honorentheos wrote:Hard to say.
I haven't seen anyone on the board discussing the GDP numbers or Trump's self-congratulatory brief yesterday. But that number could be much more significant to the results in the midterm election than almost any of the things in the list above. There are plenty of people in America who look at the Russia investigation and see a knotty, partisan bitch-fest that would take fairly serious substantial results to move the political dial significantly to seriously affect House and Senate races. But people who feel like the economy is finally freeing up are far more likely to vote for the status quo or not vote at all, both of which are not in the favor of Democrats. And let's be real, it will require the House being taken by the Democrats for Trump to be impeached. On the flip side, if the trade conflicts aren't resolved come October, and small businesses and manufacturing is hurting, then again that could end up being far more important than any of the things in the list in the OP.
The economic numbers are undeniably good news for Trump. And you are right, the economy is another variable that will affect his popularity and his support. The trick is to stimulate an economy
without running trillion dollar deficits. And one of the difficult points of prognostication is how people react when the other shoe drops, and massive cuts in social programs are discussed. This is one of the reasons why you hear Republicans talking about making these tax cuts permanent so quickly, before we start talking about paying the piper.
The trade wars are another big variable. Recently it seems like Trump is beginning to recognize the political liabilities of what he is doing. How all of his base feels about this in November will be a factor. And the argument that corporate tax cuts would precipitate wage hikes has been shown to be at best, a misguided belief, and at worst a ruse.
Wages have actually fallen. (If, as Mitt Romney said, "Corporations are people, too", then it is also true that corporations do not like sharing the wealth with those people who don't happen to be corporations.)
And how much the economy influences the election is somewhat at the mercy of what information is revealed through Mueller, the Manafort trial, and all of the information that is revealed between now and November.
But I think we may actually be getting ahead of ourselves if we believe that if the Republicans control the House, the President has no danger of impeachment. Again, I have no idea of when Mueller completes the investigation, but if some particularly egregious charge develops after November, it could sway public opinion enough to make his political survival a question mark. Undoubtedly the bar will be much higher with a GOP majority (and I imagine the majority will be far more slender), but it not necessarily insurmountable. There are civil actions as well. And there's the nomination of Trump's
Get Out of Jail Free card Supreme Court Justice.
But that's what makes thinking about this so interesting: there are so many variables, and all of those variables can greatly amplify or diminish the effect of other variables.
And of course...the ever present shadow in the background...
Benghazi ;-)
PostScript: It strikes me that I never did my own prognostication: Based of a percentage, what are Trump's chances of survival until 2020?
It's still a big crap shoot, but I think his odds of survival of less than 50%. My reasoning is basically fuzzy math. If you give each of the scandals brewing odds of being true 30% for and 70% against, there is still going to be some pasta that sticks to the wall. And finally, there is the man himself. Don't preclude the possibility of Trump doing something else between now and 2020 that precipitates his own demise. And it is not impossible that the rigors and pressures of the Presidency could test the physical constitution of an overweight, sedentary septuagenarian. Trump has a fantastically loyal base, and the GOP ihas abandoned the idea of sticking to their principles in lieu of not biting the hand that feeds it. One can make the Irresistible Force versus Immovable Object argument. But ultimately I don't think Trump will be channeling
Gloria Gaynor.
How much less than 50% do I think his chances are? That gets really difficult to prognosticate, but I would put the odds at somewhere in the 35-45% area. So I certainly think it's possible that he would survive 35 to 45 times out of 100. But given one chance, I go with the odds.
I had Clinton winning the electoral college by about 20 over Trump, so of course I'm always right.