This national election is starting to remind me a bit of the Texas election for governor in 1990. That year, the Republicans nominated Clayton Williams as their candidate, and most people thought he would easily sail to victory. But that was before he started talking. He started with a "joke" about how any woman who's being raped should just lay back and enjoy it. Then he made it worse every week with another outrageous pronouncement. He destroyed his own campaign, and the result was that Texas got a great Democratic governor -- Ann Richards.
Donald Trump is doing the same thing on a national level. All the Democrats had to do was nominate a decent candidate (Joe Biden), and then watch as Trump self-destructs -- and take many other Republicans down with him.
Donald Trump was already very unpopular with the public. His job approval ratings have been upside-down since he was sworn into office. Now he is just making things worse with his lying, incompetence, and outrageous actions -- especially his gross mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The charts above are from a New York Times article by Lynn Vavreck and Christopher Warshaw. They did a study of polling, and they found that in the counties with the most Coronavirus deaths Donald Trump is losing support fast -- and the GOP senators are also losing support. The top chart shows the decline in support of Donald Trump in those counties, and the second chart shows the decline in support for Republican senators.
Trump can't blame Democrats (or China or anyone else) for this. It is wholly his doing -- and the American voters know it. Trump delayed reacting to the virus, allowing it to get a foothold in this country. Then he failed to provide enough testing. Compounding those terrible mistakes, he then urged states to reopen their economies -- even though the virus had not been controlled. The result has been the virus has infected over 4 million Americans and killed over 150,000 of them -- and there's no reason to believe that either will slow anytime soon.
Trump poor job approval was always going to make it tough for him to be re-elected. But his mishandling of COVID-19 is a classic example of self-destruction. Voters want a competent president who can control the virus and get the economy back on track. Every week, Trump shows them that he's not the person who can do that.
Biden and Democratic senate candidates don't have to look great to win -- just competent.
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