Just a side or secondary point that I wanted to add to what’s below. As I said, a President can’t lose the support of his congressional party going into an election. Why that happens or whether it’s fair becomes secondary to the fact itself. It’s one thing in ordinary circumstances. But you simply can’t have or survive that going into an election, certainly not one where you appear to be running at least a bit behind. I wanted to mention something about members of Congress themselves. In my experience the vast number of members of Congress have no hidden insight or greater access to information than you or I do. They may in certain instances get access to party polling. But that usually leaks in some form or another fairly quickly. They’re basically just as prone to panic, the groupthink of their social sets or cocoons, wishful thinking as you or I am.
This isn’t universal of course. Some have better political instincts than others. Some have really good political instincts. But on balance they’re just not cut from very different political cloth. That’s my experience at least.
