The Agony of Paul Ryan: It's going to be a looooong five month, Paul

No. That poll seems to be utter bullshit. Otherwise, I’m sure Euphonious Polemic would have been able linked to something less lame than prntly.com

Current headlines on prntly:

Clintons August panic: Trump beats Hillary with Millennials as Sanders fans join

Must Read: Trump’s brutal response to Obama’s press conference calling Trump unfit

New Leaks show that the real reason why FOX and other media honchos hate Trump

Must Share: Gold Star Mothers rebuke Khan’s DNC comments: Media stunned

New VA poll shows Trump SURGED after Conventions and Khan-Troversy to lead

Media KhanTroversy masks new Clinton plot to put White Rust Belt families out of work

Ryan responds to Trump praising his opponent:

“Neither Speaker Ryan nor anyone on his team has ever asked for Donald Trump’s endorsement”

I don’t know if Ryan is being callous, tweaking Donald’s nose, or both.

Sorry! The above was in response to some lie Donald made to WaPo about Ryan asking Trump to endorse Ryan.

Still awaiting a press release about the other. Might never come, of course.

Hey Paul,

President Obama on line 1!

Oh, and Khizr Khan on line 2!

FWIW, I couldn’t find a poll like that. The anti-Trump National Review cites other polling evidence favoring Ryan, as well as some comparisons to Cantor who also led in the polls before his defeat. Ryan: I Never Asked For Trump's Endorsement | National Review
Trump is a negotiator. We should interpret this as an opening bid. It’s all part of a plan. First Trump dangles an endorsement in front of Ryan. Then Ryan says he never asked for an endorsement to begin with. Then Ryan wins his primary. And the last step is Trump gains nothing at all aside from additional seething resentment from another part of the GOP base. To those who say that Trump couldn’t negotiate his way out of a paper bag I say this: try thinking laterally. Trump is moving into the bag, not out of it.

That is brilliant. Hope you don’t mind if some of us Not-On-Social-Media-Yet-So-Yeah-Probably-Never types email that line to all our friends.

Just a bump to remind all that today is Paul’s primary day.

Looks like Ryan won with 90% of the vote.

  1. Trump has no legs
  2. Paul is now free to do what he wants w/o worry in regards to primary election

Does he dump Trump or double down? Next day or three will be telling…

If Ryan does not dump Trump in the next couple of days, he will be stuck with him (and Every. Single. Stupid. Thing. Trump. Says.) for the next 90.

He keeps playing it as he has. His perspective is believing that this is his long game play.

He assumes that Trump will lose, wants Trump to lose, and is positioning himself to lead the party from there.

He does not want Trump supporters to end up saying that Trump lost because he was sabotaged by “mainstream” Republicans who would not be team players when one of their preferred candidates failed to be the standard-bearer. So he endorses and supports.

He does want the traditional GOP elements to see him as able to lead the party into a less “other” phobic positioning in the marketplace of ideas, to a rebranding that allows some outreach to conservative-minded Blacks, Hispanics, and college-educated White women.

He believes that he is threading that needle, a path that he thinks that will not cause Trump supporters to completely abandon the party in what they feel is disgust after Trump loses with much traditional GOP defection while clearly staying on an outreach message long term that limit-sets hateful speech.

Not sure the play will work but clearly such is his intent.

A Trump win would be his worst outcome I think.

Ryan’s walking the fence as best he can. Looks like he doesn’t have to worry much about how this affects his reelection.

Eta: oh, I guess that poll you cited last week was only off by 40%. Lol

Ha ha! I did not check the source before posting. My bad.

So is Ryan now — erm - bulletproof? He survived the challenge, so now I could see him at least repudiating the remarks, though not actually dumping Trump.

“He [Ryan] does not want Trump supporters to end up saying that Trump lost because he was sabotaged by ‘mainstream’ Republicans who would not be team players when one of their preferred candidates failed to be the standard-bearer. So he endorses and supports.”

Trump’s supporters will say that [del]if[/del] when Trump loses whether Ryan and the others continue to support him or not.

Paul Ryan claims that he hasn’t seen the footage or really know what the latest controversy is about.

Who believes him?

Perhaps the testiest ending to a victory presser in history.

From his perspective some will and some won’t and what those who do say say that do may be different if he merely repudiates individual comments versus withdraws support.

Which is not to disagree with you. It may be too fine a needle to thread. But I see the logic. There is a distinction between those who grumble but end up voting or not voting as they did before, and those who are angry enough about something to act on it in some way. If he can bring the haters along in the clown car as he (if he) manages to get the steering wheel after Trump loses and drives the car more into the direction he believes the party should be going, into a place that can become acceptable to some more “others” within a couple of cycles, then he has done as good as he can hope for.

Trumpists would, but having tried to honestly engage with them, I assure you they are uninterested in the facts.

“I haven’t seen the video” is as pathetic an out as you can possibly come up with, and he’s actually pulled it out of his hat. He’s Sergeant Shultz. Truly astounding. I understand Ryan is probably the most important Republican there is, and abandoning his party’s candidate is a political nuclear move but… Donald Trump just said someone should murder Hillary Clinton.

If Ryan is determined to toe the party line the next three months will see him tap dancing to make Fred Astaire look like an amateur. He’s got to find a way to actually endorse a traitor to be President of the United States. That’s way past any level of spin a politician is used to playing.

It’s a bit easier when you are as utterly unencumbered by courage and convictions as Paul Ryan.

+1
And I am particularly embarrassed about him because I am a Wisconsinite.