Obama to be extensively involved in 2016 campaign

[Virginiá]

This could either be a great idea for the Democrats or could backfire in the worst way.  Trump can dig up a lot of dirt on Obama's presidency, as well.  It's one of those high risk/high reward tactics.  I look forward to seeing where this leads.

What dirt? They tried tarnishing him in 2012. Since then, there hasn't been anything worse than before 2012's election that would do any damage. Democrats have very high approval ratings of Obama, so either way it doesn't matter.

Obama has been a decent president overall and no amount of Trump blowing through his piehole will change that Bushie

[Virginiá]

Indeed. However, having Obama out there could also help Trump drive out the white vote. Obama's share of the white vote was only 39% in 2012, and odds are in 2016 America, his share of the white vote would fall further if he were on the ballot. I'm curious as to how bad Hillary might end up doing with the white vote if the Democratic Party continues to embrace urban rhetoric and dismiss white voters (IE Coal industry, Trump supporters, ect)

If Obama ran for a 3rd term, he may actually get less white votes - It's possible, but that problem is most likely his own. A white non-Obama candidate going forward can probably expect slightly less than the Democratic white vote average for the past generation: 41%~, which is more than enough given the massive non-white support we will get.

But it must be noted that Obama's very low white vote national average is heavily influenced by collapsing support in the South, while his white vote averages in all the swing states/states he needed were largely OK, if not better. So the South really skews his averages.

I can't see Hillary getting more than 34-35% among Whites ... which would be worse than Obama did. And that means something. Especially if many white DEM males are sitting out the election or rural ones who switch over to Trump.

And somehow Trump is much more appealing? That makes no sense. Why does everyone conveniently ignore how much of a scumbag Trump is and how shady/terrible his history is, or how toxic his campaign has been so far? How is that not worse than Hillary? Him drawing large crowds of angry Republicans doesn't really mean anything.

After all, Mondale got like 36% or lower in 1984, yet that didn't represent the new white vote ceiling for Democrats, even though people probably said it did back then. Dukakis got only 40% of the white vote as well, but it did rebound eventually. Bill Clinton only got 39% of the white vote in 1992, but 43% in 1996 and Gore/Kerry stayed above 40%. Obama in 2008 got 43%. One election (2012) with 39% does not make it the new ceiling.

Suffice to say, Trump is not going to break even 60% of the white vote. He's too polarizing and offensive. This much should be obvious.

I completely agree that the demographics are changing in America, but when you start losing 60-70% of white America, doesn't that spell some concern for Democrats?

Only getting 40% of the white vote is perfectly manageable, esp if most of that loss is in red states. Democrats can actually stand to get even 37% - 38% if non-white vote support holds up (which it appears it will), and still win the White House. That's how fast demographics are screwing over Republicans.

It's easy to say Republicans will just somehow keep getting more of the white vote, but it ignores the sad reality that the GOP essentially wrote off an entire generation of white youth. They won't favor Republicans nearly as much as older folks do now.

[Virginiá]

In fact, many of my calculations show a plausible scenario where Trump loses the popular vote by 1%, but wins a comfortable electoral college victory.

Well I'm curious exactly how much of the white/black vote you're giving Trump, and what the turnout is. Trump is unlikely to do much better than Romney with blacks given what has been going on at his rallies. People are watching the news clips showing black people getting assaulted. It doesn't even matter who started it. It's perception and he might as well be George Wallace to black voters. This could even drive their turnout higher than it was in 2012.

Look, we can argue this all day, but I'm saying that you guys need to be more open to the fact that Trump will most likely alienate a lot of white voters. Your scenarios depend on him somehow not alienating those people, which ignores the dark nature of his campaign.

I just don't get the rationale that Hillary simply being Hillary will cost her so much support, yet Trump doing all the offensive, almost-evil things he's done so far costs him nothing. It makes no sense.

[Virginiá]

All of them.    Remember hes also getting people who generally dont vote.   You do realize that voter turn out for elections is not 100% ?  

Actually voter registration stats and research into his 'coalition' show he is not really bringing many new voters to the polls - Not many more than any other candidate would. In fact, a lot of his coalition appears to be put together from existing Republican voters.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/03/trumps-revolution-from-within/473430/

Right...there is "fear of Hillary" but no"fear of Trump"

That's...like...100% rational thinking right there....

This is exactly what I'm saying. People are completely ignoring the toxic effect Trump is having on large swathes of voters. Like somehow Hillary is worse than Trump, which may be true to some Republicans, but there are a lot of people who see Trump as a terrible human being and unfit for president.

Somehow when everyone prognosticates about Trump winning, they completely neglect to factor in how people view him. They treat him as if all Republicans would be fine with him, which is very clearly not the case, at least as far as the polls show.

If the demographic turnout remained exactly the same as 2012, but Trump slightly increased his share of white non-college votes and turned them out slightly more, he instantaneously jumps from 206 electoral votes to 253.

In fact, if Trump increases non-college white voters enough, and Hillary gets 88% with blacks, Hispanics and Asians, she still loses the election 274-264 despite winning the popular vote 49-48%.

So you're saying Trump is going to get over 60% of the white vote? That's preposterous and extremely wishful thinking. Is it possible? Sure. Is it likely? Not at all. Not unless he completely changes his entire strategy and becomes a nice person, instead of some asshole crowd agitator who uses things like banning Muslims or building walls to stay in the spotlight.

There are a couple things right now I think we can settle on. First, Hispanic turnout is going to skyrocket, as intense mobilization efforts that are already starting bear fruit, and their support will be upwards of 75% - 80% for Hillary. Against Trump, there is no credible argument that says this won't happen.

And for blacks, 11% - 12% Republican share is too generous at this point. Have you seen what Trump allows, even encourages, at his rallies? The Media has been playing videos of black people getting spit on, shoved and assaulted for months now. It doesn't matter if Trump is racist himself or if maybe the video's context is misunderstood, the only thing that matters is what it looks like.  And right now, his rallies look like something you'd see at a George Wallace rally. So no, Trump would be lucky to get Romney numbers for blacks, maybe a tiny bit more.

In a new era defined by police brutality and bias of the criminal justice system against blacks, they actually care about that stuff. Seeing Republicans at a Republican presidential rally treat black people like that goes much, much, much farther than some orangutan yelling "make america great again"