Round 2! I was going to do a properly seeded version this time around and then I decided that sounded like too much work and I’d just pair them off by the margin they won Round 1 by (also, seeding it would likely have given us a Santorum-Fiorina pairing, which no one wanted):
Rubio vs Christie
Kasich vs Santorum
Fiorina vs Pataki
Huckabee vs Paul
And for fun I’ll add the two nearly-wons as a stall for deciding whether I want to keep them in the competition:
Graham vs Perry
I predict the first three will be pretty clear-cut, but the last two will be more interesting.
Christie - Corrupt as hell, but I think Rubio is too and Christie has more executive experience.
Kasich - Duh.
Pataki - Duh again.
Paul - Best of a bad lot. Won’t get my vote in the next round.
There’s a reason these were the also-rans…
Perry - Complete fucking idiot, but less likely to get us in a major war within hours of the inauguration.
I realize that I didn’t put any reasoning in. My god! How will anyone survive without hearing my lameass reasoning?
Rubio over Christie. I think Rubio is a naif and Christie is a crook. It’s a terrible choice between those two things, but I do think Rubio is smarter and doesn’t just cover his ignorance with bluster and attack the way Christie does. And I think Christie is another Nixon in the way he would attempt to use the power of the presidency.
Kasich over Santorum. Easy choice. Kasich is an ass sometimes, but Santorum is santorumy.
Pataki over Fiorina: Fiorina is a nothing and a nobody. Pataki has some accomplishments, and his name is more fun to say. (I always hear it in the voice of David Letterman.)
Huckabee over Paul: I think libertarianism is a fool’s game that can do irreparable harm. Huckabee is a wannabe theocrat, but hell, Paul has some of that as well.
Graham over Perry: Perry just strikes me as another GW—weak, lazy, and rather dim. Not evil, but dim. Graham just seems like he has a clue even though I don’t agree with most of his clues.
