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applegrove

(118,019 posts)
Thu Aug 18, 2016, 07:36 PM Aug 2016

WHAT ARE DONALD TRUMP, ROGER AILES, AND STEVE BANNON REALLY UP TO?

By John Cassidy at the New Yorker

http://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/what-are-donald-trump-roger-ailes-and-steve-bannon-really-up-to

SNIP............

Trump’s got a core group of supporters who love his nativist, outsider shtick and pack his rallies. There is another chunk of voters who have reservations about Trump, but who are so disgusted with regular politicians, or who are so opposed to Hillary Clinton, that they have decided to back the Republican nominee. It’s been clear for months, however, that these two groups make up, at most, about forty per cent of the electorate. To beat Clinton, Trump would have to win over many more Americans who have an unfavorable view of him. (According to the Huffington Post poll average, this group makes up about two-thirds of the electorate.) That’s not media bias: it’s arithmetic.

For months now, Manafort and other Republicans have been trying to get Trump to broaden his appeal by urging him to stay on message and act a bit more Presidential. Trump chafed at this advice—last week he admitted as much to Time magazine—and now he has cast it aside. In turning to Bannon, he is embracing a right-wing enragé whose business is appealing to ultra-conservative Tea Party types. (Two headlines from today’s Breitbart home page: “Clinton ‘Does Paid Errands’ for Russian Oligarchs”; “Roger Stone on Huma Abedin’s ‘Very Clear Ties to Radical Offshoots of Islam. ”)

The appointment of Bannon isn’t merely another affront to establishment Republicans, such as Paul Ryan, whom Breitbart News has lately been targeting. It is an acknowledgment by Trump that he no longer has any interest in modifying his strategy to appeal to college-educated voters in places like the suburbs of Philadelphia and Milwaukee, where he is running miles behind where Mitt Romney was in 2012. Instead, he has decided to retreat to his base, which is a surefire recipe for political failure. But not necessarily business failure.

Back in June, Vanity Fair’s Sarah Ellison reported that Trump was “considering creating his own media business, built on the audience that has supported him thus far in his bid to become the next president of the United States.” A person briefed on Trump’s thinking told Ellison that it went like this: “Win or lose, we are onto something here. We’ve triggered a base of the population that hasn’t had a voice in a long time.” One of Ellison’s sources also reported that Trump resents the fact that he has helped raise the ratings of certain news organizations, such as CNN, without getting a cut of the additional revenues. Trump has “gotten the bug,” the source said, “so now he wants to figure out if he can monetize it.”

.............SNIP
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WHAT ARE DONALD TRUMP, ROGER AILES, AND STEVE BANNON REALLY UP TO? (Original Post) applegrove Aug 2016 OP
This certainly makes sense PatSeg Aug 2016 #1
That's what I thought. demgrrrll Aug 2016 #2
Very interesting....Nate Silver has a good writeup also asiliveandbreathe Aug 2016 #3
Recommended, and to move to the essential part: guillaumeb Aug 2016 #4
They want in the white house so bad MFM008 Aug 2016 #5

PatSeg

(46,798 posts)
1. This certainly makes sense
Thu Aug 18, 2016, 07:39 PM
Aug 2016

because we all know, he doesn't want to be president. He wants money and nonstop attention.

asiliveandbreathe

(8,203 posts)
3. Very interesting....Nate Silver has a good writeup also
Thu Aug 18, 2016, 07:47 PM
Aug 2016

Goes along with your discussion..

snip..

On average, Trump has just 37 percent of the vote in these polls (Clinton has 44 percent). That puts him on par with Barry Goldwater and George McGovern, who each got 38 percent of the vote in their respective landslide defeats of 1964 and 1972.


http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/trump-is-doubling-down-on-a-losing-strategy/?ex_cid=2016-forecast

guillaumeb

(42,641 posts)
4. Recommended, and to move to the essential part:
Thu Aug 18, 2016, 07:56 PM
Aug 2016
One of Ellison’s sources also reported that Trump resents the fact that he has helped raise the ratings of certain news organizations, such as CNN, without getting a cut of the additional revenues. Trump has “gotten the bug,” the source said, “so now he wants to figure out if he can monetize it.”



I emphasized the critical part.

MFM008

(19,776 posts)
5. They want in the white house so bad
Thu Aug 18, 2016, 07:58 PM
Aug 2016

They will even hook up with this orange clown who gets kudos when he puts a coherent sentence together.

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