votes (only 270 are needed to win) and Trump with 154. The rest were toss ups. In the last month, however, the race has move strongly towards Trump. The following states moved from leaning to Hillary to being toss ups: Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Virginia, New Hampshire, Michigan, Colorado and Maine. Missouri moved from toss up to leaning to Trump. There were other moves as well, but they were within the gradations for one candidate or another. There were seven such moves toward Trump and only one towards Clinton (which was later reversed.) As of this morning, the state polling averages show the race at Clinton 198 and Trump 165. If you assign the toss up states to the candidate who is ahead in the polling averages, the race goes to Clinton ahead of Trump by 272 to 266. Some of these states, though, are so close that there really no way to know right now who is ahead.
Putting all this together, one finds that the race is very close and even the slightest difference could mean the margin for victory (or defeat.) But there's more to this than just tight polls. Remember that during the last month, Hillary Clinton and her allies ran roughly $200 million of negative ads slamming Trump. On his side, Trump and his allies ran a little less than $40 million of ads and not all were negative. Clearly, the negative barrage by Hillary has not kept Trump down. If Trump unleashes a major advertising campaign, it may move the needle in a big way (or prove as ineffective as Hillary's). No one knows how the riots in Charlotte or the terrorist attacks in New York, New Jersey, Minnesota and Washington will affect the race. And then, of course, there's the debate.
One thing is certain: no one knows what will work or how things will come out. I keep laughing as I see the various pundits tell us on TV what Trump or Hillary must do in order to win the debate. These are the same people who did not see Bernie Sanders as a candidate who nearly beat Hillary. They are also the same people who told us that Jeb Bush would be the likely candidate because he had so much money locked up. They told us five or six times that Trump was through and his candidacy over. There's more, but the point is that these pundits would have done better by just flipping a coin to pick the ultimate winner. They really don't have a clue this year as to what will work or why.
Putting all this together, one finds that the race is very close and even the slightest difference could mean the margin for victory (or defeat.) But there's more to this than just tight polls. Remember that during the last month, Hillary Clinton and her allies ran roughly $200 million of negative ads slamming Trump. On his side, Trump and his allies ran a little less than $40 million of ads and not all were negative. Clearly, the negative barrage by Hillary has not kept Trump down. If Trump unleashes a major advertising campaign, it may move the needle in a big way (or prove as ineffective as Hillary's). No one knows how the riots in Charlotte or the terrorist attacks in New York, New Jersey, Minnesota and Washington will affect the race. And then, of course, there's the debate.
One thing is certain: no one knows what will work or how things will come out. I keep laughing as I see the various pundits tell us on TV what Trump or Hillary must do in order to win the debate. These are the same people who did not see Bernie Sanders as a candidate who nearly beat Hillary. They are also the same people who told us that Jeb Bush would be the likely candidate because he had so much money locked up. They told us five or six times that Trump was through and his candidacy over. There's more, but the point is that these pundits would have done better by just flipping a coin to pick the ultimate winner. They really don't have a clue this year as to what will work or why.
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