Nobody's going to win this election by more than 7 points, much less 10 or 15 points.
I think Cruz loses by 10-15%, which is basically the modern day floor and equivalent to Goldwater. For Trump, a 2/3rds chance he loses by 10-15% and a 1/3rd chance he wins by 1-4% IMO.
There is not a chance in bloody hell Ted loses anywhere close to 10-15%. His absolute floor would be a -6% in the GE, and that's if he gets shredded in the last couple of months debate wise and what not (not happening).
Here's my reasoning. Cruz has done absolutely nothing to reach out to any meaningful number of Obama 2012 voters on any issue. He also doesn't have much potential to alter the electorate by bringing out non-voters, save for a handful of Evangelical Christians who were cool toward Romney. And even that is very overstated, as Romney both did better than Bush with Evangelicals and got higher turnout. And there's a whole litany of extreme statements and actions for Democrats to hit him on. When swing voters get a sense of how out of the mainstream he is, the bottom will fall out. He'll go down with the ship, but look intelligent doing it.
Trump, on the other hand, is on Trump's side. On many issues, I expect he will fly to the center at Mach 3 the day after he clinches the nomination. He would be the GOP nominee, but running as an effective populist 3rd party candidate. And he has that Nixonian vibe. He has a credible appeal to a broad swath of 2X Obama voters. He would start off way down, and stay there more likely than not, but he has a chance if he plays his cards right.
Still, to go from Romney -4 to Cruz -10 to -15 takes a whole lot more than just not getting any Obama '12 voters and getting some "extremism" attacks from Dems: keep in mind, you're saying that Cruz will lose by nearly twice the margin McCain did by. That's just absurd, IMO. First, Clinton is less popular than Obama was in 2012 and the economy is showing some shaky signs heading into 2016. Second, with respect to extremism, given how unpopular the GOP congressional establishment is, Cruz could definitely frame himself as being a maverick and an independent fighter, and given his general debating prowess, he could utilize his intelligence (as you put it) to re-cast himself in a more moderate image while retaining his conservative stances.
Usually I agree with your posts, but this one I'm strongly against (granted, I am a Cruz supporter at this point, so take it with a grain of salt). I think Cruz's absolute floor is -10% and that his median is probably Clinton +4, with a reasonable (but not great) chance of a Cruz victory.
