Just how likely is it that the polls will be right? Notice first, I said, polls, plural, with an “s.” There is no particular reason any one poll should be “right” — except ours, of course. That’s what the statistical margin of error is all about. The results should fit under a classic bell curve,…
We think of “follow the leader” as a rather inane children’s game. It’s much more than that. In an adult version, it describes how many partisans go about deciding their views on public issues — they follow the course charted by the leader of their party or the party itself. That’s certainly been the case…
Perhaps we have reason to be complacent about the persistence of our democracy. It’s lasted nearly 230 years, through war, depression, recession, cultural change and even civil war. Still not perfect, it has, with fits and starts and setbacks, gotten more so over time. I imagine the Athenians felt pretty comfortable about their democracy, too…
Where to begin? Stranger things have never happened in presidential politics — at least in the modern era. A candidate for the highest office in the land gleefully describing his penchant for sexual assault on tape. Some 50 senators, governors and members of Congress abandoning their party’s nominee. That nominee behaving like a malevolent creep…
As a wise and wizened reporter once pointed out: “Buried deep inside that word ‘newspaper’ is the word ‘news.’ And inside that, you’ve got ‘new.’ ” This aphorism explains why some trends evident in this election are described as radical departures from recent history, when in fact they are part of a continuing process of…
We enjoy believing debates are central determinants of election outcomes. They give campaigns a focus, journalists a hook around which to wrap their coverage and citizens the illusion that we render verdicts based on intellectual trial by combat. In truth, though, debates have probably never decided a presidential election. That does not mean they don’t…
Republicans have suddenly discovered the economic privations afflicting America’s middle class and those struggling to join it. Their newfound interest in people they argued for decades would benefit if only the rich were helped to get richer is not motivated by sudden concern over the plight of those left behind, but rather by Donald Trump. If…
Pundits now regularly proclaim that Hillary Clinton has an almost singular and unique problem with voters who don’t think she’s honest or forthright. These pundits are wrong, both as a matter of fact and of voter perception. Nonetheless, the commentariat has elevated this view to the lofty level of a “narrative” into which every new…
As we say good-bye to the summer and the party conventions fade in voters’ memories, polls suggest two very different sets of people will be disappointed come November: Republicans who thought this would be the year they recapture the White House and Democrats who were convinced Donald Trump would lose in a landslide that would…
Nominating Donald Trump probably won’t change the Republican Party, but putting him atop the ticket will damage it. All the channels through which he could influence the future of the GOP will be closed to him. Trump does not lead an organized movement — indeed, his own campaign cannot be characterized as organized. He is…
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