Americans Are Asked What The Biggest Threats Are To The U.S. And Trump Tops The List

Along with a poll released yesterday, Gallup noted that 35% of Americans "name the government, poor leadership or politicians as the greatest problem facing the U.S. This is the highest percentage Gallup has recorded for this concern... 11% specifically citing Trump as the most important problem (5% name the Democrats or liberals and 1% Congress). When asked to name the #1 biggest problem for the country, this is how it came out in the wash:

• The government/Poor leadership- 35%
• Immigration- 19%
• Healthcare- 6%
• Race relations/Racism- 5%
• Unifying the country- 4%
• Poverty/Hunger/Homelessness- 4%
• Environment/Pollution- 3%
• Ethics/Moral/Religious/Family decline-3%
• Federal budget deficit/Federal debt- 3%
• Economy in general- 3%
• Unemployment/Jobs- 3%
• Lack of respect for each other- 2%
• Education- 2%

As we approach the heart of tax season, the mood of the country is getting surly and more surly. It's not what the Trump regime and their lickspittles in Congress were expecting. Reporting for HuffPo, Arthur Delaney wrote that "Republicans boasted all last year that their new tax law boosted paychecks and showered bonuses on several million workers. But now that tax season is upon us, several million Americans are getting a nasty surprise: a bill from the Internal Revenue Service that they never expected."

Many people who had less in federal taxes withheld from the paychecks last year are having to pay for it-- and then some-- in surprise demands from the IRS, demands as much as 5 times more than what they thought they had saved because of the Republican Tax Scam! Two reasons: the Republicans purposely limited deductions that would hurt tax payers in blue states like New York, California, New Jersey and Massachusetts, Hawaii, Minnesota, Connecticut, Vermont, Illinois, Oregon-- and is also hitting Iowa and Wisconsin hard. Voters responded last year by defeating 7 of the 14 California members of Congress from California. All but one of New Jersey's red congressional districts flipped. Iowa went from 1 Democrat and 3 Republicans in their delegation to 1 Republican and 3 Democrats. 2 Red seats flipped in Minnesota and in Illinois and 3 flipped in New York. Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont and Hawaii went into the election already Republican-frei.

The average refund is down 8.7% so far this year. "By capping deductions for state and local taxes," explained Delaney, "Republicans knew the tax hikes in their law would be concentrated on states with high taxes-- which tend to be led by Democrats, who use the taxes to provide more social services." Republican voters in Wisconsin and Iowa are "collateral damage." And although Wisconsin is gerrymandered enough to protect Republican legislators, every single Republican running statewide in the Badger state was defeated in 2018.

The Real State Of The Union-- Most Americans Hope Trump Dies Tonight

State of the Union Poster by Chip Proser

None of those new polls that came out yesterday looked good for Trump-- nor for his congressional enablers. In fact, the CNN poll found that nearly 7 in 10 voters say the federal government is doing a bad job of governing, including 43% who say it’s the worst job of governing in their lifetimes. 19% of Americans think Trump's government is doing a good job. That appeared to clash drastically with Trump's interview with Margaret Brennan on Face The Nation Sunday when he bragged-- lying-- that he's created the best economy in history and that he's headed to a 2020 reelection victory. "The only thing I've done," he stated, falsely, "is created, maybe, the best economy we've had in the history of our country." Tell it to the voters who responded to the new Monmouth poll. Among them, just 37% think Trump should be re-elected-- as opposed to 57% who want to vote for someone else.



He also spent a lot of time talking about his vanity wall, which the new Gallup poll shows is opposed by 60% of voters, up from 57% opposing it 6 months ago. Despite the efforts of the Republican Party 61% of voters oppose deporting all illegal immigrants back to their home country. In fact "the vast majority of Americans (81%) favor allowing immigrants living illegally in the U.S. "the chance to become U.S. citizens if they meet certain requirements over a period of time."

Preparing for a night of lies (his State of the Union address this evening), Trump is freaking out over the massive White House leak that shows he's a lazy sack of crap who does nothing all day but sit around watching TV, eating junk food and gossiping with his friends on the phone. Mike Allen wrote that "White House insiders said the leak sowed chaos. Cliff Sims, the former White House official who wrote the dishy Team of Vipers, told me: 'There are leaks, and then there are leaks. If most are involuntary manslaughter, this was premeditated murder. People inside are genuinely scared.'" One of the NY Times' Trump specialists, Maggie Haberman took to Twitter:

Trump's instinct for self-preservation, though, isn't just to go on the attack against Democrats-- he went full-on against Pelosi, who is now more popular than he is among the American public-- but to have his political team squelch any attempts within the GOP to mount a primary against him. Yesterday's Monmouth poll shows that 43% of Republican primary voters want a primary next year. Zeke Miller and Stephen Peoples reported for the Associated Press that Trump is worried and "has launched a state-by-state effort to prevent an intraparty fight that could spill over into the general-election campaign... including taking steps to change state party rules, crowd out potential rivals and quell any early signs of opposition that could embarrass the" disgusting, hated slob that virtually anyone who isn't an anti-democracy fascist wishes would die tonight as he speaks.

It is an acknowledgment that Trump, who effectively hijacked the Republican Party in 2016, hasn’t completely cemented his grip on the GOP and, in any event, is not likely to coast to the 2020 GOP nomination without some form of opposition. While any primary challenge would almost certainly be unsuccessful, Trump aides are looking to prevent a repeat of the convention discord that highlighted the electoral weaknesses of Presidents George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter in their failed re-election campaigns.

To defend against that prospect, Trump’s campaign has deployed what it calls an unprecedented effort to monitor and influence local party operations. It has used endorsements, lobbying and rule changes to increase the likelihood that only loyal Trump activists make it to the Republican nominating convention in August 2020.

Bill Stepien, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign, calls it all a “process of ensuring that the national convention is a television commercial for the president for an audience of 300 million and not an internal fight.”

One early success for Trump’s campaign was in Massachusetts, where Trump backer and former state Rep. Jim Lyons last month defeated the candidate backed by Massachusetts Republican Gov. Charlie Baker, a Trump critic, to serve as the state party chairman.

“We have a constant focus on tracking everything regarding this process,” Stepien said. “Who’s running, what their level of support for the president is and what their vote counts are.”

The campaign’s work extends beyond state party leadership races, which are taking place in many key states in the coming weeks. Trump’s team plans to organize at county and state caucuses and conventions over the next 18 months to elevate pro-Trump leaders and potential delegates. Ahead of the convention, it aims to have complete control of the convention agenda, rules and platform-- and to identify any potential trouble-makers well in advance.

...[T]he efforts to protect Trump simply highlight his vulnerability, said an adviser to one potential Republican opponent.

“They’re not talented, but they’re not idiotic. They rightfully understand that he could be badly damaged or lose in a nomination battle. They’re doing too much. It looks weak,” said John Weaver, a senior adviser to former Ohio Gov. John Kasich, one of the few high-profile Republicans seriously contemplating a primary challenge.

Trump’s campaign is closely monitoring the intentions of Kasich and other potential primary challengers, and aides said they expect someone to mount a campaign for the nomination. But they insist their efforts are not borne out of fear that Trump is vulnerable.

Primary challenges against incumbent presidents have never been successful in the modern era. And Trump’s poll numbers among Republican voters have proven to be resilient. Still, his aides said they are taking lessons from one-term leaders who lost their re-elections after embarrassing nominating fights.

Those in the past who challenged a president both distracted the incumbent from the November campaign and offered a voice to intraparty discontent, seeding weaknesses that were exploited by a general-election rival.

Another poster by Chip Proser

People Don't Like Trump-- His Popularity Has Dropped In Every Single State

No one wants to work for Trump. Politico reported that he offered the Defense Secretary job to former Arizona Senator Jon Kyl, who turned him down. A cadre of generals have also told him thaty're not interested, including one of his favorites, Jack Keane. He's either stuck with keeping on the acting nitwit he has, Patrick Shanahan, or finding some TV actor to appoint and hope he can get him through the confirmation process.

But prospective Pentagon chiefs aren't the only ones who hate Trump. This morning, Harry Enten reported for CNN that the majority of Americans are against Trump on the wall and the shutdown. "Polls show a majority of Americans blame him and Republicans for the shutdowns, and the majority have also consistently been opposed to his idea of a border wall with Mexico. The average of polls taken since the shutdown began indicate that Americans are blaming Republicans... in the average, about 50% [and] think Trump is most to blame." There is also some sign that Trump may be losing voters in the center of the electorate because of the shutdown and now he is less popular than Nancy Pelosi for the first time during his presidency. And according to Morning Consult, Trump's approval rating has gone down in every single state + DC over the course of the last year-- yes in the states like California where we already hated his guts (and his disapproval sank from 48% to 62%) and in the dumb states where they really love him, like Mississippi (and his disapproval went from just 27% to 39%).

Trump’s net approval rating is now underwater in nine states that he won in 2016: Wisconsin (-12), Michigan (-12), Iowa (-10), Arizona (-7), Pennsylvania (-6) Florida (-3), Georgia (-3), North Carolina (-3) and Ohio (-3).

This list shows every state with their are disapproval and, in parenthesis where that disapprovals were a year ago:

• DC- 79% (61%)
• Vermont- 64% (45%)
• California- 62% (48%)
• Hawaii- 62% (51%)
• Massachusetts- 62% (47%)
• Maryland- 62% (51%)
• New York- 59% (41%)
• Washington- 59% (44%)
• Oregon- 59% (43%)
• Illinois- 58% (40%)
• Connecticut- 58% (42%)
• New Jersey- 57% (44%)
• New Mexico- 57% (35%)
• Rhode Island- 57% (46%)
• Colorado- 56% (44%)
• Delaware- 56% (41%)
• Minnesota- 55% (43%)
• Wisconsin- 54% (41%)
• Michigan- 53% (40%)
• Nevada- 53% (39%)
• Iowa- 53% (40%)
• New Hampshire- 52% (44%)
• Arizona- 52% (35%)
• Pennsylvania- 51% (39%)
• Maine- 51% (40%)
• Florida- 49% (34%)
• Ohio- 49% (37%)
• Georgia- 49% (35%)
• North Carolina- 49% (35%)
• Virginia- 49% (41%)
• Kansas- 47% (32%)
• Utah- 46% (31%)
• Montana- 46% (32%)
• Missouri- 46% (34%)
• TX- 45% (34%)
• Alaska- 45% (31%)
• Indiana- 44% (33%)
• Nebraska- 44% (33%)
• North Dakota- 43% (33%)
• South Carolina- 43% (31%)
• Arkansas- 42% (29%)
• Idaho- 42% (30%)
• Oklahoma- 41% (27%)
• Louisiana- 41% (28%)
• Tennessee- 40% (28%)
• South Dakota- 40% (33%)
• Kentucky- 40% (27%)
• Mississippi- 39% (27%)
• Alabama- 37% (26%)
• West Virginia- 35% (25%)
• Wyoming- 32% (23%)

What about Trump's approval ratings? And sure enough, there are some states where he's still really popular, even if it's dropped a bit, right? Right. His approval is 50% or more in 16 states.

• Wyoming- 64%
• West Virginia- 61%
• Alabama- 58%
• Mississippi- 56%
• Tennessee- 56%
• South Dakota- 55%
• Kentucky- 55%
• Oklahoma- 54%
• Louisiana- 54%
• Idaho- 53%
• Arkansas- 53%
• South Carolina- 52%
• Nebraska- 52%
• Indiana- 52%
• North Dakota- 52%
• Montana- 50%

That's 101 electoral votes... not even halfway to the 270 electoral votes needed to keep Señor Trumpanzee in the White House.

John Pavlovitz is a progressive evangelical pastor with an excellent blog, Stuff That Needs To Be Said. Yesterday he wrote about why he doesn't care about a member of Congress cussing-- and why none of us should. "And let’s be honest," he wrote-- "you who are clutching your pearls and carrying on and feigning righteous indignation, don’t care either."

If dropping an MF-bomb or profanity or coarse language were at all offensive to you, you wouldn’t have voted for this President a couple of weeks after hearing him talk about women like they’re pieces of garbage-- would you?

You wouldn’t have dismissed him saying he could grab them by the p*ssy, as just “boys will be boys locker room banter,” right?

You wouldn’t have held your nose and cast your ballot for him to lead our country, after hearing him say he “moved on” a married woman “like a bitch,” would you?

You wouldn’t have cheered the expletive-laden speeches and vile interview comments as “straight talk from a guy who tells it like it is,” right?

You don’t care about cussing.

I know the shows you stream with your kids, I see you Tweeting about missed field goals in playoff games, I hear you when you’re cut off in traffic, and I know the words you let fly when you’re angry at your kids. Let’s be honest, here.

I don’t care about cussing either.

I care that families are being separated.

I care that medical bills are bankrupting people.

I care that we’re drowning in guns and daily shootings.


I care that Muslims are caricatured into terrorists, migrants into advancing hordes, and LGBTQ people into imminent threats, by our elected leaders.

I care that we’re talking about an asinine multi-billion dollar border wall that won’t solve a crisis, even if there were one-- and there isn’t one.

I care that we have accused predators in the White House and on the Supreme Court.


I care that our climate is changing and our planet is warming and our environment being degraded, and we have politicians who see Science as an adversary.

I care that this Administration solicited and welcomed foreign interference in a Presidential election. 
I care that our President took to Twitter to personally malign Christine Blasey Ford, and that Republican women were fine with that.

I care that voter suppression and gerrymandering are making it almost impossible for poor people and people of color to be heard and represented.

I care that Evangelical Christians are failing their calling to be lovers and healers and compassionate caregivers to the poor and invisible.


I care that racists march without hoods now, that elementary school teachers dress up like border walls, that wrestling coaches cut off a black man’s dreadlocks in public.


I care that our President is mentally unfit to lead, and that he is buffeted by a group of professional enablers who know he is unfit and defend him anyway.


I care that every single day brings  new legislative attacks on people who are already pushed to the brink.


I care that so many of my Christian friends seem not to have the slightest interest in the teaching of Jesus.

I care about families and sick people and underpaid teachers and hungry kids and unpaid Federal workers and transgender teenagers-- and the millions of beautiful, vibrant, disparate human beings who are daily endangered by the leadership of this country.

That’s what I f*ckin’ care about.

I wish you cared about those things. You don’t.


I wish injustice as discrimination and inequality were offensive to you. They aren’t.


I wish marginalized people could merit such passion from you. They don’t.

That offends me.

As White House Dysfunction Becomes More Apparent, Trump's Approval Sags

This week's embodiment of corrupt Trumpist dysfunction-- rodeo clown Ryan Zinke

Miss all those polls that we got to read every couple of days in the run-up to the elections? (Did any of them predict a net 40 seats flipping?) A couple of new ones came out today. The one I thought the most worthwhile though was from NBC and the Wall Street Journal.

Generally speaking, fewer people (33%) believe the country is headed in the right direction and more (56%) say it's headed in the wrong direction. Trump's job approval is also down to it's lowest point since last spring-- 43% approve and 54% disapprove. In terms of "feelings" towards Trump... 24% very positive, 13% somewhat positive, 11% neutral, 9% somewhat negative and a whopping 43% very negative. His "very negative" numbers have been in the 40s and 50s since October, 2015 when only 39% of Americans felt that way about him. When asked who do you want to see take the lead role in setting policy for the country- Trump, Republicans in Congress, or Democrats in Congress? Trump was at his lowest point since they began asking in when he first occupied the White House in January, 2017 (when 28% wanted him to take the leading role). It is now just 19% Trump, 21% Republicans in Congress and 48% Democrats in Congress, the highest ever for Democrats in Congress. When registered voters were asked who they would vote for in 2020:

• Definitely Trump- 23%
• Probably Trump- 15%
• Probably the Democrat- 13%
• Definitely the Democrat- 39%

Asked in House Dems should investigate Trump, 55% said yes and 43% said No. More feelings:

• Republican Party: 32% positive, 42% negative
• Democratic Party: 39% positive, 37% negative
• Michelle Obama: 60% postive, 22% negative
• Nancy Pelosi: 28% positive, 41% negative (this is before she kicked Trump's ass in the Oval Office last week)
• China: 10% postive, 46% negative
• Saudi Arabia: 6% positive, 59% negative

• Russia: 6% positive, 58% negative
• FBI- 51% positive, 17% negative
• Robert Mueller: 30% postive, 23% negative

And... speaking of Russia, the FBI and Mueller, here are some relevant questions they asked on the topic of Putin-Gate. Asked in they agree with the statement "Donald Trump has been honest and truthful when it comes to the investigation into Russian interference with the 2016 presidential election and related matters," 34% agreed and 62% disagreed (51% strongly).

Another question: "Based on what you have been seen, read, or heard about Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller’s investigation, has it given you more doubts about Donald Trump's presidency or not?" 50% said more doubts and 44% said no doubts. 34% of respondents said the investigation should end and 45% said it should continue.


The Most Hated President Ever? Also The Most Loved

Chances are, if you're a DWT reader, you're a Trump hater through and through. Unless you're a Republican. Rank-and file Republicans love Trump-- they really do. A recent poll shows that if Romney runs against Trump in 2020, the Republican primary would yield Trump 75% of the vote... and Romney just 1%. Sit down and take a deep breath. Señor T "commands the second highest 'own party' approval rating of any president at the 500 day mark since World War II, behind only President George W. Bush, after 9/11." He makes it "respectable" to be a racist, which-- let's face it-- has a lot more to do with why anyone, pre-Trump, ever wanted to admit about joining the GOP. Feh... right?

I guess they never really liked anything the GOP stood for anyway-- except the racism and bigotry-- and now Trump is throwing it all way... except the racism and bigotry. Jonathan Swan: "Trump’s hijacking of the formerly conservative GOP is complete-- an astonishing accomplishment. The majority party in America is fully defined by his policies, his popularity with the base, his facts-be-damned mentality, his ability to control and quiet virtually all Republican elected officials.

Everything changed:

• Trump has wiped out a large portion of Obama’s legacy. He’s exited the Paris climate deal; signed major tax cuts, especially for corporations; confirmed an ultra-conservative Supreme Court justice and record numbers of circuit court judges; deregulated like crazy; exited the Iran deal; exited the TPP trade deal; repealed the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate; and moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing it as Israel’s capital.
• New hardline immigration enforcement is in place, including separating children from parents of illegal immigrants. An extraordinary percentage of Trump’s senior staff has quit or been fired.
• Only one campaign original remains on Trump’s staff: social media director Dan Scavino.
• A national security adviser who began with bombastic high hopes of enforcing a new hard line against radical Islam-- Mike Flynn-- is now at personal peril in the Mueller investigation.
• Trump no longer talks about wiping out the national debt by ending “waste, fraud and abuse.”
• Trump no longer talks about shutting down federal agencies.

Nothing changed:

• Family survives despite many premature obituaries about Jared and Ivanka (Javanka).
• Trump still watches a ton of TV, views everything through a media lens, and obsesses over negative coverage.
• Trump still views foreign negotiations as zero-sum games with a clear winner and loser. The scorecard is the bilateral trade deficit; Trump’s hardline instincts on trade and immigration are unchanged from the campaign trail.
• There’s no trillion-dollar infrastructure package.
• Mexico hasn’t paid for the wall-- and Congress has only given Trump a pittance so far.
• The national debt has climbed ever higher under Trump’s stewardship.
• Trump still lies, exaggerates, distorts and responds to paper cuts by butchering his enemies.
• Vice President Pence remains-- and nobody I’ve spoken to has ever seen him criticize or debate the president in any meaningful way.
• Trump has the same media diet: heavy on Lou Dobbs, Sean Hannity and Fox & Friends (with a sprinkling of hate-watch channel-surfing to CNN and MSNBC), and the same core diet of print newspapers, led by his hometown New York Times and New York Post.

So... is it actually possible the GOP will retain control of Congress after November? I don't think so, but everyone I know is worried about it. Something called the CBS News Battleground Tracker claims the House is a toss-up. Forget the 40-some-odd seats in state legislatures that have flipped since Trump occupied the Oval Office... they have polls. The tracker predicts 219 Democrats to 216 Republicans-- a one seat majority if the election were held today. But the margin of error is 9 seats, so... way too close to call. It still predicts a twenty-odd gain for the Dems, less than half of what I've been predicting.

The pointless Democratic Party that stands for mostly nothing at all-- a tent too big to be meaningful-- is lucky people don't like Trump and the GOP, because barely half of Democratic Party supporters in swing districts say they are voting for the Democrats because they are for the Democrats. 49% of them are just against Trump and the Republicans. The Democrats are exactly what they've been trying try to be for over a decade-- the lesser of two evils. And identity politics voters prefer Democrats, of course (like the gender gap)

Republican supporters actually like what the GOP stands for-- shhhhh... that racism and bigotry we talked about above.

While Democrats may be poised to make gains, more than half of voters don't think either party in Congress has been trying to address the things they care about. Partisans think their own party is trying at least some to address their concerns, but few partisans think they are doing a lot on that. Right now, the GOP has a slight edge with independents, some of whom like the president's policies-- but not the way he handles himself personally. About a quarter of them aren't sure who'll they vote for.

Overall, voters in these competitive districts want to hear a lot from congressional candidates on health care, jobs and wages, and immigration.

Democrats and Republicans have different priorities. Most Republicans want to hear a lot about immigration, followed by jobs and wages, and health care. Nearly two-thirds of Republicans say the arrival of new immigrants has changed the area where they live, and most say it's for the worse.

For Democrats, they want candidates to focus on health care a lot, as well as income inequality, education and teacher salaries, and jobs. They are more likely than Republicans to say unemployment and the availability of good jobs is a problem where they live.

Alan Grayson made a good point: "Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does politics. When you don’t say much of anything about what you will do if you are elected, then the other side does it for you. That’s why the GOP is telling everyone who will listen that the only thing that the Democrats will do if they win the election is to raise taxes 'on you, on me, and on that fellow behind the tree.'" We need this guy back in Congress... badly.

Levi Tillemann, the progressive candidate running against Trump rubber stamp Mike Coffman in the Denver suburbs, has to get through a DCCC conservaDem, Jason Crow, before he can get to Coffman. Crow is a typical nothing candidate, a New Dem who would go to Washington and be a careerist waste of a seat. Tillemann is looking for real reform-- and that means reform of the Democratic Party. This morning he put it like this: "Today Democrats in Washington seem to lack all conviction while Trump’s cronies are full of passionate intensity. Democrats need to fight for something-- we need to fight for justice and opportunity. We can’t sell out workers, families, and marginalized communities to corporate donors and Wall Street. I say enough is enough. It’s time for change."

Professional Republican operatives are still very worried, of course. Charlie Black, a veteran GOP consultant told the NY Times yesterday that Trumpanzee "is like a suicide bomber: He could still blow himself up the day before the election and ruin everything." Let's hope. since there's more of a chance of that happening than there is of Pelosi and her leadership team supporting popular and effective congressional candidates or even putting forward and propagating a meaningful platform for Democratic candidates to run on.

Is Trump Honest And Trustworthy? Most Americans Say NO-- And Most Say Fox Is The Top Source Of Fake News

Trumpanzee-- no brain surgeon-- was at least smart enough to always know he was too intellectually limited (and perhaps aware that he is deteriorating mentally too fast) to actually be a real president in anything but name. And that was fine with him. When he offered Kasich the vice-presidency, Kasich was told he would be in charge of all domestic and foreign policies, while Señor T would just be in charge of Making America Great Again. When he's not out golfing or making ceremonial appearances he sits around watching Fox and tweeting their nonsense.

Nancy Ohanian asks, "What Would Freud Do?"

Yesterday, Republican polling firm Rasmussen, Trumpanzee's favorite pollsters released a survey of likely voters on the trustworthiness of various news sources. Señor Trumpanzee, they reported "suggested earlier this week that the media should award an annual Fake News Award for the worst coverage of his presidency but left Fox News out of the running since it is the only network the president and his supporters believe gives him fair coverage. But 40% of all voters think Fox News should be the winner of the first annual Fake News Trophy... 53% of Democrats and a plurality (42%) of voters not affiliated with either major party declare Fox News the winner, just 24% of Republicans agree." These were the results of which news organizations voters find least believable and the most fake:

• Fox- 40%
• CNN- 25%
• MSNBC- 9%
• ABC- 4%
• CBS- 3%
• NBC- 2%
• someone else or undecided- 17%

SSRS did a poll for CNN earlier this month. When asked if Trump’s statements and actions since taking office have made respondents more confident or less confident in his ability to serve as president only 30% said more confident while 64%-- the highest ever-- said less confident. When asked if foreign leaders respect Trump, just 24% said they thought so, while an astronomical 68% said no. The they got to the trustworthiness question. Just 20% of likely voters believe most of the communication that comes from the White House, while 37% believe "some of it" and 32% believe none of it.

This isn't just bad for Trump; this is dangerous for the U.S. And when they asked specifically if Trump is "honest and trustworthy," only 34% were delusional enough to say yes. (64% of American voters say Trump isn't honest and trustworthy.) Only 33% think he should be reelected and 63% say he doesn't deserve reelection.

Nancy Ohanian takes a look at Huckabee's deranged daughter

Watch Tony Schwartz, Trump's Art of The Deal ghost writer, being interviewed on MSNBC this week about the deterioration of Trump's mental health. "This is a person," he said, "who is exceptionally dangerous because he is losing his grip... someone no longer connected to reality."



Who you calling a kook? Is Donald J. Trump fit to be president of the United States? Has he ever been? And, while, we're at it, is Lindsey Graham fit to serve as a U.S. Senator and has he ever been? Please... you decide:

Who Still Supports Trump? The Same People Who Backed The High Sparrow In Game Of Thrones

Last night we took a quick look at Tuesday's legislative special election in which a Democrat beat his GOP rival handily in a swing district that had gone heavily for Trump last year. Trump's reverse coattails have been acting as an anchor in state legislative district special elections all over the country, as independent voters growing increasingly disgusted with him and his Regime and the way congressional Republicans enable him. Vice News' report yesterday that he has instructed his team to provide him with 2 folders daily-- one at 9:30 a.m. and one at 4:40 a.m.-- is further persuading people that Trump is an ineffective buffoon and a fake president-- and the Korea crisis is emphasizing in the minds of many why that is dangerous. By the way, the silly propaganda folders are 20-25 pages of... wait for it-- "screenshots of positive cable news chyrons (those lower-third headlines and crawls), admiring tweets, transcripts of fawning TV interviews, praise-filled news stories, and sometimes just pictures of Trump on TV looking powerful."

I'm sure you've seen the dismal, sinking poll numbers-- now heading towards impeachment territory if you ascribe to the theory that once Trump's job approval is below one-third (it's now 32% in one brand new poll), significant numbers of Republicans in districts where independent voters are the key to reelection, will want to be seen opposing Trump... bigly. Yesterday Steven Shepard at Politico made the point that Trump's base has been shrinking since election day-- a direct contradiction to another couple of tweeted lies from Señor Trumpanzee that his base is "bigger and stronger than ever before." Stevens' point is that the obsessive Trumpanzee claims are "contradicted by a steady stream of recent polling showing that the share of Americans who approve of Trump’s job performance is shrinking, along with the share of Americans most enthusiastic about his presidency." Most Americans now recognize that he's a compulsive liar and that it doesn't make sense to assume anything he ever says is true.

However you measure the president’s base, it has diminished, not increased, in the seven months he’s been in office. It’s a slide he’ll need to reverse to avoid dragging down the GOP in the midterms-- and to have a more credible shot at reelection.

A new Politico/Morning Consult poll shows Trump’s approval rating slipping to the lowest point of his young presidency. While he’s confounded the polls before, it’s the trendline that should be most worrisome to the White House.

Only 40 percent of registered voters approve of the job Trump is doing as president, the new Politico/Morning Consult poll shows, down from a high-water mark of 52 percent in March. And the percentage who approve strongly-- one way to measure the size of Trump’s most fervent supporters-- is also at a new low: just 18 percent.

That fits with other surveys conducted over the past few weeks, all of which show Trump at or near the low-water marks for each pollster. And there is evidence Trump’s backslide has eroded some of his electoral base: The president has lost ground with Republicans and the independent voters that propelled him to victory.

Trump’s approval rating among self-identified Trump voters is at 81 percent, down from 86 percent last week. And among Republican voters in the new Politico/Morning Consult poll, the president is at 76 percent, down slightly from 79 percent last week.

..."Unabated by the turbulence of the last six months, there remains a core base of ardent Trump supporters," said Morning Consult co-founder and Chief Research Officer Kyle Dropp. "However, that base has unquestionably declined since the president took office. In late January, 56 percent of Trump voters strongly approved of the president, and just 1 percent disapproved. Today, 41 percent strongly approve, and 17 percent disapprove."

Trump isn’t bringing converts into his base, either, the poll shows. Among voters who say they backed Hillary Clinton last year, more than 3 in 4, 78 percent, strongly disapprove of Trump. Only 8 percent of Clinton voters even somewhat approve of Trump... The ongoing contraction of Trump’s base has accelerated over the past month. Those trends show Trump’s approval rating has fallen because certain segments of Republicans and independents have soured on him.

So who still backs him? People so filled with fear and hatred and whose lives are so dismal that they want to die-- in other words, typical cultists who are, generally-speaking, severely mentally ill. As Andy Kopsa wrote for Rewire these people believe Señor Trumpanzee is their ticket to paradise and that he will "pave the way for the second coming of Jesus Christ." Kopsa writes about a cult called POTUS Shield, whose leader claims God told him to start it "in the middle of the night and told him to gather to POTUS Shield prayer warriors and prophets, in order to cast a protective shield to surround Donald Trump... The president, it turns out, was chosen by none other than God himself."

Along with [High Sparrow Frank] Amedia, POTUS Shield is populated by right-wing religionists like Alveda King, Lou Engle, and Jerry Boykin. Its followers believe a Trump presidency has a holy mission: to pave the way for the second coming of Jesus Christ.

POTUS Shield is a unique gathering of key players in anti-choice, anti-LGBTQ, and “religious freedom” politicking of the last two decades. Groups like Engle’s “The Call Ministries” and the Family Research Council (FRC), where Boykin sits as executive vice president, have influenced national, local, and international political policies from a strictly Christian worldview-- including abstinence-only “education,” virulently anti-choice protests, and the deadly anti-homosexuality bill in Uganda. As the director of the anti-choice group Civil Rights for the Unborn, meanwhile, King uses her Uncle Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s civil rights legacy to flog anti-choice rhetoric that abortion providers are specifically targeting Black communities.

The POTUS Shield website has a “donate” button where the faithful can give to the cause. Although POTUS Shield is registered in Ohio as a nonprofit organization, it does not appear to have a record of federal tax filings as such, which makes it difficult to track where its funding is coming from. Inquiries to POTUS Shield representatives about the group’s nonprofit status were not answered.

Some individuals in the group adhere to a religious doctrine of “Seven Mountains,” a term popularized by member Lance Wallnau, who was one of a few evangelicals to predict Trump’s election. Seven Mountains’ strategic goal is for Christians to seize control of all aspects of civil and political society by whatever means necessary. This includes the media, arts, education, government, religion, business, and family. Once these believers secure all of these “seven mountains,” Christ will return. And for POTUS Shield, Donald Trump is the guy to do it.

...Trump’s arguably un-Christian history of alleged sexual assault and harassment, questionable business dealings, multiple marriages, and general vulgarity are of little apparent consequence to POTUS Shield, since God put his favor on him. Recently, however, it seems POTUS Shield and other conservative Christians found a way to make Trump palatable to those less zealous among them-- Trump is just a means to an end. Trump as president, right-wing evangelicals suggest, is akin to a latter-day Constantine. Constantine was the initially non-believing Roman Emperor who nevertheless converted the Roman Empire to Christianity. Viewed through this lens, Trump is still a tool of God and washed clean of his obvious “sins.”

Fortunately for the people of POTUS Shield, there is always true believer Mike Pence. Members of POTUS Shield (and other evangelicals) refer to Pence as a “covenant man.” This designation places the right-wing former Indiana governor in league with Bible heavyweights Moses, Jacob, and Noah. Lengthy videos by POTUS Shield and adherents explain a covenant man is obedient to God despite a corrupt and sinful culture.

Most Americans Think Trump Sucks-- But The Moron Voters Who Put Him In The White House Are Happily Sticking With Him

We're not quite at the 100 days of Trump mark yet but all the polls show him increasingly unpopular with the general public, The latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll show that 54% disapprove of the job he's doing, compared with 40% who approve, a 14-point gap that is significantly wider than February's 4-point difference. 64% of the public view his first 100 days as fair or poor-- mostly (45%) poor. Qualities like temperament and honesty are still major problems for him, respectively 21% and 25% of people seeing him as strong on those characteristics. Only 27% see him as knowledgeable. Only 14% say he's off to a great start. And he's dragging his party down with him-- or perhaps his party is dragging him down with them:

When the poll looks at white with college degrees and whites without college degrees, there's a very marked split in feelings about Trump. He knew what he was saying when, during the campaign, he said he loved the poorly educated. They love him too. Only 34% of whites with degrees approve of Trump (57% disapprove) but that statistic flips on it's head when you look at whites without degrees. 56% approve of Trump and just 38% disapprove.

A poll from the Washington Post had even worse news. Just 4% of Trump voters would ditch him in a redo of the 2016 election and only 2% of Trump voters say he's been worse than expected. 62% of Trump voters say he's been better than they expected. Think about that. Gary Langer explained the poll he did for ABC News:

His challenges are considerable. Majorities say Trump lacks the judgment and the temperament it takes to serve effectively. Six in 10 doubt his honesty and trustworthiness, see him as out of touch and don't think he understands the problems of people like them. Fifty-six percent say he hasn't accomplished much in his first 100 days. And 55 percent say he doesn't follow a consistent set of principles in setting policy (though fewer see this as a problem, 48 percent).

All told, 42 percent of Americans approve of Trump's performance as president, while 53 percent disapprove. That compares to an average of 69-19 percent for past presidents at or near 100 days in office-- for example, 69-26 percent for Trump's predecessor, Barack Obama.

Still, the national survey also finds some brighter spots for the president-- chiefly in pushing for jobs and in foreign policy-- as well as deep popularity problems for the opposition party. Sixty-seven percent say the Democratic Party is out of touch with the concerns of most Americans, even more than say the same about Trump, and similar to the Republican Party (62 percent). That's a steeply negative turn for the Democrats, 19 percentage points more critical than when last asked three years ago, including especially steep losses in their own base.

Trump's better grades include broad 73 percent approval of his pressuring companies to keep jobs in the United States-- even most Democrats, liberals and nonwhites approve, three groups that are broadly critical of Trump more generally. And more than half, 53 percent, see him as a strong leader, although that compares with 77 percent for Obama at this stage.

On one specific issue, a plurality, 46 percent, says he's handling the situation with North Korea "about right," as opposed to being too aggressive (37 percent) or too cautious (just 7 percent). Similarly, a recent ABC/Post poll found 51 percent support for Trump's missile strikes on Syria; together these results make his foreign policy a comparative bright spot. They're also a contrast with Obama, seen by 53 percent as too cautious in his foreign policy in fall 2014, as he dealt with Syria and Russian intervention in Ukraine.

As noted, this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates, finds no evidence of buyer's remorse among Trump supporters. Among those who report having voted for him in November, 96 percent today say it was the right thing to do; a mere 2 percent regret it. And if a rerun of the election were held today, the poll indicates even the possibility of a Trump victory in the popular vote among 2016 voters.

...Among Americans who say they voted in the 2016 election, 46 percent say they voted for Hillary Clinton and 43 percent for Trump, very close to the 2-point margin in the actual popular vote results. However, while Trump would retain almost all of his support if the election were held again today (96 percent), fewer of Clinton's supporters say they’d stick with her (85 percent), producing a 40-43 percent Clinton-Trump result in this hypothetical re-do among self-reported 2016 voters.

That's not because former Clinton supporters would now back Trump; only 2 percent of them say they'd do so, similar to the 1 percent of Trump voters who say they'd switch to Clinton. Instead, they're more apt to say they'd vote for a third-party candidate or wouldn’t vote.

In a cautionary note to her party, Clinton's 6-point drop in a hypothetical mulligan election relates to views of whether the Democratic Party is in touch with peoples' concerns. Although the sample sizes are small, those who say the party is out of touch are less likely to say they'd support Clinton again, compared with those who see it as in touch.

Still, there's no strong evidence that defectors primarily come from groups that favored Bernie Sanders in the primary. There are no broad differences by age, and liberals are 9 points more likely than moderates and conservatives to stick with Clinton. Similarly, nonwhites are 10 points more likely than whites to say they would not support Clinton again, with more than a third of them heading to the Libertarian candidate, Gary Johnson.

I hear a lot of fury and hatred expressed towards Trump. Although I have a brother-in-law who voted for him, I don't know anyone else who did. I suspect most everyone I know would like to see him dropped into a tank filled with hungry sharks-- even the ones who oppose capital punishment. But what few people ever want to express out loud is the rage they feel towards the Trump voters-- our fellow countrymen. [UPDATE: This morning the mayor of a French town that voted for Le Pen yesterday says he's thinking of resigning because he doesn't want to "serve assholes."] Do you want to kill them? No? How about take away their right to vote? They suck. But you know who else sucks? Here's who-- look at these numbers closely-- and the Democratic number is so jarringly high because almost half of Democratic voters agree that the corrupt party elites-- overwhelmingly careerists-- are out of touch, which they clearly are: