Several weeks ago, a GOP strategist told SiriusXM's Michelangelo Signorile that Donald Trump's hold on his followers is a Ponzi scheme.
"It only works as long as it appears to work," Signorile observes. "A few major losses can bring the whole thing crashing down. I feel like that’s happening. And Trump knows it."
Similar to Signorile, blogger Digby thinks Trump’s scheme may be collapsing even among his own followers, thus Trump falling to just 38 percent approval in Gallup's weekly tracking poll—practically plummeting from his 44 percent approval a couple weeks out from Election Day.
"If I had to guess," Digby writes of Trump's drop, "I'd say that it's because his ‘winner’ bubble has burst and some of his voters finally realize that he isn't teflon and they've had to accept that his absurdity is a liability."
Trump's most fervent followers not only see him as their champion, they seem to get a certain sense of self-worth by attaching themselves to him and his supposed "winning." It's clearly validating for many of them to be seen, and then be seen as crushing their detractors and/or those who they believe have ignored and disrespected them in the past.
But there's no fun in attaching yourself to someone who's vulnerable and weak—a loser. That's a death knell for someone whose success depends almost entirely on their cult of personality persisting among a minority of the population. Last week, Trump declared the midterms “very close to a complete victory” for him and the GOP. Since then, Democrats have cemented a resounding victory in the House, significantly blunted the GOP’s pickups in the Senate, and key races have slipped back into recounts.
Has anyone noticed how desperate Trump is to win in Florida?