Just a guess, but imagine that he’s aware enough to know that he might well lose to Hillary Clinton; how does he spin that? Does he say that Lyin’ Ted Cruz, the runner-up who raised his hand on live national television and pledged to endorse Trump, broke his oath and stabbed the great man in the back instead of unifying the party?
Something about how Trump beat every Republican candidate, and would’ve beaten the [del]Democratic[/del] Democrat candidate, but he’s only one man and even he can’t run against two parties at once? That the best he could do was earn that pledge from men who couldn’t beat him, but could break their word to take his campaign down with them?
Sure, it’s weak – but any Here’s-Why-I-Didn’t-Win story he spins is going to be built around him losing for some reason; as reasons go, is this one sellable?
Right, in my mind it’s not a big deal, it’s mainly amusing, like the unfortunate initial Trump Pence logo.
The first day of the convention basically all of the speeches were about how unsafe you are and terrorists are coming to get you. From what I heard, none of the speeches made a convincing argument about why you should vote for Trump, they just made arguments about why you should hide in your bunker from the terrorists and feminazis. But then Melania gave an actual optimistic speech that people liked. So the irony is that the only optimistic speech was inspired by and stole from Michelle Obama’s previous speech.
There are plenty of other Republicans who aren’t speaking at the convention, including the other candidates from this year. I don’t think John Kasich is there, and he’s the governor of the state that the convention is in. No previous Republican president or presidential nominee is speaking, and I read that the only previous nominee in attendance is Bob Dole.
If Cruz hadn’t come it would be noted but it would be a minor blip. Letting him speak but pointedly not endorse Trump let him dominate the news story for once. His speech definitely overshadowed Pence.
I’d guess that Trump is the only major Republican who doesn’t really care if he plays to white supremacists or not. Most don’t consciously pander to them, they pander to the much larger population of white people who of course think that all races are equal but are uncomfortable around black people, and who hate Muslim terrorists but because of the terrorism not because of the race. I don’t know much about Laura Ingraham, but I’d guess that she might have said some stuff about White Lives Matter, and how we should be suspicious of Syrian refugees, but I’d very much doubt she’s meaning to pander to white supremacists.
We definitely should be aware of what white supremacists are doing and who they are supporting, but just because their number isn’t zero doesn’t mean that anyone on the RNC stage is sending out such obvious secret signals to them.
Also, it’s a bad idea to accuse someone of doing a Nazi salute when it’s much more likely that it was just an interrupted wave or something weird like that, because it waters down arguments. Trump and other Republicans have said actually fascistic stuff, but if you point that out then some conservatives will just reference Godwin’s law.
But at the same time if I was a Republican strategist, I’d make sure that every single person who goes out on stage was drilled a bit about how to wave to crowds so that it looked natural and didn’t inadvertently ever look like a Sieg Heil, just like I’d make sure someone reviewed every repeating graphic pattern, like on scarves or wrapping paper or whatever to be sure that there is nothing Swastika like accidentally in there.
When everyone else is absent, there’s no story if Ted Cruz is just as absent.
There is nothing smart about allowing Cruz to do this. It’s Trump’s “47%” moment. There is no positive way to spin this - Cruz went on the stage and made the rift official and gave moderate Republicans (and yes, there are millions of them) a moral out for not voting for Trump.
If somebody called my wife ugly and insinuated that my father was involved in a murderous conspiracy, they’d get off lightly if I shit on their parade rather than punching their lights out.
I hate Ted Cruz with the force of a thousand suns, but he is a skilled orator. If you listen to a replay of the speech last night, listen for his cadence, and how and when he uses pauses, and when he varies his tone and register. A skilled speaker can completely change the impact and meaning of a phrase by emphasizing or de-emphasizing sections or words. I think Ted sent his transcript to the Big Cheeto, and “hey, this doesn’t look so bad” was DT’s evaluation. The Ted delivered it, with intent. Bam.
FWIW look at it context here. It was at the end of her exhortation of “let’s elect Donald Trump … and God Bless the United States of America” at the end of a speech in which that Trump image was there the whole time, a turn immediately toward the image, looking in that direction, apparently eyes fixed on that point, arm stiff out immediately, held, then eyes move away as goes into the wave.
That was not a generic looking into the broad audience. It ending her speech, fixing her eyes on a specific spot, then turning to it, aiming, saluting, and releasing her gaze and salute from the spot at the same time as she turned into the wave.
After Camp Trump changed their story about Melania’s speech a half dozen times in two days, I wouldn’t believe them for a second when they insist that they knew all along.
Here’s Trump & Family watching Cruz’s speech. Those pissy bitch-faces could curdle milk, especially the one on Trump. No way of knowing for sure but that doesn’t look like a guy who knew well in advance what Cruz would say and was totally cool with it.
I hate to give Trump credit, and I’m still not sure this played out quite the way he wanted, but the way I see it you have two options for converting die-hard Cruz supporters.
Have Cruz speak early in the week, without an endorsement, and some weak “vote your conscience” language. Hope it gets little play and the rest of your convention convinces them you are the guy their “conscience” makes them vote. Leaves Cruz with quite a bit of control/relevance going forward (both this year and in the future). Or don’t have him speak at all (like Kasich).
Let Cruz speak in a prime spot, without an endorsement, basically taking a dump in the middle of your stage/party. Know there will be (or even orchestrate) significant discontent and booing in the crowd, and time your entrance to get maximum “me vs. him” optics with the adoring masses clamoring for you and booing Cruz off the stage. Know the press will cover it like crazy, endlessly replaying Cruz getting roundly razzed. Leaves Cruz pretty marginalized and (IMO at least) looking like even more of a shit-heel than he is by nature.
I think an alpha-male like Trump considers option 2 a much preferable situation. Remember, free publicity is the oxygen that makes his campaign breathe, and putting other people “in their place” is what he seems to get off on more than anything.
Yeah, but the American electorate is not the WWE audience. If there’s some sort of bizarro revenge wrestling allegory going on here, it’s just not translating that way.
I hadn’t really thought about it this way until right now, but I do think that the overlap between Trump voters and WWE fans is probably pretty big. Tough, aggressive, “winner”, brash, charismatic - the attributes of a successful WWE performer and the adjectives most used by Trump supporters are pretty damn similar.
I guess I’ll wait to see what the polls show, but I’m not sure I’d put much stock in the way last night was translated by CNN etc (or SDMB for that matter) - they’ve all been very wrong about the impact of Trump’s behavior on the ~35% of the country that seems to love the guy.
That’s where you are wrong. And that’s why I expect Trump to win. The overconfidence of Democrats and reasonable people thinking they are not outnumbered by WWE-Americans.
Last night on Maher’s show, a guest (Trump’s ghostwriter, good perspective) said “This is a guy who hasn’t read a book all the way through for his entire adult life!” Michael Moore had to point out to him that while he says that with (justifiable) derision, he is talking about more than half of America right there. And that’s why the race is tied.
I don’t buy it. The only story this morning was Cruz shitting on Trump. None of the other speeches or events got so much as a nod. Melania’s speech stole two days worth of convention momentum. I know there’s people who believe in “any publicity is good publicity” but the convention was going to get publicity anyway without these stories that make Trump a laughingstock and choke out any positive word from the other speakers.
People are trying to put a brave face on it but this convention’s been a shit-show.
The snag in this theory is that it’s impossible to imagine Trump doing anything other than looking for the words “Donald Trump” in the transcript, or his being okay with them only appearing once.
With his thin skin, I wonder how much time he’ll waste focusing his vitriol on Cruz before remembering that he ought to be doing something to attack Whatzername.
You think there is a memo from the DNC/Hillary campaign going out to every speaker at the Democratic convention saying “Remember to BEND THE F****** ELBOW!”?
Seriously, The Democrats, if they are smart, won’t say a word about it, or just say it was inadvertent and of course was not a nazi salute, nope, nope nope…the picture is out there, it is being seen by millions, and they really don’t have to do a damn thing.
So Trump speaks tonight…one of two things will happen, he’ll make a good, albeit traditional speech that has been crafted and tested by professional speechwriters, or he’ll go off on his own tangent, and who the hell knows what comes out.
The first is the best thing to do, but the second is the Trump thing to do. Place your bets, folks.
