If Trump had known in July about this November's GOP losses, he'd have taken AF1 to Kiev and

[highplainsdem]

personally put Zelensky in front of a CNN camera, skipping the phone call.

That's the opinion of Fox News' Juan Williams, writing in an opinion piece for The Hill about Trump's fear of Biden:


https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/470775-juan-williams-trumps-ukraine-scandal-rooted-in-fear-of-biden

The only reason for Trump to risk asking a foreign leader for help getting political dirt on an opponent is that he feared that rival’s power. And that November 2020 powerhouse in Trump’s mind is Biden.

Recall that in June, Trump’s anxiety was on display when he insisted his campaign fire some its pollsters after internal polls showed him losing in Michigan and Wisconsin to Biden.

Trump’s shaky nerves went public again in July when a Fox News poll showed him losing to Biden — by a lot. Trump went ballistic and attacked Fox.

The president still has every reason to be nervous about a possible match-up with Biden because polls continue to show the Democrat beating him badly.

If Biden, a well-liked moderate, is the nominee the election becomes a referendum on Trump. With an approval rating hovering in the mid-to-low 40s, that is not good news for the president.

-snip-

Why is Biden a special foe for Trump?

He has the backing of black voters and is well-liked by white, working-class voters.

Other Democrats do well against Trump but none of them shows Biden’s power at the polls against Trump. If Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) or Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is the nominee, Trump has a better chance to shift the focus to attacks on their agendas — for example, higher taxes on the rich.

-snip-

But Trump’s nervousness about Biden convinced him he had to damage Biden at any cost.

If Trump knew in July that by November his party would lose big in Virginia legislative elections, lose big in Pennsylvania suburban elections, and see 20 House Republicans announce they are leaving before the 2020 election, he might have skipped the phone call.

He would have fired up Air Force One for a trip to Kiev and personally put Zelensky in front of that CNN camera.

I hope Williams, who's usually at odds with the other pundits on Fox, has said this on Fox News, preferably while Trump was watching.

And I think Williams is right that if Biden is the Democratic nominee, next year's election will be a referendum on Trump. And if Warren or Sanders is our nominee, Trump will probably be able to make the election about whether their policies are too far left.

[efhmc]

1. Warren will have the most trouble beating the evil idiot.

She is a progressive seen as too left for many and she is a woman and the US is blatantly misogynistic.

[Demsrule86]

2. Biden is the most electable Democrat. I don't think we win the EC with anyone else. K&R

[oswaldactedalone]

3. Agree

Go Joe!

[Demsrule86]

6. I love Joe.

[Chambi]

4. Petty

I didn't like it.

[Cha]

9. What's "petty" about his observation? It

makes sense to me.

[Sloumeau]

5. highplainsdem, thanks for the great posting! :)

I think the basic idea that Juan Williams is going for is true. First of all, Joe Biden is by far our best chance to beat Trump. It is possible that another Democrat could beat Trump, but the next best bet would probably be a moderate like Amy Klobuchar or Kamala Harris. I believe that what endears Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren to many Democrats, their Democratic Socialist type Left-Wing Progressivism, will repel many Independent voters that we need in order to win the Presidency. Independents are the largest voting block in the country, followed by Democrats and then Republicans. Democrats do not win the Presidency without a majority among Independents or something very close to a majority (Obama won in 2012 with 49% of the Independent vote, but only because the Democratic Party had grown since 2008--about 4% of former independents became Democrats during that time). I've looked at the numbers for Presidential elections since the 1970s, and the percent of Independent votes that a Presidential candidate wins, Democrat or Republican, is directly proportional to the size of their overall wins. Donald Trump won more Independents in 2016 than Hillary did, and it was, in particular, the Independents that Trump won in the Rust Belt that made him President.

Too many people who voted for Obama switched to Trump in the Rustbelt, and when asked why they switched, the main reasons all have to do with economics. They specified their main reasons as the Economy, Trade, and Immigration. Under the Economy, they thought that Trump could get America more jobs and better-paying jobs, under Trade, they thought that his promise of tariffs against places like China and Mexico would bring high paying manufacturing jobs back to the U.S., and under Immigration, they thought that immigrants were taking American jobs and were willing to work for less, so they thought that immigrants were lowering wages overall. Pretty much none of this was true, but many working-class voters *believed* it was true, due to Trump and his Super PACs targeting them with television ads pushing these ideas and with highly targeted Facebook ads pushing these ideas.

Working-class voters, both white and black, did not suddenly become weak supporters of Democrats in 2016. They had started to fall away from Democrats ever since President Bill Clinton started pushing NAFTA in 1992. Rustbelt voters, in particular, saw industrial jobs get shipped off to Mexico and China, so Trump's message found willing ears to his message in the Rustbelt. In 2000, working-class voters, sometimes also referred to as "Non-College Educated" voters, swung toward George W. Bush in 2000--many because they were angry at the manufacturing job losses that they blamed on Clinton's NAFTA. Trump specifically went after those voters in 2016 in the Rustbelt states. Because China achieved Most Favored Nation status in 2001, the rate of jobs fleeing the U.S. to China only accelerated after that. After the Great Recession began, which started in 2008, many lost jobs in the Rustbelt, and many had to take lesser paying jobs in that area as the economy recovered. Who were some of the hardest hit by the Great Recession of 2008, and who had the most trouble recovering? Well, among others, many people of color in the Rustbelt had a terrible time recovering.

By 2016, Democrats were saying that the economy had largely recovered due to Barack Obama, and that was indeed true. However, for many working-class/Non-College educated people in the Rustbelt, they did not see the recovery as many other people did. Some had been working full time before the Great Recession, and now many were only working part-time. Some had to take new jobs for lesser pay that barely kept food on their table. Trump made big promises that many in the Rustbelt were only too happy to believe. Many working-class voters in the Rustbelt thought that NAFTA meant that Democrats had abandoned them because they remembered what the Rustbelt was like before NAFTA and MFN status for China. For many of them, Trump's "Tariffs for China" and "Ending NAFTA" seemed like a chance to return to the glory days of manufacturing in Rustbelt states. However, these voters also had to contend with Donald Trump's unending bigotry and racism.

I believe that many white working-class voters simply ignored Trump's bigotry, attributing it to a personal character defect, and voted for him in the hopes of better economic days. They did this complete ignoring the damage that his racism had caused and would cause in the future. This really is not hard to believe at all. As a white person, I know from first-hand experience just how easy it is for white people to ignore racism. However, I believe that many African American working-class Rustbelt voters, on the other hand, simply could not stomach Trump's racism--nor could they vote for a political party that had been much more racist than the Democrats since the 1960s. I believe that many African American working-class voters who both did want to vote for racist Trump, but who also felt abandoned by the Democrats, simply sat out the elections--or voted third party.

I've known African Americans my whole life, and they tend to be really intelligent. One thing they are really good at figuring out who the racist is. Black Americans knew it was Trump. Also, pretty much every American, of every gender, all knew who the misogynist was--Trump again. I believe that what working-class voters in the Rustbelt were looking for was a candidate who was going to reverse some of the negative effects of Free Trade policies (like NAFTA) and Most Favored Nation status for China. I believe that if Hillary Clinton had done a better job showing Rustbelt voters what she would do to fix that problem, we would not have to be dealing with Trump in the White House today.

[Demsrule86]

7. I have told folks here that the loss of manufacturing is devastating here in Ohio and to

the rest of the Mid West. Liar Trump promised to fix this...but of course he is a liar and did not...in fact he as good as shut down Lordstown himself and then blamed unions. That will leave a mark. Warren's plan for the mid west is to level the playing field overseas in terms of wages and environmental...well we all know that is not worth the paper it is written on and will never be enforced. This is standard for some Democrats coming here...'the jobs are not coming back', 'retraining' etc. Well you saw the results in 16. Also, Warren wants 'better' trade agreements...no such thing really. We need a real manufacturing plan four our country...green energy is a good opportunity.

Now GM sent four plants to Mexico this year...they made so much money that there was no need for this-just plain greed...we have to stop allowing this. There should be consequences for those companies that manufacture elsewhere. And lip service will not work here anymore. Except for supporting president Clinton's NAFTA, Biden has a good record on manufacturing and some good ideas too. He can win Ohio and elsewhere...but I don't think any other candidate can.

[Cha]

8. KR!!

Makes total sense.