In comments I was asked why Cruz should be preferred. This seems like a pretty good argument to me.
52 thoughts on “A Cruz Defeat Of Trump”
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In comments I was asked why Cruz should be preferred. This seems like a pretty good argument to me.
Comments are closed.
The faults of Mr. Trump are many and well documented by others. That said, Mr. Cruz was eager to accept the endorsement of a leader bent on “if not destroying, at least seriously degrading” both the transportation system as well as the education system of a state known for a great roads and a world-class public university. This is not my assessment — this view was expressed over at Sailer’s blog, perhaps by a Trump supporter. Heck, this view was expressed by Mr. Trump himself.
The State of Wisconsin is a geographic place that some would call a “Whitetopia”, which people at the U do not regard as a good thing. In a country that is taking on the racial makeup of L.A. depicted in Ridley Scott’s “Blade Runner”, here is a holdout, a white colony if you will, a social experiment to determine if white persons can govern themselves and manage their own affairs without the leavening of adequate Diversity. The UW-Madison Chancellor said as much in remarks to the Faculty Senate.
The people of Wisconsin are not perfect — some miscreants have to discredit all all white people by engaging in gratuitous racial insults on campus, and this was a topic for lengthy conversation by the Chancellor and Vice Chancellor on Monday. White persons also spit in public — there was this big puddle of a loogie I had to dodge on leaving the student union for a social event with the AIAA this evening.
But by and large this colony has acquitted itself rather nicely with a really good road system and a world-leading public education system. Until now. Mr. Cruz stands with wrecking the transportation and education systems?
Donald Trump was “called out” for not disavowing the endorsement of David Duke, a genuine racist and purveyor of an odious ideology. I am calling out Ted Cruz for not only failing to disavow the endorsement of a state leader seeking to wreck the roads and schools, gratuitously putting down white people without any compensatory elevation of persons of color in return. I am calling him out for actively embracing this endorsement.
Anyone who wants to destroy two of the biggest rackets in government can’t be all bad.
Related: “Today, the courts put a needed check on Scott Walker’s attacks on working families by ruling that Wisconsin’s right-to-work law is in violation of our state constitution,” said Phil Neuenfeldt, President of Wisconsin AFL-CIO, in a statement.
http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/wisconsin-judge-strikes-down-states-right-to-work-law/ar-BBrxhTp?ocid=spartanntp
The judge’s ruling is that depriving unions ability to force people to pay dues -even if they want no part of any union – is a taking from the unions. In essense, he’s saying the unions have the right to people’s money. Screw that.
But how far did that get him with other voters? Public employee unions may be a particularly egregious and entitled form of unionism, but what price to you pay for a frontal-assault on unionism and working-class voters having family traditions of union membership?
Does restriction of immigration constitute a kind of union? We levy taxes on ourselves through collective action regardless of whether or not a particular voter supports spending tax dollars on national defense or on a social safety net, and we restrict membership in this Union we call our Federal Government.
Someone comes on strong with an immigration restriction plan and taps into the favorable sentiment working class (Democrats!) have for the union principle. Someone who comes on strong because they are not encumbered by Republican anti-union ideology, not encumbered by the odd open-borders Libertarianism embraced by Democrats and running contrary to the self-interest of much of the Democratic Party Base.
You might get working class Democrats to “cross over” on a platform of opposing their party’s efforts to make gasoline and electricity expensive, doctrinaire opposition to even enforcing existing provisions of immigration law, “sanctuary” for persons committing crimes involving drugs and or violence, efforts to undermine the efforts of police officers, working-class men and women of all races working under impossible conditions to protect persons of all genders and races from the predators among us.
How far would the Governor have gotten getting Democrats to cross over and vote for him on a platform of “we busted the unions, and we will fight attempts to restrict free trade enforce immigration law”?
Success in taking on the public employee unions is why I favored Scott Walker. Only the loonie left would equate what is good for the union with what is good for the service the members supposedly provide.
Why do you even need roads up there? It’s flat. Here we have to cut through a mountainside to build a driveway. We got some of the best roads in the country, and I’ll give you a tip to keep yours in good shape too. Put all your cars up on blocks and the roads won’t wear out so bad.
And why do you need an education system? People in Wisconsin are already plenty smart. The come from smart people, like their Norwegian ancestors who figured farming someplace warmer and flatter would be way better than trying to grow crops at the bottom of a fjord north of the Arctic circle. All your fancy educating is doing is convincing them that northern Norway was an arctic paradise that will be destroyed by 2 degrees of warming. Just look at Scott Walker. He ain’t got no fancy degree. Don’t need one cause he can just hire them kind of people.
And don’t you worry none about being too white. No matter what immigrants you take, dark skinned people are gonna wither away and die up there because they can’t get no vitamin D in the winter. You’ll have to stick them all in tanning salons once the first snow hits and keep them there till May, and that’s going to screw up your power grid. You all know this, which is why only 6 percent of you were worried about immigration.
“I am calling him out for actively embracing this endorsement.”
I think all you’ll get in return is belly-shaking laughter.
Go ahead and shake your abdominal adipose in laughter. This is not a Republican-Democrat or a Right-Left split. This is a split right down the middle of Republican voters.
I’ll give you a fer-instance. The State of Michigan had a ballot proposition supporting school vouchers, something hated with a white-hot fury by the “pinko” teachers’ unions, a fave of Libertarians everywhere, and a “lost cause” pursued by a politically iconoclastic faction in the black community.
This ballot proposition “went down in flames” and who voted against it was the Conservatives. Well no, not really. It was the wealthier, less diverse suburbs that turned out against this. People who sacrificed financially to own houses in those districts with what are regarded has having good schools. People who spent a lot more money in mortgage and property tax payments so their kids could “get ahead.” And the gummint is now going to level the playing field by handing out vouchers to people who didn’t “buy in” (cough, Detroit, cough). And yes, there is a less-than-altruistic racial component to this, from white persons who would otherwise insist that their hearts are in the right place on race.
Well I guess the wealthier less-diverse suburban enclaves, even outside of college towns, are increasingly voting Democratic. Where are you going to scare about the votes for your Libertarian Dream?
Go ahead laugh. We shall see who is laughing come January 2017 when people will start saying “Madam President.” I won’t be laughing — will you?
You see the same effect when you try to take an Occupy Wall Street’s iPad away to give to a homeless person. Suddenly “BUT IT’S MINE!” kicks in.
Or take any liberal sipping coffee at Starbucks and lecturing people on how we must save the rain forest. Don’t dare impinge on their day-to-day life in any way that will really affect them or they’ll throw a fit.
Wisconsin voters don’t care about the illegal immigration issue (according to exit polls), and that’s because illegals aren’t moving into their neighborhoods or taking their local jobs. That’s all happening somewhere else – to other people.
But they would care about foreign trade and plants that are packing up and moving to Mexico. And many of these concerns resonate with conservatives when they realize that it’s their factory that’s moving, while the jobs we get in return are theoretical – and probably in Berkeley or Boston and in a completely different field.
OK, I am trying to get a read on your position, here, in the emerging Republican factional alignment.
I am not blaming anyone in Wisconsin for not caring about immigration because it is not adversely affecting them (yet). I am not blaming wealthy suburbanites in the state of Michigan for voting their self interest in voting down school vouchers. People do vote their self-interest, often in contradiction of ideologies they espouse, and I see a legitimate function of political parties as building coalitions along voters with similarly aligned self interests. Or rather, people pursuing a rigid ideological purity, whether Occupy people or doctrinally pure Conservatives and Libertarians, risk not simply being hypocrites, they risk being in a permanent political minority wilderness and wondering why.
I guess what I am asking, is an Occupy protestor “discovering” property rights in hanging on to their iPad a hypocrite whom we must chastise or a realist with whom we may have a “conversation” regarding principles of individual liberty?
Is a Libertarian upset about losing their job to Ricado’s Comparative Advantage and Smith’s Invisible Hand a hypocrite for being upset and someone who needs to read some more Ayn Rand to stop sulking and restore their Libertarian purity? Or is this someone whom we should take aside, “Welcome to the real world — let’s work on a mix of affordable energy, sensible regulation, and trade agreements that don’t sell out our national interests to restore our economy.”
I’m not aware of the details of the ‘school voucher’ initiative you’re discussing, but you were asking for opinions…
1) Many of these sorts of things are openly or subtly flawed, and then openly or subtly advertised in ways that cause voting to not line up with expectations. Attaching an oversized tax hike, or a disproportionate tax hike, or exempting large blocks – all sorts of ways that can influence people that supposedly support something to vote against it.
2) The correct way, IMNSHO, is to convert the entire system to vouchers in one go. That is: Take the ‘Average per-student expenditures’ on a per school district basis (or city basis, or county basis, whatever seems like it works best). And then basically cut checks. “This check payable by the State of X is only valid with the additional endorsement by a parent/guardian and the principal of an State X accredited educational facility.” This puts the entirety of the public school system in play as well. Everyone that’s currently private schooling, or homeschooling, or even childless is -already- paying the necessary taxes for this approach to be mostly paid for. (“Mostly” only because of the paperwork.)
This would continue to have the fervent opposition of the teachers unions and every educational administrator. The only other group “screwed” by this would be the homeschoolers. In ‘Al-land’, perhaps the checks could be paid right back to the parents based on grade-level test results.
My position is primarily that the GOP establishment has screwed up badly by being almost completely ineffective at halting Obama, probably on purpose because they saw how his actions were wildly energizing their base. Conservatives have always known how Democrats keep the minority fired up and energized by not stopping the latest “conservative outrage”, so I suppose it was only a matter of time before the Republicans tried the same strategy.
But we’re not like Democrats. If Democrats are doing something to enrage us and the Republican establishment, who controls the House and Senate, insist on letting the Democrats keep on doing what is pissing us off, I get pissed off at the Republican establishment, not the Democrats, who after all can’t help what they’re doing, bless their little hearts.
And among the things the Republicans kept doing are not funding a border wall, not returning illegals, not stopping Obama from importing hundreds of thousands of Muslims straight from a war zone, not standing up to China on trade or the South China sea dispute, and not stopping Iran’s rush to become a nuclear armed terrorist power. Heck, they couldn’t even hold the IRS to account for targeting us, and couldn’t hold Hilary to account for anything at all.
So various parts of the Republican base are disgusted and upset, and unlike Rubio and Cruz debating the arcane nuances of the failed Gang of Eight bill, Trump says he’s going to build a wall and make Mexico pay for it. He says he’ll stop Muslims immigration (which caused a firestorm). Basically, he doesn’t speak in the politically correct terms. Cruz doesn’t speak in them either, but he speaks in the terms that are politically correct to conservatives. Maybe he means it, maybe he doesn’t, but he’s often too clever by half. Maybe he’s an insider, maybe he’s an outsider. Opinions vary.
But based on the party’s reaction to Trump, Trump is definitely an outsider. I’m not sure either political party would have him. That might be a plus, because one thing people are getting sick of is how everybody they send to Washington becomes engaged in some complicated process that doesn’t seem to remotely resemble anything we’ve sent them there to do.
They’re all hanging around with their fellow Harvard and Yale graduates and DC’s economy keeps booming and booming while places more than a few counties removed from DC are not doing very well.
I’m not particularly pro-Trump, because he’s pretty much an idiot in many ways, but he’s also not one to suck up to the establishment, as opposed to paying them to do what he wants and then leave him alone. In contrast, Cruz seems to revel in the arcane complexities of New York and DC.
As Will Rogers said about Washington politicians, “If it keeps circling the outhouse, it might be a fly.”
So my irritation with Cruz’s campaign is that it shouldn’t exist at all. The establishment was never going to let him go anywhere because he’s ineligible. But to them he was also very useful, doing all the pandering among the evangelicals just so they could hand his delegates to Jeb, or then Rubio, and now Kasich, Romney, or Ryan.
It’s a Trojan horse. At present he’s the best way to get to a contested convention, but he’s not an actual option. Instead the nominee will be someone who has either won one state or no states at all. And this apparently is a plan.
This makes me pretty fed up with the GOP establishment, who have been proving themselves more and more incompetent, if that be possible. They’re the people who were brimming with confidence that Jeb had a lock on it.
His candidacy reminds me of a sermon I heard about dog food.
The CEO of a dog food company was angry that sales weren’t better. His brand was lagging in sales and unable to gain market share. He called a meeting of his executives and pounded the table:
“Don’t we have the freshest ingredients? Don’t we have most nutritious product? Don’t we have the best TV commercials? Don’t we have the best print marketing? Don’t we have the best coupons and promotional offers?”
“Yes sir, we do!” came the chorus.
“Why then aren’t people buying our product!”
One lone executive meekly spoke up. “Sir, the dogs don’t like it.”
“You see the same effect when you try to take an Occupy Wall Street’s iPad away to give to a homeless person. Suddenly “BUT IT’S MINE!” kicks in.”
And they say that dressed in their nylon anoraks, leather shoes or nylon sneakers…..
Cruz is toast. It will not get to a second ballet.
Still think this?
Cruz is IMHO pushing the limits with his current delegate games (manipulating the delegate selections so some delegates pledged to other candidates are Cruz supporters. So far, what he’s doing (that I’m aware of) is within the rules, but… it depends how far he takes it.
If he goes too far (or has already?) and these tactics result in defections of pledged delegates on the first ballot (via not voting for who they are pledged to vote for, including not voting) then what is being done is disenfranchisement of voters, and that would be unacceptable to many (this Cruz supporter included).
However, if these technically-within-the-rules moves are seen as okay, you know what else is technically within the rules? Bribing delegates. You can’t do it with campaign funds or promise government posts due to federal law, but that’s the only limitation. It’s also, IMHO, not outside the realm of possibility that Cruz might find himself with a convention opponent for the nomination who is personally wealthy, and perhaps even happens to own hotels, golf resorts, private jets, a large corporation (jobs for delegates!) etc, and said purely hypothetical candidate could well use Cruz’s delegate machinations as an excuse for some machinations of his own, and thus Cruz might find himself, um, Trumped…
Is there a political party just for conservatives? Would they be better off just leaving the establishment GOP?
There is a Conservative Party in New York, but it’s not national. Ironically, Sean Hannity has long been a member of it, before he went all the way to eleven on stupid with Trump.
Nothing prevents starting a new party (call it conservatives.) But multiway races tend to disappoint. The third party can’t win, but they can throw a wrench into the works.
That’s why saying republican voters are not republicans makes no sense. Republican is just a word. A party is defined by its voters.
Happened already in the early 20th century. After losing a few elections, they wised up and made up..
The only way I can see successfully creating a 3rd party (of any political outlook) is to build up from local and state elections in most of the 50 states. You can’ t build one by starting from the top, I don’t believe.
I’m seriously open to being convinced one way or another (although I admit at this point being inclined toward Cruz, if only for the classic “It’s Good to Be a Clinton” ad); but it’s hard for me to take Republicans who favor Trump seriously when, if put to the question–THE Question: which one, Cruz or Trump, is closer to being a libertarian?–I get either weasel words and dodges, or even the honest answer, in effect, “I find liberty over-rated.”
I just read this USA Today story that was interesting.
Hrm….
But that last part didn’t have much context. Is he referring to his own campaign or the campaign against him?
I know ever people who liked THE FOUNTAINHEAD and seem to have missed the point. Wonder if Trump has read ATLAS SHRUGGED, in which the crony capitalists team up with the whiny collectivists. Guess what happens?
Here is an article about one of those Cruz eligibility lawsuits
This one wasn’t tossed out on a technicality but rather common law precedent.
Yes, I read that opinion in full. Pellegrini wouldn’t last fifteen minutes in a debate because his position is unsupportable by any early reading, scholarship, and subsequent court decisions, all the way through Zivokofsky v Kerry (2015), in which the Court weighed whether a child born in Jerusalem to two US citizens could have “Israel” listed as his birthplace.
The case weight the Article I powers of Congress to write uniform rules for the naturalization of aliens (Zivokofsky was a naturalized citizen) with the President’s Article II powers over foreign relations. Justice Thomas, in part concurring and in part dissenting, did make an offhand statement that he thought Zivokofsky was a natural born citizen, but then delved right in to the power of Congress to handle naturalization.
Scalia, in his dissent, said:
The entire paragraph would be devastating to Cruz’s claim, but particular illuminating is where he says “Art. I, §8, cl. 4, enables it to grant American citizenship to someone born abroad.”
Natural born citizenship cannot be granted by Congress or the President. The only way they can create a natural born citizen is to have a baby on US soil, just like everybody else.
You make compelling arguments and I am not familiar enough with relevant court decisions to offer a counter. I guess we will have to wait for the courts to decide and who knows how they will?
“The only way they can create a natural born citizen is to have a baby on US soil, just like everybody else.”
So what you’re saying is that if you have a young American married couple where the woman is preggers, and they are vacationing in Quebec, and she goes into labor and delivers in Quebec……
….that that child is not a natural born, US citizen and cannot be President?
This was the argument made against John McCain (Who was born in the Panama Canal Zone). Didn’t work too good there either.
McCain was covered under 8 USC 1403, which addressed the citizenship status of children born in the Panama Canal Zone to US Parents. We passed almost identical laws for the US Virgin Islands, Guam, Puerto Rico, Alaska, and Hawaii.
That gets in to the interesting question of what qualifies as US soil for jus soli citizenship, where there can be legitimate gray areas, both in space and time. That came up before with Barry Goldwater, but the operating principle is that the US had total and complete sovereignty at the place and time of birth.
What can’t be disputed is that Alberta was never one of these places.
Yup.
Turning to James Kent’s Commentaries on the American Law, which he started from his lecture notes beginning in 1794 (Oliver Wendell Holmes edited the 12th edition), he says in lecture 13:
The constitution requires, that the president should be a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of the constitution, and that he have attained to the age of thirty file years, and have been fourteen years a resident within the United States. Considering the greatness of the trust, and that this department is the ultimately efficient power in government, these restrictions will not appear altogether useless or unimportant. As the president is required to be a native citizen of the United States, ambitious foreigners cannot intrigue for the office, and the qualification of birth cuts off all those inducements from abroad to corruption, negotiation, and war, which have frequently and fatally harassed the elective monarchies of Germany and Poland, as well as the Pontificate at Rome.
Like virtually all period authors and Supreme Court opinions, “natural born” and “native born” are interchangeable constructions. In Zivotofsky v Kerry (2015) the Court cited Samuel Johnson’s 1768 definition of “natural” as “native; native inhabitant” and the act of “naturalization” as making someone like a native inhabitant.
He also mentions than no alien born children were allowed to sit in Parliament, and that each naturalization act had to have a disabling clause.
And the bitter experience was this: Your prince or princess is married off to a foreign royal in a dynastic marriage. If their child is born and raised in the country that is your rival and frequent enemy, you don’t not want to put that foreign born child on your thrown – even though by blood they might claim right of sovereignty over you.
So, a quick fix for that. Require a natural (native) born citizen for the highest executive office.
Coming back to this, yes, it does seem unfair, doesn’t it?
And for that reason, back in 2000, Barney Frank introduced House Joint Resolution 88
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to make eligible for the Office of President a person who has been a United States citizen for twenty years.
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years after the date of its submission for ratification:
Article —
“A person who is a citizen of the United States, who has been for twenty years a citizen of the United States, and who is otherwise eligible to the Office of President, is not ineligible to that Office by reason of not being a native born citizen of the United States.”
As I’ve been saying, people who are not native born cannot be President. The opposite of “native born” is “foreign born”, which of course includes foreign born children of US citizens. Thus the proposed Constitutional amendment. It did not pass, so foreign born children are still ineligible to assume the office of the Presidency – or the Vice Presidency (a birther tried to block Chester A. Arthur’s Vice Presidential candidacy).
“Coming back to this, yes, it does seem unfair, doesn’t it?”
I don’t buy it.
“….. is not ineligible to that Office by reason of not being a native born citizen of the United States.”
Reciting the article doesn’t make any difference. The issue revolves around the definition of “foreign born” and “native born”.
Harvard Law Review:
The Constitution directly addresses the minimum qualifications necessary to serve as President. In addition to requiring thirty-five years of age and fourteen years of residency, the Constitution limits the presidency to “a natural born Citizen.”
1. U.S. Const. art. II, § 1, cl. 5.
All the sources routinely used to interpret the Constitution confirm that the phrase “natural born Citizen” has a specific meaning: namely, someone who was a U.S. citizen at birth with no need to go through a naturalization proceeding at some later time. And Congress has made equally clear from the time of the framing of the Constitution to the current day that, subject to certain residency requirements on the parents, someone born to a U.S. citizen parent generally becomes a U.S. citizen without regard to whether the birth takes place in Canada, the Canal Zone, or the continental United States.
…………..
The Supreme Court has long recognized that two particularly useful sources in understanding constitutional terms are British common law
3. See Smith v. Alabama, 124 U.S. 465, 478 (1888).
and enactments of the First Congress.
4. See Wisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co., 127 U.S. 265, 297 (1888).
Both confirm that the original meaning of the phrase “natural born Citizen” includes persons born abroad who are citizens from birth based on the citizenship of a parent.”
Now I’m no lawyer so I’m not able to argue the issue with an informed point of view.
But it seems to me that it simply is not as cut and dried as you would have us believe.
Gregg,
Hamilton used the requirement that the President be a “born citizen of the United States” in his draft Constitution. That would include people born abroad to US parents as it means all citizens from birth. But the convention received the letter from John Jay warning about foreign intrigues, so they adopted “natural born citizen” as the requirement.
So “natural born citizen” cannot be the same as “born citizen”, by logic, because it wouldn’t result in the tighter restrictions on the office. Marbury v Madison says that if possible, the Constitution must be read so that every word have meaning. If you go with the “born citizen” reading of the phrase then the word “natural” becomes “surplusage” (the court’s term) which is not allowed.
From the beginning until 2015, the court has interpreted “natural” as meaning, or synonymous with, “native”. A “native born” citizen would rule out anyone born abroad, just as a person can’t be a native born Ohioan if he was born in Michigan to Ohio parents.
And you can get up to speed on all this really quickly.
Blackstone’s Commentaries (1765), book 1, chapter 10 takes about 10 minutes to read. Just Google “Blackstone’s commentaries chapter 10” and look for the most readable presentation. You can also buy Blackstone’s entire work free for Kindle (or pay $250 for a fancy print version that looks like what you see behind lawyers who are saying “Injured in an accident?”)
George Tucker’s Commentaries (1803) runs a bit longer, but is of course written for the US and has some other interesting items in it.
US v Wong Kim Ark runs about 70 pages and has been frequently cited in subsequent court opinions.
And there’s a nice Amicus brief in the New York case filed by a Harvard Law professor.
Keep in mind that until quite recently “Constitutional Law” was just a 3 credit hour college course, and citizenship law couldn’t amount to 1 or 2 percent of the subject. You could probably read every relevant early passage and court opinion in a day or two, or certainly in a week.
Last night I was reading an old book on the British Naturalization Acts of 1870, and earlier in the evening I was reading an article in the Albany Law Journal from 1899 about the citizenship of US women. I landed on the Albany journal to answer a response I’d gotten in noting that Winston Churchill’s mother was a US citizen and yet he could not be President because he was born abroad (he was in the same position as Cruz). Someone responded that she’d given up her citizenship by marrying Churchill’s father. The Albany Journal article, addressing women’s citizenship showed that to be false (though it was written long before Churchill was important).
It was a common assumption in Britain that American women who marry a British subject lose their citizenship – because British women who marry an American lose their citizenship and take their husband’s. If the husband died they could then resume their British citizenship.
But American women never lose their citizenship upon marriage, and the US government at times reminded the British of that, saying that the President of the United States was authorized to use all measures short of war to protect the US Constitutional rights of all women married to British subjects.
Indeed, an American woman could lead a war against the United States and all the US government could do about her citizenship is plead with her to please renounce it. If she refused, they were powerless to do anything more, as the Constitution grants the government no power to unilaterally revoke or alter the citizenship of a natural born US citizen.
It can and does, however, retain the right to revoke the citizenship of a naturalized citizen, for acts including the mere refusal to testify before a Congressional committee investigating subversive acts and the like.
Naturalization, including the recognition of the citizenship of children born abroad to US parents, is done through an act of Congress, and what Congress does they can also undo, within limits.
But they can’t touch natural born subjects because natural born subjects are superior over them, having elected and paid them to do our bidding in a government we created to serve our own purposes. As I think Kent put it, Congress creates naturalized citizens. Natural born citizens created Congress.
By the way, if you say anything like this at National Review Online your comment, and possibly the entire subthread, will get deleted in the blink of an eye. You can say absolutely anything about Cruz, except citing any Founder or Supreme Court decision. That is not allowed.
Trump and (astonishingly) Drudge whine, dissemble, and prevaricate on the Colorado caucuses. All Republicans in Co were able to attend the caucuses. NO ONE was disenfranchised or cut out of the process.
The rules have been in place and explained in great detail online for 7 months prior to the caucuses.
Trump didn’t crank up anything in Colorado until March. By then it was too late.
trump either didn’t want it badly enough or thought his fantastic mystique would carry him through. Either way, Cruz outfought him fairly and squarely.
I’m not quite there yet but I’m putting more and more credence in Schlicter’s point of view that Trump really doesn’t want to be President and is looking for a way out. And that part of bailing will be to whine that the system is rigged.
IMO, less of Trump not wanting it and more of an example of how unprepared he has been and/or this one state not fitting into his campaign strategy so just writing it off.
I wouldn’t expect Trump or any of the candidates to be uber wonks on the electoral process of every single state but Trump should have people working for him that are. It seems unlikely that he doesn’t. Wouldn’t a slip up like this get someone fired? He did just reorganize some staff so who knows?
It could be that oddball states like CO exist outside of his campaign strategy. Trump has been running a different style of campaign, very minimalist in terms of campaign commercials and local staff networks. He hasn’t spent very much money and has done rather well. He might be thinking that he can afford to lose a few states.
Under that scenario, he might just write a state like CO off because it doesn’t fit into his cookie cutter strategy. He saves some money and gets to continue attacks against the establishment. Trump lost some delegates but did he lose any support? He might have actually gained support because the process looks rigged or unfair.
“Under that scenario, he might just write a state like CO off because it doesn’t fit into his cookie cutter strategy.”
But it’s getting harder and harder for Trump to get to the magic 1237 prior to the convention. Writing off states is not a good plan.
So Trump has been telling us – ad nauseum – that he’s a “closer”. He closes the deals. He gets the deals done.
Then why didn’t he close the deal in Colorado?
He didn’t go there.
He didn’t speak there.
He didn’t bother to read the rules there.
He didn’t even try to close the deal.
Maybe Trump trying to get the most voters voting for him.
Which is related to him speaking at large rallies.
Or the larger the rally the less time one has to talk- more eyeballs- sort of like the focus of internet.
Or if the people are not voting in Colorado, and therefore one can’t get large numbers of people to to show up- he not interested in wasting his time.
–Gregg
April 12, 2016 at 5:01 AM
Trump and (astonishingly) Drudge whine, dissemble, and prevaricate on the Colorado caucuses. All Republicans in Co were able to attend the caucuses. NO ONE was disenfranchised or cut out of the process.
The rules have been in place and explained in great detail online for 7 months prior to the caucuses.–
Well, it reminds me of Hitchhikers Guide.
But I have a question.
Now, it seems to me that the whole purpose of a bound delegate is related to the public’s vote.
So on the Dem side, one has Superdelegates.
And these Superdelegates are not bound, because this would
be silly to say- because people are expected understand what a bound candidate is.
One could say that Superdelegates are wise men who have greater wisdom then, mere the voters or the random chance of voting.
So Clinton has got a lot of SuperDelegates but they are not to mistaken for bound delegates If these delegates decide to vote for Bernie on first round, they would not be breaking any rules, they would simply be changing their minds regarding their previous decision to back Clinton.
And whole idea of bound delegates is one can’t change the decision of the voters [in terms of first round of voting- or whatever other rules are established regarding this condition of being a bound delegate of a particular State].
So what do you call these delegate of Colorado who it is claimed to be all supporting Cruz?
It seems to me that what they are would be cheerleaders for the front runner. Cheerleader is sense of wanting the front runner to until to battle to the very end of the game by changing the score so it appeats the game is closer than it is.
Now I think it would be wonderful to have a close race all the way to California. But I think at game should have rules which are followed, and changing the scoreboard based upon desire have a close game is not actually a brilliant idea. Though there are many people do like to watch Professional Wrestling.
In terms of Professional Wrestling it seems to me, the fake wrestling of Dems now appears more realistic. It seems Bernie is the beginning was merely fooling around, but now it appears he is becoming seriously interested in winning.
“So what do you call these delegate of Colorado who it is claimed to be all supporting Cruz?”
I would call them whatever the Colorado rules say they are called.
Each state writes up it’s own rules.
This seems pertinent:
http://rightwingnews.com/column-2/voice-people-fallacy/
Speaking of fallacy. Imagine you have 10 candidate who each get 10% of the vote. You could argue, incorrectly, that 90% of the people don’t want any particular candidate.
This becomes apparent as candidates drop out. People reevaluate when their options change and first choice may not indicate second choices.
“People reevaluate when their options change and first choice may not indicate second choices.”
I think it’s fairly safe to say that, upon the whole, Walker voters are not going to pick Kasich.
Walker voters are not going to pick Kasich.
There are so many variables that you just can’t be certain. Why would nominal republicans say they would vote for Hillary before Trump?
Do they not know Hillary? Do they discount everything Trump (and supporters of Trump) have to say? It’s more than bizarre.
If Hillary gets elected… inconceivable, but I thought that of a 2nd Obama term. Disgusting.
Why would nominal republicans say they would vote for Hillary before Trump?
Because if they’re going to have a Democrat in the White House, they’d prefer one who calls herself one, rather than having one taint the Republican brand under a false flag?
“There are so many variables that you just can’t be certain. ”
This is why I used the phrase “upon the whole” – a few Walker voters might – almost certainly will, vote for Kasich.
But *upon the whole* I don’t think that will be the case. i.e. most will not.
taint the Republican brand
ROFLMAO… good to see you still have your sense of humor intact. Trump is the corrective action of a party that has become an oligarchy.
He’s not a conservative nor a democrat. He is exactly what he appears… common. He will not be going on a world apology tour. He’s a decision maker. What principles guide his decisions? This is where we are at odds. His flaws are common flaws. Hillary is evil.
—ken anthony
April 14, 2016 at 10:37 AM
taint the Republican brand
ROFLMAO… good to see you still have your sense of humor intact. Trump is the corrective action of a party that has become an oligarchy.—
Hmm.
Oligarchy assumes some people are controlling something.
In this case controlling the US or perhaps what you mean is the republican brand.
And I don’t see much controlling of either by the Republicans.
Or a small unnamed group controlling the Republicans.
I would not count the vast herds of lobbyists as small group nor having anything amounting to control or governance.
–He’s not a conservative nor a democrat. He is exactly what he appears… common.–
Or someone who appears to be an American buffoon.
Perhaps he seems like the stereotype of the ugly American:
“”For some reason, the [American] people I meet in my country are not the same as the ones I knew in the United States. A mysterious change seems to come over Americans when they go to a foreign land. They isolate themselves socially. They live pretentiously. They are loud and ostentatious.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ugly_American
Accordingly, Trump isn’t going to another country- but rather he is an American from different world visiting the other worlds of America.
Or perhaps it’s merely a New Yorker going to other parts of America.
Trump on the campaign, seems like an American tourist touring America.
Or perhaps a common American if one talking about +50 years ago.
–He’s a decision maker. What principles guide his decisions? This is where we are at odds. —
I think his principles are what he claims they are- he wants to make American great, again.
I don’t think he is overly impressed with the politicians that we have and imagines that he could do a better job.
And he thinks that President of United States is where he needs to be in order to make America great, again.
Now, most people would imagine that it would be better to start as governor or maybe Senator. But it appears that Trump doesn’t have that kind of patience.
I think that when Gingrich told him, it would cost about 50 million to get the North Carolina, that he thought that this was a reasonably good bargain. It’s 50 million for something on his bucket list.
And I think he began like others begin [like Carson for instance]- to see if he could get his message out- influence the nation in some way. Though also thought maybe he would get lucky and actually end up being the Republican Candidate.
As far as other principles, he seems rather keen on fairness- Old Testament, eye for a eye fairness. An ancient value. And an outdated value.
It also appears that Trump is interested in the latest fashions- such political correct views, central banking, etc.
a New Yorker going to other parts of America.
Many people don’t understand NYers. Because NY is so self sufficient (can you go two blocks from home, take your shoe off and hand it over the counter to a cobbler to have a new leather sole put on while you wait anywhere else?) they get a very myopic view of the world. They know they are the best regardless of reality, when in fact they are not involved in the much wider world. Even Trump, who has lived and worked beyond the city, hasn’t left that view. While they consider themselves cosmopolitan the rest of the world easily sees the immaturity which is real. It’s sad but it’s not fundamental. NYers are still just folk like anyone else… just a bit louder and boorish.
It’s not the fatal flaw some make it out to be. Those that do have their own myopia.
I miss the food in NY.