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Big winners of this election cycle:

Trump - If he wins, it's big. If he loses his brand is immensely toxic and no business/brand will want to do business with him. He'll have to go the Glenn Beck route and create his own media network and try to sustain and leverage the alt-right movement.

Alex Jones - Getting a lot more mainstream penetration in my view. He'll be selling a lot more seeds and prepper gear.

Julian Assange - Got a new lease on life after he started fading from relevance, especially after Snowden outscooped anything Wikileaks did.

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Not sure, Assange / wikileaks went from "impartial leaked docs hosting service" to "at the whim of founder's grudges" for me. Releasing the dem emails is fine, timing it for maximum damage to Dems election prospects isn't.

I can't agree. First off, they say they stand for transparency. That's often synonymous with impartiality but not always.

Second, one of the candidates in this election has previously stated that Assange should be killed.

To me that moves the motivation from founder's grudge to self-defense.

> one of the candidates in this election has previously stated that Assange should be killed

Is it really biased to expose lies and wrongdoings of a person who called for you to be executed without trial?

It is if the claim is bullshit

>Second, one of the candidates in this election has previously stated that Assange should be killed.

Claim does not hold up.

http://www.snopes.com/julian-assange-drone-strike/

Anyone who ever thought it was the first was deluding themselves. Assange has always has an agenda. It's just that his old supporters don't like the new flavor of his Koolaid.

What's his agenda ?

In addition to forcing transparency on governments, corporations, and non-profits around the world, I think he would like to secure his own future freedom.

It seems highly likely that a Trump administration would give him immunity or a pardon.

OTOH, many of his old Republican enemies who were calling for WikiLeaks to be treated like al-Qaeda love him, for now. And they have a lot more power and influence than the anti-establishment outsiders that were his old supporters, so he's definitely improved his own situation.

Maybe I've missed it, but most of the coverage and statements from Republicans on this seem to include disclaimers about how irresponsible Assange has been (hard not to when he dumps SSNs), while still happily using whatever red meat they can find.

If Assange had 'an agenda' (how nebulous) then why would he have been successful at interviewing the world's most cited academic, Noam Chomsky, and other high-level thought and political leaders? What exactly is the 'agenda' he is supposed to have? You are spreading fallacious FUD.

Are you really implying that Chomsky doesn't have an agenda? He's more famous for his political nonsense, e.g. being a far-lefty who supports people like Castro and Chavez, than his actually (very good) linguistics research.

Yes, I am.

Chomsky publishes his research and backs his arguments with innumerable facts, the man is practically a walking encyclopedia of US foreign policy, human rights violations and hypocrisy over the last 100 years.

The difference between an academic and someone with an 'agenda' is that one is interested in the truth and publishes cited analyses, the other is only motivated to impress a particular opinion.

Chomsky is voted by the global community of academics as a valued member of that community. Against that shadow, your assertions are valueless.

That came very early for me. I also believed Wikileaks was a force for good (I was thrown off by the name, Wiki implied to me being something like Wikipedia), then they released the Collateral Murder video in 2010 which revealed Assange's intentions (propaganda). From Wikileaks' perspective, it was a great move because it brought them massive publicity and they basically made their name off of it.

> (propaganda)

meaningless. what you mean to say is "something I disagree with"

I think you forgot one:

Hillary Clinton - President of the United States

Best case scenario for her: she's elected as the least-liked president in history.

Least liked would and will be George W Bush. He lost the popular vote in 2000 by more than 500,000 votes. He exited office with a 30% approval rating.

approval rating is different than favorability, which was what I meant (I should have used the more specific term).

In any event, if she's elected, she will have 4 years to drop below 30%, its an easy goal.

She's at 41%[0] (38% among only registered voters, Trump is at 37% by the same metric) and falling favorably wise, Bush was also at 41%[1] when he was inaugurated but around 47% - 48% at this point in the election. Given her probable "private position" on TPP and other anti-worker policies that number will be lower than Bush (his personal worst in office is 29%), and in half the time. Democrats should hope that she steps down or is impeached, as it will be impossible for her to win the election in 4 years as an incumbent.

[0]https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/08/31/a-... [1]http://www.pollingreport.com/BushFav.htm

> ... as it will be impossible for her to win the election in 4 years as an incumbent.

It should be impossible for her to win re-election in four years. But it also should have been impossible for her to win this year. All the Republicans had to do was run somebody moderately competent. But...

Looking at the numbers, all they have to do is not pick Donald Trump. Carson is at 44% (8% never heard of him and 12% report they have no opinion) right now with no advertising spend. Assuming he doesn't have some dark past we don't know about in 4 years, against Clinton it's not even a contest.

Relative favorability isn't much of a guide to incumbent vs. challenger elections, though I think there is some evidence that it has some loose utility as a predictor of open-seat elections. (OTOH, the incumbent's approval -- not favorability -- seems to be a strong predictor for incumbent reelection.)

AFAIK, there's not much evidence of a particular link between favorability (as opposed to approval) and reelection prospects, and even less for pre-election favorability and reelection prospects.

I don't know of a study, but if 70%+ of the country dislikes you it will be difficult to get elected.

Trump is basically preventing her from losing.

> it will be impossible for her to win the election in 4 years as an incumbent.

4 years is a long time in politics. GWB was struggling in early 2001: his "compassionate conservatism" platform had been revealed for the religious fundamentalist welfare-slaughter program it always was, he was under fire for making backroom deals with energy-industry cronies and other serial polluters, was clearly stuttering in public appearances, and half the country thought he was just a rich brat who had cheated his way into the White House.

Then 9/11 happened and GWB became Fearless Leader. For a few years his power had literally no boundaries. He walked into re-election.

Hillary will need a bit of luck, but nothing that cannot be solved with a well-timed spat with North Korea or equivalent.

EDIT: uh, why the downvotes?

The ground zero speech[0] is why I believe that happened, while simple it stands as one of the most memorable in American history (This is coming from a kid who wore his "fuck bush" t-shirt to school). I don't think Hillary can pull something like that off.

[0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7OCgMPX2mE

Maybe, maybe not. The way the media works these days, you need very little to weave a narrative - a tear, a hug, a sign of rage, a simple speech in the right place... She's not a crowd-pleaser the way GWB or her husband were, but I'm sure she can muster a decent "Joan of Arc" in the right circumstances.

Andrew Johnson has her beat for that honor.

Hard to compare to someone who was never elected and served prior to the advent of modern communication or even polling to determine things like that (hardly implying that I consider modern polling authoritative).

So, then, how modern do our choices for comparison have to be? Or are you willing to keep producing eliminating qualities so that you can continue with your narrative about Clinton?

And gets a full pardon "so we can stop being distracted by politics and get to the real work".

> If he loses his brand is immensely toxic and no business/brand will want to do business with him.

As if the usual short-attention-span media and population will ever care about it. It'll be maybe until a couple of months after Clinton's inauguration and no one gives a f... about Trump any more. There's always something more newsworthy than the misery of a failed presidential candidate.

The only exception will be the GOP: they're in for a couple very nasty years, divided between a couple remaining "ordinary" conservatives, the Trump/Tea Party extreme-right-wing movement which surely won't be retreating even if Trump loses, and a society that is more and more moving towards the left end of the political scale - just look at marijuana, homosexual marriage, abortions... society is on a way towards progress and you just can't sell abortions and homosexual marriages to a party consisting of (extreme) Christians and right-wings. No one will vote for them any more.

The GOP will be shattered, the only problem is that there's no one to fill the gap yet.

It might as well be that the alt-right is already the one filling the gap.

> It might as well be that the alt-right is already the one filling the gap.

By their volume and tone in shouting on the Internet, yes, for sure - but in numbers? I seriously doubt that the alt-right is capable of maintaining a nationwide powerful political party.

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