TRUMP, THE “REVERSE BRADLEY EFFECT,” AND THE MAN’S UPCOMING LOSS IN IOWA

12/23/15

As I have been telling people with whom I engage in political discussions for (at least) weeks, Donald Trump will lose in Iowa.   While Iowa is not an inordinately conservative state, its GOP electorate is dominated by socially conservative evangelical Christians.   For obvious reasons (e.g., the serial marriages, the only vague familiarity with religion of any kind, the references to “eating the wafer,” and the lack of concern for most of the issues these voters hold dear), these people are not big Trump fans.   For the last several months, their support has been split between Ted Cruz and Ben Carson, with a few votes going to the walking dead Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee.   With Dr. Carson’s candidacy weakening, that evangelical support in Iowa has been going to Mr. Cruz and, if Dr. Carson’s support continues to swoon, more of his supporters will go to Mr. Cruz.   So it looks like Mr. Cruz will triumph in Iowa.

The only qualification I would provide for the above prediction involves what I call Mr. Trump’s “reverse Bradley effect.”   Many of you remember Tom Bradley, the mayor of Los Angeles who happened to be black.   Mr. Bradley wanted to be governor of California and won the Democratic nomination for that post in 1982.   The polls going into election day showed Mr. Bradley winning the general election against George Deukmejian.   After the polls closed, news organizations, working from their polls, projected Mr. Bradley to be the winner.  But Mr. Bradley wound up losing the general to Mr. Deukmejian.   It was later determined that Mr. Bradley, or at least the polls that showed him winning, suffered from the tendency of a substantial number of white voters who had no intention of voting for the black candidate to tell pollsters that they intended to vote for that candidate so that they didn’t appear to be racist.   That tendency of white voters to appear to do the politically correct thing and thus “misreport” their intentions to the pollsters will thus forever be called the “Bradley effect.”

Yours truly, by the way, considers honesty in all things to be perhaps the paramount virtue.   One should never lie; I never do.   This may be due to virtue or may be due to laziness and/or a faulty memory.   You see, when one is honest, one has to remember far fewer things.   Despite this fealty to honesty, however, I encourage my readers to ALWAYS lie to pollsters because of the deep seated antipathy I have toward polls and the havoc they have wreaked on the drama of election night.   If I am ever polled, I don’t know how I will handle the moral dilemma that will confront me.  But I digress.

Back to the point...There is little doubt in my mind that Mr. Trump suffers from a “reverse Bradley effect;” i.e., lots of people who support Mr. Trump will not admit to a pollster, or to anyone who could constitute a member of polite company, that they will vote for the man.   The reason for people’s hesitancy to report their support for Mr. Trump is obvious:  the media have made the guy out to be a demagogue, a bigot, a lowlife, a dictator, a racist, a misogynist, and any number of ghastly characterizations.  A vote for Mr. Trump is perhaps the most politically incorrect act a person can commit. The reason for people’s support, even if verbally unexpressed, of Mr. Trump will be covered in a future post or posts.

Mr. Trump’s reverse Bradley effect may carry the day for him in Iowa, but I suspect it will not.   Mr. Cruz will, in all likelihood, “win” the caucuses …to the extent such a thing is possible given the nature of the Iowa caucuses, which few people understand.

The question then becomes what the even temporary loss of the veneer of invincibility will do to Mr. Trump’s campaign.   Will he be finished or will this defeat in the first real contest, like so many other things, roll off his back as he goes on to rout the opposition in New Hampshire, where Mr. Cruz has little support, emerge triumphant in South Carolina, and face a thus weakened Ted Cruz in his southern backyard?   But enough predictions for the day, especially from yours truly who, believe it or not, does not like to make political predictions.