This lack of enthusiasm for Clinton — known as the “enthusiasm gap” — presents a serious threat to her candidacy, as the election necessarily will largely be about turnout and demographics. With no boots-on-the-ground war and unemployment at 4.9 percent, these factors will hold far more sway over the outcome than candidates’ stances on any of the existing nonissues.
It requires enthusiasm to turn demographics into votes. Giving millions of potential voters little reason to go to the polls is a foolproof formula for increasing the number of red states. The 2016 Democratic nominee surely will need the same type of enthusiasm that Obama used to spur those additional 1.4 million voters to the polls in Virginia and turn the state blue. But this is exactly what Clinton lacks.
Could Trump bridge the enthusiasm gap for Clinton? Could he drive people to the polls merely to vote against him? Will those extra 1.4 million Virginians, who may yawn at the thought of Clinton — Hispanics, blacks and other minorities; the unemployed; the working poor; and all the rest of the Trump-offended — work up enough enthusiasm against Trump to turn the state blue? And, if so, could that pattern repeat in enough other swing states, so that in the end Clinton might not actually win the election as much as Trump might lose it?
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