Despite polls showing Donald Trump's campaign has lost ground over the past few weeks, conservative pundit Pat Buchanan isn't convinced the billionaire real-estate tycoon will be trounced in the 2016 presidential race to Hillary Clinton.
"As Yogi Berra reminded us, the game 'ain't over, till it's over,"' Buchanan writes in a column published Friday in The American Conservative.
Buchanan, an adviser to Presidents Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford, believes unknown anti-Clinton forces may be preparing an "October surprise" — a "massive document dump that buries" her.
As well, Buchanan believes, Trump is remaining true to himself, which voters appreciate.
'"I did it my way,' crooned Sinatra. Donald Trump is echoing Ol' Blue Eyes … Should he lose, he prefers to go down to defeat as Donald Trump, and not as some synthetic creation of campaign consultants," Buchanan writes.
"Trump believes populism and nationalism are the future of America, and wants to keep saying so."
But one problem Trump has is his proclivity to directly attack Clinton himself, he says.
"While exposing the Clinton character and record is essential, among the primary rules of presidential politics is that you do not use your candidate to do the wet work," Buchanan writes.
"[President Dwight] Eisenhower had Vice President [Richard] Nixon do it for him. President Nixon had Vice President [Spiro] Agnew, who was good at it, and enjoyed it."
Buchanan is the author of "The Greatest Comeback: How Richard Nixon Rose from Defeat to Create the New Majority," published by Crown Forum.
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