THE POLLS ARE CRAZY – AT 11:16 A.M. ET:  New polls are out.  Someone is doing something right, or wrong, or somethin'.  Consider, from NBC:

Democrat Hillary Clinton holds a five-point advantage over Republican Donald Trump after becoming her party's presumptive presidential nominee, according to the latest national NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

Forty-six percent of registered voters back Clinton, versus 41 percent who support Trump - slightly up from Clinton's three-point lead in May, 46 percent to 43 percent.

When the horserace is expanded to four candidates - including Libertarian Gary Johnson and the Green Party's Jill Stein - Clinton gets support from 39 percent of voters, Trump gets 38 percent, Johnson 10 percent and Stein 6 percent.

We're starting to see the impact of small parties in a close election.  Remember that it was Ross Perot who cost President George H.W. Bush re-election in 1992, when Bill Clinton was elected.  And an argument can be made that Ralph Nader may well have cost Al Gore the election in 2000.

From ABC: 

Hillary Clinton surged to a broad advantage against Donald Trump in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll, capitalizing on Trump’s recent campaign missteps. Two-thirds of Americans see him as biased against groups such as women, minorities or Muslims, and a new high, 64 percent, call Trump unqualified to serve as president.

These and other doubts about Trump have produced a sharp 14-point swing in preferences among registered voters, from +2 points for Trump in mid-May, after he clinched the GOP nomination, to +12 points for Clinton now, 51-39 percent. That snaps the race essentially back to where it was in March.

Trump has dramatically improved his campaign in the past week, but we must ask whether it's too late, and whether his newfound self-discipline will last.  I'm not all that optimistic on the latter point.  Trump often seems like one big self-inflicted wound.

From CBS:

Battleground states are called battlegrounds for a reason: They're often close, and 2016 looks like no exception.

Hillary Clinton holds narrow leads over Donald Trump across a number of key states of Florida (up three points, 44 to 41 percent); Colorado (Clinton 40 percent, Trump 39 percent); Wisconsin (Clinton up 41 percent to 36 percent) and North Carolina, which has flipped back and forth between the parties in the last two elections, where it's Clinton 44 percent and Trump 42 percent.

Ah, what could have been.  This could have been an easy Republican year had the party had a sane primary season and nominated any one of a number of fine governors or senators.  I think Marco Rubio would have rolled over Hillary by now, even placing her nomination in jeopardy.  But we have Trump, and he'd better shape up fast.  He can win.  It's up to him.  He's not that far behind.  He has to run a positive, inspiring campaign.  No more personal insults.  No more self-destruction. 

June 26,  2016