Democrats Confused by Trump's Positive Poll Numbers
The Hill reported that Democrats and liberals are shocked as they look from their journalistic howitzers to discover that Trump’s ratings have not sagged and are near all-time highs. In between firing broadsides, they have noticed that their negative stories about Trump are having no effect on the president’s approval ratings. The Hill reported that Democrats are “scratching their heads” to understand why Trump is so “resilient.”
Trump’s 45.0 percent job approval in Tuesday’s RealClearPolitics.com average reflects his third best day since March of 2017.
Why are Trump’s numbers growing so steadily despite being subjected to such heavy fire after the Helsinki Summit?
The answer is the fable of the boy who cried “wolf.” The Democratic barrage, faithfully reported by the media, has been so constant and shrill that voters have become numb to the negative headlines. The lurid “revelations” of Trump’s misconduct have been repeated so often, they’ve lost their effect.
The president often speaks of “false news” being spread by the liberal media. It would be more accurate to call these journalistic eruptions “false analysis.” Each day comes with dire prophesies for Trump. The trade war with China is going to tip the economy into recession. Republicans are going to bolt over Trump’s “appeasement” of Russia. The Manafort trial will unearth damning evidence against Trump. Impeachment is just around the corner. The North Korea deal will fall apart. Iran will not be hurt by U.S. sanctions. Our Western allies are being permanently alienated. The tax cuts will cause the deficit to skyrocket.
As these predictions fall short, one after the other, people begin to discount the hysterical headlines in the mainstream media and stop believing the words of formerly credible journals like the New York Times and The Washington Post.
Instead, voters believe their own eyes as they see the Trump economy surge and realize the extent to which Democratic predictions of disaster fall short.
The media’s credibility gap has become so great, its negative stories are discounted.
The media is in some ways going through the same loss of credibility that gripped the American presidency during the days of Lyndon Johnson, when people began to realize the White House was lying to them. This denouement undermined faith in our democracy all during the 60s and 70s until Reagan restored some degree of trust.
Now it is the media’s turn to be left in the cold by voters who have come to distrust its every utterance. The resultant rise in alternative media — social media, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter — is a direct result of this turn away from establishment media organs.
And Trump keeps on rising.
Dick Morris is a former adviser to President Bill Clinton as well as a political author, pollster and consultant. His most recent book, “Rogue Spooks,” was written with his wife, Eileen McGann.
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