Tag: 2016 GOP Primary
The GOP Created the Monster that Is Trump
Republican elites are panicky about the durable dominance of Trump (and to a lesser extent Ben Carson) in the presidential race. They are right to worry, but I don’t feel much sympathy. Trump is a problem of their own creation. … Trump gets ever more base in his bigotry — and yet, with few and intermittent exceptions, rival candidates, party leaders and GOP lawmakers decline to call him out. So he continues to rise, benefiting from tacit acceptance of his intolerance. … For months — years, really — Republicans have averted their gaze from Trump’s attacks on women, Hispanics and immigrants. Now the racism becomes more overt — and still, he goes unchallenged.
— Dana Millbank, writing in the Washington Post.
This Generic GOP Stump Speech Could Be Used by Any Republican Candidate
FiveThirtyEight asked former Republican speechwriter Barton Swaim to write a ?totally pandering stump speech for an imaginary GOP presidential candidate. If you’d like to see the version with Swaim’s annotations, go here.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Who’s ready to stand up for America? [applause] Who’s ready to take this country back? [applause] Who’s ready to send a message to the elites in Washington? [slightly waning applause]
You know, the Democrats want to make this election complicated. They want to convince you that taking more money out of the private sector and giving it to bureaucrats in Washington will somehow improve the economy.
How would that work? They’ll tell you, “It’s complicated; just trust us.”
They want to convince you that giving Iran’s extremist thugs whatever they want — and trusting that they won’t build a nuclear weapon — will somehow make the Middle East more stable.
How, exactly? “Well, it’s complicated. Just trust us. Just trust the Obama administration. Just trust the Democratic leadership in Congress, like Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi.”
They’re going to try to convince you that putting government in charge of your health insurance is somehow going to improve our health care system. You might wonder how putting government in charge of anything makes it more efficient or improves its quality.
It hasn’t exactly worked that way with the Postal Service, but hey — it’s complicated. You’ll just have to trust them.
[pause; wait for a few people to boo]
Trump Tops GOP Field Nationally Four Months in a Row
4
Number of consecutive months Donald Trump has led the GOP primary field. A new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds Donald Trump leading the GOP field with 32%, followed by Ben Carson at 22%, Marco Rubio at 11%, Ted Cruz at 8% and Jeb Bush at 6%. No other candidate has more than 4% nationally. In the Democratic race, Hillary Clinton leads with 60%, followed by Bernie Sanders at 34% and Martin O’Malley at 3%.
A new Fox News poll also shows Trump expanding his lead to 28%, followed by Carson by 18%, Cruz at 14%, Rubio at 14% and Bush at 5%.
Trump: U.S. May ‘Have to’ Shut Down Mosques
Nobody wants to say this and nobody wants to shut down religious institutions or anything, but you know, you understand it. A lot of people understand it. We’re going to have no choice.
— Leading GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump, saying the United States will have “absolutely no choice” but to close down some mosques where “some bad things are happening,” Politico reports.
Want a ‘Know Nothing’ President? Vote for Carson
The candidate’s advisers are saying on the record he doesn’t know anything, has trouble learning anything, and cannot seem to recall even what little information he has managed to assimilate. I don’t see how a Carson presidency could go wrong.
— Jonathan Chait, in New York Magazine.
Moderators Who Interrogate
Now we’re well into the primary debate session,
And the candidates are whining about media aggression.
Because no matter what the channel,
Or how senior or balanced the panel,
Moderators are just supposed to moderate — not ask hard questions!
