Those of you who read this blog know about the Republicans’ affinity for the bandwagon effect — tell everyone you’re winning and in the end people will want to go with the winner. Trump is especially enamored of this because he brags about everything anyway. Dan Pfeiffer has a piece today explaining that it might not be the smartest move this time out. Believe it or not, there are strategic reasons why Republicans publicly assert they are winning no matter what the polls say, and Democrats always hypothesize that a stunning defeat is right around the corner. However, this election is unlike any other. The electoral coalitions have shifted, and the Trump campaign did not adjust its playbook to address the new reality. For the longest time, the Republican coalition was comprised of older, mostly college-educated voters who participated in every election. Democratic success, on the other hand, depended on turnout from lower-propensity voters who rarely voted in midterms. This explains why Republicans generally did better in lower-turnout midterm elections and Democrats have won the popular vote in all but one presidential election since 1988 (Yep, you read that correctly). Higher turnout was good for Democrats and bad for Republicans. Higher turnout means irregular voters show up and dilute the power of the GOP’s hard-core base of regular voters. […] Because of the differing nature of their coalitions, Democrat and Republicans took different approaches to motivating their voters. The Republican theory depends on the “Bandwagon Effect.” They believe that undecided voters will…