Oddly, it’s Morning Joe, the one MSNBC show that manages to stay out of the Kool-Aid tank for Democrats, so the surprise is notable. “It’s still early,” Jonathan Capehart tells Joe Scarborough, who says, “I never thought I’d see” Hillary Clinton upside-down on favorability. She’s been upside-down in practically every election cycle since 1992 in Gallup’s polling, but perhaps it’s just been assumed that Team Hillary would have fixed these issues. I’m not sure why anyone would assume that, especially after watching the last four months unfold, or why anyone would be surprised that the sleazy goings-on at the Clinton Foundation and Hillary’s secret e-mail servers would dramatically erode her standing with the public, unless they get all their news from MSNBC.
Perhaps the best explanation comes from Jeremy Peters of the New York Times, who describes the cognitive dissonance among Democrats, and the dread (via Free Beacon):
One of the other things that’s really troubling for Hillary is the enthusiasm inside the Democratic Party. That’s why you’ve seen this energy around Bernie Sanders’ candidacy, this interest in Martin O’Malley. When you talk to Democrats, there’s almost a certain sense of obligation, almost resignation that yes, she’s going to be the nominee and yes, we’re onboard.
If that sounds familiar, it should. It’s exactly what Republicans did in 2012 — try out a series of non-viable alternatives to the inevitable nominee. And it portends exactly the same result: a nominee who can’t fire up enough votes to win a national election. It’s still early, as Capehart notes, but not early enough to get a better candidate in place to replace Hillary, and her pattern shows that the decline lasts as long as the election cycle does. The rapidity in which it arrived speaks to the length it will stay, and we may not have seen Hillary hit bottom yet.
In fact, Hillary can’t fire up enough enthusiasm to find 125 women for a fundraiser — in New York City. At the last minute, organizers had to expand access to men after only 50 women bought tickets for the max-contribution event … but Jazz had more on that earlier today, so you already know that.
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