Donald Trump’s emergence on the political scene occasions some interesting comment by Nate Silver, at FiveThirtyEight. He divides Republican presidential candidates into two groups, one of which (the Fairfax Five) has the party establishment’s blessing, while the other (the Factional Five) does not.

For the establishment Republicans, it must feel like a game of Whac-A-Mole. Just as Ms. Palin’s numbers decline, candidates like Mr. Trump and Ms. Bachmann — who could be nearly as problematic next November — pop up in her place.

As a result, the Fairfax Five are gaining no ground at all on the Factional Five — in fact, the opposite is true. In an average of four polls of Republican voters conducted in November and December, just after the midterm elections, the Fairfax Five collectively held 27 percent of the vote, to 31 percent for the Factional Five. In the three most recent polls, however, the Fairfax Five’s share has declined to 22 percent, while the Factional Five’s — mostly because of Mr. Trump — has risen to 44 percent.

[snip]

I’m not convinced that these markets are underrating the Factional Five, each one of whom has some significant liabilities as a candidate and several of whom may not run. I do wonder, however, whether the sorts of candidates that Mr. Will likes will ultimately have enough Main Street charisma and Tea Party bona fides to win over Republican primary voters, especially in conservative states like Iowa and South Carolina. There is plenty of time left, but at some point, for a candidate like Mr. Pawlenty to prevail he has to at least begin to poll in the high single digits rather than the low single digits, which would suggest he has some flesh-and-blood appeal.

How do you find governors for people who don’t like government?

Drop me a line at rjk@dailyblague.com
This entry was posted on Thursday, April 14th, 2011 at 8:00 pm.