Today, our intrepid politicians figure out that party unity isn’t always a good thing, but who’s to say that should stop one’s ambition? After all, when your campaign is built on clever marketing, the sky is the limit!
Tag "Cruz"
Today news broke that the Democrats have a nuclear option when it comes to the supreme court nomination of Mr. Garland.
Evidently the Democrats only need to offer up a rare procedural trick which would essentially cause a simple majority vote to take place leading to the eventually up or down vote on the judge. Senator Grassley, the Republican in charge of the process reportedly said, “There’s nothing we can do about it” when asked about whether he could prevent the eventual vote.
So, while Republicans in congress constantly accuse the president being an amateur, of not leading, or of leading from behind, these same people continuously lead their flock into fights they can’t possibly win. Each time they end up being out-maneuvered by the president whether it’s the budget, debt ceiling, foreign policy, or, well, you name it.
- Ted Cruz led a useless attempt to defund the ACA and ended up shutting down the government for nothing. Beyond that, the Republicans have voted dozens of times to defund or repeal the law.
- The Republicans led an effort to reign in Obama’s climate policy.
- The Republicans and Tom Cotton led an effort to reign in Obama’s Iran initiative.
- Now the Republicans have picked a fight they seem to be unable to win with the Supreme Court pick. They lose no matter what happens.
Meanwhile, President Obama must be scratching his head. Why would the Republicans continue to take public positions when they can’t possible previal?
He must wonder if losing over and over (and over) is considered great leadership by the Republican base. In the end, our President Obama usually gets whatever he wants. Perhaps this so-called ‘amateur’ isn’t so dumb after all, eh my Republican friends?
Today a prominent member of our intrepid cast, Senator Paul Ryan, came to the realization that the entire crop of 2016 presidential candidates is bat-shit crazy. Donald Trump reportedly bit the head off a Mexican immigrant during a rally in Tempe and spit it out into the eager hands of a waiting Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Ted Cruz issued a statement calling Trump a ‘stupid-pants’ for stealing his idea.
Senator Ryan’s next move was one of desperation….
Our intrepid geniuses are hard at work devising a plan to keep us safe in this dangerous world. If it weren’t for these deep thinkers, we wouldn’t stand a chance. Let’s all celebrate the fact that we’re lucky enough to have such amazing people calling the shots.
Today’s red meat loving right-wing base doesn’t mind hearing terrible things about Muslims, immigrants and anyone else they decided they don’t like. But when outrageous talk provokes outrageous action, , they won’t bother looking in the mirror or at their leaders for answers. Instead violence only provokes more violence and their leaders will be the ones clamoring to bring it to them.
Engagement has always been the way to quiet the angry rumblings of international animosity. Winning hearts and minds was never accomplished through violence. But most in the grassroots right-wing conservative movement don’t even know the difference between Sikhs and Muslims and often mistake them for one another. How can they be expected to vote for leaders who claim to understand the nuanced way to deal with a culturally different and population? They just want to vote for people who preach violence and intolerance.
The reason we have freedom of religious is not only to protect the religious group, but to prevent discord within the population in general. Antagonizing an entire group of people, especially religious fanatics, is a great way to provoke a response and we need to collectively come to that realization.
In the last decade, it seems that terror attacks just prior to elections have become all the rage. It’s almost becoming a regular expectation even when it doesn’t happen. As a population of intelligent and calm-minded people, we need to learn to expect such atrocities in today’s environment and not over-react to even the most terrible of provocations. If we can’t do that, then the bad guys win – the war mongers among us who would rather steal power through antagonistic methodologies and violence, and those who perpetrate the violence by provoking the reactions they set out to provoke.
For months now people on both sides of the political spectrum have been handwringing about how to beat Donald, or whether he might beat himself. The Republicans will be the first to fall by virtue of the fact that they meet Donald head-on in primary season but make no mistake – the Democrats will have to face him soon enough.
To just about everyone in the media, the circus turned serious contender has been nothing short of a jaw gaping mystery. You mean a total outsider with a loud mouth and ridiculous policy positions hasn’t been laughed out of the race? What about Michelle Bachmann, Todd Akin and Sarah Palin? That’s what’s supposed to happen to these kinds of people!
But lo, Trump has managed to elude the grip of death that has doomed so many before him leaving the media in their collective confusion to wonder about their own relevancy in this new, bizarre world. How does this end? And if I can’t predict the future with any reasonable degree of accuracy on this roller coaster, what good am I to anyone as a pundit?
But there is a simple answer, and that answer is to ignore the 3 Bs (bullying, bloviating and bombast) and forcefully return the conversation to one focused exclusively on policy. Donald can be beaten on policy, but if he’s allowed to run his entire campaign using the 3 Bs, he’ll control the news and the election.
Imagine for a moment a match-up in a general election between President Obama and Donald Trump. How would President Obama handle Trump and his 3 Bs? Obama wouldn’t get caught up in Donald’s web of nonsense. He would stick to the policy discussion, ignore personal attacks, and beat Trump by discussing his positions. The problem we’ve had this election cycle is that Trump has figured out that if he talks about waterboarding, carpet bombing, Losers and Megyn Kelly, he doesn’t have to talk about healthcare, minimum wage, gay marriage, or how he’s really going to handle Putin in the Ukraine, or North Korea, or Iran. Pulling back the curtain is the way to expose Trump to the middle of the road voters who decide every election.
At the end of the day, Trump is a showman who has relied on smoke and mirrors to drown out his competition. But his co-campaigners have also allowed Trump to control the dialog, flailing away with various tactics in their attempts to dodge the steam roller. Cruz tried by killing Trump with kindness – at least at first. But you can’t win playing a willing second fiddle. Bush tried feebly to stand up to the campus bully with predicable results. He was verbally wedgied out of the race. Rubio is finally putting up a stronger fight, but even if it wasn’t too little too late, it wouldn’t work anyway. You can’t out-3B Donald Trump. You simply need to change the rules back to the default. Get campaigns talking about campaign issues, and not Donald’s latest foray into his beloved mine field of taboos.
But Trump has used the Bs to great advantage and obscured from the public his lack of policy sophistication as his Achilles heel.
Recently Donald mentioned that he’s a fan of Planned Parenthood. This is policy kryptonite that not even Donald can overcome with some of his prospective supporters. If Hillary can find enough policy positions that are untenable to his RINO hating base, he’ll prove himself the closet liberal they are all afraid of, and he’ll lose vital support. Policy, and nothing else will sleigh this dragon, but we need to steer the conversation back from the brink of darkness. If Donald continues to be allowed to control the news cycle with the 3 Bs, he’ll control the election.
When Donald Trump signed his pledge not to run as an independent, it was worthless. Worth less than the paper it was written on, to be specific. Let’s be honest. Does anyone believe that Donald Trump wouldn’t invent a reason to walk away from his pledge as easily as he might stiff a waiter on a tip?
The reality is that Donald is used to doing EXACTLY what Donald wants to do. As a billionaire, he knows no rules, no boss, and there are no exclusion zones. He has a wife, which generally governs the activities of a man, but he’s traded in his wife twice already, so it’s clear that even interpersonally, Donald Trump is willing to do whatever he wants without limitation.
So can we trust Trump to do what he says?
This week while simultaneously calling out Ted Cruz as the single biggest liar in the Republican race (a tacit admission that they are all liars?) Trump also managed to accuse the RNC of breaking its pledge to treat him fairly by not condemning the negative ads run by Cruz’s campaign. So in Donald’s view, negative ads and personal attacks are his providence only, and if he’s not defended by the (supposedly) impartial RNC, they are in violation of their impartiality. I wonder if this is Trumps negotiating style we keep hearing so much about? Demonize the other party while simultaneously accusing the other party of unfairly demonizing you. Then threaten then judge or moderator if they don’t support you.
I’m not sure I’d call that great negotiating, but Donald probably would. Still, let’s think this through. First, he’s backing himself into a corner. Obviously the RNC would never condemn an attack ad unless it crossed a line of decency so egregious that they had no choice. Otherwise they’d be condemning virtually every ad from every candidate. Let’s face it, attack ads are the meat and potatoes of our current political environment.
So by insisting the RNC condemn said advertisements and by further insisting the RNC is packing debate halls with detractors, the Donald is essentially guaranteeing himself a loophole by which he can run an independent campaign without losing face. Logically, he would have to leave the Republican party if this were true, but don’t believe it. Nothing Donald Trump says really matters. He’ll make up whatever excuse he wants and do as he pleases.
Those leading the Republican party today are total jokes. Punchlines for late night comedians. Fodder for the water cooler. The only qualified republican candidates are being overlooked and ignored by the media and will be forced to withdraw after a while due to lack of funds.
You could read 10 stories about Trump and never see a headline about about Christy, Bush or ummm, who are the other people running?
Perhaps this is a media coup after all? I mean, look what they are talking about in the press. Carson? The guy has a picture of himself with Klingon Jesus and doesn’t know apples from oranges about foreign policy.
And Trump? He’s a showman and a salesman, but NOT a politician who knows anything about policy. He thinks ratings translates into votes. We found out that isn’t true last night when we destroyed by Cruz in Iowa.
And Cruz? How could the most hated man in Washington run Washington effectively? Here’s a hint: he can’t. Can you imagine a president like Cruz? I true ideologue? He’d use executive orders to undo all the positive social changes President Obama worked so hard for. He’d work to ban every single type of abortion. He’d kick millions of people out of health care plans with his promise to repeal Obamacare. He’s a sick man who’s ready to wield power for the betterment of himself and his own personal views, but he definitely won’t be the president for all Americans. Only the staunch right wing bible thumping crew who think the apocalypse is nigh.
These guys are all fatally flawed candidates. They can’t win an election against a normal, center Democrat like Clinton. So my feeling is that the media is pumping them up which makes an easy glide path for a Democrat to take office in 2017. But I’m fine with all of it. And thank goodness. Let’s keep talking about Trump, Cruz and Carson. The more the better! I’ll laugh all the way to November.
TRUMP/PALIN for the republican ticket! smh
Let’s review the candidates as they stand today starting with Donald Trump. While he’s the so-called Republican front-runner, there’s very little chance he’ll win the nomination let alone the presidency. So let me be very clear about my prediction: Donald Trump will NEVER be the President of the United States. Period.
Why would I go out on a limb so early? First and foremost, you can’t be President and also a loose cannon – and Donald Trump is an unapologetically loose cannon. It makes for great political theatre as evidenced by his TV ratings, but you can’t win an election with 40% of the vote. Suppose for a moment that Trump was somehow (inexplicably) able to cinch the nomination. Now it’s just Trump and Clinton – all the other voices silenced in the primaries. How long do you think it will take Trump to say something stupid like he’s done so many times before – calling Rosie O’Donnell a pig, Carli Fiorina ugly, and Megan Kelly a bimbo. You can’t expect to get away with that stuff forever, no matter how brazenly unapologetic you are. And what works in primary season when only politicos care about the election is different from October of an election year when the rank and file voters start to get interested in the contest.
Next there’s his controversial immigration policy – if you can reasonably call it that. Threatening Gestapo-like tactics to round up and deport millions of illegals is a losing issue with the majority of the voters, let alone Latinos. You might find a few confused Mexican-Americans willing to vote for Trump, but most people are smart enough not to vote against their own interests when the consequences of an election would hit so close to home. In other words, what person would vote for a politician who advocates kicking their friends and relatives out of the country?
Trump is also weak on policy. He’s just a salesman with big, shiny ideas. But his ideas only appeal to the extreme right, and those folks don’t care about substance. It’s fine with them that Trump wants to build an expensive, impractical wall between the US and Mexico. They’d rather deport Mexican immigrants than worry about the cost or practicality of such an endeavor. But the voters at the center aren’t going to be so easily bamboozled and there’s still a year before the election where Trump is going to be forced to debate his ideas with more substantive policy positions. Telling us he’s going to have wonderful, talented people and amazing results will only take him so far and it’s only a matter of time before voters figure out he’s selling snake oil.
Moving on
Ted Cruz will never be president either. Nearly all his colleagues hates him and he’s far too extreme anyway. His tactics are slash-and-burn with a heavy dose of take-no-prisoners, and it will cost him. He’s far more knowledgeable than Trump when it comes to policy and will be a much better debater, but you can’t win from the fringe, and Cruz isn’t a pragmatist. Cruz has a shot at the nomination because he’s not stupid and he appeals to the republican base, so it’s possible he’ll the eventual nominee, but that’s as far as he’ll go.
And now for the rest: Jeb Bush never had a chance. He’s a Bush. I know it seems simplistic in the general analysis of things to say that Bush can’t win because of his family name, but there’s a lot of truth to it. Also, he’s been so underwhelming in his overall performance that it’s difficult to see him climbing out of the hole he’s in.
Kasich, Paul, and Fiorina just don’t have the star power or support to present a formidable challenge for the nomination. They might as well have been on the JV debate stage with never-were candidates like Santorum and Huckabee. Meanwhile, Carsen, it turns out, is something of a whack-o and he’s not going anywhere either.
So who does that leave? Just Marco Rubio, the only other person with a credible shot at the nomination. The problem with Rubio is that he’s no more capable of defeating Hillary Clinton than Ted Cruz. He might be smart, relatively clean, and even able to lure some Hispanics. But when compared with Clinton, he’s going to come up short. She’s got decades more experience than the young Florida Senator and he’ll be out of his league competing against her in a general election. He might not lose some debates, but he’s never going to win any.
Assuming that Marco Rubio grabs the nomination, and putting aside Hillary as a nearly unassailable challenge, Clinton still has two weapons for which the Republicans have no answer. Not one, but two former, beloved presidents. Bill Clinton is still wildly popular with many Americans, and Barack Obama gets passing marks from the majority of voters as well. Both will campaign relentlessly for Hillary and their star power will mean something when it’s time to vote.
Meanwhile who among the Republicans compares to these two men? There are none who do. Former Republican candidates are weak, fringe, or controversial. George Bush and Dick Cheney are toxic. John McCain and Mitt Romney are both blah. Palin is a joke and hardly worth mentioning, except as an example of the ineptitude of the available Republican surrogates. Simply put, the Republicans are a rudderless ship.
So it’s difficult to see how the Republicans win the Whitehouse. This will be the third presidential election in a row where they have failed to field decent candidates. When it comes time to vote, it’s hard to see how anyone but Hillary will prevail.