Cruz says that the convention simply cannot give the nomination to someone who did not run. But they could give it to him–someone who ran but did not win.
“Nominating Donald Trump would not only elect Hillary Clinton but it would lose the Senate, it might well lose the House of Representatives. It would lose races up and down the ballot.”
OK - now tell us about the downside.
“Nominating Donald Trump would not only elect Hillary Clinton but it would lose the Senate, it might well lose the House of Representatives. It would lose races up and down the ballot.”
Tell me more about this proposal. I like it.
For all I know, he could be right.
And if he is, he’s right about why – because of fear of the disaster that may (and probably will) befall the GOP if Trump becomes their nominee. It certainly wouldn’t be because a sudden surge of love for Ted Cruz appears. It would be because the party is out of other options. Which, John Kasich or Paul Ryan’s fantasies aside, they basically are.
But at the moment it looks more likely to me that Trump manages to hit the threshold and win the nomination outright, or else come so close that he easily wins in a second or third round of voting.
But Cruz still has a sliver of a chance of dethroning Trump, and that sliver of a chance is more than anyone else’s chances. But by referring to a contested convention he’s basically admitting he can’t beat Trump outright. Which, I haven’t checked the math lately, but he’d have to go on an incredible winning streak to do that.
I guess his assumption is that everyone who voted for Rump will just fall in line and vote for him.
And the avid Rump supporters would ensure Cruz wouldn’t be able to leave alive.
A contested convention for what, Ted? To pick the next leader of the Alberta Progressive Conservative Party?
I don’t think you would be eligible to be on the ballot just like there is uncertainty about your eligibility to be a presidential candidate.
You should have stayed in Canada or moved to Cuba.
Cruz Rosetta Stone: “My penis. My penis my penis my penis. My penis my penis MY PENIS. My penis.”
He’s like Hodor, but with “my penis”. I swear it’s becoming all I hear at this point when I watch him talk.
Shorter Cruz: I helped destroy the Republican Party so as to be your sole alternative to Trump.
Donald Trump is pursuing an incredible vendetta against Meghan Kelly for merely asking him about his past statements. He is still sending pictures of his hands to the guy who called him a short-fingered vulgarian almost 30 years ago. What does the Republican party think he will do if he is denied a nomination when he has the most votes of any candidate? I’m not talking running as an independent, although I think he will do that in as many states as possible under election law, I’m talking about telling his supporters to not vote for any Republican for any office because the part “betrayed” them. And he’ll kind of be right about the betrayal part. I’d get out the popcorn and watch, but the Repubs can’t think that Donald will pack up his bags and go home if someone else gets the nomination.
I hope Cruz is right.
The GOP rationalized its losses in 2008 and 2012 with the absurd claim that McCain and Romney were not conservative enough. If Trump is the nominee the hard right will write their defeat off to the same “not conservative enough” nonsense and the country will be treated to another 4-8 years of total dysfunction. If Cruz is the nominee in 2016 and loses to Clinton or Sanders the GOP just might have to confront the disaster of its hard right turn after the “establishment” ceded control to the extremists.
And if Cruz does win the nomination and then loses the general election in November, what will the Republicans say? Will they pull out that tired old bromide that they lost because their candidate wasn’t conservative enough?
No, you wouldn’t, Ted. But keep whipping up the lizard-brained religious fanatics to believe you would.
Except they won’t. They’re cognitively incapable of self-reflection.
Alberta Rafael forgets that nominating rules are adopted by the convention’s delegates. The delegates can modify the rules – in fact, there is a Rules Committee responsible for exactly that. Alberta Rafael could toss a monkey wrench into the Rules Committee if he manages to get some delegates elected to it.
All in all, the Republican National Convention is shaping up to be the first interesting convention of my adult life.
Like minds.
Crud is such a crappy candidate that not even one editorial cartoonist bothers with him.
How in the world can this arsehole expect to be the nominee if editorial cartoonists don’t view him as worth their time and efforts?
Cleveland will be a very bad place to be come July. Not that there is ever a good time to be in Cleveland of course.
As Ted knows perfectly well, the rules are the rules until the rules are changed. And the rules would be changed about five seconds after the first ballot–if not five seconds before.
The interesting question is how they’ll be changed. The eight-state rule might be replaced by the rule that says that no person shall be nominated whose name rhymes with Schmonald K. Flump.
Or maybe a rule that says that in order to qualify for the second and subsequent ballots, your name has to be put in nomination by three sitting Republican Senators (not counting yourself)!
I don’t get it. Who’s he trying to fool here? The convention delegates know better, and even low-information voters aren’t going to think there’s some sort of unstoppable Cruz juggernaut at work here.