I don’t think Christie will win the nomination (I still think it’ll be Rubio, though my confidence is fading), but I don’t think there’s even a slim chance that he won’t run. He’s definitely going to make a serious attempt at it, and whoever does win is going to have to put in a real effort to defeat him.
And I can’t imagine any realistic Democratic candidate that I’d pick Christie over, but I can still say that we could do a lot worse than him. Depending on how the candidates shake out, I can maybe see myself voting for him in the Republican primary (even though he’d be a harder candidate to defeat), just not in the general.
These things evolve. Sure, in 2016 the Republicans could completely blow it by nominating someone like Ted Cruz. And then they’ll learn from the ensuing blowout. Personally, I think the Republicans are already showing better learning skills than many on your side give them credit for, as proven by their desire to stop interfering with the Democrats while they destroy themselves and understanding the damage the government shutdown did. They also recognize the demographic challenges they face in the future and have many ways forward for dealing with that problem, many of which will be tested in actual elections and be judged by their success or failure.
So I figure in 2016 the Republicans are really going to want a win and will put up with Chris Christie to get that win. Or, they could go with my current favorite, Bobby Jindal, who is actually a conservative, plus is a nicer guy.
How are the Democrats destroying themselves? By implementing what will be a popular insurance law? And if the Republicans learned so much, why are they threatening default again?
Bobby Jindal is in no danger of being nominated. Zero charisma, an uninspiring speaker, run of the mill Republican orthodox views, and on top of all that he’s an ethnic.
Republican leadership isn’t learning, they knew all along. Whats happened is that the shut down debacle allowed them to finally stand up to the crazy wing. But you are confusing republican leadership with the republican base, those two sides are in no way seeing eye to eye right now. I’m sure the leadership is doing whatever it can to affect the primaries and not end up with a Ted Cruz, but it won’t mean a damn thing if the base is united.
This is the interesting point. The Republicans have not tested many solutions in the past; indeed they have been extremely vocal about denying any need to do so and in practice have made it much harder on themselves to succeed in the future.
Certainly, some individuals in the party are concerned about this failure. The much mocked sensitivity training seminars are actually a good starting point, IMO. The talk about immigration legislation leads to another possible path.
However, the gap between a few concerned individuals and actual implementation is vast. There are simply no signs of real-world progress that would lead me to expect real-world candidates to prosper from changes to the base culture.How do we know? Because we’re not hearing howls of outrage 24/7 from the Tea Party. Any change will be extraordinarily painful for some in the party. We can all judge the progress by the level of screaming. It’s quiet out. Too quiet.
Lots of time remains, to be sure. This is a 2016 concern, not a 2014 concern for the most part. But the process will require years, so now is not too soon.
Yeah, any day now it’ll be popular. How long have we been hearing that? Not saying it won’t someday be popular, but not during Obama’s term of office. for 2014 and 2016, the issue definitely works for Republicans, which is why just as in 2012, the Democrats are seeking to change the subject. Income inequality is going to be their big distraction.
Some are. Not enough to matter. Just in case, my money’s out of the market though.
Well, I go for substance more than style, and he is a capable governor who has gone a long way to clean up a very corrupt state. Of course, you can say that about Christie too.
Well, my view is that demographic concerns are overrated. But even if demographics doesn’t doom the party, they need to stop alienating minority voters. If you lose 70% of minority voters, you need at least 60% of whites. It just shouldn’t have to be that way and it doesn’t have to be that way.
I’d like to see the GOP do Bush-era numbers among minority voters, that would keep them viable for decades even assuming the changes Democrats are counting on to save their bacon.
There is a little question about closing 4 lanes of the George Washington Bridge as revenge by Christie apparatchiks on a democratic mayor who wasn’t playing ball with Christie. We should wait and see how that plays out before we talk about a Christie nomination.
Sounds like an important issue, but hardly a candidacy killer. the President closed all the national parks, even ones that didn’t require any staffing, in revenge for the shutdown. Sounds a lot more serious to me.
Yes, these are extremely similar. Well, except for the part where you seem to be the only person in the country to believe this about Obama. Your predictive abilities are greatly impaired by not cross-checking Free Republic against the rest of the world.
I said in another thread that you never know what weird small issue keeps popping up because it turns into shorthand for a person’s faults and that it remained to be seen whether the bridge incident solidifies into the perception of Christie as a bully. Since that time, there have been several major newspaper reports, all of them making Christie look very bad, and this seemingly minor incident keeps being played in political reports. Interesting. It’s still way too early to know if this is anything other than the merest blip, and I think that the stories of Christie failing Romney’s vetting will prove more damaging when the reasons come out. I do think you’re right they will comes out in dribs and drabs, but that is always much worse than getting it all out at once.
Given the lowness of the bar for Republicans - Christie with major flaws and virtues seems like a large step up from 2012, which would be disaster at any other time - he still has a very real chance at the nomination. That’s as much because he’s a governor as anything else. Congress has built up such enormous negatives that I think no one currently in Congress stands a chance. On either side. I would be very surprised if two governors didn’t get the nominations.
Wait, McCain ran against the unknown Obama, right, not the universally known Hillary Clinton? Or wasn’t that the case in your universe? Honestly, your living in an alternate reality is the kindest explanation I have for the majority of your posts. Especially this one. (And yes, Clinton is not in Congress now. I’m sticking to my prediction that she’s not the nominee.)
There’s nothing predictive there. It’s an observation of the past, not the future. Why did the President order the closing of national parks that didn’t even require staffing? If it was not to cause as much pain as possible, what was his motivation?
I was responding to a comment about McCain’s 2000 campaign, when he ran against GWB, who had lavish funding and near 100% name recognition.
I believe that if GWB had not been in that race, McCain would have served two terms as President.
Hmm - interesting. I suspect you’re right. It was a squeaker with Bush v. Gore, and McCain was more experienced and IMHO a better campaigner than Bush was in 2000. He probably wouldn’t have invaded Iraq but would’ve focused on Afghanistan after 9-11, and thus would likely have done even better against Kerry.
ALEC is busiest of all at the state level. Go through the raft of crazy red-state initiatives that have passed lately- most of them are ALEC bills. Which makes GOP governors right now ALEC rubber-stampers, which should make them all repugnant choices to most informed voters- even conservative ones. ALEC Christie et al. cannot truly represent the American public- they’d be too busy working directly against its interests.
By all means, let’s have a debate about ALEC in a Presidential election, but let’s look at the bills ALEC has actually gotten passed, instead of using innuendo and images of shadowy evildoers in the halls of legislatures getting nefarious bills passed that we won’t name because they might actually be popular.
I get the feeling ALEC is about as threatning as the Kochs, who may be the left’s bogeymen, but who no one else finds particularly threatening.
The George Washington Bridge Scandal has legs. An email from Christie’s Deputy Chief of Staff on Aug. 13 said “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.”
