Republicans standing with Trump are banking on voters having short-term memories

[DonViejo]

THE BIG IDEA:

PROVO, Utah—Republican elected officials who continue to stand with Donald Trump, even as a procession of women come forward to credibly accuse him of grotesque misconduct, are gambling that the American people have very short attention spans. They might not be wrong…

Three years ago today, the federal government was two weeks into a shutdown. Conservative hard-liners, led by Sens. Ted Cruz and Mike Lee, forced congressional Republicans into a quixotic showdown with the White House over the funding of Obamacare. As public opinion turned sharply against them, establishment figures cut a deal to get the lights back on and 800,000 furloughed employees back to work.

At the time, there was a great deal of hand-wringing among GOP strategists and lawmakers about the damage that the fight was doing to the party’s image. They feared that voters would become convinced that they were incapable of governing. A Washington Post poll conducted immediately after the government reopened seemed to validate these worries: Eight in 10 Americans disapproved of the shutdown, and just one-third of the country held a favorable view of the Republican Party (an all-time low).

How quickly people forget and the media moves on. The disastrous rollout of healthcare.gov dominated the conversation in the second half of October, and public opinion swung against the Democrats. Terry McAuliffe was expected to win the Virginia governor’s race by double digits, but backlash to the Affordable Care Act meant that he only prevailed by 2 points. Republicans won control of the Senate just one year later. In 2016, the shutdown has not emerged as a top-tier issue against GOP incumbents up for reelection in places like New Hampshire, Florida, Pennsylvania or Ohio -- largely because voters don’t remember it.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2016/10/13/daily-202-republicans-standing-with-trump-are-banking-on-voters-having-short-term-memories/57fed736e9b69b059243020d/?wpisrc=nl_daily202&wpmm=1

[MineralMan]

1. Voters are going to be reminded again and again

prior to the election. New revelations are going to appear weekly until November 8. No worries.

[Qutzupalotl]

2. Voters will have just seen their ACA rates for 2017

when they decide between Clinton and Trump. We need to make a pitch to take back the House because that's the only way ACA can be reformed. The Republicans want to keep it in a death spiral so they can repeal it, Americans' health be damned.