Her mistake was to agree to be his running mate.

No, because that would be done on an individual basis.

If the Republican Party withdrew its support from Trump and asked people to vote for Hillary, that would be analogous. But I can’t imagine that happening. However, if it did, it would be analogous. Individuals deciding to do it on their own is quite different.

Yes. Sort of like what would happen if anti-Trump Republicans threw in their lot with the Democrats and went for Hillary.

Like you I wonder who Trump would manage to assemble as a cabinet. I just can’t imagine anyone wanting to clean up after all his unconsidered pompous remarks. And can you imagine what he would say about you if you disagreed with him.

You write, “isn’t it possible that Trump supporters hide their allegiance for the candidate more than other supporters of other candidates?” Anything’s possible, but I actually think the opposite is more probable: that some people say they support Trump who don’t, or who are not even planning to vote in the primaries, just to piss off the GOP.

Seriously, that’s what I think is more likely.

But actually, I think that in general people who take the trouble to answer polls tend to answer them honestly, because I’ve noticed that in general polls are relatively accurate. However, not always. In particular, polls in primary states that involve predicting the primary vote don’t have a good track record (for example, NH is notorious for surprising everyone). In part, this is because the samples tend to be small.

I read that “humiliating defeat” stuff. It doesn’t make sense to me. I wrote a post about the first round of the elections, where this was the result:

The nationalist FN got about 28%, ahead of the centre-right Republicans party led by former President Nicolas Sarkozy, which polled just under 27%, and the governing Socialist Party (PS), trailing with 23.5%.

That was considered a big victory for the FN. But what was actually happening? The three major parties split the vote three ways, with the FN leading.

What happened in this latest election to change that? Very simple: the Socialist Party pulled out, and suggested that its voters vote for Sarkozy’s party in order to stop the FN. It’s right there in the article you linked:

Following last Sunday’s results, the Socialist Party withdrew several of its candidates in the regions where it had come in third while encouraging supporters to vote for the Republican candidate to keep the National Front out of power. Preliminary data from the French voting authority reported the gamble paid off, with the National Front losing all 13 regions. A poll released last week reported 77 percent of Socialist supporters in the regions where the party pulled its candidate had agreed to vote for the Republican party.

Actually, if anything, the FN gained support if it got about 40% of the vote rather than 28%. But the first election was considered a big victory and the second vote a defeat? All that happened was that the other two parties united in order to defeat the FN.

At most, they’d sit it out. Voting for Hillary would be like voting for your house to be burned down around your ears.

I’m actually looking forward to see this, whichever candidate takes her on. If Trump is nominated, I will definitely vote for him — things would be so dire if Rodham Clinton is elected that we literally would never recover. I do favor Cruz, and I hope he’s taking notes from The Donald’s very effective style of combating the Leftmedia.

One other thing: I wonder if the experience of taking all the excrement and lies from the media could be an educational experience for Trump and shift him towards the right. Like the old saw that a conservative is a liberal who got mugged. Will be interesting to see.

Ever in esperance….