Il Douché and His Discontents: The 2016 Primary Voting Thread, Part 4

The contested-convention scenario actually worries me a bit because I don't want Trump's supporters even more (justifiably) angry. He gets the nomination and loses, well, they had a legit chance even if a lot of Republicans were against him. Trump gets screwed out of the nomination, and whether he runs third party or not, they'll be fuming for years that their guy could have been in the white house if it wasn't for the establishment's scheming.

well it wouldn't really be justifiable if he got jilted out of a nomination if he walked in with 35% of the votes/delegates. i mean that's not a mandate. but i otherwise basically agree - the prospect of a whole trumpist "stab in the back" narrative fueling and animating his wing (and probably getting him to run again next time) is really unsettling.

er, i mean the anger wouldn't be justifiable

kasich seems to be thinking that he'll win his home state, other candidates will steal other states from trump, and when they get to the convention trump won't have enough delegates and they'll - like dr casino said - mash their delegates together to make a majority and share a ticket (and maybe promise something to the guy who doesn't get to be on the ticket). the ramifications of executing this successfully are that they lose a sizable chuck of their constituency (hard to imagine Trump not running as 3rd party but even if he didn't). but the real issue is that many of the big states are winner-take-all and not proportional delegates. the more ppl who stay in, the easier it is for trump to win all these winner-take-all states and pretty soon he has an easy majority and then it's impossible bc there is no party infrastructure really in charge he will be the nominee.

man i kinda like romney for giving this speech, ulterior motives aside

basically as i see it this new strategy is a lie the candidates are telling themselves so they don't have to make the difficult decision of consolidating the field down to trump and nevertrump and it is going to destroy the last chance they have of stopping him

man i kinda like romney for giving this speech, ulterior motives aside

― carly rae jetson (thomp)

He's a charlatan and a fool and will convince no one except Beltway people on cable talk shows -- saddest thing ever

well, yes, but it's nice to see this sort of thing said so prominently by someone from the GOP:

"Mr. Trump is directing our anger for less than noble purposes. He creates scapegoats of Muslims and Mexican immigrants, he calls for the use of torture and for killing the innocent children and family members of terrorists. He cheers assaults on protesters. He applauds the prospect of twisting the Constitution to limit first amendment freedom of the press. This is the very brand of anger that has led other nations into the abyss."

Williard also took umbrage at Trump calling George W. Bush a liar so fuck that

yeah, the contested thing really only happens if trump is actually losing some of those big states. which is not impossible! he hasn't swept the table so far, he has vulnerabilities, he has states that are slam-dunk trumps and states that aren't. arkansas for example was quite close - might have gone differently if carson had quit a week ago. kasich was three percentage points away from winning vermont. but those other places where has huge, HUGE leads, terrific leads, sure look like he's heading to just win the thing outright. but i haven't actually looked at any kind of big delegate chart or anything.

romney speech is interesting mainly as a halting, in certain ways still very cautious draft version of what all these other clowns should have been saying six to eight months ago. and a possible model for striking back at trump that doesn't go "i've got it --- pants-wetting jokes!" mitt's basic temperament seems unable to go there and so he's revealed another approach that would have seemed obvious to most normal grownups but which may not work coming from anybody, and certainly won't work coming from him.

i am happy whenever a republican disavows explicit bigotry bc even though it demonstrates that they're in total denial about the implications of their preferred policies at least they do have some unactivated sense that hate is wrong and dangerous. i half-expect them to still line up behind trump bc their dedication to the republican brand is more important than any actual principles they hold.

alfred i will happily look over that for his returning to the demonizing-muslims-is-not-acceptable note four times

He said he saw thousands of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating 9/11. Wrong, he saw no such thing. He imagined it.

my mormon friend says its literally the only thing on her news feed this morning ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

xpost yeah i agree and also having more people saying "bigotry is wrong" is just generally good for the national conversation.

Dubya also spoke up vs bigotry against Muslims while his administration was legally socking it to em

Every GOP statement I've heard condemning Trump's KKK demurrals -- Ryan's, the moron governor of New Mexico's a few minutes ago, Rubio's -- has been pathetic! It's always at the level of Beltway civilized discourse. It's "outrageous," "beyond the pale," "unacceptable." Yet it's OK to mention black-on-black crime and decry "race hustlers." Come on.

I'm halfway on Romney's speech--there's good stuff in there, but it's so transparently and desperately calculated that all of that is nullified. And going by the right-wing call-in show out of Buffalo I catch on the way home, it's backfiring spectacularly.

but just point that out and YOU'RE the Real Racist™

#socialmediajustice

xpost

basically as i see it this new strategy is a lie the candidates are telling themselves so they don't have to make the difficult decision of consolidating the field down to trump and nevertrump and it is going to destroy the last chance they have of stopping him

― Mordy, Thursday, March 3, 2016 7:15 PM (38 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this.

fox news debate on now

http://s1.totalprosports.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/displeased-wwe-fan-gifs-of-wrestling-fans-being-wrestling-fans.gif

America, man. Maybe we are this dumb.

has to be the first time in history that a presidential candidate bragged about his penis size in a debate

BRAGGIN2016

America loves when its presidential candidates make dick jokes.

Oh, god...Trump says everything's just fine with the hands and with everything else.

Cruz alternates between looking defeated and totally amazed at Trump

lbj would have whipped it out

this is just unbelievable

kasich is too boring for this bloodfest

wtf is Rubio doing flamenco?

this republican primary season has been the slowest most excruciating trainwreck to watch and somehow again and again my shock and surprise at the state of the race is renewed

cannot even

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdtKbq3Omkw

Took Trump about 10 minutes (after pulling back on "Little Marco") to go back to Little Marco.

I still think it's not too late for Flavor Flav to jump into this race

Rubio looks like he's running for class president

you know what, I regret that quip. shame on me for besmirching Flavor's name like that.

holy shit they are challenging him with graphics is this new???

fox news going in on trump

do GOP voters care that trump knows nothing about policy

james fallows' head is exploding

who is that

it is impossible for me to believe that there is a single human watching this and thinking they really want to vote for trump but then
https://twitter.com/ByronYork/status/705579962460413952

All this "businessman" is a reminder that Republican = businessmen during the Reagan era, and Trump's kind of doing a more successful version of what Romney tried to do, with a dollop of Pat Buchanan thrown in.

when is Byron York gonna get that his long hair went out with Bennington and Bret Easton Ellis in 1987?

"chief political correspondent"

http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/160303211516-04-fox-debate-0303-overlay-tease.jpg

megyn kelly looking p fierce tonight

That defense of off-the-record conversations was more nimble than any of the other imbeciles to his left and right onstage could've managed.

just realized that rubio's cadence sounds like dirk diggler

Is the booing directed at the moderators or the candidates? It's hard to tell sometimes. I think these people just enjoy booing.

is rubio sick or something? he looks terrible