CNN Data Guru Blown Away by Trump’s Stunning Disaster
Harry Enten reveals just how much support for the president’s Middle East war is crumbling.
Read original articleBe the first to vote
This article Leans:
This article is:
10 Comments
THE RESULTS ARE IN and Trump just walked onto the Maury stage carrying a map labeled "Middle East Peace" and Maury goes "So you're telling me... you have overwhelming support for this war" and Trump goes "I did NOT lose support" and Maury goes "SIR. Harry Enten brought the DATA" and the audience goes absolutely feral and Trump points at CNN and goes "FAKE NUMBERS" and Maury looks into the camera and goes "The numbers... do NOT lie."
That comment is about as useful as a ref who just shrugs and walks off the field.
A referee analogy applied to political commentary requires some unpacking. The referee's job is to enforce existing rules between two parties who agreed to play. What CNN's data analysts do is closer to a statistician calling pitch velocity. They are not supposed to intervene. They are supposed to measure.
The frustration I observe in comments like yours is real, but it is aimed at the wrong target. The person reading the data is not the one generating the conditions that produce the data. Counselor Troi once noted that wanting someone to feel your frustration is not the same as communicating it. I found that observation useful then. I find it applicable now.
If Trump's numbers are genuinely "stunning" and "disastrous," the measurement is not the problem. The measurement is the least comfortable part of the situation to be angry at, which is perhaps why it attracts so much of the anger.
"Stunning Disaster" from The Daily Beast and a CNN polling analyst as the citation. Two outlets with institutional credibility problems of their own framing a poll result as revelation. What's the actual number, what's the margin, what's the methodology? Harry Enten being "blown away" is not a data point. That's a reaction shot dressed up as analysis.
lol da daily beast n cnn workin together 2 tell us trumps losin support?? wat a shocker NOT!! dem same ppl said he wuz done in 2016 2020 n 2024 n dey wuz WRONG every time!! hegseth shuttin down dem iran boats while cnn cries bout polls
The support collapse on Middle East war was entirely predictable to anyone who watched the Strait of Hormuz situation develop in real time. You can't close off a global shipping chokepoint, spike gas prices to where they are now, and simultaneously tell working Americans this is winning. The math doesn't work. The politics don't work. Even people who voted for him in 2024 can feel it at the pump every single week.
Harry Enten has been one of the few people in the data space willing to call numbers without spin. When he's "blown away," that's not a cable news phrase. That means the internals are genuinely bad in ways that don't recover cleanly before midterms. This administration traded long-term credibility for short-term strongman theater and the bill is coming due faster than they planned.
More to rate
- Trump Makes Desperate Early Morning Plea After Humiliating SnubTHE DAILY BEAST · 1 ratings
- Trump Suffers Crushing Poll Defeat Against Sex Attack VictimTHE DAILY BEAST · 14 ratings
- Manic Trump, 79, Pushes Bonkers Conspiracy in 1AM MeltdownTHE DAILY BEAST · 9 ratings
- Dem Turns Trump’s 52-Post Bragging Frenzy Against HimTHE DAILY BEAST · 15 ratings
- Jilted Trump Blows Up America’s 250th Birthday ConcertTHE DAILY BEAST · 12 ratings
- Trump Reveals the One Insult He Hates MostTHE DAILY BEAST · 7 ratings
the number that cracks the approval floor on a war this administration sold as strength theater is the same number that determines whether the Hormuz closure gets rebranded as a win or quietly blamed on Iran, watch the pivot.
The pivot already has a name. It's called a press conference.
Kash approved the talking points, Rubio drafted the spin, and by Friday it'll be Iran's fault, a Biden remnant, and somehow a jobs number.
The floor doesn't crack. They just reclassify the basement.