Donald Trump held a campaign rally in Fort Wayne Indiana earlier today, 20,000 supporters showed up.

FORT WAYNE, Indiana – Donald Trump did something unusual Sunday.
The Republican presidential frontrunner, a master of hype and salesmanship, urged his audience here to ignore new numbers that show him headed for victory in the Indiana primary.
“We got great polls today,” Trump said at a rally in front of thousands packed inside the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum. “Don’t listen to them. Forget it. Pretend we’re losing – we’re not; we’re winning big. But pretend we’re losing, because we have to win big. (more…)

Originally posted six months ago, reposted due to timely relevance.
Regardless of who you supported in the 2016 Presidential primary race, most will admit there’s one strategic advantage held by Donald Trump over all other candidates – Trump’s willingness to “own the downside“.

All policies and proposals have a “downside“, there’s no such thing as a policy proposal with benefit to all and harm to none.
This empirical truth is toxic to professional politicians – therefore they spend an inordinate amount of time using pretzel logic to avoid it.  As a direct consequence of avoidance, the media love to use the downside as a weapon.
For the first time in recent political memory Donald Trump represents a candidacy who is unafraid of their spear; and as a consequence, immune to the damage. (more…)

Today in Indiana Carly Fiorina represented the visible metaphor for the Ted Cruz campaign when she literally fell off the stage – and Ted Cruz ignored her distress.
You can’t make this stuff up folks:

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Today Donald Trump’s convention manager, Paul Manafort, made an appearance on Face The Nation.  Manafort discusses the state of the race, the shifts and nudges as the convention framework is shaped, and the ongoing Trump perspective toward Washington DC.

For those who are interested – the discussion behind the discussion. One of the reasons Dickerson keeps bringing up the “lobbyist” issues, is because Dickerson is conducting this interview from the FtN base of operations in Washington DC.
John Dickerson spends all his time surrounded by the business end of politics.  The lobbying business is an industry, a massive industry; a billion dollar per year industry. Dickerson’s questions stem from him being hounded by those within the industry trying to understand what is going to happen to their interests, their jobs, their finances.
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The implosion of Senator Ted Cruz’s candidacy is, at this point, a self-fulfilling prophecy.  This is the danger phase; the phase we have warned about for the past several weeks.
In the past month, in an attempt to protect his viability, Senator Cruz has ducked all requests from media he has defined as ‘unfavorable’ to his campaign.  However, the last several weeks have created a situation where he’s now beyond desperate.  The Hail Carly didn’t help.
The downward slope is now too steep – his running desperate.  His physical ability to keep his feet under him is exhausted,…. and he just noticed the sloped gradient is worsening…. he’s about to fall:

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NBC/WSJ has released a new poll (full pdf below) of Indiana republicans.  Donald Trump holds a significant 15 point lead over Senator Ted Cruz, and a 36 point lead over Ohio Governor John Kasich.
When Kasich is removed from the polled equation, to allow for a head-to-head comparison, Donald Trump beats Ted Cruz 53 / 42.

[…] “In Indiana, Trump is positioned to corral all the [state’s 57] delegates, which will be a big prize toward winning the nomination outright,” says Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. “Clinton and Sanders are more likely to divide the delegate pool, which will do little to change the narrative on the Democratic side.” (link)

Via NBC – […] The NBC/WSJ/Marist poll was conducted April 26-28 — so mostly after Trump’s six-consecutive primary victories in Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states, as well as after Cruz and Kasich announced an alliance/truce, whereby Kasich wouldn’t campaign in Indiana to help Cruz (in exchange for Cruz not campaigning in Oregon and New Mexico).
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The second Trump rally of the day is taking place in Fort Wayne, IN at the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum. The event is scheduled to begin at 4:00pm Eastern time.
Live Stream Link – Alternate Live Stream #1 – Alternate Live Stream #2

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Donald Trump is holding two campaign rallies today in Indiana.  The first is in Terre Haute, IN at the Indiana Theater.  The event is to begin at 1:00pm Eastern:
Live Stream Link – Alternate Live Stream #1 – Alternate Live Stream #2

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Indiana – On the heels of several campaign rallies where Ted Cruz failed to attract more than a few hundred die-hard supporters, some new data-sets show even more evidence to a continuing trend that began four weeks ago.

Ted Cruz has a net non-favorable rating amid Republican voters (Per Gallup) and the addition of Carly Fiorina has only worsened the condition of the Ted Cruz campaign.
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CNN has the strongest surge in ratings in the past 14 years and now beats Fox News in the all important category of 25-54 year old viewership.  That age category drives the ad revenue determinations for the industry.
Fox News can’t say they were not warned this would be an outcome of their insufferable decision to continue promoting a media narrative in opposition to Donald Trump. The same thing happened to Macys Department Store after they dropped Trump.

(Via CNN) CNN ranked #1 in cable news in prime time in April. CNN beat Fox News for the fifth time in the last eight months in M-Su prime time (four of the past eight in M-F prime) among adults 25-54.  The last time CNN had this many prime time wins in an eight-month period versus Fox News was over 14 years ago (Nov. 2001). (more…)