2016 elections - because it's never too early

[lustindarkness]

IMHO no matter what happens the GOP is already destroyed/changed from what it was. I will be interesting to see what will emerge from the ashes.

[dps]

Yep, Trump is toast. 

Hope you're right.

[citizen k]

Do I really have to root for Bernie?

[Eddie Teach]

I'd like to see Bernie riding a skateboard(and not archived footage from 30 years ago).

[CountDeMoney]

Quite frankly, I'm surprised they haven't tried to peg this one on Hillary.

[CountDeMoney]

Yep, Trump is toast. 

Hope you're right.

Meh, you've got a few states of Trumpistan right around the corner:  New York, New Jersey, Rogue Island, Delaware, Connecticut, and Pennsyltucky--where the latest Quinnipac poll just put him at 48%.  He's going to win these states.

[FunkMonk]

I don't think they (the GOP) cares about winning states anymore though. They just seem to care about delegates, and making sure Der Trumpenfuhrer doesn't get to 1237. As long as they can deny him the first ballot, he can win all the states he wants.

That seems to be their super duper cheat code strat,  but they may have to blow on the cartridge a few times to make it work, though.

[Monoriu]

I don't think they (the GOP) cares about winning states anymore though. They just seem to care about delegates, and making sure Der Trumpenfuhrer doesn't get to 1237. As long as they can deny him the first ballot, he can win all the states he wants.

That seems to be their super duper cheat code strat,  but they may have to blow on the cartridge a few times to make it work, though.

But if not Trump, then who?  Cruz doesn't seem to be a very mainstream candidate either.  And he is a distant second in the primary election no matter which metric is chosen to measure his popularity.  Picking Kasich or anybody else will mean almost completely disregarding the results of the primary election, making a mockery of the process and possibly angering the voters. 

[Berkut]

Great article. Love the chair/referee analogy...

http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/donald-trump-and-the-stunts-that-expose-the-g-o-p

[jimmy olsen]

I find it funny that people are acting as if Cruz has won the nomination. The end game is still the same - either Trump wins outright or a brokered convention, with Trump having the plurality of delegates.

Martinus, I don't think you understand how this works.

The delegates are people. Some are picked by the candidates, but many are picked by some version of the party or people that show up to obscure party meetings. Cruz is by all reports organizing to take over these meetings, but he seems to be the only candidate doing so. Some other delegates are automatic based on their position in the party.

Most delegates are obligated to vote for the candidate based on their state rules. So for instance, in Arizona, all the 55 delegates are Trump delegates because he won the state, and on the first ballot they are all obligated to vote for him. But there are news stories that Cruz supporters took over the actual delegate selection process, and of the actual 55 people that make up the delegates, ~50 actually favor Cruz. Arizona is not unique in this.

So on the first ballot, everyone votes as they are pledged and Trump wins a plurality but not a majority. So we go to a second ballot. I don't know when the Arizona delegates cease to be bound to abide by their state's vote--it varies from state to state--but once they are, it is almost certain almost all of Trump's Arizona support will evaporate.

This is why Trump's nomination odds are plummeting (and why I never thought he had a great shot at the nomination to begin with). He is in strong position to get a first ballot plurality, but if he doesn't get a majority, he is in an incredibly weak position as many of "his delegates" are poised to desert him.

So here's a scenario: Donald Trump comes close, but not actually at, 1237.  Lets say he has 1180 or so.  Rubio and Kasich have about 300 between them, so Cruz is somewhere around 1000.  On a first ballot no one reaches a majority.

Now it would be one thing if, on the second ballot, Kasich and Rubio's delegates come over and vote for Cruz.  That's how these things are supposed to work.

But if, on a second ballot, Trump not only loses, but gets substantially fewer votes than the delegates he came in with?  That just sounds profoundly undemocratic, and Trump may be onto something when he talks about riots.


You know I've warmed (slightly) to Ted Cruz in that his campaign is looking at all the little details.  He seems to have strong voter ID and GOTV efforts.  I've been a campaign manager twice before and I've always believed that the ground game is important in doing politics right.  But there is such a thing as being too clever, and if Cruz manages to win solely because Trump delegates are voting for him I think the GOP could be in real trouble.

[Jaron]

I find it funny that people are acting as if Cruz has won the nomination. The end game is still the same - either Trump wins outright or a brokered convention, with Trump having the plurality of delegates.

Martinus, I don't think you understand how this works.

The delegates are people. Some are picked by the candidates, but many are picked by some version of the party or people that show up to obscure party meetings. Cruz is by all reports organizing to take over these meetings, but he seems to be the only candidate doing so. Some other delegates are automatic based on their position in the party.

Most delegates are obligated to vote for the candidate based on their state rules. So for instance, in Arizona, all the 55 delegates are Trump delegates because he won the state, and on the first ballot they are all obligated to vote for him. But there are news stories that Cruz supporters took over the actual delegate selection process, and of the actual 55 people that make up the delegates, ~50 actually favor Cruz. Arizona is not unique in this.

So on the first ballot, everyone votes as they are pledged and Trump wins a plurality but not a majority. So we go to a second ballot. I don't know when the Arizona delegates cease to be bound to abide by their state's vote--it varies from state to state--but once they are, it is almost certain almost all of Trump's Arizona support will evaporate.

This is why Trump's nomination odds are plummeting (and why I never thought he had a great shot at the nomination to begin with). He is in strong position to get a first ballot plurality, but if he doesn't get a majority, he is in an incredibly weak position as many of "his delegates" are poised to desert him.

So here's a scenario: Donald Trump comes close, but not actually at, 1237.  Lets say he has 1180 or so.  Rubio and Kasich have about 300 between them, so Cruz is somewhere around 1000.  On a first ballot no one reaches a majority.

Now it would be one thing if, on the second ballot, Kasich and Rubio's delegates come over and vote for Cruz.  That's how these things are supposed to work.

But if, on a second ballot, Trump not only loses, but gets substantially fewer votes than the delegates he came in with?  That just sounds profoundly undemocratic, and Trump may be onto something when he talks about riots.


You know I've warmed (slightly) to Ted Cruz in that his campaign is looking at all the little details.  He seems to have strong voter ID and GOTV efforts.  I've been a campaign manager twice before and I've always believed that the ground game is important in doing politics right.  But there is such a thing as being too clever, and if Cruz manages to win solely because Trump delegates are voting for him I think the GOP could be in real trouble.

[Berkut]

You know I've warmed (slightly) to Ted Cruz...

Shocked! Shocked I am!

[Habbaku]

I find it funny that people are acting as if Cruz has won the nomination. The end game is still the same - either Trump wins outright or a brokered convention, with Trump having the plurality of delegates.

Martinus, I don't think you understand how this works.

The delegates are people. Some are picked by the candidates, but many are picked by some version of the party or people that show up to obscure party meetings. Cruz is by all reports organizing to take over these meetings, but he seems to be the only candidate doing so. Some other delegates are automatic based on their position in the party.

Most delegates are obligated to vote for the candidate based on their state rules. So for instance, in Arizona, all the 55 delegates are Trump delegates because he won the state, and on the first ballot they are all obligated to vote for him. But there are news stories that Cruz supporters took over the actual delegate selection process, and of the actual 55 people that make up the delegates, ~50 actually favor Cruz. Arizona is not unique in this.

So on the first ballot, everyone votes as they are pledged and Trump wins a plurality but not a majority. So we go to a second ballot. I don't know when the Arizona delegates cease to be bound to abide by their state's vote--it varies from state to state--but once they are, it is almost certain almost all of Trump's Arizona support will evaporate.

This is why Trump's nomination odds are plummeting (and why I never thought he had a great shot at the nomination to begin with). He is in strong position to get a first ballot plurality, but if he doesn't get a majority, he is in an incredibly weak position as many of "his delegates" are poised to desert him.

So here's a scenario: Donald Trump comes close, but not actually at, 1237.  Lets say he has 1180 or so.  Rubio and Kasich have about 300 between them, so Cruz is somewhere around 1000.  On a first ballot no one reaches a majority.

Now it would be one thing if, on the second ballot, Kasich and Rubio's delegates come over and vote for Cruz.  That's how these things are supposed to work.

But if, on a second ballot, Trump not only loses, but gets substantially fewer votes than the delegates he came in with?  That just sounds profoundly undemocratic, and Trump may be onto something when he talks about riots.


You know I've warmed (slightly) to Ted Cruz in that his campaign is looking at all the little details.  He seems to have strong voter ID and GOTV efforts.  I've been a campaign manager twice before and I've always believed that the ground game is important in doing politics right.  But there is such a thing as being too clever, and if Cruz manages to win solely because Trump delegates are voting for him I think the GOP could be in real trouble.

[Razgovory]

People are under this weird impression that this an election for elected office.  It is not.  It's part of the party machinery.

[CountDeMoney]

I don't think they (the GOP) cares about winning states anymore though. They just seem to care about delegates, and making sure Der Trumpenfuhrer doesn't get to 1237. As long as they can deny him the first ballot, he can win all the states he wants.

That seems to be their super duper cheat code strat,  but they may have to blow on the cartridge a few times to make it work, though.

I would really like to see some actual demos on Trump delegates;  unlike Democrat superdelegates--who are often bona fide party leaders and elected officials back home in their respective states--these delegates that are committed to Trump may not have to worry about the blowback back home if they change their tune at the convention after the first couple ballots. 

Trump has no real future in the party, and these delegates--many of whom may very well have future political aspirations at the local, county or state level back home--know that.  So, cast your Trump ballot out of courtesy, and then see what fans out.  But Cruz knows how to game the professional pols, the delegates that will still want to be politically active long after The Donald ascends to the heavens on the golden escalator from whence he came.

But other than anecdotal stuff, I don't really know how many Trump delegates to date are hardcore, longtime conservative party activists, or one-off Teabagger types fittin' to Make America Hate Again.  If there's a shitload of the latter, Cleveland could burn.