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Reuters: GOP Shoots to 6-Point Generic Ballot Lead

by Rush Limbaugh - May 22,2018

RUSH: House rating change. The Cook Report, Charlie Cook, considered to be the godfather of the aggregation and analysis of polling data from all over everywhere. To predict congressional and presidential races, off-year elections, he’s considered the go-to. What Cook says… Whether he’s right or wrong doesn’t matter. His reputation is that people believe what he says. After a rough start to year, House Republicans are suddenly feeling less pessimistic about their fall prospects.

“At the ‘macro’ level, robust economic data and positive developments on the Korean peninsula have helped lift President Trump’s approval rating to 42%…” Larry Tribe — the know-nothing legal professor from Harvard — was on CNN last night warning these Democrats if you’re gonna impeach Trump… Even if you win the House, if you’re gonna impeach you better succeed or you’re fished. The old adage: “If you’re gonna shoot the king, you better kill him.”

He actually uses that language, by the way. “If you’re gonna shoot the king you better kill him.” You know, let me go on CNN and try talking that way about a Democrat president; see what happens. But he did. And because he pointed out exactly… He made my point. You cannot impeach a president with 42%, 45% public approval. You just can’t do it. The deep state has failed to get Trump’s approval numbers down to the twenties where impeachment would be easy. That was the initial objective.

Constitutionally getting rid of Trump would have been very tough, forcing him to resign in shame, that’s what they wanted. They wanted Trump walked out of there in shame, and then they wanted to put him in jail, and they want to put his family in jail. And they still want to do all that. But it’s backfiring on them. “Democrats’ lead over Republicans on FiveThirtyEight’s generic congressional ballot average has ebbed from 12 points in January to just five points today.

“Republicans have also received small doses of good news at the ‘micro,’ race-by-race level. After a winter dominated by a new, unfriendly map in Pennsylvania and a special election loss, May has been kinder to the GOP…” The bottom line is that Charlie Cook has changed four House races from lean Democrat to lean Republican, and this is becoming a trend. How many weeks now have we been reporting to you that the generic ballot advantage the Democrats have is whittling away?

Breaking news right before the program began. Reuters: The Republicans now have a six-point lead over the Democrats in the Reuters generic poll. It’s 40.7% to 34.5%. The Republicans have a lead. Now, a lot of people are confused about this. Do you believe the polling data, or do you believe what’s on the ground? On the ground is, Democrats are winning some special elections, but Republican turnout is greater than Democrat turnout.

Let me help everybody understand this, whether you’re inclined to listen to me or not. The Democrats’ fortunes in the midterms depend 80% on how Donald Trump is perceived, 85%. If Trump’s doing well, if people are happy with Trump, you Democrats can kiss good-bye the winning of the House of Representatives. It’s all about Trump. And what is being seen in all of these generic polling exercises is that people are not abandoning Trump.

The Democrats’ victory depends on a percentage of the Trump base abandoning him. It isn’t happening. The Democrats already own the deranged, lunatic, insane, radical leftist base. The Democrats have to keep that emotion at a fever pitch for many more months. They gotta keep the insane insane for a long time; maybe drive ’em even more insane. They have to somehow cause Trump supporters and voters to lose interest.

It isn’t happening.

They don’t know why. They can’t understand why.

The reason is they don’t understand why Trump was voted for. They’ve spent so much time holding voters for Trump in contempt — putting them down, insulting them — that they have made no special effort to find out why these people support Trump. They are still gobsmacked over the fact that Trump survived the NBC Access Hollywood video. They can’t believe it! They can’t believe that Stormy Daniels hasn’t taken him out.

They can’t believe that every weapon in their has not worked. They can’t believe it, and they don’t know why. They’re stuck in a playbook of the past running plays from the past that always worked against traditional Republicans. But that’s not what Trump is, not who Trump is. I don’t think they’re going to be able to figure it out because their minds are not open enough to accept the truth.

Because if you’re gonna endeavor to find out why Trump has so much support, you’re gonna have to look at your own party. There’s a lot of Obama voters that voted for Trump. People that voted for Obama twice voted for Trump. A lot of Democrats voted for Trump. The Democrats are gonna have to realize they are disliked and not popular in certain sectors of their former base. And they’re not gonna be open to that. The Democrats are never disliked. The Democrats are never opposed.

When they lose, it’s because somebody cheated against them — like the Russians or what have you. But the Reuters generic ballot lead: Republicans six points. First time in this cycle.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: CBS has a new poll that they did with YouGov. The upshot is that Americans are increasingly happy and supportive of Trump’s economic policies. “CBS/YouGov poll shows Americans are getting more enthusiastic about economic growth and crediting Trump more for the expansion.” So it just…

You can find all kinds of accurate, I think — and on balance good — news out there if you look for it. Most of it’s buried. It’s all underneath this ongoing coup to get rid of Trump, but it’s there. And it does not augur well for the Democrats and their wild nightmare — their dream — of retaking the House in a gigantic blue wave in November.


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