I’ll admit that I’m a bit out of sorts and out of touch with the political news cycle. On Friday night, we had Andrew’s wake. On Saturday, we had his memorial service at which I delivered one of the eulogies (my brother, Phil, delivered the other). I’m trying to get back in the swing of things, however slowly.
I knew that the Republicans were having some kind of collective freakout about the CNBC debate and were discussing asinine plans to protect their candidates from any further uncomfortable questions, but I had no idea that the first thing they did was to cancel a Telemundo debate scheduled for February.
That the Republican National Committee did this after issuing a post-2012 autopsy that called on the party to be more inclusive and welcoming of Latinos is stunning to me.
I think David Atkins nailed it with this:
It’s perfectly obvious that of all the battles in the GOP civil war between the establishment and the base, immigration is by far the most toxic. Immigration is the main reason Donald Trump is where he is in the polls, Jeb Bush seems to have one foot in the campaign grave, and media/establishment darling “winner of every debate” Marco Rubio can’t seem to climb higher than 10% in the national numbers.
Any attempt to even consider bring a legislative proposal on immigration in the House would destroy what little is left of Republican Party unity, and make the presidential race an even bigger clown show than it is now. That downside risk is far scarier to most Republicans than whatever upside gains might be made with Hispanics come November as a result of actually trying to be responsible legislators.
Atkins was talking about why Speaker Paul Ryan won’t dare bring up an immigration reform bill, and also why the media are so reluctant to explain this to the American people. But this also explains why the RNC would go from saying immigration reform is vital for the GOP’s future presidential aspirations to canceling a debate with a Spanish-language network.
This makes the party look racist and spineless at the same time. It’s not an attractive look.
Yes, we will see, won’t we? Because its only a suspension, right?
I find it so comically ironic that as the GOP house continues to smolder, and as flames are starting to lick out from under the eaves, everyone in the Party continues to trek into the house with 5 gallon cans of gasoline in each hand. Because apparently in the bizarro world of Republican-land, water is for pussies. And besides that, they have decided in their own bubble of make-believe that gas is a better quencher of fire than water.
The GOP has turned into George Constanza.
If every instinct they have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right.
“Forward” not “back.” Major losses are life changing and it takes time and energy to fully incorporate change. This reader expects and wants nothing more from you than what is right for you to write.
IMO Rinse stepped into the big muddy embracing Cruz’s well-rehearsed hissy fit at the last debate. Partisan Republicans complain about the moderators at their debates and partisan Democrats do the same. While the moderators may be mediocre, neither camp wants their guys to be subjected to first-rate debate moderators. None are complaining that the candidates mostly ignore the half-decent questions in favor of pulling out one of their talking points. What they want are softballs that allow their guy to hit-it-out-the-park in response. However, for candidates or the RNC or DNC to state that out loud only makes them look weak and whiny. Not attributes that voters reward.
Anne Rumsey Gearan
Billmon:
WaPO:
Jaffe
Or just following their leader, Trump?
All of the numerous people in the world that the GOP has harmed or caused their deaths deserve to see the GOP fall. Karma is at work against the GOP may it give them ALL what they have given to so many others.
“Atkins was talking about why Speaker Paul Ryan won’t dare bring up an immigration reform bill, and also why the media are so reluctant to explain this to the American people.”
Not reluctant.
Callow.
This, my friends, is what the “painting into a corner” that President Obama described to the Republicans in 2010 is like. And in 2010, Obama keyed on Boehner, Ryan, McConnell and Coburn as interlocutors. Those were not the most reasonable Republicans then, but look at their situations now.
The elephant in the room is the failure of neoliberal “modern conservatism” and neoconservative “muscular” foreign policy. But that failure cannot be talked about because the Great GOP Wurlitzer has so engrained that thinking in the base that the media personalities now consider themselves kingmakers. What you are seeing is a corporate battle between FoxNews and the other networks to be the Pravda of the new American state. The candidates are tools by which the party powers seek to destroy the “liberal media”. Thank goodness Democrats no longer depend on the “liberal media” for support. When CNN, CBS, NBC, and ABC go down as news operations, there will be no tears shed. The exit of Dan Rather a decade ago was their death knell.
Republican rank and file talk about immigration because they can’t effectively be outright racist and because it is a handly symbol of the jobs that NAFTA and other trade agreements sent overseas. They can’t come out and say that the local employers won’t hire them because they can can hire undocumented workers at sub-minimum wages. And the GOP employers allow as how Americans are not willing to work at those jobs [but not saying “at subminimum wages because American workers could call down the law on the employers.] The peer pressure is rather interesting on working Americans.
The Republican establishment is screwed, but so is the Democratic establishment for not finding an active way to take advantage of the Republican’s predicament because …. bidness contributions.
A lot of this is a structural result of the Supreme Court’s allowing unlimited money from sketchy sources into election campaigns. One billionaire bigot can do a heap of damage with the right demagogue.
Mirror, mirror, on the wall…
Why people put stock in National Numbers is beyond me. I really don’t get it. They aren’t relevant until after New Hampshire.
There are signs that a Rubio-Cruz fight is emerging. Today’s poll in Iowa has Cruz at 15 in Iowa, only 5 behind Trump and trailing Carson, who leads in Iowa at 28.
Meanwhile Rubio is third in NH today at 13, trailing Carson by 3.
Iowa and New Hampshire are very fluid, and polling suggests only about 1 in 5 have made up their minds. Anyone who thinks they know how all this plays out is insane.
I don’t know who is running Bush’s campaign, but attacking the guy who is in third when you are in 5th is pretty dumb.
If we’re talking about meaningful polling, there’s none right now, except in determining who gets to stay in the race until it begins to matter.
At this time in 2012, Herman Cain was on top of the Iowa polls and had been for nearly a month. Romney was a distant second, with Santorum and Paul barely on the map.
When the caucuses were over, Santorum had won 24.6% of the vote (+21% relative to his November polling), Romney had won 24.5% (+7% compared to November), and Ron Paul had won 21.4% (+10% difference).
The New Hampshire polling correctly predicted a Romney victory there, going all the way back to January of 2011. You didn’t need polling to tell you that, anyways.
Iowa matters. It is in some ways the only thing that matters.
I am aware of the history of Iowa polling. I wrote this at Bleeding Heartland, an Iowa political blog:
http://www.bleedingheartland.com/2015/09/13/a-deep-dive-into-iowa-caucus-history/
Agree but as of now there is a degree of consensus among the GOP national and state polls. Trump and Carson in the #1 and #2 or #2 and #1 slots. Rubio #3. Bush and Cruz in the #4 and #5 slots.
As it usually does, Iowa was predictive. Carson took the lead in Iowa before he did nationally, and has a stronger one there, than in either NH or Nationally.
Except there is a track record of the best rightwing, religious nutcase in the GOP primary coming in first in Iowa and not getting much further than that. At the moment Carson may be the GOP’s best bet to knock down Trump and once that’s a done deal, Carson won’t be difficult to knock off.
And Sen. Mike Lee and Sen. Rand Paul are posturing as the protectors of the Social Security Trust Fund in their filibuster. And too many seniors are taken in by their rhetoric.
Interesting challenge:
Billmon @billmon1 29m29 minutes ago
6) Compare the GOP’s defensive, near hysterical behavior now to the 1980 presidential debate between Reagan and Carter.
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http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/donald-trump-campaign-negotiate-debates
Trump blows off the other candidates in the demands that his advisors participated in drafting. Smart move for him, because it makes his opponents all look like spineless wimps (which they are). Of course, no one will mention that Trump’s advisor was one of the initiators of this effort. You can almost imagine that it was a trap from the beginning.
This is why I can’t get on board with the idea that Rubio gets the nomination.
If you don’t spend a lot of time with white middle-aged wingnuts you won’t understand the appeal of saying they support Ben Carson or Herman Cain. They need to prove to themselves that they really aren’t racist. The black GOP candidate won’t actually win because a lot of that support will disappear come voting time (this is the Presidency after all, not some rinky-dink office), but openly-expressed support in advance of the election gives wingnuts r-credibility. But there isn’t any such r-credibility for supporting a hispanic.
Ted Cruz, maybe. Sure he’s got a Spanish name but he’s not really “hispanic”, in that his roots are much more Spanish (read: European/white) than indigenous. Rubio? Nope – he’s really one of them. No way the wingnut masses trust him to keep the dark ones from crossing the border.