What follows is political analysis based on a supposition that Hillary and Trump win their Party's nominations. It is derived from a notable opinion piece by Dan Balz entitled, "What would Trump be like as GOP nominee?" I paraphrase some of Balz's passages and use quotes, as well. Our conclusions are different. Dan Balz is Chief Correspondent at The Washington Post.

The General Election Strategy

Clinton and her team are planning to go early and hard against Trump. They are convinced that in the general election, Trump will be the same kind of opponent that he was in the Republican Primaries; that Trump's fall campaign style will continue to be slashing. They expect Trump to come at Clinton from both the right and the left.

Clinton’s team is preparing for what they believe will be one of the nastiest campaigns in recent memory. “Hillary set out a year ago to be a champion for everyday people and to help families finally start getting ahead again in this economy,” said Robby Mook, Clinton’s campaign manager. “That’s what she’s going to keep talking about in the general election. . . . Trump, I’m sure, will try to bully and throw out insults. That’s not going to derail her.”

But the Trump that Hillary's Team is preparing for is not the Trump who will be running in the general election. And, that could derail her.

Paul Manafort, Trump’s convention manager, made news recently when he told members of the Republican National Committee meeting in Florida that Trump had been playing a “part” in seeking the nomination and would change as he looked to the fall campaign. Once Trump becomes the Republican nominee, and the Party consolidates and coordinates behind him, the Presidential Donald Trump will emerge.

Trumps advisers see his earlier rhetoric in the Republican Primaries as a strategy to capture the angry, disaffected Republican base from his competors. They argue that, while he has said provocative things that have drawn condemnation or criticism, including that the United States should rethink its position in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization —over time some of his ideas have come to be seen as more acceptable or open to fair debate.

Nonetheless, Donald Trump as an opponent is still Trump. When he is attacked, he always counterattacks fiercely. That's his style. He also describes his opponent in a way that shrinks and limits them. Trump is a semantic expert, quick to define his opponents in ways they can’t get out of.

If Hillary's key strategy in the general election is to continue to assert that she is a victim of misogyny, she will be finished before she begins. That cheap shot really only works with beaten down Democrats. At the same time, it alienates Independents and Millennials, who hold the key to the 2016 election outcomes.

Dan Pfeiffer, former senior adviser to President Obama, remarked that no one on the Clinton team has had to run against anyone like Trump, who confounded a lot of very good strategists on the Republican side.

Indeed, Trump confounded every newspaper pundit and corporate news blower in America, who were 100 percent wrong about Trump's campaign every time they opined over the past eleven months. The alternate news from the Left has also failed to see what was unfolding in front of their eyes. Meanwhile, the clueless Democratic establishment is still back at the starting gate with their shoelaces tied together.

As if to prove that point (a passage from Balz article):

That, however, doesn’t change Pfeiffer’s broader analysis that Trump in the end cannot win the general election or that Clinton won’t be prepared to parry the attacks. “She has a lot of experience dealing with misogynistic males,” he said.

When asked about this on Friday by CNN’s Jake Tapper, Clinton said, “I have a lot of experience dealing with men who sometimes get off the reservation in the way they behave or how they speak.”

Here, Dan Pfeiffer shows Democrats how to circle the drain.

Name This Strategy

Trump's strategy in the general election is a simple one: focus entirely on issues. This will confuse the pundits, apparently, who regard it as proof of Trump's "unpredictability."

Trump will be using the "Bernie Sanders strategy." He plans to draw contrasts with Clinton on issues, from who can create jobs to their competing positions on trade to a foreign policy that puts America first rather than one stressing nation building to a debate over the right size and role of the U.S. military.

In issues that involve a sustainable economy, he's not just moving to the Left of Hillary, he plans to move to the Left of Bernie. For example, according to Trump, he fully supports Israel. But if they want the US to destroy nations on their behalf, and give them swag in the form of advanced weaponry, the free ride is over. They will have to pay up front, in cash, for the entire operation, without the free swag. Same goes for nations that want our Navy to patrol their shipping lanes; they need to cover the costs. The American taxpayers are not going to carry their crushing weight on their backs anymore.

Trump is apparently not that big on the New American Century Empire and ruling the world with US forces.

Manafort said, “Trump’s message is that he’s an outsider who owes nobody but the American people and that he will break the gridlock that has caused people to lose faith in Washington. That’s a message for the whole country. The message isn’t going to change. The audience is going to broaden out.”

In the end, Pfeiffer admits that there are aspects of Trump’s message that could appeal beyond the Republican base.

If you take out his positions on immigration and women, he has the most pure, economic populist, reform message. He’s got the best Republican message we’ve seen in a long time. Anti-trade, anti-Wall Street, anti-big-money-in-politics is very powerful.

What Remains is This Question

The question is, will either Hillary or Trump take on income inequality and kick it to the curb? They both admit it is destroying the quality of life for the American people. They are both of members of the One Percent Club. Is Hillary too beholden to the Club that funded her? Will cutting the economic hemorrhage of the military by making it profitable to Americans do the trick, as Trump suggests?

What do you think?