presidential elections

Just getting around to Nick Confessore’s piece in yesterday’s NYT, explaining how the GOP elites lost touch with their base. Some excerpts:

The Republican Party appears to be headed for its third consecutive loss in a presidential election and the sixth time in the last seven presidential elections that it will lose the popular vote. If Trump ends up as the nominee (still the most likely outcome at this point), the GOP seems doomed to lose by a wide margin thanks to defections, depressed turnout, and the nominee’s unprecedented unfavorability rating.

The New York Times reported over the weekend on the desperate lengths to which some anti-Trump Republicans are prepared to go. If they are unable to stop Trump’s nomination, some Republicans are thinking about launching an independent presidential bid for the general election:

JPM's head quant, Marko Kolanovic, who turned somehwat gloomy in the past few months, has seen some hits and misses in his recent forecasts. On one hand he did accurately predict the surge in gold one month ago, as well as the rebound in oil and Emerging Markets; however on the other he suggested that being long VIX and cash would be a good place to wait out the upcoming market volatility.

Following MoveOn.org's "success" last Friday, George Soros is back on the lips of an increasing number of Americans as Bloomberg reports, the liberal billionaire, whose effort to unseat President George W. Bush in 2004 shattered political spending records, is returning to big-ticket activism after an 11-year hiatus. Soros has spent or committed more than $13 million to support Hillary Clinton and other Democrats this election cycle and has warned Donald Trump (and Ted Cruz) of "consequences" for their words and actions. Welcome to the Oligarchy.