These poll results are not shocking at all to me.
Everywhere we go, every get together, every chance conversation at a store, people are talking about Trump.
People that haven't voted in decades, people that were life-long Democrats and Republicans alike.
I try to be helpful at times and attempt to explain WHY this is happening, but it usually falls on deaf ears.
As long as folks insist on viewing 2015-16 (across the spectrum: politics, the civil society, gubmint, culture) in terms of 1980 or 1990 lenses, then they will never understand.
As I said in the other thread, it isn't about "conservative" versus "progressive," nor Republican versus Democrat. These distinctions have fallen out of usefulness for a whole host of reasons. The primary one being people's own experience: they have watched what has gone on for decades. Listened to all of the LIES. Have seen the RESULTS of both Democrat control and Republican control.
A lot have simply walked away... tuned out for many years.... and each time they peek back in, they see that it has just gotten worse.
Right now it is Donald Trump, it could have been many different personas. Trump stepped forward and is filling a void that has not been filled in decades. That is the reality. People can stamp their feet and whine that he isn't "conservative" or isn't even a "Republican," but the truth of the matter is that not many care any longer. Being a "Republican" and a "conservative" has lost its meaning and relevance in 2015-16.
If, against still very long odds, Trump gains the Republican nomination, he will blow HRC (or whichever Dem is nominated) away in a landslide. It really isn't all that difficult to understand, especially if one listens to what people all across this country are saying.