This is not hyperbole.
The Great Pumpkin arose and, addressing a crowd in Reno today, Trumpsplained that they really should pronounce their state Neh-VAAH-da instead of, well, how they actually pronounce it. Let’s go to tape:
He declared that “nobody says it the other way.”
The confused silence from the crowd mixed with a few shouts of disagreement indicated that quite a few Nevadans pronounce their home state “Neh-VAD-uh.”
www.cbsnews.com/...
I got this wrong once, and let me tell you I made sure I only did it once. They do not take kindly to uppity east coasters mangling their state’s name.
This could be one of those oddball stories that gets legs and drags the campaign under once and for all at least in Nevada. First of all it is easy to understand. He pronounced Nevada wrong and, when corrected, doubled down and called the Reno crowd losers for insisting on their pronunciation. You can describe it in a single breath. It can be one of those news snippets you see in elevators nowadays.
Second, it reinforces terrible qualities that people have heard about him. In this case it is a two-fer as hits both rudeness and extreme ignorance. He wants to be the president of the United States for jeebus’s sake! We seem to have abandoned all our other norms for what is disqualifying this year, but have we set the bar so low that you don’t even need to pronounce all the states right?!?. Okay maybe we have, but once you find out you are mispronouncing it, do you really need to be a jackass about it and insult the people at your own rally?!? Epic.
I have to think this — along with Trump’s cratering Latino support — will goose Hillary’s numbers in Nevada enough to effectively take it off the table. We should see it in the polls soon.
Now while it is going to start as a funny local story, it has the potential to become a two or three day national story. It is so ridiculously easy to understand, and so ridiculously indicative of some of his worst qualities, that once it hits social media it could really take off and have a broader impact.
If this moves the polls even a point or two in Hillary’s favor, you have to think it would be very difficult to come back from that.
I am curious to see how this plays out.