For the past five months, real estate magnate Donald Trump has led all but two national polls of the Republican national primary. On Wednesday, a CNN/ORC poll found him with his largest lead yet: a 21-point advantage over Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who himself has been surging in the polls of late. Trump was up three points from CNN's last survey in November. Many people are still asking themselves how this bombastic businessman could maintain frontrunner status this long. Trump has sold much of the Republican primary electorate on his ability to tackle the issues most concerning to Americans, with the economy and foreign affairs among them. Perceptions of his electability, favorability, and strategy on key areas have all improved considerably over the past six months. In many of these cases, he has seen dramatic shifts with the GOP electorate. Here are some of the findings: In December, 72% of registered Republicans view Trump favorably compared with only 51% who vie...

Did you watch the Republican Presidential Debate last night? It made for entertainment television, that's for sure. Here were a few of my observations: The FOX moderators came out swinging, and they especially put Donald Trump on the spot. Some people think the barrage of tough questions asked of Trump signal that right-leaning FOX News is leading the charge to undermine his campaign. The only issue is that Trump could not rule out running as a 3rd party candidate if he were to not win the nomination. If that ends up happening, it'll split the Republican vote, effectively handing the campaign to the Democratic nominee (presumably Hillary Clinton).  Wouldn't it be something if Trump were in cahoots with one of the parties? I keep thinking whether his entry into the presidential race is part of a furtive scheme concocted with the Democrats to split the vote and get Hillary into the Oval Office. After all, Trump, a former Democrat, was known to cozy up with the Clintons....