From the outside looking in, it means that 35% of your country is fucking insane, and that’s much too high a number for my comfort. Especially as another 15% does not give a shit about their insane buddies, and is supporting them.
@Aeschines, now that all open opposition has fallen away, do you still think there will be a serious effort to deny Trump the nomination at the convention? (Not trying to pull a “gotcha,” I’m genuinely curious.)
I never thought Haley could win outright. I feel stronger in my conjecture now than when I first made it here, inasmuch as the deterioration of Trump’s physical and mental state has accelerated even faster than I had thought possible, and the media is giving it a lot of attention.
I think it’s going to come down to TPTB (such as they are) will be saying in a couple more months, “This guy even stand up and talk at this point. We either ditch him or it will be ‘Campaign at Bernie’s.’”
In 1964, the powers that be didn’t ditch polling disaster Barry Goldwater. What has happened in the past sixty years to give TPTB all this extra power?
There’s a reason people say Trump executed a hostile takeover of the GOP. It’s because he did. End of story.
Here’s what happens when a weak candidate gets nominated: They lose. The suspense this time is because we’re about to get two weak nominees.
If Trump can’t stand up and talk, his people will finds docs who swear he will arise better than ever right after Election Day. Maybe he’ll lose votes, but there is something to the idea of a sympathy vote.
No. The Republicans who aren’t willing to kiss Donnie’s ring have either been purged or driven away. Trump’s nomination is pretty much a given and there will be no concerted effort to deny him the nomination. I think the Republicans should change the name of their party to MAGA as it’s an entirely different animal these days.
Good, pithy summary of the whole 2024 situation.
I just don’t get this negative attitude about our current president. For the first time in the 21st century, we have no troops on the ground in the Middle East. The economy is booming. Businesses are thriving, the “help wanted” sign has returned from the dead, and I can attest as a commuter that there are significantly more trucks and traffic in general because there is more commerce and a higher volume of retail business. What more is it, exactly, that you want from the guy?
Better foreign policy, I’d guess-even though supporting the Palestinians or continuing to support Israel will cost him votes, as I understand it.
I’m not interrogating you, but I’d really like for you to elaborate on this because I’m not seeing a problem. We’ve managed to help Ukraine without boots on the ground. We’ve exited Afghanistan. Israel is the only thing resembling an ally that we have in the Middle East, and we haven’t interfered with what they feel they have to do while, at the same time, are trying to assist in brokering a cease fire.
Well, one can admire the courage of your convictions, at least! It’s obvious that you are dead wrong about this (mostly because you vastly overestimate the power and spine of the GOP “establishment,” such as it exists anymore), but boy I wish you were right.
Who are they and what mechanism will they use to deny him the nomination at the convention?
Serious question. I don’t know whether the GOP has the ability to strip a nominee from the ballot at the convention.
The thread is about a negative attitude, in GOP powers that be, regarding someone who says he is the legitimate current president. So I will put on my former-Republican hat and answer it as if you had meant to address the negative attitude about Trump. Apologies in advance for grabbing your post out of context – if there were real red American GOP loyalists in the thread, I’d instead address them, but they apparently stick to their own kind.
So:
There is absolutely no reason to dump DJT. Every single day, for the past year, he has been ahead of Joe Biden in the rolling horse race polling averages when you add in the three percent GOP electoral college advantage. Every single day. 2020? Not every day then. But ever since Biden’s bad luck to be president during a world-wide inflation splurt, yes, every single rolling poll averaged horse race day.
Legal problems? Our guy’s delay strategy is working like gangbusters. Donny’s My Cousin Vinny lawyers are going to drag out Georgia jury selection until the courthouse gets closed for snow. They’ll be some bad headlines if Bragg gets his business records falsification conviction this summer, but Donald’s lost Manattan cases before with no polling impact. How long do you think DeSantis would last if it turned out he was a rapist? So long Casey! But as long as Melania doesn’t much care – and she doesn’t (or keeps it in the family, which is just as good) – small town Pennsylvania won’t care what Manhattan juries say either.
Lately the Democrats are having a hissy that he can’t put together an English sentence the way he used to. Is his command of English why you’ll vote for him? Didn’t think so. Median voters want a President who sounds strong, and he sounds stronger than that Joe Biden, even if no one understands a word. What the words are doesn’t matter – if they did, that Hillary Clinton would be finishing up her presidency just about now.
Every candidate has weaknesses, but DJT’s are the least. All-that-counts-is-winning Republicans are smart to keep him.
And if they did, not without blowing up the party such as it is. In that scenario we can foresee a large number of State parties declare themselves autonomous from the RNC to run Trump Electors anyway forcing state courts, secretaries of state and legislatures to try and figure out (or decree directly) who has claim to be the “real” Republican Party in their state.
If you don’t consider sedition, which is a form of treason, to be a “weakness”, then we have no common ground for any discussion. Thank you, though, for taking the time to explain your feelings.
Under current RNC rules, and under some states’ parties rules, delegates are required to vote for whomever they are pledged to on the first ballot. The overwhelming majority of RNC delegates will be pledged to Trump, so if they stick to the rules he will be nominated on the first ballot.
Of course, the RNC can change their rules. Before the nominating convention begins, a rules committee will consider and make recommendations to the convention for rules changes. To be effective, those rules changes will require a majority of the delegates to vote in favor.
And this is where @Aeschines’ optimistic scenario falls apart. There will be over 2,000 delegates at the RNC. Some of them will be what you might consider to be “the powers that be” – governors, senators, etc. But the strong majority will be grassroots party activists. These are Trump’s strongest supporters and absent him being comatose it’s simply unthinkable that they would deny him the nomination.
I should clarify-I don’t have (many) concerns about his overseas policy. I was just mentioning Gaza since it’s a divisive news story right now that can be used to attack Biden, and has cost him some votes thus far in Michigan. Will that be the case as time goes by? Who can say?
Yeah, even if you agree completely with Biden’s policy and actions in re Israel and Gaza, you’d have to be delusional to deny that the situation is massively controversial and divisive and will be problematic for Biden in the election.
But this is getting off track; the thread is supposed to be about how the Republican Party will magically find its conscience (probably rolling around on the floor in the back seat of the limo) in time to interrupt Trump’s renomination.
I think you may have missed this part of his post:
I will put on my former-Republican hat
I don’t think these are his feelings. He’s just explaining (as a former Republican supporter) the feelings of Trump supporters.
Mea culpa! Thanks. 
I don’t think @Aeschines argument involves conscience at all, he sees removing Trump as a purely self serving move by the GOP.