I haven’t read the whole thread so apologies if this has already been mentioned, but I can tell you right now what will happen. Unless they hook the man up to an IV bottle of diazepam, it won’t be long before he mouths off and and starts pissing people off - it’s just who he is.
What people don’t understand about Christie is that the very things people say they like about him are the things that, unless carefully, nay hyper-managed, will lose him any chance at the nomination - forget about the election.
What you saw of him after Sandy and how he responded to the failure of Congress to release disaster relief funds is the type of thing you’re going to see on the campaign trail. People loved that shit here in NJ and you can say ‘well, that’s why he did it.’ Maybe so, but I think it goes a lot deeper. I really think that’s who he is and that it’s only going to take a couple long nights and couple reporters getting under his skin before he lets it all hang out.
And as for the weight issue, with the lap band or whatever bariatric surgery he got, I really can’t see that being an issue in another year. At least for his sake I hope not. I don’t know that he’ll be exactly svelte, but hopefully he’ll have trimmed down enough that his health won’t be a concern any more.
OP is the textbook example of everything that is wrong with the American GOP, and the only chance democrats have of winning if Obama’s approval rating doesn’t come back up by 2016.
ILikeForeignLanguages, when did you decide to be straight?
Of course I chose to be gay back in 1993. The Devil came to me as a child and offered me money for my soul. I said, “No devil I will not give up my soul for money.” And then he tempted me with power and I said, “No devil I will not give up my soul for power.” And then he tempted me with a big huge throbbing dick and I said, “Hmm ok you got yourself a deal.”
Seriously, get a grip. I hope you and your family continue to vote for the absolute most extreme radical republicans in the primaries that you possibly can, so that democrats will win the general election. The only reason Romney lost was because he had to tack so far to the right in the primaries that nobody could take him seriously when he went back to being a centerist for the general election. That, and that republicans as a whole are seen as backwater religious zealots who think being gay is wrong and that abortion is murder and every other loony thing they believe.
But just like I told my Dad, please, vote for Santorum in the primaries.
And the outcome of the elections indicates you’re wrong in this. When people have been given a choice between a conservative candidate and a moderate candidate, the majority have been voting for the moderate.
The problem is too many conservatives are living in a bubble. They only know other conservatives and only listen to conservative media. They simply ignore the rest of the country and convince themselves it doesn’t exist. So they come to believe the majority of the country is conservative and every election is a surprise to them when they’re reminded they’re actually just a minority in the general electorate.
Environment is a lot different now. 24hr news cycle (which was just starting then), multiple major news-only outlets all vying for eyeballs, social media, ubiquity of cell phone videos, etc. I would offer that every single word a candidate utters in public is recorded now (and a good many “private” ones as well - see 47%). Was that true in '96?
Christie can win the nomination but he has to run as Christie and not try the stupidity that Giuliani did of pretending to be a “True Conservative”. Christie could carry the less conservative states in the primary and win the nomination of the leading Tea Party favorite. He could potentially drag the party back towards the center with him. He would run as the candidate that could win the election and then work with the opposing party to straighten the country out. In public perception he is already **believed **to be a straight shooting, say what he means and willing to work with both side of the aisle. People will like this in the primary. He would win NY & NJ which would really help in the primaries and he might even carry them both in the general election.
If he then went up against HRC, I would say he had a fairly good chance of being President. She is so strongly disliked that she would make a terrible nominee. I suspect Biden would fair far better 2016 despite current polls and few treat him with much respect but he is not hated.
That’s a good point. The people that dislike Hillary hate her so much they become slobbering balls of rage, and will vote against her even if they’re on life support.
People dislike the loud mouth Christie, but not like he’s the devil. Democrats will have their work cut out for them ‘firing up the base’ with the prospects of doom and gloom of Ralph Kramden running the country.
This is not supported by the polls. Even after a rather severe drop recently, her positive poll numbers are larger than her negatives. She technically has a higher approval rating than Christie but this is largely due to the fact that a large percentage of the people polled don’t know who Christie is.
I don’t think that poll shows what I was talking about. I recall polls stretching back to when she ran against Obama that showed roughly 30% of those likely to vote had a strong dislike to hate of her.
The last couple of Republican campaigns have been chocked with a host of ‘candidates’ who’s only interest was in the publicity and in branding (as others have called it) themselves. Was there ever a chance that Herman Caine or, Og forbid, ‘The Donald’ would ever get the nomination? I don’t think so and I don’t think they thought so either - they liked being presidential candidates and they liked the talk show circuit.
If the R party can’t find a way for the serious candidates (For this exercise, I’m assuming Christie is serious) to be on a stage without being surrounded by a half dozen attention grabbing blowhards then they will never be able to nominate a serious candidate. When the debate is whether Obama is actually Satan or only one of his henchman, for example, or whether the gay destroys all of America or only families, it’s tough for a moderate to get a word in.
That’s going to happen this time, too. If the party was more settled those candidates wouldn’t get a lot of attention or wouldn’t convince themselves they could win.
I cannot agree. McCain was a ‘maverick’ in 2000, but had turned into a cranky old man who was slurping cranky conservative kool aid to get nominated. Romney never had any principles, moderate, conservative or otherwise. Didn’t we have some sort of chart about the ideas he both endorsed and atacked?
Is this an opinion, or do you have some data?
It is difficult for me to believe that conservative voters would sit out an election because the republican wasn’t conservative ‘enough’ when the only alternate was ‘not conservative at all’.
I think you’re on to something there. Even the conservative/right-wing propaganda and glurge plays against the line of thought that suggests to sit the election out, with the heavy application of FUD and nostalgia for bygone days and the presentation of the Republican party/conservatism as the protector of such things. Even a less conservative Republican is still preferable and less frightening and uncertain than any Democrat to most right-leaning Republican voters.
I mean, my Dad isn’t going to vote Democrat anytime soon, and in his mind, not voting is about as good as voting Democrat, and I think he’s fairly representative in that regard.
What evidence do you have in support of that belief?
There are a large number of couples in the US who are incapable of having children. Homosexuals make up only a small percentage of them. Is homosexuality more unnatural than being post-menopausal? Why?
Also, can you define how you’re using the word “natural” here?
Homosexuality doesn’t cause AIDS. HIV causes AIDS. Far more heterosexuals world wide suffer from AIDS than do homosexuals.
Yes, well, “hate-monger” does seem rather strong, I’ll grant you that. Although, honestly, why I should care what you like is beyond me, given the attitudes you’ve already expressed about me in this thread.
“I don’t hate gay people! I just have utterly wrong beliefs about them and what they do that I use to advocate for not treating them like actual human beings!”
What if Christie lost the nomination for the Republican party, which I’m sure he will, and someone backed him to run for POUS as an independent?
Who would he take votes from? The democrats or the republicans?
Who was that man that ran as an independent in November 2000?
Whoever he was kept Gore from beating out Bush in the by now famous presidential election of that year, because people said the votes he got would’ve gone to Gore.
It’d be interesting, but one person wouldn’t be enough to do it. And I don’t think Christie would do it since unless he won his political career would probably be over.
Ralph Nader.
They’re wrong. Nader pulled votes from Bush and Gore.
