Discussion for article #241921
Rubio is slowly rising in the ranks, as expected. Fiorina is starting the crash stage that flavor of the month candidates take in the GOP. Kasich, Paul, etc. are seeing their support vanish as GOP voters start getting serious about winnowing people out.
Still, I am becoming more convinced that we aren’t really going to get a handle on whats happening in the GOP race until after Iowa, and probably after NH. Trump is polling well with people who never vote. That’s a problem for a campaign that has never run a campaign. If Carson can’t pull a big win in Iowa, his support elsewhere will drain off rapidly. If he can, it may very well solidify. Yeah he is crazy and all, and that plays well with the GOP…but I am still not convinced that the GOP is going to nominate a Black man to replace Obama.
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This seems like further corroboration that these six have separated themselves from the rest of the Republican field, and that until that changes, everyone else should be sent to the kiddie table.
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Why do I keep flashing on Monty Python’s election night coverage? The G.O.P. appears to have no one who isn’t representing either The Silly Party, or the Very Silly Party. They have no one who is even remotely plausible as the President of the most powerful nation on the planet.
Are they really going to nominate Tarquin Fin-tim-lin-bin-whin-bim-lim-bus-stop-F’tang-F’tang-Olé-Biscuitbarrel? Or will they play it safe, and nominate Jethro Q. Walrustitty?
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They really don’t want that to happen. So instead the internal behind the scenes pressure from the RNC will start increasing for other other-rans to drop out instead of getting demoted to the kiddie table. And for the kiddie table people to just bow out entirely.
That entire visual has been an embarrassment for the RNC. They want it to go away.
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That sketch seemed hugely meaningful in 2008 and today, jeeze, it’s like one of those Onion articles people don’t realize is a joke. It wasn’t that long ago when The Simpsons used Trump being President as a shorthand for a nightmarish dystopian future. And that future is here, in very nearly honest-to-God major-party-candidate form.
Fuck.
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Iowa is a terrible predictor for who will win the GOP primary and election. Quite a bit better for the Dems. What Rs have won Iowa? Huckabee? Santorum? Pat Robertson? Crazies. NH is a much better predictor, a more serious GOP electorate. And at this point I have no idea who they might pick.
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Once South Carolina is done, Trump and Carson will be gone.
Except Trump and Carson, especially Trump, have their biggest leads in SC and NV. Trump is 20+ points ahead in both states. It just wouldn’t make sense for him to bow out before Super Tuesday, which is only a week or two after NV.
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Guess who was getting this much support from the GOP at this time in 2011? Give up?
Rudy Giuiani.
Who?
Exactly.
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Another marked success for Scott Walker.
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Except there’s no actual comparison because in 2011 the top spot was constantly changing, but such is not the case this year. In 2011/12, one person would reach the top for two or three weeks, they’d have a huge gaffe or make an ass of themselves, and then Romney would immediately overtake the lead. That’s simply not happening here. In fact, for the last several months people have made that 2012 comparison with various names precisely because the top spot kept changing, but the thing that never changed was Romney. If there are any comparisons to be made to 2011/2012, it’s that Trump is Romney and Jeb!, Rubio, Carson, and Fiorina are the flavors of the month.
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If they do, it will be for the exact same craven reasons McCain chose Palin and why the RNC choose Steele. I could envision enough Republican voters sticking with the REAL black man, the REAL Christian in some delusional, wild-eyed attempt to stick it to Obama, to show blacks how we’re “supposed” to act. For some GOPers, there’d be nothing better than having their own ni(clang) in the race much the same as those very same people hate people of color with a passion, but adore their basketball and/or football team and players, most of which are men of color. Marge Schott once put it quite succinctly when she said, she loves her “million dollar ni(clangs)s”.
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Fantastic post.
Greatly illuminates the pathology of Racism in ways that are not often done.
Years ago, I was a young professor and had to show a video on racism, featuring some outstanding scholars who spent a great amount of time lamenting the damage done to minorities by racism.
The most telling (and CHILLING FOR AMERICA) comment, however, was made by an eminent African American psychologist, Dr. Kenneth Clark, who concluded the entire presentation by stating that the most extensive damage of racism comes to the racist himself, rather than the victim.
What kind of human being devotes the kind of time and energy to racist thought and action against people he does not know, who have not done things against him?
A mentality which can do this is unstable, highly sociopathic and subject to the kinds of “compensatory” makeovers, in which certain “selected menials” are allowed “personhood”.
Temporarily, anyhow.
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Yes, it’s time that only Carson and Trump be permitted to be on the debate stage. The rest prove they are either going nowhere fast, or falling out of the clown car altogether.
I agree. Further, those folks below 9% are going to be out of money soon. Either way, they will have to pack it in. However, even if Rubio (I don’t buy his 13%), Bush and Carson stay on through the winter, they are going to have to stay crazy or learn to be crazy (rather than just incredibly bumbling like Bush) to stay relevant to Trump. If the GOP wanted statesmanship and a real leader, Trump would have been laughed off the stage in the first debate. There may be a certain percentage of yahoos who would vote for him, but it’s certainly not enough to elect him president and it may not be enough to get him past the first few primaries. I mean, who gives a shit in the larger picture about who Iowa or NH like for a GOP candidate?
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My reasoning has to do more with what sort of ground game Trump actually has. If he fails miserably, that’s a pretty good sign he doesn’t actually have any ground game, and you can lower your expectations for him for rest of the race. And of course, the media will turn on him immediately. “Trump is a LOSER in Iowa” sort of stuff.
Carson has consistently polled well in Iowa, but I am skeptical if it holds during a caucus. If it does, that doesn’t tell us much, but if it doesn’t…then we can write him off quickly. I think GOPers like telling pollsters they will vote for Carson, but showing up at a caucus and voting for the crazy black man in front of your friends and neighbors? That might be a different story.
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Yes…except I suspect that Rubio’s 13% isn’t too far off from reality. He picked up a lot of seasoned people from Walker’s demise, and its about the right time for that to begin to be showing. Kasich is being abandoned, and people are getting edgy about Bush, and Fiorina is starting her nose dive. All of that points to people moving into Rubio’s camp, as he is the only viable “Establishment” candidate left (And lets face it, despite not holding office, Fiorinia’s rhetoric is very establishment oriented).
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If Trump does well in Iowa and NH, he cake walks his way into the nomination. The media buzz will be behind him and he will have proven he actually has a ground game.
I agree, saying either Trump or Carson drop out after SC if they are doing well, is just so much whistling past the graveyard.
If they aren’t doing well, then Trump will be looking for exit strategies. Carson will stay in until he is mathametically eliminated, either by his campaign going bankrupt or not being able to get the delegates.
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All the Republicans suck… so it really doesn’t matter…
“One of the penalties of refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.”
― Plato
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