In light of Martin’s Trump-Cruz article today, following are my thoughts on the Republican convention.
Unless Trump shows up with 1237 delegates, we’ll witness the first truly open floor fight in more than 40 years. Fearing electoral disaster, particularly down ticket, party insiders are going to want to find someone other than the Donald. We see that already. But that means rejecting the guy who got the most votes when for over 40 years voters have been conditioned to think their primary and caucus opinions mean something.
Let’s say the party is willing to cast Trump aside and argue he didn’t lock down 1237 so all bets are off. Their folks are already making that argument. Do they then turn to the only other candidate who made any kind of decent showing outside his home state, Ted Cruz? As Martin asked, what does Cruz get them that Trump doesn’t and is it worth pissing off 35% (or so) of Republicans to get it?
Cruz is a movement conservative, a true believer; not a loose cannon like Trump. But his positions are far more conservative than any nominee we’ve seen in any of our lifetimes. He makes even Goldwater look like some kumbaya-singing hippie. Plus Cruz exudes smarm. One look at the guy and most folks want to run the other way. (Heck, even those inside the tent almost to a man/woman can’t stand the guy.) With Cruz, the Republicans probably take a shellacking (to use Obama’s 2010 turn of phrase) but maybe (maybe!) they’ll do better in down-ticket races because their core voters show up. This assumes Trump voters don’t sit it out and Cruz’ presence on the ballot doesn’t drive enormous Democratic turnout.
Under this scenario, Republicans might prefer it if Trump ran as a third party candidate because, even though they’d be screwed at the presidential level, they’re screwed anyway and at least all their voters would show up. Most of the angry ones voting for Trump would still vote for the people with “R”s next to their names further down the page.
Of course there are many insiders already arguing that the party should just choose someone else entirely. According to the rules set up by party insiders, they can only nominate someone who has won at least eight states. This was their attempt to tilt the deck in favor of Jeb. It blew up on them because now only Trump and Cruz qualify.
But, hey, they can change the rules. It’s their rules, right? Well . . . to echo what others have said, they might want to think carefully. Doing so after the fact really smacks of subverting the will of the people — plus Trump and Cruz voters are the very ones most likely to go ape-shit. These are folks who already believe party insiders have been subverting the will of the people. Hard to see how this happens without tearing the party to shreds — their rank-and-file having voted overwhelmingly for either Trump or Cruz, and the insiders then rejecting both in favor of someone more to their liking.
Were they to go that route, is there a nominee who could mollify anger and get everyone “in?” Kasich ran and won only his home state plus he expanded Obamacare — so no. Rubio performed even worse, losing his home state badly, plus he committed the worst possible offense if you’re a Republican, looking like a squish — so no. Jeb’s showing was pathetic plus he’s a Bush — so double no. Walker dropped out almost before we began — no. They could turn to someone who didn’t run at all but who? Paul Ryan, the boy wonder, Winston Wolf himself? Maybe with the PR of four years ago that might have worked but Ryan in 2016 has already lost credibility with the far right. One quick view of freeper comments inspired by discussions of him as nominee makes that abundantly clear. Mitt Romney? Mr. Can’t-Disclose-My-Tax-Returns, House-Garage-Elevator, Corporate-Raider, 47%ers, Self-Deportation, Passed-the-Original-Obamacare? Uhm — no. They’d be better off digging up Reagan’s cadaver.
Perhaps like John McCain pulling a bunny out of his hat, they’d find the next Sarah Palin. Not Caribou Barbie herself because she’s way past her stink-by date even among Republicans. Her name at the top of the ticket would be worse than Trump’s. But maybe a Jeff Flake or a Joni Ernst.
Such folks are way outside the political mainstream but maybe (maybe!) it prevents total party meltdown. No matter how they slice it, it’s hard to see a path to the presidency. My guess is any movement to anoint someone other than Trump will be focused on preventing a debacle in the House and Senate and it state-level races. But when it’s all gamed out, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if the party decides their best option is to just get on board the Trump Express and hope for a less than total-clusterfuck outcome.
It’s Trump or Cruz, nobody else. It’s Cruz if Trump can’t win on the first ballot. Cruz has planned it all out from the beginning, and made sure even Trump delegates are his after the first ballot.
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We can’t know for sure but that’s where I’d place my bet too. Someone recently pointed out the delegates are disproportionately party activists (more than true insiders). Cruz’ people should be out in force.
Not my problem. Not my choice. I don’t care.
Can’t go wrong by always expecting that the GOP nominee will be an unacceptable person for the office of the Presidency, but the nominee and the GOP will be a tough opponent in the general election and therefore, it’s up to DEMs to nominate the most acceptable person that can shine through in the general election campaign.
Unfortunately, both of our candidates have weaknesses. Wish Obama could run again.
Obama facilitated clearing the decks for HRC ’16. Thus, HRC is his chosen successor. The difference between the two is more one of demeanor (including being less inclined to demonstrate raw power) and attitude than of substance. Yes, BHO’s demeanor did lead to successful negotiations with Cuba and Iran, neither of which HRC is likely to have advanced, but otherwise, he’s been strictly by the book DLC/DEM neocon. That’s not good enough for what was needed in ’08 and even less good enough for ’16. So, no I don’t agree that I’d like to see him remain in office for a third term and do resent the backroom deal(s) to install HRC which wasn’t a principled move and is why HRC was the only DEM ’16 candidate.
MOM was the play the role of hapless contender — which he did well. The other two (Webb and Chaffee) that entered the race were former Republicans. Although Chaffee is really a “better Democrat” than most in DC. It’s not as if Sanders had been plotting a Presidential run for decades. He entered the race because there were no traditional DEM voices in it and it was either him or nobody and the left the DEM party and country in the continued grip of the policies that have been hurting ordinary people for the past three-plus decades. It really was a patriotic and self-sacrificing act on his part. How many 74 year old people have the health and vigor to do what he’s done? Most are RTD couch potatoes.
Having “better choices” would have required DEMs to be far more active in saying what is and what isn’t acceptable over the decades. We didn’t do that and nor did we reject HRC sufficiently in ’08 that she would go away. So, it is partially out fault that she was allowed to become the anointed one.
I disagree, Marie. I see Obama as one of the greats. Certainly the best president of my lifetime (dating to 1963) and, though I’m not a historian, one of the best ever. I believe he’s accomplished a tremendous amount against a backdrop of completely unprecedented (well, except for Lincoln and Southern succession) opposition. Certainly no one’s faced anything like that level of total opposition in our lifetimes. And yet he’s accomplished a tremendous amount.
At least he didn’t openly take bribes. Nor hide what he was saying from the press by using a noise machine .
The most corrupt presidential candidate of my lifetime.
You write:
Yup. If we have learned anything from the success of the Trump campaign, it is that rules are now there for the breaking.
My own take on this? One that I doubt the Rats will be able to follow?
The presidency is now…and pretty much has been since the JFK/Nixon debates…a beauty contest/popularity contest. A “Who will be King (or Queen) of the Prom” competition.
That said, there is only one possible RatPub choice (other than Donald Trump, of course…aka Mr. Unthinkable.) if they mean to win:
Paul Ryan by a mile.
If they do not mean to win, that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms. Cruz? Too creepy-looking to win. Kasich? Too…plain. Rubio? Trump literally destroyed him in terms of image with his “Little Marco” stuff. Bush? Trump destroyed him, too.
Whoever besides Ryan? They lose while Ryan sits pretty…and I do mean “pretty”…for 4 more years and then charges in on his white horse.
Rules???
“Rules schmules!!!” as schlongmeister Trump might put it.
Watch.
AG
The Republicans are not in a good place, with no good options. However I’m not sure if many movement conservatives and GOP base voters share the visceral distaste for Cruz exhibited by GOP establishment and liberal Dem voters. Most Republicans would hold their noses and support him and he would also get quite a lot of tea party support. Cruz is nothing if not smart.
It’s hard to pin down the Trump demographics, but I suspect he has more Independent and even Dem support – people who would likely revert to the Dem nominee if he were denied the nomination, out of spite if nothing else.
I suspect most Republicans know the Presidential race is all but over, and will focus on congressional races much more. I wish Dems would do the same, because neither Hillary or Sanders will accomplish much without a Dem congress.
Hillary will probably win the Presidency as “the lesser of two evils”, hardly an inspiring message and one unlikely to mobilise the masses to vote. It’s actually Sanders voters who hold the key: will they turn out to ensure a Dem congress with a much larger progressive core? Are they committed enough for the long haul to actually build a progressive movement to rival the Conservative movement in their control of the party machine?
Otherwise we might just get a neocon dominated Dem Presidency…
There are plenty of state Democratic parties as well as at the local level that are barely functioning. A smart thing for those who felt the Bern to do would be to get involved at that level, rebuild some party infrastructures that will have to be done practically from scratch and on a shoestring budget, and do the grunt work of running local candidates, supporting initiatives that have popular support in specific states and localities, etc. There will likely be some compromises made along the way. What we think of as revolutions don’t happen overnight (they only seem that way in hindsight), nor do any serious meaningful reforms. This is a marathon, rather than a sprint. Easy for me to say at a relatively advanced age, but it was something that struck me as true as a much younger person a few decades ago (got called a “reformist” enough times in the process). I do see an opportunity here for the (mostly) young activists who got excited by the Sanders campaign to make a lasting change, but only if they are willing to organize and only if they are willing to accept that if their candidate loses the nomination (a prospect that Sanders had gone into expecting) that it is hardly the end of the world. A battle may be lost, but there is a much bigger set of battles yet to be won if they’re organized enough to take advantage. Time will tell.
” will they turn out to ensure a Dem congress with a much larger progressive core”
No, because Debbie Wassermann-Shultz has made sure that economic progressives are few and far between.
It happened here in my own district just as it did when Rahm Emanuel was the DCCC chair.