I Was Wrong

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I recall writing that I thought that Bernie Sanders had a better chance of getting his party’s nomination than Donald Trump did of getting his party’s nomination. So, chalk up another in a series of bad prognostications.

However, I am curious about one thing. Of all the votes cast in primaries (forget caucuses for the moment), how does Sanders’ percent of Democrats compare with Trump’s percent of Republicans? If I read this correctly, then as of March 19 Sanders had roughly 40 percent of Democratic votes and Trump had 37.5 percent of Republican votes. My guess is that both of their shares have gone up since then. Perhaps the answer to my question is here and here.

I think Sanders has out-performed Trump by this measure, although I may be wrong again.

12 thoughts on “I Was Wrong”

  1. Their positions are quite different. The Democrat side wad anyone but Hillary. And a total unknown filled the bill. I bet what’s her face who now seems to be angling for a vp slot is kicking herself for not throwing in early. The Republican side was anyone? Anyone? And some celebrity with name recognition and the unforeseen matching temperament for angry voters floated to the top. Few recognized how nihilistic voters have become, but let’s not go too far the other way now. Both of these guys are (barely) warm bodies that fit the bill. It is mostly demand-side. Remember when we thought Gore, Dole, Dukakis, and Romney were bad candidates? Sheesh!

  2. Sanders was running against one opponent. Trump started against 16, though that gradually diminished as losers fell out. But right through Indiana he always faced multiple opponents, not just one. So the comparison seems meaningless.

  3. I think an important difference between them is that Sanders gained steam because his views closely match the lion’s share of the democratic base, who are basically scandinaviophiles that tolerate market processes because you can’t get rid of them but are communists at heart.

    Trump’s base probably had more to do with people who are dissatisfied with political elites and liked him as an avatar as someone who’s able to overcome various forces they find distasteful. I’d bet a lot of Trump voters don’t actually agree with a lot of what he says.

    Both parties seriously underestimated how much they thought they could get by with the status quo.

  5. I agree with the others – on top of just the number of opponents, Trump vanquished people heavily favored by party insiders. And he did it with pretty much on instinct, with no help from experienced political consultants. And now he’s doing exactly what he said he would do, unify the Republican party

    In 2008, “not being Hillary” was a successful strategy for Obama. The difference is that Obama is actually charismatic, so he was able to pull it off. Sanders by contrast is a Ron Paul-style curmudgeon with almost no charisma. And even if he magically wins the primary, the party behind him will be in shambles.

    Bernie should get a lot of credit for his success for sure, but I don’t see it approaching the magnitude of Trump’s accomplishment.

    • While Sanders is certainly less charismatic then Obama, lets not kid ourselves. In 2008, black people voted for the black candidate over Hillary. In 2016, black people aren’t voting for the whitest nerdiest politician ever. Sanders won all of Obama’s voters minus black people, and that is all the difference.

      It’s very hard to win a democratic primary without black people, and its very hard to win black people unless your either A) black yourself or B) plugged into the get out the vote patronage network in black communities/have a lot of name recognition in the black community.

      This should be worrying though. If I were a Democrat I would see how a nobody like Sanders could nearly topple the Clinton dynasty, and realize that if I put out a well funded charismatic socialist capable of playing identity politics (and maybe having some darker skin) I could easily win the democratic primary and probably the general election.

      Obama was this candidate, though he was a bit of an empty suit. The next Obama will be more radicalized, the Trump of the left.

  6. Arnold, do you follow betting markets for politics? Sanders’ maximum probability of getting the nomination was ~20% in February. Trump was at 20-50% in February (very volatile). (Look at electionbettingodds.com or predictwise.com).

    Last October Trump and Sanders both were given 10-15% probability of getting the nomination. Before that point, you were probably right, Sanders had a higher probability.

    Ben Kennedy, Trump did not vanquish people that were heavily favored by party insiders. Party insiders never coalesced around any candidate according to endorsements (tracked on 538). There was no candidate that insiders liked. I’m sure they would have picked the field over Trump however.

  8. And yes, Bernie Sanders will likely get more votes than Trump and I believe has a higher level of delegates at this point. (Sanders will fall below since Trump will get 80% of the delegates as the presumptive nominee.) The big difference is the Democrats winnowed down to two candidates 1 hour after polls closing in Iowa while the Republicans still had 10 candidates after Iowa winnowing. In reality, HRC has had delegate math and a defined path when she swept the 5 Primaries (FL, NC, IL, MO, OH) on March 15th but Sanders had enough donations to keep running.

    Probably the oddest point of the Democratic Primary, almost every Primary could have been predicted by Demographics of the state in which HRC has been strong with minority voters and Bernie winning states that have a high percentage of white voters. (And June 7 Primaries look bad for Bernie although I think he can win NM and keep California close.)

  9. 16 candidates vs 2.

    One of the biggest mistakes of the analysts was assuming that everyone not voting for Trump was against Trump. This was the so called “Trump Ceiling”, where he couldn’t possibly get more the 30% then 40% then X% of the vote.

    This was disproved in the big April primaries when Trump shattered the ceiling. It was followed up in Indiana and knocked out Cruz.

    While Trump wasn’t people’s second choice that often, he was their second choice often enough. People who supported Ted Cruz as their first choice weren’t always keen to support Kaisch as their second choice, and vice versa. So even if only a small fraction of voters for the candidates that dropped out went to Trump, that was enough to give him a solid majority.

    I pointed this out before and got dismissed, even though the polls and math were pretty clear. You wouldn’t accuse a party in a multi-party parliamentary system which got less then 50% of the vote as “losing” the election. David Cameron only got 37% of the votes in the UK, did he lose the election?

    • One of the biggest mistakes of the analysts was assuming that everyone not voting for Trump was against Trump.

      Exactly right. I got figuratively blue in the face pointing this out over the last few months. The only real opportunity for the rest of the field to beat Trump might have been to have had a heads up after New Hampshire, but I don’t even think that was likely to have carried the day as results have come in.

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