Remember when we discussed the Romney 2016 possibility in April 2014? I took a poll:
And I said:
Can America go for a candidate who has already had the nomination and lost?... Why couldn't he win if he ran not because he was a sore loser and felt entitled or ambitious, but because he's a modest, dutiful man, called into service in a time of need? And take into account that the opposing candidate is quite likely to be Hillary Clinton, who was so much the front runner in '04 that her failure to get the nomination makes her seem like a previous loser, and that prior loss seems more loser-ish than Romney's 2012 loss, since Hillary was a frontrunner who got blindsided by an upstart, and Romney had an uphill battle against an incumbent. (And wouldn't Romney have won if he'd kept up the first debate aggressiveness in that second debate?)And I did this poll in January 2015:
That's pretty decisive, telling us something we clearly know now. Jeb's not cutting it.
Let's have a new poll:
Posts
82 comments:
Romney would be an excellent President. The question is, can he be elected? He would need to be much more aggressive.
I would support him if Trump self destructed but I don't think that is going to happen. If Cruz or Rubio looks like winning it fair and square, they would have my support. I am a big Mitt fan but I;m not sure this is his year. I think we will see multiple Muslim attacks next year and this might even be a wartime election.
"...Hillary Clinton, who was so much the front runner in '04..." You mean '08. Nobody even corrected you back in the original comments to that post, so I figured better late than never.
The Republicans are going harder after Trump than the Dems went after Romney.
Has there ever been so much planning by a Party to undermine their potential voter-selected winner?
I get it: the Republican Establishment doesn't mind losing as long as their chosen guy beats the Spread: then they can still see themselves as players.
I am not a Trump supporter, but -- if he wins the nomination -- he will be The Last Republican I Ever Vote For.
A note to Paul Ryan: growing a beard does NOT make you Aaron Rodgers.
Bring back the Guillotine,
I am Laslo.
I'm not a draft mitt guy but the bottom line is both fields are filled with unpresidential candidates that are either executive neophytes, wild cards, single issue candidates, or the sleaziest of politicians.
It would be a proud moment for our country if either side had a serious experienced contender step in at the eleventh hour.
If we're going to draft someone, it should be Mitch, not Mitt.
But, Mitt is better than most of the current crew. Give him Cruz or Rubio as a Vice, and go to town...
He'd definitely be a better war-time president than anyone currently in the running.
Any attempt to stop Trump, Cruz, or Carson by anything other than the ballot box will result in a 3rd party attempt and President Hillary Clinton.
BTW, Ford was going to run 3rd Party if Reagan had won in 1976 (per Ron Nessen). Never trust the establishment.
And elements within the Stupid Party are working hard to earn that sobriquet!
If Trump wins the primaries, well, the voters have spoken, for good or for ill. If he's denied the nomination, he'll go third party & a large fraction of the Republican electorate will follow him out the door. Hell, if even 5% of the Republican electorate follows him, the Repubs lose to Hillary. Do the Romney supporters think that they'll magically pick up the Democrats & Independents who didn't vote for him last time? What's their schtick going to be? "Vote for us. We slayed Trump the Magic Dragon to save the Republic"? Sure, that'll work, BFT.
Romney couldn't beat Candy Crowley !
I could be wrong, but MAN would you guys be stupid if you went ahead and did that! Romney has ZERO cross-party (or minority) appeal. Romney is BO-ring. Romney is about as politically correct a cookie-cutter candidate as they come. Romney is not the man to incite a reformation of Islam or to stop turning the American budget and economy into someone else's Swiss bank account.
Whatever Althouse and her 85% are smoking, I want some.
You omitted the correct answer, which is "There is no Plan!".
several longtime Republican power brokers argued that if the controversial billionaire storms through the primaries, the party’s establishment must lay the groundwork for a floor fight in which the GOP’s mainstream wing could coalesce around an alternative, the people said.
The development represents a major shift for veteran Republican strategists,...
They did not signal support for an overt anti-Trump effort. But near the end, McConnell and Priebus acknowledged to the group that a deadlocked convention is something the party should prepare for,
So a few people urged a plan to fight a Trump nomination, nothing was decided, at most the targets mouthed a few platitudes about a different set of circumstances. Yet somehow the "reporters" concluded this is a big change from something.
What a pack of fools.
"Romney would be an excellent President. The question is, can he be elected?"
If he could somehow manage to get the democrat party's nomination, yes. Otherwise, no.
The obvious GOP plan is to find the best man that will be able to step in after the Globalist Billionaires pay for the CIA to hire off the books assassins to shoot Trump dead. That will shut him up when nothing else will.
Romney has volunteered to be their man.
I like Romney. I voted for him, and I wish he'd won. It's heartbreaking how much better off this country would be if he had.
But seriously?
A brokered convention giving the nomination to a candidate who wasn't even on the ballot in the primaries?
I'd leave the party.
Don't expect general election voters if the votes of the primary voters aren't taken seriously by the party.
Come on.
I personally expect a Trump/Cruz ticket at this point. I won't regard it with joy. Still, I would rather have that than some behind-the-scenes switcheroo deal, which I would expect would end the Republican party.
If they want Mitt, they need to ask Mitt to get into the race with everyone else so people can vote for him as nominee.
Of course, if I were more comfortable with Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee, all of this wouldn't worry me so. I find my standards for potential presidents are dropping by the minute. They are, however, never going to drop low enough to get me to vote for Hillary Clinton.
Aside from her record of financial and administrative misdeeds, I personally find the willingness to pin the Benghazi tail on the Coptic Christian vid so appalling that I cannot explain the depths of my despair and revulsion.
If forced to pick between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, I would vote early and often for Donald Trump. It is not even a choice.
Althouse, I have been researching the Madison dining scene and it looks like it has become fab.
Why don't Meade and you go to some of these places.
How can you not like fine dining?
tits and muscles.
Although it's painful to admit, Hillary's experience and long time on the national and international stage means she does have a perceived "gravitas" that all the current runners in the GOP field lack. Romney, though, is a match for her in that regard. And head to head, in a time of growing terrorism, I think he'd be able to beat Hillary.
Mitt had his opportunity and blew it. Badly. I think that he was the right man for 2012, but probably not the best choice for 2016. He's a great Mr. Fixit, but after 7 years of Barack Obama (with one to go!) it's going to take more than that to get the US back on course.
"Althouse, I have been researching the Madison dining scene and it looks like it has become fab. Why don't Meade and you go to some of these places. How can you not like fine dining?"
I suffer from anosmia and Meade is squeamish about the sanitation.
To me restaurants are kind of boring.
"Fine dining" is such a silly, bourgeois term.
Populist candidate resonates with a growing number of voters and the losers are still talking and musing about how they can undo popular will instead of listening and learning about what people want.
It's getting pathetic in here. I almost want to stop listening.
"Hell, if even 5% of the Republican electorate follows him, the Repubs lose to Hillary"
You're forgetting another subset - people like me. If the GOP pulls any stunts to deny the legitimate front runner, I will crawl over broken glass to destroy the party. Tired of getting stabbed in the back. Hell, I'll even campaign for Hillary just to spite them.
Titus, what are some of the places that serve real pizza cooked with the correct kind of wood with the pie placed at the regulation distance from the coals?
Asking for a friend.
I agree with R&B's 6:48.
Romney is as pre-fabricated a phony as they come. Strange strategy. Instead of going for the least censored candidate ever, despite his standing in the polls, unprecedented freedom from conforming to the Republican elite, the media, elites in general, the money game or just any plain old convention, you want to flip back to the opposite of all that so as to run last cycle's loser - and one whose core constituency shrinks every year. Genius strategy.
You're being conservatives, I guess. Having trouble adapting to the fact that Trump, despite his misstep, is the future. There's no DeLorean for going back to 2012 and losing the same way again. Either win (or lose) this way or go home.
And just when I think your party's finally starting to do something vaguely right...
"I personally expect a Trump/Cruz ticket at this point."
“I believe that gravity will bring both of those campaigns down…People are looking for who is prepared to be commander-in-chief, who understands the threats we face? Who am I comfortable having their finger on the button?"
I doubt there would ever be a Trump / Cruz ticket after what Cruz said to donors about Trump. Trump isn't the forgiving kind.
Suppose that Trump is character assassinated by some journalistic conspiracy or by a "lone wolf" gonzo journalist. That seems to be the consensus and ardent wish of the DC cabal. But it's going to leave a gaping wound in the nation's political psyche that isn't going to filled by Mitt Romney or by Jeb Bush. It will just make the people want a populist even more.
Heh. Ritmo thinks its in our best interests to ditch Trump.
He's terrified.
well romney has learned little from the experience, he still entertains the notion of climate change, is sanguine on the principle behind robertscare, and thinks amnesty is a viable option,
" . . . you want to flip back to the opposite of all that so as to run last cycle's loser"
Who is this "you" you are speaking of, R&B?
Who do you believe thinks of the GOP leadership as "us"?
The notion that ROMNEY could stop Tromp is the funniest joke I've ever seen on this blog -- funnier even than Laslo at his best!
You brokered convention gripers sound like Alec Baldwin threatening to move to Canada.
hythm and Balls said... [hush][hide comment]
Romney is as pre-fabricated a phony as they come. Strange strategy. Instead of going for the least censored candidate ever, despite his standing in the polls, unprecedented freedom from conforming to the Republican elite, the media, elites in general, the money game or just any plain old convention, you want to flip back to the opposite of all that so as to run last cycle's loser - and one whose core constituency shrinks every year. Genius strategy.
You're being conservatives, I guess. Having trouble adapting to the fact that Trump, despite his misstep, is the future. There's no DeLorean for going back to 2012 and losing the same way again. Either win (or lose) this way or go home.
And just when I think your party's finally starting to do something vaguely right...
WTF are you talking about? EVEry comment here says it is a bad idea.
I wish like anything Romney was President but he can't creep in at a brokered convention. Especially since there are attractive candidates like Cruz, Rubio and Fiorina. Moreover I think Trump would very likely emerge as smiling victor in any contest based wheeling and dealing - to the surprise of those who thought their deals were putting in Jeb or Mitt. The look on Karl Rove's face!!
I don't think Tromp will get the nomination. He's like that woman you (if you're a straight man) see in a bar, with the low cut red dress and the nice ass. You might take her to a hotel for a night of fun, but you aren't going to take her home to meet Mama (or to Cleveland -- although a convention at the Quicken Loans Arena does play to Tromp's strength).
But if no one in the crowd of candidates in the GOP field stops Tromp, how does adding a proven loser to the field help? The non-Tromp votes will coalesce around some or all of Rubio, Cruz, Christie, and Bush during February, and after March 1 around one or two of them. Before the end of March, it will be a two-person race, Tromp v. one of the others, or, more likely, Tromp will have graciously withdrawn and thrown his support to one of the others. There will NOT be a deadlock at the convention, and no need to bring in an elder loser -- sorry: elder statesman -- to break a tie.
I would like it a lot better if Trump and Romney ran as the Democrats they are.
FG
"Blogger Rhythm and Balls said...
Romney is as pre-fabricated a phony as they come."
Says the dope who voted for Obama.
Goodnight. If Ritmo is out, MacDonald's must be closed.
I used to support Cruz. I support Trump now. He is what this country needs. Why do I support him?
Do I agree with him on every policy position he holds or even most of them? Obviously not. But the time for policy and ideological discussion is long gone. There is no policy that will help this country at this point.
We will not move forward positively until we uproot the DC political class root and branch.
This goes for all conservatives and liberals. We all need to kick the progressives out and the cronies that run our government with them. We are also going to go nowhere until the electorate figures out the difference between a liberal and a progressive, but that is a tangent.
After we deal with the problem at hand we can maybe talk about electing a Cruz or a Romney or a Fiorina. But right now we need Trump to crush the Overton Window and remove the parasites.
Mitt Romney is, as of this writing, quite likely the best president we never had, in the lifetime of anyone living today. (Someone might say WWII bomber pilot and hero George McGovern. McGovern was a man of honor and complete decency. And Nixon resigned in disgrace. But I don't think much of the prospect of a McGovern presidency at that time.)
Can anyone name another presidential candidate who lost, and whose loss was worse for the country, than Mitt Romney's 2012 loss?
As for the fans of Donald Trump... I don't expect any of you are more devoted conservative Republicans than I am. We could fight over the fact that Trump is one of the worst/faking "conservatives" in the Republican primary field right now. Arguing that point will only run us into the weeds.
My point, and my question to all of the Trump fans is this: Trump as the Republican nominee will result in Hillary Clinton winning the Presidency of the United States and holding that office until Justice Scalia is 85 years old. Hillary could nominate replacements for Ginsburg, Breyer, and one or two Republicans. We could end her term with a Supreme Court comprised of six young liberals who might serve for 25 years.
Climate change is a joke, compared to those prospects.
If Trump is the Republican nominee, Hillary Clinton wins by 350 electoral votes.
If Trump runs as a third party candidate, Hillary might win by 300 electoral votes.
What do you say, fans of Trump? Is that what you want? I don't want to hear you gripe that the Republican establishment would be to blame, or that a biased media would derail a Trump campaign. I don't want to hear that Republican money would be denied to a Trump campaign. None of those excuses will stand up to scrutiny. Trump has done nothing to win over the Republican Party. We all know that the media hates Republicans, and it is generally worth 3 to 6%, having the media on the Democrats' side. That has always been the case. This is no different. Trump has sneered at the thought of raising money for a campaign. He's said frankly stupid things about Super PACs and campaign finance laws. Mitch McConnell -- the target of so much hatred from the Tea Party -- has done more for campaign finance law freedom (and, frankly for Tea Party Republicans vis-Ã -vis the Party) than Trump will ever know. McConnell has forgotten more law than Trump will ever understand.
So, Trump fans; what say you?
I don't understand those who seem to believe that winning a mere plurality of the convention delegates nonetheless entitles someone to a party's nomination. The convention rules on this matter have been in place for a very long time (since 1856 for the Republican party) and winning the nomination requires an actual majority of the delegates, not a plurality. This is something that should come as no surprise to either the candidates or their supporters.
If Trump wins a majority of the delegates, he'll win the nomination. If he doesn't win a majority, he can bargain with the other candidates for their delegates or simply try to peel off their delegates. But if Trump can't win a majority that way, then he's got nothing to complain about if someone else is ultimately able to put together a majority of the delegates.
Of course, nothing can stop Trump from running as an independent if he wishes, but at that point, it's really just a sore loser's move. Especially if the party has picked a broadly acceptable candidate (e.g., a majority's second choice), and Trump's independent candidacy will almost certainly assure the victory of the Democratic party. There's certainly no moral high ground in that.
I suppose Romney could be a desperation, the delegates cannot decide on anyone else, selection. Those have happened before, I think. That would be unfortunate but acceptable.
If this is Plan A, then there has to be a serious consideration of why the Republican Party exists at all.
@Fen: "Tired of getting stabbed in the back." As in, other people got more votes? Those people weren't as conservative as you liked? Yeah, majority rule can stab you pretty bad that way.
"Hell, I'll even campaign for Hillary just to spite them." Impeccable logic: I got stabbed in the back, therefore let me help the Dems screw the country.
Nobody but a complete fool would vote for Romney again after his pathetic, feckless performance in 2012. Can you imagine what Reagan would have done with Candy Crowley in that debate? And he would have done it with class. I recall way back in the 1960 Election (I was eleven) the supporters of Lyndon Johnson, Stuart Symington, and Adlai Stevenson tried to get together to stop Kennedy. It didn't work then and hasn't worked since. Worse yet, now the Republican establishment has a real image problem with cowardice, corruption, fecklessness, and dishonesty. They have lost their own voters. None of their favorites is in double digits in the polls. Whether Trump wins or loses, I think its over for them same as it was for the Humphrey Liberals in the Democratic Party after 1968. San Bernardino has probably put the GOPe corpse on ice. If the economy tanks, Hillary and the Democrats will join them. Events matter.
Just how messy do the Republicans want the suicide to be? Will they splatter blood and tissue all over the wall on national television, or just take the right pills and fall peacefully asleep?
If it comes to that, of course. My guess is that all of this is only going to make Trump more attractive to the voters. Oh yeah, the voters. Those people whose ballots finally decide elections.
We will see how all of this goes when there is actual voting. One alternative of course is that Trump gets stronger, and will go into the convention with a strong plurality. (The relatively high incidence of proportional voting will make it hard for anyone to have a clear majority.) By then or even well before I predict that some of the bigwigs will start to flirt with Trump, and end up being the seduced rather than the seducer.
And then there's the question of who Trump's VP candidate will be. It cant be a mainstream suit to "balance" the ticket. If he runs third party, I think you can safely predict it will be a black man or woman. Someone who can pull off 10-20% of the black vote from Hillary. For that and many other reasons, probably someone who is not big in elective politics right now. He might try to cram that down Republican throats also, if he has a chance at the nomination. (Ben Carson, stay near your phone.)
Trump is the first genuinely original voice we have had in American politics since Reagan. Loose canon? Perhaps. But perhaps he has just decided that being provocative is the best approach, which is great since it fits his personality. But I'll bet you he can amp up the gravitas when it's called for.
The mainstream Republicans, who have been longing for the next Reagan, will make a grave mistake if they stifle that voice by any means other than the ballot box.
The Romney notion? Same bullshit as when they were predicting he would jump into the race.
Add another question.
"Do you still beat your wife, Trump-breather?"
Your poll is a push like McCain's black baby.
R&B wrote:
"Romney is as pre-fabricated a phony as they come."
Romney can't possibly be more phony than Hillary Clinton.
South Carolina's Democratic party destroyed itself doing something similar to their primary winner in 1974:
In 1972, Ravenel decided to return to Charleston with his young family, and two years later, he made a fateful decision: He joined six other Democrats in the race for the gubernatorial nomination. Against long odds and the advice of friends and political observers, he put together a sophisticated campaign and television blitz like South Carolina had never seen. At 36, he was the voice of a new generation with new attitudes.
Ravenel vanquished his six rivals in the Democratic primary. Six weeks before the general election, he was leading Republican James Edwards in the polls by 38 percent. Until that moment, the golden boy could do no wrong, but this is when the wheels came off the career of Pug Ravenel.
Disgruntled Democrats challenged his primary victory, saying he had not met the state constitution's five-year residency requirement. The state Supreme Court ruled him ineligible, and the nomination was handed to second-place primary finisher Congressman Bryan Dorn, an old-style politician and the antithesis of Ravenel.
The Democratic Party wrecked itself over the challenge, opening the door for Edwards, who rode through to become the first Republican governor since Reconstruction. Republicans have dominated the office ever since.
Rhythm and Balls said...
"You're being conservatives, I guess. Having trouble adapting to the fact that Trump, despite his misstep, is the future. There's no DeLorean for going back to 2012 and losing the same way again. Either win (or lose) this way or go home."
The GOPe goal is to lose. Graciously and in a non-racist totally PC fashion. Their purpose is to lie to people who want a smaller government and more freedom from the plutarchs and trick them into thinking we have a choice.
"And just when I think your party's finally starting to do something vaguely right..."
Vaguely is appropriate. But the combination of skills and appeal necessary for what is necessary at this time was unlikely to occur in someone normal or reasonable. Our greatest leaders were almost all manic depressives. Lincoln was a textbook case. People who run for president invariably have massive ego's. (Yes Carson has a monstrous ego; his outward persona is very carefully calculated and maintained.)
I consider us very lucky. We were heading for a Rubio/female governor ticket before Trump rolled in. The base would have stayed home to protest the inevitable amnesty and the blue collar voters would still be democrat/stay homes. I still think he would beat Hillary but it wouldn't have made any real difference.
I don't think there is anything real about the Romney story. This was click bait at best.
"Whatever Althouse and her 85% are smoking, I want some."
I have ~30 pounds of fire in 6 different strains in inventory right now. There isn't enough shit in this world to make Romney a viable option.
A Romney substitution at any point now in this cycle comes across as one thing only, that Republican leadership is too scared of their own voters. How on earth can the American people trust that Republicans will have the fortitude necessary to deal with terrorism or any of the problems of governance if they can't even handle a vote that doesn't go their way? It would be one thing if Romney was actually running, but to insert him after putting the voters through a year plus of a primary where the actual nominee was never presented as an option cannot help but come across as a bait and switch.
This is part of a larger problem, particularly at the national level, wherein politicians in power don't want to take votes unless they know they will win and do anything possible to get their way without a vote if they won't win.
If Romney has sense, he will refuse to have anything to do with this.
Why did Bush III fail?
It's really basic chemistry: donors need acceptors. If you don't remember that from chemistry, read no further. Or maybe change the word "acceptor" to "receiver."
The donor/acceptor model failed for Bush III. Why? The "donor" part was there (as per usual), but the "acceptor" part failed. Bush III could not pass on the donor's gifts to the people because they would not receive them. And so the donor's donations got bottled up. Constipated Bush. It still seems like he couldn't give a shit about being POTUS.
In the case of Hillary, the donor's gifts were never passed on, but were sequestered -- personally -- in her capacity for opacity.
With Trump, the whole donor/acceptor paradigm is upset. This is the real reason behind his success.
There are Republicans who still think of Mitt "Obamacare" Romney as an example of anything but what not to do? Why not drag Bob Dole out for another run? Hey, George H.W. Bush is still eligible for a term!
The "vision thing", as the elder Bush put it, matters. Romney has all the vision of a mole. Trump's only vision is himself in the White House; he's flip-flopped on everything he's ever said on policy to serve that vision.
So, sure, throw every trick in the book to block Trump, whether manipulating the caucuses, brokering the national convention, having the state parties disregard the convention and put someone else on the ballot, convincing electors to defect . . . whatever works.
But then pick a leader, not a technocratic manager; inside the Beltway all technocracy gets you is well-administered versions of Democrat/Big Media ideas. Cruz, Carson, Rubio, Paul, and Fiorina all are better choices than Romney.
That is just wrong for so many reasons. Not just wrong, it's disgusting. It's demented.
Show some pride, guys. Go with Calvin Coolidge, Barry Goldwater, or somebody. They won't win either, but at least you avoid disgracing yourselves.
If you want to draw Hammond away from the Libertarian lever, you must go back and re-think it.
Apart from the outrageousness of rejecting the choice of the party electorate, it is also outrageous to commit the offense for the sake of Mitt Romney.
(And wouldn't Romney have won if he'd kept up the first debate aggressiveness in that second debate?)
It's not merely that Romney lost, it's that he lost a winnable race. He abandoned every winning strategy his team rolled out, he stopped to put the gloves back on each time Obama was vulnerable to the knockout blow, he wasn't ready for questions he should have anticipated (even if they came from a source they should not have come from--yes, I'm referring to the Candy Crawley sucker punch), but on election day, he failed at his core competency. He was presented as an effective manager and his election day get out the vote debacle was entirely a failure of management.
He lost because he didn't really want to win. It would be insane to throw away another election on this man.
Do the Romney supporters think that they'll magically pick up the Democrats & Independents who didn't vote for him last time? What's their schtick going to be?
Their(the GOP establishment) “schtick” is ‘anyone but Trump.’ Even if they have to field a loser candidate like Romney. Hillary would win over Romney, just as Obama did, but the establishment’s power in the GOP would be preserved.
A comment: "Romney would be an excellent President. The question is, can he be elected?"
The wonderful reply: If he could somehow manage to get the democrat party's nomination, yes. Otherwise, no.
Another winning comment: Populist candidate resonates with a growing number of voters and the losers are still talking and musing about how they can undo popular will instead of listening and learning about what people want.
I’m in total agreement.
Tired of getting stabbed in the back.
Me too. But I will enthusiastically vote for whoever ends up running against Hillary. It’s tempting to write off this election if Trump is denied the nomination unfairly. It would be tempting to me and every Trump supporter should that happen but please let’s not have another 8 years of stupidity. Hold your nose and flip the lever for the GOP candidate, whoever they may be, come election day.
"Darth Trump" is hilarious. Skip twenty seconds in to get past the opening music.
I like what Trump and Cruz are doing to shake up the status quo.
It's great FUN to watch the political elite (Democrat & Republican) squirm.
They have ALL failed us
Romney could or would not challenge the establishment as Cruz has, nor would he boast of his accomplishments like Trump.
It's a long slog before the convention so we might as well sit back and enjoy the cliffhanger.
I will.
A GOP spokesman has promised that the will of the primary voters would be respected in July, and that there would be no brokered convention.
He also promised to only stick the tip of it in, so that's reassuring.
That's pretty decisive, telling us something we clearly know now. Jeb's not cutting it.
Although this statement is probably correct, you can not reach that conclusion by relying on your "polls". I put polls in quotes because what you are doing is not a poll, it is a survey, and it has no statistical value at all. It is merely a reflection of the opinion of your readers who are motivated enough to take your survey.
BUT...if Romney was persuaded to jump into the race before the primaries started, and co-opted elements of Trump and Cruz, as Bill Clinton did with Ross Perot in '92...well...
Maybe this is Walker's chance!!
So far, zero primaries and zero caucuses. Maybe we should wait and see what actually plays out?
If Mitt Romney gets the nomination, he will be Adlai Stevenson. He will be respectable and he will lose.
"Although this statement is probably correct, you can not reach that conclusion by relying on your "polls". I put polls in quotes because what you are doing is not a poll, it is a survey, and it has no statistical value at all. It is merely a reflection of the opinion of your readers who are motivated enough to take your survey."
Do you think there is anyone who doesn't know that?
I wonder what went through your head as you arrived at the motivation to type out those sentences? How stupid do you think people are? Ironically, it's stupid to think people are that stupid.
And you are not even correct about the distinction between a survey and a poll. Don't make a pedantic distinction -- most people don't even care -- unless you're sure you're correct about it. It makes you look like a: a) horse's ass, b) idiot, c) other.
"Trump as the Republican nominee will result in Hillary Clinton winning the Presidency"
Free clue: that's happening no matter what the repubs do.
Fen: Tired of getting stabbed in the back.
Sebastian: "As in, other people got more votes? Those people weren't as conservative as you liked? Yeah, majority rule can stab you pretty bad that way."
Let me know when you get done fapping off your strawman.
I'm talking about all the Failure Theater, if you don't understand what that term encompasses, sit down and shut up
Fen: Hell, I'll even campaign for Hillary just to spite them.
Sebastian: "Impeccable logic: I got stabbed in the back, therefore let me help the Dems screw the country."
I expect the Dems will screw the country over. What's unacceptable is betrayal. Would you rather be stabbed from the front by an enemy or stabbed in the back by a "friend" ? When you figure that out, you can come back and lecture me about "logic", asswipe.
You're forgetting another subset - people like me. If the GOP pulls any stunts to deny the legitimate front runner, I will crawl over broken glass to destroy the party. Tired of getting stabbed in the back. Hell, I'll even campaign for Hillary just to spite them.
Not sure if I would be as bad. Just likely to sit the election out. Or, maybe support a 3rd Party Trump candidacy (when I have other candidates I prefer right now). Not only does Romney not have anything in cross party appeal, maybe more importantly, this sort of sneaky slimy behavior would piss off the Republican base royally. It is fairly simple - they are limited to the candidates who are running right now. Romney had his chance to jump in, and bowed out. That was it, and he is out. The establishment types have their choices laid out for them: Trump, Cruz, Rubio, JEB, etc. Anyone who isn't on those debate stages is either out, or there is no Republican party this coming election.
What is interesting here is that the Republican party is now the democratic one, while the Democratic party is the top down, the power elites know best, party. How else do they get a candidate as flawed as Hillary shoved down their throats. It works because it is a party of interest groups, and the leaders of the interest groups essentially still sit around a table in a smoke filled room negotiating this sort of thing, and then the members of those interest groups are expected to back whatever their leaders agree to. A far thing from where we all thought the Dems were going back in the 1960s, and, in particular, their 1968 convention. By now, their system is so stacked with Super Delegates that insurrection is all but impossible. On the Republican side though, there is far less respect for party leaders and this sort of backroom dealing - because if we waned that, we would be Democrats. And, after the Tea Party, we pretty much know that politicians, even Tea Party politicians, inevitably sell themselves out to keep in power. So, why should we respect them? We don't.
This will guarantee a 3rd party run and a Clintonian Dynasty restoration.
Chuck: I don't expect any of you are more devoted conservative Republicans than I am.
That would be a pretty good bet. Only a "devoted conservative Republican" would still be be bleating the "...but but but Hillary would win" line as if it were novel observation. And as campy @8:00 AM gently reminds you, believing that avoiding Trump would avoid a Democrat victory is a fond, not terribly well-substantiated hope, not a fact.
Is that what you want? I don't want to hear you gripe that the Republican establishment would be to blame...
The Republican establishment is to blame, Chuck. That you "don't want to hear it" is your problem, not anybody else's. There are reasons why political parties have a shelf life and eventually morph into something new or die out.
There is zero chance of this happening. It almost reads like a Trump ploy to fire up his base. I always thought Trump was a bombastic clown but I'm beginning to think he's actually a genius. Not that the two are mutually exclusive.
To the Trump fans; then do it. Nominate your guy. And see what happens. Some of you seem to forget; the point of the game is winning. I'll be back, in December of 2016, to remind you of this, if Trump is the Republican nominee.
Oh; and I would definitely hold my nose and vote for Trump, if he's the Republican nominee. That is more loyalty than some of you supposed conservatives had for Mitt Romney. I would vote for Trump over Clinton because four more years of Obama/Democrats would be so ruinous for the country. I would vote for Trump because I am pretty sure that Congressional and national Republicans would not let him do anything too stupid.
Trump's got about 25% of the electorate interested in him now. If he's the nominee, he'll get another 10% of dead-ender Republicans like me to vote for him. And at 35%, he'd be the most embarrassing U.S. presidential candidate since Alf Landon. "Landslide" would be insufficient to describe that debacle.
And no, I will say again: DO NOT BLAME US RATIONAL REPUBLICANS FOR TRUMP LOSING in a general. I am telling you now. He is so polarizing, he won't get any money for fundraising. That's on Trump, not the money guys. It is the candidate's job to sell himself and his candidacy. And no, Trump is not going to spend $850 million of his own money. (I doubt that he has that sort of cash in any event; never mind his encumbered balance sheet.) We already know that the media hates Trump, and they hate him like they hated Mitt Romney, John McCain and George W. Bush. So don't blame the media for the Trump loss. The media is a 6% disadvantage for any national Republican. (And sure, we can all join together in exposing and assailing the liberal media. That's a good fight. We will continue that fight. Together. But reality is no excuse for Trump.)
One last thing; DO NOT MIX ME UP WITH WHATEVER MIGHT BE YOUR PERSONAL NOTION OF 'ESTABLISHMENT' REPUBLICANS. A Ted Cruz nomination doesn't bother me. And if you don't know how anti-establishment Ted Cruz is in the Senate, I can't help you. I am a lot better Republican than you can even know. I'm the greatest fan of Mitch McConnell, who led the good fight against McCain-Feingold, and who was the original plaintiff against the FEC before Citizens United. But I'm fine with Ted Cruz. Cruz and McConnell differ on strategy, not on goals. But I'm sure the reverse is not true. A lot of the Trumpies want to tar and feather Mitch McConnell. They regard him as a traitor. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nothing could be more revealing of Trumpian stupidity.
I think Romney likely decided against a run precisely because Jeb Bush decided to run. This just reinforces my contention that Romney never really had the fire in the belly necessary to win a general election. I liked Romney a lot- I thought he was by every measure a better man than the one that sits in the Oval Office today, and sat there before 2009. However, you have to be able to win the office, and Romney just doesn't have that kind of drive.
Republicans would be delighted if Democrats nominated Bernie Sanders.
Democrats would be just as delighted -- maybe moreso -- if Republicans nominate Trump.
What I don't get about Trump is that he isn't anything like the "most conservative" candidate. He's probably the least conservative candidate in the Republican field. He's certainly the lest cognizant of the meaning of the Constitution, for all of the Ted Cruz/Rand Paul types.
In Michigan, the Democrats nominated a guy like Trump for governor in 1998. The candidate was Geoffrey Fieger, a multi-millionaire trial lawyer. A hyper-aggressive personal injury lawyer, rich enough to self-fund a campaign (although, like Trump, he was in fact too cheap and too insincere to sink most of his fortune into a political campaign). And he went beyond standard law practice in the pursuit of celebrity. He defended Dr. Jack Kevorkian (with amazing success) before Kevorkian himself went off the rails and tried to become his own lawyer. Fieger had a talk radio program in Detroit. He shot off his mouth about Republicans in a very Trump-like manner, calling out appellate judges who ruled against him, and suggesting that the Republican governor's triplets were "born with corkscrew tails."
Fieger's demographics had a Trump-like quality. Lots of angry working class white guys in the 18-35 range. Some quirky Libertarian types (per Kevorkian) and lots of union guys. There was a sizable black population for him, because Fieger was sticking it to the man, of course. (From his home on the Bloomfield Hills Country Club golf course, about a 3-wood from the boyhood home of Mitt Romney.) Fieger's father Bernie was a left-wing lawyer with a picture of Che Guevara on the wall of his law office dating back to the 1970's. Fieger was a pure Democrat personal inury interest peddler, but with that weird streak that Fieger himself wanted to brand as "constitutional conservative." Like Trump, Fieger positioned himself as the outsider who had never before run for office. Oh, and this; Fieger had a version of Trump's hair. Here's a picture of Geoff Fieger with his onetime client at the premiere of the docudrama, "You Don't Know Jack":
http://www2.pictures.zimbio.com/gi/Don+t+Know+Jack+Detroit+Premiere+dLMqSgpjFzHx.jpg
So do you want to know what happened when Michigan Democrats nominated Fieger to run against establishment Republican John Engler, in a purple state that barely leans red in gubernatorial years, and blue in almost every presidential year? It is interesting because Fieger and Engler truly hated each other. Their supporters hated the other's supporters' guts. The election was going to be a referendum on a blood feud. There would be a winner, and a loser. No prisoners would be taken. No quarter given.
Fieger got slaughtered. In the worst landslide in a generation. Before election day rolled around, he was so far down in the polls, it was a joke. Fieger lost, 62% to 38%.
I'm a Cruz supporter, but I'm going to paste in this tweet every chance I get:
Jeff @EmpireOfJeff tweets:
"You "conservative" "pundits" still don't get it: Trump isn't our candidate. He's our murder weapon. And the GOP is our victim. We good, now?
12:25 PM - 14 Aug 2015 "
Preibus and the RNC are terrified of Trump - not because they think he can win, but because it would demonstrate the absolute irrelevance of the Republican Party.
I would like Trump to self-destruct, and take the entire GOP "establishment", from the Rockefeller Republicans to the Shrubs to the Romneys with them. The "elite" RINOs don't want to take us back to a Republic; they just want to control the establishment that Clinton and Obama have. That's why they support unrestricted immigration - to make conservatives as dependent on government as the liberals are.
Trump may be good or bad, but at least he can destroy the one party elite government that rules from Washington, and never considers the desires of "middle America".
Fandor said: "BUT...if Romney was persuaded to jump into the race before the primaries started, and co-opted elements of Trump and Cruz, as Bill Clinton did with Ross Perot in '92...well... "
If Romney tried to co-opt elements of Trump's and Cruz' policies, we'd laugh at him and KNOW that he was lying. If he had done that in 2012, he _might_ have won, but he didn't really want to win. I even voted or him, which I never did for McCain or the Shrubs, but he was wasted effort.
What real Republicans need to do is to identify the GOP ripoff "consultants" who stole several tens of millions of dollars of Romney money for the "ORCA" get out the vote program. That was supposed to track everything right up to election day, and it failed even worse than the Obamacare website did. Somebody needs to "name and shame" those guys and ensure that they NEVER AGAIN have anything to do with politics.
Chuck: Some of you seem to forget; the point of the game is winning.
No, the logic of the game for non-stupid, non-unhinged people is to elect people whom they believe will lead this country where they think it ought to be going, and represent their legitimate interests (or at the very least don't actively work against their interests). Voting for an electorally successful candidate whose campaign MO is "vote for me, then go fuck yourself" is not "winning".
DO NOT MIX ME UP WITH WHATEVER MIGHT BE YOUR PERSONAL NOTION OF 'ESTABLISHMENT' REPUBLICANS.
Nobody thinks you're a member of the Republican establishment.
And no, I will say again: DO NOT BLAME US RATIONAL REPUBLICANS FOR TRUMP LOSING in a general.
Nobody gives a damn what you "rational Republicans" are going to do with your votes. Getting hysterical about other people not voting the way you want them to is your game, toots.
What I don't get about Trump is that he isn't anything like the "most conservative" candidate.
No shit, Sherlock.
Ken, Trump isn't going to be anybody's weapon, and he isn't going to "murder" anything, if and when he loses a general election by 400 electoral votes. And if he presides over a 2016 in which Democrats take back the Senate from a shattered Republican Party.
What we will all get out of that is tow or three more ultraliberal Supreme Court Justices.
Anglelyne; I have a suspicion that you may be smarter and better-read than Trump. I'm oddly encouraged by that.
It makes me curious; what do you really want? What sort of ideal America would you like to see, before we get to 2020?
Are you upset that Republicans haven't been conservative enough? If so, I have some sympathy, but more than anything I have this overwhelming mystification as to what you'd think you'd get with Trump?
He seems unconcerned about upholding Citizens United; he seems sort of contemptuous of the decision, as if he were a KosFiles reader. He seems to actually (?!) be determined to "tax" Ford Motor Company to force it to close Mexican assembly plants. He's got a kind of blundering obliviousness to the legality and futility of trying to ban all people from a certain religion from entering the country.
So I am really interested in what it is that you want.
Make no mistake; I am not hammering Trump because I am soft. I have no common cause with Democrats or Obama or Clinton. I feel rather certain that I want to beat them more than you do. I'm not insisting on any particular candidate for you. I'm just saying that nominating Trump is a guarantee of a lost election. What's your strategy? What is the policy point of a Trump candidacy? (I was about to ask about the "policy point" of a "Trump presidency." But that isn't going to happen. Still, you could tell me about that if you wanted to.)
Anglelyne; two more points.
1. I have almost never thought of Republicans in the mode of their saying "fuck you" to me. There are several strains of Republicans, of course. One of my least favorite strains is the Chris Christie strain, where he is milking the federal government for every last billion he can get, for "hurricane relief" which basically means more pork spent on the Jersey shore. I know Congressional Republicans can't do anything big until we have the White House back, and until we've got close to 60 votes in the Senate. Democrats were able to do something big, when they had those numbers. Trump is precisely the wrong guy to get us to the White House and also get us to 60 votes in the Senate.
2. If indeed you are serious about liking Trump because you are certain he's nothing like the most reliable conservative in the race, that is going to be big news to Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, etc. I think that the editors of the Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard, National Review, etc., have already figured out that Trump isn't a reliable conservative (in addition to being a certain loser in 2016) and have blown off Trump as a matter of simple policy principles. Do you really think it is all about some unnamed secret ruling class co-opting an election for a private agenda?
Rush Limbaugh says basically that he's dissatisfied with establishment Republicans because they aren't conservative enough and aren't active enough. Are you saying that you like Trump for the reason that he really isn't all that conservative? Do you join with others who want Trump to win so that he can destroy the Republican Party as we know it? Is it really such a good time to blow up the Republican Party when we've got a chance to control the House, Senate and White House? And more state houses than any time in the last 100 years?
How do you feel about a plan to make Romney the GOP nominee?
It's incredibly stupid.
Romney is wrong candidate for this.
You might consider the guy who's been growing the Abraham Lincoln beard.
Yet somehow the "reporters" concluded this is a big change from something.
Somebody must been spinning this. Probably somebody who didn't wnat it happen,
A brokered convention giving the nomination to a candidate who wasn't even on the ballot in the primaries?
This only works if candidates controlling a majority of the delegates support it - perhaps after trying themselves to get a majority and fnding they can't get the convention to coalesce around them.
Maybe make that candidates plus Uncommitted, but in that case you should get up the 61% or 62% range.
It was really bad that Jimmy Carter won the Ohio primary in 1976 based on the idea taht Hubert Humphrey was not running the primaries. People don't always geta choice to votw for what they would want.
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