Mothra said:
whiterock said:
Mothra said:
whiterock said:
RMF5630 said:
whiterock said:
Osodecentx said:
whiterock said:
Mothra said:
whiterock said:
McCain wing of the AZ Republicans win another one for the Democrats. They will keep doing it (crossing over to vote D). until they can wrest control of the party back from the (much larger) conservative wing of the party.
Perhaps Kari Lake arguing for a bigger tent, as opposed to parroting Trump's conspiracy theories, would have helped her gain the slim margin she needed to win in AZ. But not only did she bend knee to Trump, she also alienated McCain voters with her comments about him.
I don't disagree with you about McCain or his supporters, but she (and Trump) must share a lot of the blame for this one.
"success has many fathers and failure is an orphan."
Plenty of blame to go around but in fairness we cannot absolve the Oso/Cheney faction for actively assisting the enemy. Incompetence is one thing, but purposely assisting the enemy while we are in a struggle with them has to be called out for what it is.
That's a silver lining for Desantis. The new guy can side step all the old trenches and wads of razor wire from past conflicts within the party. Old station but new tracks and new train…..
I'm Independent, not a faction of the Republican Party. I am disappointed in Cheney's support of Democrats; I wish she wouldn't. I take ownership.
I'm waiting for you to take ownership of a disastrous slate of candidates, your number was 55; you'll be lucky to hold what you have. Instead, you double down on your Dear Leader. You're posting like a Republican precinct chairman in Bum****.
Highest inflation in 40 years
Worst border crisis in history
Most unpopular president since Truman (Biden approval around 40%)
75% of voters say country is going in the wrong direction
Worst crime wave since the 90s
Yet voters looked at the Trump recruited candidates and said "no". Why?
Well, you did send Cheney money, and she did use it to help defeat some of those candidates you didn't like, so don't try to hide behind platitudes of disappointment.
Our candidates weren't the problem. They were outspent by as much as 10-1, in no small part because our Senate Leader signaled to the donor class that there was a problem with candidate quality. Far greater critique could be made of Democrat candidates: Pale reflections like Murray, Hobbs, Hassan; wild eyed ideologues like Barnes and Warnock; and on what candidate could Fetterman be considered (by Republicans) a superior candidate to a well-spoken world-famous doctor like Oz? ALL of those equally (or more) flawed candidates were beatable had we had proper and well-funded campaign plans.
Excerpt from excellent article at link:
"The anti-right narrative is a remarkable thing: when a candidate Trump supported lost, like Oz in PA, it was Trump's fault; when a candidate Trump opposed lost, like Joe O'Dea in CO, it was Trump's fault. When a candidate Trump supported won, like Vance in OH, pundits discounted the victory; when a candidate Trump opposed won, like Kemp in GA, the same pundits found it enormously significant. DeSantis's nearly 20-point margin of victory in FL, a big win for the right, was mostly hyped as a defeat for Trump, even though FL is Trump's home base."
https://spectatorworld.com/topic/this-election-was-no-loss-for-trump/
To that last observation about DeSantis, we must note uncontestable facts: DeSantis was a founding member of the "Freedom Caucus" in the House. you know, the place where the MTG-types plot & plan how to move the GOP caucus rightward. Further, Desantis literally owes his first election victory to Trump, whose endorsement elevated him out of a crowded primary field. So Trump's endorsements are hardly a badge of dishonor. And we cannot ignore that DeSantis is not anti-MAGA. He's proto-Maga. Not a rejection of the original, but a new, improved version of it. Finally a word about last Tuesday that is material but thus far overlooked: I'm as excited as anyone about the DeSantis victory. But what was the quality of the candidate he faced? A grey'd out shape-shifter who is now 3 wins, 5 losses in statewide races run on the ticket of both parties - neither liberal enough to enervate Dems,nor conservative enough to enervate conservatives. How many "notional points" did he add to DeSantis's win total? (answer: probably more than the notional "-2.something points" sombear's WDC connections indicated applied to GOP senate candidates.) So yes, Desantis's victory was impressive and cannot be said he beat up on a teddy bear. But neither was it a clash of titans....
Here's the cold hard reality:
There were wins and losses last Tuesday.
Establishment Republicans made no progress in moving the GOP leftward.
The realignment of the GOP as a multi-racial working class party continues.
It cannot be stopped.
Ball is in your court.
I am confused with one thing, you seem convinced anyone that believes that MAGA is bad for the future of the GOP is trying to move the Party left? I don't get that.
- Trying to open the party to be more inclusive,
- Trying to have the party by less dark,
- Trying to get away from fear politics,
- Trying to get back to a Reagan-esque view of the world?
All guilty as charged, but further left? No. Policies are fine (Granted, there are always tweaks including whether to work more within the system or blow it up. ), it is the way that the MAGA group operates that is the problem.
GOP has some nice winners, Trump attacks them and tries to discredit them. That summarized the problem to me. There is no Team GOP, either you are Trump or you will be attacked and discredited. That is not the conservative Party I signed up for.
Trump is a survivor. Do not miscalculate that he will just fade away. He will be a very, very tough out.
You make a lot of well-thought out decent points, but I really don't get your reasoning here, and your track record on predictions is pretty abysmal.
Trump lost the 2020 election handily to a geriatric patient with no good ideas. The candidates he really threw his weight behind performed poorly in 2022. Yes, I know you would like to blame that all on funding, but it's interesting that "funding" hurt Trump's sycophants much worse than it hurt non-sycophants. In fact, despite your now stated excuse of lack of funding being the reason Trump's candidates were defeated, you told us just a couple of weeks ago there would be a red wave, and that someone like Kari Lake could replace DeSantis as the GOP wunderkind and be a potential VP. Now we know how that turned out. No wave, and Lake got beaten by a frumpy Democrat who was too scared to debate her. Yet again another bad prediction. In fact, as of late, I am having difficulty remembering the last time one of your predictions has proven right.
Tell us, why should we believe your prediction that Trump will be a tough out, and should get the party nod over other candidates given your less than stellar track record at predicting these things? He lost in 2020, and that was before the election denying nonsense and myriad of legal issues. All of the polls show he is much less popular now than he was then. Hell, his own children apparently don't even want him to run. What makes you think a guy his age, with his track record, and inability to control his worse impulses, who is a loser in the last election, is all the sudden going to find his mojo again at the ripe old age of 76? And if he does get the nod and runs again and loses handily, what is your excuse going to be next time after you inaccurately predict another win for Trump?
There is no denying Trump did some good things, and helped the Republican Party's demographic problem. I think his populist bent is something the party can build on to form a bigger tent, and generally agree with your opinion of the establishment Republicans and neocons (they're terrible). But Trump hasn't won anything since 2016. He caught lightning in a bottle running against a terrible candidate. We would have to completely ignore his track record since then to buy what you're selling.
Did anyone other than Canada get it right on predictions for this election? I got sucked into thinking momentum would win it in AZ and that NH was in play, based on polling, and missed it like everyone else in PA and NV. Walker still should win GA. State and national GOP has plenty to get it done. But can they? Walker is hardly a more flawed candidate than Warnock, and GA is still not a blue state.
The candidates Trump endorsed had a very good performance on 2022, just not in a handful of key races. And yes, funding is a pretty big issue. Getting outspent by up to 10-1 by an incumbent has infinitesimally small win record. (that Specator article I've posted elsewhere, in whole & in part, is instructive on this point. It takes quite a bit of framing bias to lay 2022 at Trump's feet.)
Trump will be a tough out in the primary because he has last I recall $200m in the bank and a 75m vote head start. He also has a critical advantage in a crowded primary field - a large, fervent, unshakeable base of support, He's going to start off at ca. 30% support in every race. He only needs to pick up a few percentage points to guarantee a top-2 finish. He has a record of accomplishment in office that will be appealing given likely future socio-economic conditions. Populism is hardly a spent force and he excels at appealing to it. Finally, he will be campaigning all day every day from here. The best of his competition face governance responsibilities that will for sure give opportunity for earned media, but will also place significant limits on travel & time. The lower tier candidates will be left to toil away on the rubber chicken circuit raising little or no money, hoping to catch fire with a grassroots already in love with another candidate.
Now, all that said, we are a year before it's time to make early predictions. But to look at the field at the moment and write an epitaph for Trump is wishful thinking. I think an estimate that, as of today, RDS has 50-50 odds of winning the nomination is pretty sober.
I was talking about the general election, not the nomination. I agree with you Trump will be a tough out in the primaries. He has enough delusional people who believe he can somehow win an election again as a less popular and more unhinged candidate than he was in 2020. My question was regarding the general election. What makes you think he's the best candidate to run against the Dem in 2024? What makes you think a guy who has lost since 2016 is going to somehow turn it around now, if that is indeed what you still believe?
Well, lost in 2018 is hardly dispositive, as all but two Presidents have lost at least one congressional majority in their mid-term elections. And lost in 2022 is not really what happened. We did recapture the house. "Disappointed" is a better word choice. And Trump was not on the ballot, and did not get out and campaign like a house afire like he did in 2018. Neither was he in charge of the House or Senate campaign committees. So it's not exactly good epistemology to lay 100% of the disappointment at his feet.
But to get to your key question in bold: the biggest reason is 75m votes in the 2020 election, without a single one of them resulting from ballot harvesting. a massive improvement over his 2016 totals. Politics is coalition building. A guy who has 75m people who've voted for him has a pretty big head start on a guy who's never run for national office before. He has shown that he can take a coalition and build it. Who else has?
So my thinking here is, at risk of oversimplification, bird-in-hand vs 2-in-bush. We have a multi-racial working class party built by Trump. Much of the partisan base and the independent components are personally loyal to Trump and will not easily translate. (see Dr. Oz in PA). That coalition is growing (did grow this cycle, too). Assuming Trump can hold on to 75m (which he largely will) how do we pickup another 5-10m votes? Answer is, we are going to have to get into blue and purple states and build a better ballot harvesting program than the Dems have. I don't like that. It's not the kind of Republic I'd prefer to have, but it IS the one we have at the moment, so if we want to change it, we're going to have to win with the rules in place at the moment.
Who else could step into those shoes? The list is pretty short.
Can someone else build a NEW coalition? Sure, but what does that look like?
Lots of uncertainty with the alternatives.
Not saying it can't work. But show me what that looks like without getting into the gobbledygook about independents. They rarely decide elections, if for no other reason than they rarely turn out in very big numbers. If that superMajority of independents who SAID they liked the GOP had turned out in 2022, we'd have a 56-58 seat majority in the Senate. But they didn't.
I want to know more about how DeSantis built his coalition in FL.
I want to know more about the nationwide coalition DeSantis wants to build, and how he plans to do it.
I want to know if he's already got a ballot harvesting operation in situ, or incogito.
I like Ron Desantis.
The way I see it, the wizards of smart and the fundraising class has already made the psychological jump to Desantis. The grassroots base has not. That's why I mentioned earlier (somewhere on one of these threads) that we already have a latent "establishment vs base" conflict shaping up. Not really a schism yet, but high stress on the oldest fault-line of all in a political party. Somebody has to step in and bind those two sides back together. Who will it be?
I can tell you, just as a simple matter of physics and political history, the best way to address that issue would be a Trump/DeSantis ticket. Each side gets something it wants.
That's not pie in the sky stuff. It's pure political pragmatism.
