COMMENTARY

BRUMMETT ONLINE: In scoring position

I remarked at the time that, at her convention, Hillary Clinton hit a stand-up double that a faster runner could have turned into a triple.

Clinton put herself into scoring position, you see.

So the post-convention polls show maybe a triple after all. Either way, they show that Hillary got driven home by the big bats of others, either Barack Obama or Michael Bloomberg or, most likely, Khizr Khan.

The first major post-convention poll, from CBS, showed that Clinton had climbed to a 46-39 lead from a 42-42 pre-convention tie. That was a credible increase in her own showing and a credible decrease in Donald Trump’s, one seemingly inflicted by the surgical beating the Democrats inflicted during the convention on his pessimistic and demagogic view of America.

Then came CNN with a similar but more pronounced finding. CNN had shown Clinton trailing before the convention. It showed her leading by eight to nine points after.

CNN provided two sets of numbers — a 45-37 lead for Clinton, up from a 39-44 pre-convention deficit, with Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party leader Jill Stein in the race and, without Johnson and Stein, a 52-43 lead for Clinton, up from a 45-48 pre-convention deficit.

The most accurate numbers likely fall somewhere between those, since the Libertarians and Greens are not on the ballot in all states.

Considering that, and combining the CNN and CBS polls with a Public Policy Polling post-convention survey showing a five-point lead for Clinton, we can observe a consensus finding: Clinton’s position improved from her convention, and Trump took on water.

It probably all averages out to a lead for Clinton of five to seven points, up from a tie or even a slight deficit before her convention.

More revealing, actually, are these findings in the CNN poll:

On the question of whether Clinton would take the country in the right or wrong direction, 48 percent said post-convention that she indeed would lead in the right direction, compared with 50 percent who said she wouldn’t. That is a perilous rating, except that hers was 40-51 two weeks before the convention. Oh, and by the way: Trump’s current reading is 38-59.

On the question of whether respondents would be proud to have Trump as president, the pre-convention numbers of 39 percent saying yes and 59 percent saying no, which were horrible, came in at a starkly worse 30-65 after the convention.

On the question of whether respondents believe Trump is in touch with ordinary people, the pre-convention poll had him upside down by 42-55, but fully crashed and burned post-convention at 33-66.

So here is the general trend regarding convention bounces such as Hillary’s: Obama got one four years ago, thanks largely to Bill Clinton’s convention speech in his behalf, and held on to it as it shrunk; Clinton got one in 1992 and held on to it as it shrunk; Michael Dukakis got a big one giving him a 17-point lead on George H.W. Bush in 1988, and he lost.

So history indicates Hillary’s lead will shrink, but, absent some horrific campaigning or another redefining factor, hold.

But it’s important to remember that the polls that really matter are those in Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, the former two of which are close and likely will remain so, as ever.

Still, there’s scarcely any basis for thinking there’s been any shrinkage as yet in Clinton’s post-convention lead. Trump has been reeling since the Democrats adjourned, largely due to his own megalomaniacal inability to cut the losses inflicted on him by the Khans.

Considering that we hadn’t heard of Khizr and Ghazala Khan a week ago, it’s best to keep in mind that this race is uncommonly volatile.

Something unexpected could happen. In fact, I expect it.

John Brummett, whose column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, was inducted into the Arkansas Writers’ Hall of Fame in 2014. Email him at jbrummett@arkansasonline.com. Read his @johnbrummett Twitter feed.

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