Countdown to Extinction: The 2016 Presidential Election

[Todd]

Anybody have any thoughts on Cruz and Kasich announcing an open alliance?

Kasich is going to focus on Oregon?  Perhaps he should have worked to get his name included in the Voter's Pamphlet.

It is still possible to deny Trump the nomination before the convention, and then at the convention.  Perhaps Cruz/Kasich?  Or is it Kasich/Cruz? 

It's unusual to see such a coordinated effort to deny the frontrunner the nomination.  It happened in 1880 to stop Grant from trying for a third term, and Elihu Root and the conservative Republicans prevented TR from getting the Republican nod in 1912 despite Roosevelt's primary wins, though primaries were not as universal as now. 

[Karl Henning]

Meet El Tupé Nuevo, d/b/a Mismo-Viejo

[drogulus]

     It looks like the anti-Trump movement is collapsing. From a behavioral standpoint, Repubs are asked to vote for candidates they don't like to stop another one they don't like, so they stay home.

     The Dems either like Hillary, or like Sanders, or like a winner.

     Repub officials might be confronted soon with a choice they've dreaded, falling in line with the front runner. The strength of Trump isn't the only factor, just as significant, or more so, is that there appears to be no way of foisting Cruz on the convention. How do you convince convention delegates to nominate an intensely disliked sure loser?

    Paul Ryan may have missed the chance of a lifetime. By the time the House Repubs finish with him he'll be damaged goods.

[Karl Henning]

     It looks like the anti-Trump movement is collapsing. From a behavioral standpoint, Repubs are asked to vote for candidates they don't like to stop another one they don't like, so they stay home.

     Repub officials might be confronted soon with a choice they've dreaded, falling in line with the front runner. The strength of Trump isn't the only factor, just as significant, or more so, is that there appears to be no way of foisting Cruz on the convention. How do you convince convention delegates to nominate an intensely disliked sure loser?

Why all the effort, really, to supplant one intensely disliked sure loser, with another?

[drogulus]

   

Why all the effort, really, to supplant one intensely disliked sure loser, with another?

      The best answer would be that whatever else Cruz is, he's a Republican and elected to the Senate as such. With him the Repubs lose an election. Trump is more of an existential threat.

[Karl Henning]

      The best answer would be that whatever else Cruz is, he's a Republican and elected to the Senate as such. With him the Repubs lose an election. Trump is more of an existential threat.

Fair enough.

[Karl Henning]

. . . a Texan with the ideological nuance of paint thinner . . . .

(Chris Stirewalt, on Cruz)

[Brian]

Ted Cruz to Announce Running Mate: Carly Fiorina

This just keeps getting more and more crazy. If your whole strategy depends on wheeling and dealing at the convention, why announce a VP before that? And why announce a VP choice who flopped out of the race with tiny polling numbers?

Total desperation move. And kinda hilarious.

[Karl Henning]

Not only did Trump nearly match the showing of his 2012 counterpart, Mitt Romney, with 57 percent of the vote in Pennsylvania, but he did so with the same kind of late-primary shrunken electorate as Romney.

Turnout was something like 16 percent in Pennsylvania. It was 10 percent or less in the other states on Tuesday. Last week in New York, it was 6 percent.

The GOP electorate seems to be roughly divided bwteen Trumpsters who are motivated to turn out, and those who just wish it would all go away . . . .

[Todd]

Total desperation move. And kinda hilarious.

A desperation move, but I'd say it displays a modicum of sense.  He's almost dead from a delegate standpoint, and he needs someone less conservative than himself to try to get some votes that might otherwise go to Trump or Kasich. 

I still hope for an open convention, but I've also decided that I must prepare for the contingency of a Clinton-Trump election and select my write-in candidate.  I have settled on Puckered Starfish.

[kishnevi]

The GOP electorate seems to be roughly divided bwteen Trumpsters who are motivated to turn out, and those who just wish it would all go away . . . .

Rhode Island is apparently 70,000 Republicans, 238,000 Democrats,  and a very large number of independents.  It is a sort of open ballot:  independents can pick which primary to vote in.

The RI Republican chairman was crowing on TV about high GOP turnout:  Trump on his own got more votes than were cast in the 2012 election for Romney.

What he chose not to notice is that Sanders, in the only state he won last night, got more votes than Trump, Cruz, Kasich combined.

[Sammy]

Ted Cruz to Announce Running Mate: Carly Fiorina

This just keeps getting more and more crazy. If your whole strategy depends on wheeling and dealing at the convention, why announce a VP before that? And why announce a VP choice who flopped out of the race with tiny polling numbers?

Total desperation move. And kinda hilarious.

It is on the desperate side, but Cruz has nothing to lose at this point.  Also, he likely picked his VP mate as a move to change the conversation away from the fact that he lost five states in one day.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Ted Cruz to Announce Running Mate: Carly Fiorina

This just keeps getting more and more crazy. If your whole strategy depends on wheeling and dealing at the convention, why announce a VP before that? And why announce a VP choice who flopped out of the race with tiny polling numbers?

Total desperation move. And kinda hilarious.

Desperation, but not unprecedented. Reagan did the same thing in 1976 when he was down in the primaries and announced PA Senator Richard Schweiker as his running mate. And then Ford won the nomination, and Carter the presidency. But Reagan of course was back in 1980, ready to become the Holy Saint of he Republican Party. IOW, there may be method in Cruz's madness.

[Sergeant Rock]

[Karl Henning]

Sweet!

[Karl Henning]

(Entirely borrowing that for FB)

[Sergeant Rock]

Sweet!

It's the only sensible choice this primary season 

Sarge

[Karl Henning]

It's the only sensible choice this primary season 

Sarge

"There'll be keelhauling. I mean, I hope they don't keelhaul anyone."

[Karl Henning]

Yes! Embracing the Dark Side!

[Sergeant Rock]

Yes! Embracing the Dark Side!

https://www.youtube.com/v/KU_Jdts5rL0