Well enough. There’s just one office left to claim.
The first sentence is false, but you corrected yourself in the second sentence. You should have just deleted the first one.
Not really. She isn’t going to run against some beloved figure. She’s going to run against a real world Republican, who will take policy positions of trying to privatize Social Security and Medicare, repeal the ACA, forbid abortions without exceptions, oppose equal pay for women, defund Planned Parenthood, and block any progress on climate change. People don’t have to like her; they have to like her more than that.
Did I miss the announcement of I.B. Strawman’s candidacy or are you assuming that whichever candidate is selected is likely to shift further right for the general election? Just looking at the top 10 in the polls the majority (6) fail to meet your no exceptions on an abortion ban criteria. The odds of the likely nominee fitting all aspects of your simple stereotype completely are low.
Rubio, for example, meets all the criteria I outlined. I had intended to type “no exceptions for rape, incest, or health of the mother,” though, so if you want to use the tiny “life of the mother” exception I left, go ahead, but this position is still extremely unpopular.
Candidates in the top 10 who support exceptions for things other than just health - Trump, Bush, Kasich, Fiorina, and Christie. We’re still into coin flip territory if the nominee was selected at random from the top 10. Their positions may still be unpopular with the general populace. There’s no need to overstate the reality in overly simplistic terms to enable attacking the strawman. The right has enough people utilizing similar tactics…
Jeb’s increasingly irrelevant by now, but I stumbled across Rachel Maddow’s interesting Youtube: Jeb! isn’t very good at running for President.
Ok, saw that was from August because I was gonna say, boy, Rachel’s all over it if she’s now figuring out that Jeb’s not a great candidate. I will say, however, that she confuses campaigning with fundraising in the first minute or so of that video. Of course Jeb would turn to his family’s donors, regardless of whether he’s “his own man” or not.
Jeb could walk down Main Street stark naked and not draw a camera crew. If Trump wasn’t in the race, he’d be poring over veep resumes by now. I still think he could win, but right now he still seems to be searching for a message.
It’s hard to have a message when there are 20 other people in the race and you are all trying to appeal to the same broad constituency. Jeb’s name has too much value (or at least it previously appeared to) for him to take a “fuck it, let’s talk shit about brown people” approach a la Trump.
The GOP seems to feel like if it weren’t for Trump they could have hidden Jeb away like the Democrats are doing with Hillary (debates on the weekends) and cruise to a nomination. I don’t know. Without Trump I don’t think Jeb would be buried like he is now, but I do think he’d have a fight on his hands with Cruz and Rubio.
CNN Politics says Jeb!'s campaign is “in free-fall”: http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/04/politics/jeb-bush-campaign-free-fall-3-percent/index.html
Could you imagine a Bush at the kiddie table debate? That would be like a Kennedy not qualifying for a Democratic debate.
Jeb’s best hope is that Cruz can inflict serious damage to Rubio.
Jeb’s best hope is a time machine where he can go back and run in 2012 when he would have had a better chance.
I must say I’m absolutely amazed. Coming into the year, we all knew Jeb was running well before the announcement and he tied up a lot of money very early. I thought for sure it would be a walk in the park for him. Then Trump jumped in and it was hilarious that he had to pay extras $50 to cheer his announcement. How times have changed! I honestly don’t see a path for him now. He doesn’t have a message, he doesn’t have energy, and he has very little support. Yes he can hang on through NH, but why? I think a Trump nomination is more likely than not.
Jeb’s best hope is a series of plane crashes and/or car accidents.
Jeb still leads the Endorsement Primary but Rubio is a close second. By 538’s counting rules, Christie’s actually third, Huckabee’s fourth, then Kasich, Paul, Cruz, Graham, and Fiorina, with Santorum polluting the bottom. Trump isn’t on the list because endorsements are a proxy for how much of the party is behind you and Trump’s about as popular with the GOP as a bowl of free condoms at a Purity Dance.
So I’ll adaher for a second and dare to prognosticate: Cruz will fade, Rubio won’t. What I won’t try to predict is whether the bulk of the party’s support shifts from Bush to Rubio as it becomes increasingly undeniable that the political machinery behind the Republican Party picked the guy who’s going to have a difficult time winning the primary.
It’s possible they can work the rules to ensure Jeb wins in a way which can’t be successfully challenged in a court of law. If they do that, they’ve alienated their base, and they’re going to lose. However, if the plurality candidate remains Trump even after The Winnowing, they’re going to lose anyway, so they might as well finesse the letter of the law to avoid that kind of embarrassment.
I don’t know why I expected him to be more competent at this. Competency is not really a Bush Family trait.
That’s big enough news, but the (possibly) bigger news? Money doesn’t work any more. I insert the caveat because if its true, its huge, Godzilla’s dick huge. But limp, flaccid, a pitiful, helpless giant. Used to be, you spend $30 megabucks, you get something. Used to be, if Hitler spent $30 million dollars on advertising, his poll numbers would go up five points at least!
Now, as you may already know, I’m somewhat left of center, so I tend towards pessimism. The better the news, the more suspicious I am. We have to fight tooth and nail to get anything progressive, and then fight twice as hard to keep it. But if this is true, it spells big trouble for a Major Poitical Party. That one, there, who’s name starts with “R”.
“R”, me hearties, “R”, “R”!!!
I don’t think he’s been that bad, the combination of being a Bush and total disdain by the republican base for any establishment candidate were going to sink him badly no matter how “good” he was at campaigning.
Jeb’s best hope is a time machine where he can go back and strangle W. as a child so he doesn’t run in 2000 and taint the family brand for generations. 