Biden Is Losing This Race, Folks...
With 74% of Americans fed up over BLM/Antifa violence, Trump finally pulls even with Biden in national battleground contests.
photo credit: Gage Skidmore // Creative Commons
First things are first.
Former delegate Rich Anderson handily won election against Jack Wilson and Mike Schoelwer for chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia. Of the 3,500 delegates registered, over 1,900 votes were cast on a unseasonably rainy Saturday across the commonwealth — the second lowest total since 1970, we are told — all weighted according to the magic number of 11,000. We wish him every bit of success.
Anderson’s arrival as the new party chief comes none too soon: the Democratic-controlled Virginia General Assembly kicks off tomorrow for it’s “long parliament” in Richmond, and they have a true litany of horribles laid out that includes 2A restrictions, higher taxes, and pandemic control — all for your express benefit (of course).
More to the point? The vast number of elected officials are reporting outright shock at the physical condition of Broad and Grace Street. Why the print media refuses to report on this is anyone’s educated guess. Richmond or Sarajevo?
Of course, the General Assembly will be governing in the dark.
One of the most underreported and least talked about aspects of this special session is that it will be done away from the public almost entirely.
Citizen lobbyists have been walled off; even legislative assistants are prevented from accessing the delegates and senators given the concerns over both the pandemic and security in the wake of BLM/Antifa rioting.
But let’s get to the meat and potatoes, shall we?
Let’s talk about Joe Biden’s 10 point freefall in the polls over the last month.
Now the first thing that a Democratic reader is going to do is wave the RCP averages in everyone’s face. Clearly, Biden is up by 7 points when you average the polls.
Perhaps — but “averaging the polls” only gets you so far.
Each poll operates on its own methodology based on certain criteria for how the electorate will vote on Election Day. They all have different R/D/I splits, all focus on different turnout models, and nearly all of them are based on the popular nationwide voting patterns and not on battleground states (or battleground state electorates).
Case in point? CNN is now showing Biden to hold just a 4 point lead over Trump nationwide, a far cry from the near incredulous 11-13 point lead the media had been trumpeting just one month ago.
Oh — and in the battleground states? Biden leads by precisely one point… a statistical nothing:
What changed? Two things:
(1) Americans are sick and tired of the BLM/Antifa riots. Not just a little sick and tired of them, but “send in the National Guard and crack down on the mob” tired of them.
That’s not all.
When asked the question how important the BLM/Antifa violence would be in their voting? 72% said they were concerned, with 43% saying they were very concerned. From Rasmussen:
Voters are ready for the police to put an end to the continuing violent protests nationwide. Most also say the protests will be important to their vote in the upcoming elections.
Seventy-two percent (72%) of all voters say they are concerned about the growing level of violent protest nationwide, with 43% who are Very Concerned.
Sixty-two percent (62%) say the growing level of violent protest is important to their vote in the next election, including 35% who say it is a Very important voting issue.
In fact, 50% of likely voters were in favor of a crack down. Not a negotiation, not an end to the riots… but Rasmussen actually used the words crack down in their polling.
Ouch.
(2) Harris has hurt Biden as a VP pick and emboldened Republicans in opposition. Quite frankly, I privately held the view that Biden would “evolve” on his promise to nominate a female minority and choose someone such as former Trump Secretary of Defense Jim “Mad Dog” Mattis — remembering that only Republicans break promises; Democrats merely evolve.
Yet U.S. Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) didn’t bring much to the table at the end of the day. No one wonders how California is going to vote.
Harris’ brutal record on criminal justice reform is shocking even to law-and-order conservatives. Kamala’s open disregard for Catholics with her interrogation over the Knights of Columbus (you know, the guys who hand out Tootsie Rolls at Christmas to raise money for Down’s Syndrome) puts the entire northeast back into play once again among Catholics — and Biden had been hoping to bring Pennsylvania and Ohio back into the fold.
There’s another intangible that politicos and the blogerati aren’t discussing, and that is Trump’s leadership in handling the COVID pandemic.
Operation Warp Speed is not going to produce results before November, but one will notice a glaring omission in Democratic criticism of the president, and Trump has played the card masterfully.
You see, it is Dr. Anthony Fauci with the National Institues of Health (NIH) who is leading the charge. Trump has been very open to solutions — HCQ, remdesivir, UV lighting in public spaces, even yes wearing masks — but the White House has made it quite clear that they will follow Fauci’s lead on a vaccine.
In short, in order to punch Trump? The Democrats have to punch through Fauci, and this they will not do.
Of course, efforts to blame Trump for the pandemic just sound stupid. No one credibly blames the POTUS for an act of God anymore than Democrats blame themselves for mishandling Hurricane Katrina. . .
. . .but we’d rather not talk about that.
The Democrats will have their little shindig followed up by the RNC Convention in Charlotte, where Trump will quite suddenly have either a small lead or a near lead in a handful of nationwide polls (just like Trump/Clinton ‘16). The hate machine will spin up all September, followed by some “October surprise” in mid-October.
But the riots won’t go away. That genie is out of the cork; the toothpaste is out of the tube. No one cares about the U.S. Postal Service; if you want no mistakes just show up and vote. Biden will have no other option but to do three debates with Trump. Should Biden refuse? That will (and ought) to cost him the election.
The Democrats are going to have to do a lot more than demonize Trump in order to win in November. At the moment? Between playing it cute with debates, fomenting riots and violence in three dozen cities across America, leveraging “cancel culture” against critics and refusing to adhere to social norms?
Looking more and more like Mondale/Ferraro ‘84 everyday.
Shaun Kenney is the editor of The Republican Standard, former chairman of the Board of Supervisors for Fluvanna County, and a former executive director of the Republican Party of Virginia.