Bloomberg plays the 'what if' game with Obama or Romney running in 2016

(Image credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

A fun (if not-so-flawless) poll by Bloomberg Politics played the "what if" game with the presidential election and found that if past Democratic and Republican candidates had run against the current nominees, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump might have been clobbered:

Obama can't run for a third term, but if he could he'd beat Trump by 12 percentage points, 53 percent to 41 percent, according to the poll. Romney would defeat Clinton by 10 percentage points.The survey, conducted Friday night through Sunday, showed Clinton leading Trump by 3 percentage points. Obama was judged favorably by 54 percent of respondents, an approval rating that easily beat Clinton's (46 percent) or Trump's (41 percent). The president couldn't, however, match the 58-percent approval rating of his wife, Michelle. [Bloomberg Politics]

But that's the fun about "what if" games. They simply make you wonder what might have been.

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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.