I’m sleep-deprived, caffeine-saturated, and Xanax may still be an issue, I don’t know.
Let’s do this.
By the middle of the primaries, it’s going to be Hillary versus Jeb. There’s no last names or doubt about it: The Internet is getting increasingly insufferable about [del]George McGovern[/del] [del]Ron Paul[/del] Bernie Sanders, but, somehow, the first Jewish President just doesn’t have the same ring as the first female President and, on the other side, everyone but Jeb is a drooling mouth-breather who wants to draw, quarter, and allow to be fired from jobs every gay person in America. I want Ted Cruz to have an “Oops” moment worthy of Perry, but I doubt reality will be that kind. [del]Orval Faubus[/del] Bobby Jindal outs himself as an even worse bigot than he’s known to be now, but that doesn’t hurt him back home; he is, however, now no longer the Great Brown Hope for the GOP’s We’re Not Racist Wing so his national career is pretty much over. He coulda been a contenda, but he didn’t have class.
Meanwhile, Rand Paul will be back. It’s too profitable not to. His father taught him well.
2016 is so easy to predict that everyone is Shocked And Amazed when Nate “I Can Count” Silver does it again. It isn’t even as close as 2012.
(Tip your waitstaff and try the halibut. The five-o’clock show is completely different.)
You’re probably right, but I am nervous about Scott Walker. He’s got the not not entirely insane vibe that Bush has, but also can point back to shitting on the unions to back up his conservative credentials, so I think he could make a credible opponent just to the right of Bush. I am also more scared of the possibility his presidency than I am of Bush’s, as I fear he would do everything in his power to make the federal workforce’s lives miserable just to keep riding the I hate government wave.
Maybe someone can fight my ignorance, but I’m not getting the Bush inevitability thing. He’s the not particularly charismatic, not-that-well-known scion of a political family that was most recently associated with incompetence of historic proportions. Why presume he’s the natural winner out of the 14 candidates that have announced so far?
ISTM that the candidate with the most potential to surprise is Marco Rubio, barring some sex scandal or the like emerging. Notwithstanding that I personally find him to be an insufferable sophomoric dweeb, I do recognize his inherent charisma and compelling biography. He is good at making serious-sounding pronouncements on foreign policy matters (with all the requisite hawkishness) which I expect to be a key theme during this cycle. On the subject of Israel and Iran, he is probably the best positioned candidate to court Sheldon Adelson, for whom money isn’t an issue. Obama’s moves on immigration make it possible for Rubio at least to strike a pose well to the right of administration policy, which should be enough to redeem his earlier transgressions against the base. He has at least as many candidate strengths as Bush, IMO.
It’s the “just to the right of Bush” part which will keep him from winning the primary, let alone a general election: The GOP is at enough of a handicap in the EC even if they go moderate that any candidate which threatens Ohio, Florida, and Virginia is an immediate non-starter. Unless they go with a candidate who can credibly woo the independents, they’re going to lose big, and the people who fund candidates know this.
Name recognition, the idea that he’s moderate enough to have a ghost of a chance in swing states, and the fact he’s apparently inheriting Romney’s donor base.
He’s not opposed to DREAMers, which hurts him with the GOP base, but I agree he could be a rather strong candidate. OTOH, he’s not hugely different from Jeb, and Jeb has the money, at least right now.
If Rubio is elected in 2016 he would be the 3rd youngest President ever, behind only Teddy Roosevelt (who was elected Vice-Pres.) and JFK. For that reason the conservative 2016 play would be to run him as Vice President (making the same-state Jeb the wrong choice for Pres.).
But who will then be the nominee for President? Let’s put our (pretend) money where our mouths are and play another round of Odds on 2016 Presidential Nomination: Karachi Auction.
Money. He’s got it in spades. Not personally, but he has a lot of the donor class in his corner. This will be a replay of 2012, with Bush in the role of Romney and a bigger clown car for the un-Bushes to emerge from one by one and be eaten alive.
Of course, if HRC is elected she would be the 2nd oldest President ever, after Reagan. I don’t see age being a terminal issue for Rubio’s candidacy. (That said, I’m relishing the hypocrisy of the GOP taking seriously a number of candidates with as little experience as Obama had.)
My gut says Hillary and Scott Walker are the nominees, with Hillary winning the general election. Walker is Zombie Nixon.
Unless something causes his whole campaign to go south between now and then, Walker will win Iowa, which will cause a lot (not all, but a lot) of wingnut support currently either undecided or going to other candidates to coalesce around him. After that, the main reason for Republican primary voters to support Jeb! or Rubio will be if they find Walker unpalatable. If Jeb manages to win NH, it’ll be a bit of a slugfest, but I think Walker’s killer instinct is more well-honed at this point than Jeb’s. If Jeb loses NH, it’s game over for the Bush Dynasty, at long last.
I’m not worried about Rubio; his nuanced positions on the issues remind me of my ninth-grade self.
After typing the above, I went over to 538 to see what Nate & Co. had to say about the race in general, and Jeb! in particular. Seems they think Jeb is a weak front-runner.
Hillary vs. … some guy. Each side is guaranteed that percentage of the vote that will vote for their party no matter who they field, and the campaign will devolve into a desperate scramble to convince all the moderates in the middle that they should really care about the issues enough to vote for somebody they don’t want to see as President, with the problem being convincing those moderates that the candidates actually care about the issues.
ISTM that advantage could rapidly dissipate if another candidate proves more compelling and can make the same electability argument. The key difference vs 2012 is that there was no plausible alternative to Romney other than a guy who had a habit of breaking into Mandarin and name-dropping Kurt Cobain.
At the risk of sounding like a wet blanket, but for me it’s still way to early to make predictions. I’ll need some debates to see everyone in action on the Republican side before I can start settling on a vision.
I don’t frankly know how they are going to handle it with so many candidates. Reminds me of an old joke I wrote once - “In college I majored in Rhetoric for Large Groups, my degree is in Mass Debating.”
It will be interesting to see how far Bernie goes. Right now his support is passionate, I like having him around. But it will be interesting to see how he fares further on.
On the other side, I’m honestly watching to see how far Trump can carry this. Lot’s of folks see him as a sideshow, but don’t underestimate him. He’s got big balls and a lot of people respond to that. Most of the other Republicans come off as pushy underlings or stuffed suits in comparison.
There are three factors involved in the Republican nomination.
The winner must be a) not crazy, b) oversupplied with funds; c) the establishment candidate.
At this time in 2011 the only one to meet all three was Romney, which is why I could call it then.
This year only Bush, Rubio, and Walker might qualify. Walker is running on the Koch brothers money, and I’m not sure they qualify as establishment as they’re crazy. Rubio is lagging behind Bush in fundraising. Money will go to him if Bush drops out but in the meantime, donors don’t like two people from the same state competing: it puts them in an awkward position for later.
That leaves Bush. Nobody has to like him. Lots of Democrats don’t like Hillary. But the powers and the money people care about who can win, and disdain whoever has the public’s fancy at the moment. (Trump is second. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.) It’s really, really hard not to see Bush winning the nomination and then losing to Clinton. Remember, the Republican has to win nine - 9! - states that went Democratic in 2012 and contributed to the margin in the Electoral College. No current plausible scenario makes that happen.
Yes, that means Sanders has zero chance. He doesn’t have money. He’s Jewish. He’s not a woman. He doesn’t have an organization in place everywhere. His rise in the poll is part of the circus that is modern electioneering. As I said, lots of Democrats don’t like Hillary and wish she hadn’t run. But they also recognize that Hillary can win and that is the only criterion that matters. So they will cheer Sanders on for the rest of the year and back Clinton when she is the formal candidate.
Derleth is right. Without the equivalent of a political meteor strike the results are already written. The only way to live through it is the Odyssey solution. Stop up your ears with wax and bind crazy Ulysses to the mast.
Let’s say Hillary gets the nomination. At her age, how important will her VP choice be? A lot of people did not vote for McCain because of the fear of a possible President Palin.
You insult Nixon’s intelligence. Tricky Dick may have been evil, but he was smart evil and had a strong foreign policy agenda with halfway decent results. Walker is naive. An absolute baby when it comes to foreign policy.
Stories of Walker’s cronyism around Wisconsin will sink folks’ opinion of him.
He also very well might have one of those deer in the headlights moments during a GOP debate.
John Ellis Bush, when the dust clears, will be the GOP nominee. It might take some dirty campaigning, but his folks certainly aren’t above that.
I’d predict Bernie will win New Hampshire and maybe a couple of other primaries and lose badly anywhere a deep organization is needed. Still, his talking points are good ones and his applause lines are great. The GOP can mock him all they want, but when he says America could and should be more like the social democracies of Scandinavia, many people will see the good sense.
