I normally enjoy reading Mark Blumenthal's work, but his recent column, "Why Trump's 25 Percent is Not Enough" was truly bizarre. My best guess is that he was rushing to finish before heading out on vacation and this was the result.
His main premise seems to be this: "Because Trump is only at 25-26% in the polls, he can't win the nomination, because that would require at least 45% of convention delegates." In doing so, he cites several meaningless statistics while ignoring relevant ones that actually show just the opposite: 25-26% polling at this stage is more than enough to win.
See how Mark got it wrong below the discarded orange toupee.
To bolster his argument, Blumenthal first points to some notable nomination-losers from the past 25 years, like Rick Santorum in 2012, Mike Huckabee in 2008, and John McCain in 2000. All of these losers, he points out, received between 18 and 33 percent of the primary votes cast. If they couldn't win with those numbers, he asks, how can Trump with similar numbers?
He then goes on to show the primary vote shares of the nomination-winners from those same years: in 2012, Romney garnered 52.8%; in 2008, McCain got 47.3%; in 2000, Dubya got a whopping 60.4%.
Well, file this under, "No shit, Sherlock!" Because OF COURSE the people who had between 18 and 33 percent of the vote lost when they were up against people with between 47 and 61 percent of the vote! Is this what qualifies as analysis these days?
Two things Blumenthal clearly fails to recognize about these stats: 1) While 33% of votes may not be enough when there's someone with lots more, if Trump were to garner 26% of the votes and NOBODY had more, we'd be at a brokered convention and all hell would break loose, and 2) These statistics refer to the final tally of total primary votes, NOT the poll numbers from any point in the cycle, meaning comparing Trump's poll numbers to them is like comparing apples to combovers: completely irrelevant!
If Blumenthal hadn't been trying to pack his suitcase while writing, he would have looked at the poll numbers from this point in past elections. And those paint a very different picture.
On August 18, 2011 (at exactly the same point in the 2012 cycle as we are right now in the 2016 cycle), Romney, the eventual nominee who would go on to garner 53% of total primary votes, was sitting in the polls at - wait for it - 20.2%, according to RealClearPolitics (he was still the frontrunner). Five percentage points less than Trump.
In the 2008 cycle, RCP only did state-by-state poll averaging, but still, John McCain, the eventual nominee, was polling on August 18 at just 13.5% in New Hampshire and 9.5% in Iowa. He was polling behind Romney and Giuliani in both states, and was even behind Fred Thompson in Iowa (remember how Fred Thompson, the guy from LAW & ORDER, was a serious presidential candidate once?).
So it's pretty clear that at this stage in the game, polling at 25 or 26% is more than enough to end up winning the nomination.
Blumenthal tries, though, to obfuscate this fact by suggesting that Trump has more or less hit his "ceiling" of votes at 26%. He asks:
Could Trump grow his current support to a majority of Republican primary voters? A recent HuffPost/YouGov poll of all Republicans shows that he faces considerable resistance. On a two-way, forced-choice question, 26 percent of Republican registered voters said they preferred Donald Trump as their nominee -- a number roughly comparable to his standing in other polls -- but 54 percent said they prefer "someone else."
Don't put away that "No shit, Sherlock!" file, Barbara! I've got something else to toss in there! Duh, if Trump is polling at 26%, then 26% of the people polled prefer him as their nominee (although if you look at
the source data, 23% prefer Trump, not 26%, further proof that this article was a rush job). And - more duh - people who are currently not supporting Trump are supporting "someone else." I think I may faint from that surprise.
Suffice it to say, none of this suggests that Trump will not pick up support as other candidates drop out of the race...IF other candidates drop out of the race. In fact, 23% of respondents to this question actually answered "Not Sure," suggesting a significant amount of voters could be swayed in Trump's direction. (Note to Mr. Blumenthal:with three answers, one of which is "not sure," this isn't a "two-way, forced-choice question").
I remember at about this point in the 2012 cycle, there were concerns that Mitt Romney just wasn't "likable" enough (spoiler alert: those concerns were valid). And sure enough, primary voters began to favor other candidates in the race one by one. First Rick Perry surged in September, then Herman Cain (remember him?) in October/November, Gingrich in December/January, and finally Rick Santorum in February. But eventually, each fell back. Romney didn't crack 30% in the polls until January 2012, and he didn't get above 35% until March. I'm sure if you'd given GOP primary voters a choice back in August 2011, a majority would have likewise favored "someone else." But it didn't mean diddly to Romney's eventual nomination.
I'm not saying that Trump is definitely going to be the nominee: a lot can happen in 11 months. But if you're going to knock his chances, at least use relevant data! Hopefully Mr. Blumenthal won't make this mistake again.
And hopefully he also had a nice vacation. Maybe at a Trump resort.