Just when Hillary Clinton thought her political fiascoes would be the worst of her ongoing troubles as she glides through the Democrat primaries, and then takes on Trump sure to find a Warren Buffett-funded victory, suddenly everything appears to have gone wrong in what is most important to the scandal-ridden former Secretary of State and presidential contender: her second - and final - campaign for president.
According to WaPo [8], if one compares where Clinton is now in the Real Clear Politics polling average, the 2016 picture and the 2008 picture aren't really all that similar; in fact suddenly the trapdoor beneath Hillary appears to have sprung open. "Nationally, she was doing much better in 2008 than she is right now, perhaps in part because the anti-Clinton vote in 2008 was still split between two people -- Barack Obama and John Edwards -- instead of just one. But that recent trend line, a function of two new national polls that were close after a bit of a lull, is not very good news."
[9]
Not surprisingly, Clinton is trailing badly in New Hampshire, which is the home turf of her main socialist opponent. In 2008,
[10]
What little silver lining exists, is that in Iowa, Hillary is running a little better than she did in 2008, although as seen on the chart below even here her lead has plunged recently. In 2008 it wasn't until the last week that she fell out of the lead. She eventually came in third.
[11]
The problem remains the national race, and what's worse, if the 2008 past is prologue and if Hillary's lead in Iowa evaporates and she loses, it may be the end for the former first lady: back then she lost three-quarters of her lead after the caucuses although she did gain some of it back after her win in New Hampshire.
[12]
And while these numbers can easily change, one person who is certain to capitalize on Hillary's sudden collapse is Donald Trump, who as we showed recently has become the bookmakers' favorite after trailing badly as recently as September, even as Trump's republican competitors drop like flies on their own, the most recent casualty being Ben Carson whose campaign is all but over following news from CNN [13]that Carson's campaign finance chairman Dean Parker submitted his resignation.
Finally, moments ago the WSJ reported [14]that Donald Trump has opened a double-digit lead over his next-closest Republican rival, less than three weeks before the first votes of the 2016 presidential race are cast, a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll finds.
A third of Republican primary voters in the nationwide survey said they favored Mr. Trump to be the GOP nominee, followed by Texas Sen. Ted Cruz at 20% support, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio at 13% and retired pediatric neurosurgeon Ben Carson at 12%.
In December, Mr. Trump had led the No. 2 candidate, Mr. Cruz, by 5 percentage points. In the new poll, his lead widened to 13 points.
And so what was considered humor by most pundits as recently as last summer is becoming an all too possible reality: president Trump?
