And then there were three. With Marco Rubio out after Florida (which I feared) and John Kasich winning in Ohio (which I accepted, with gritted teeth) it comes down to Ted Cruz, John Kasich, Nobody, and Donald Trump. Which, interestingly enough, is both the alphabetical order of the remaining candidates, and how I’m ranking them in terms of acceptability. It’s actually not the most horrible thing: I liked Marco Rubio a good deal, but I like Ted Cruz too.
So… Ted Cruz for President, and may God defend the right.
That’s the endorsement Cruz was waiting for.
Welcome to Team Ted, Moe.
With my strategic voting duty done in Ohio, I join Moe’s endorsement (and order of acceptability).
Cruz is my first choice as well, however, his condemnation of anti-Trump violence on Trump does calls to question his character. Remember Move-On also hates your guts Cruz.
I did what I could in FL. My parents did what they could in IL. Sadly, too many fools to overcome.
Sadly, I think Rubio’s whole campaign was a string of delusions. 1: That people would forgive the Gang of 8 fiasco 2: That giving up his senate seat for a long shot (and it was always a long shot) presidential run during his first term was a good idea. 3: Pressing on long after it was clear he wasn’t going anywhere and couldn’t even defend his home state. 4: Not running for his senate seat as well as the presidential nomination. Now we have to run a weaker candidate in a general election that’s likely to be extremely hard to win.
He shouldn’t have run.
Rubio’s a gifted orator.
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The problem is .. Rubio is, *thus far in his career*, a gifted orator.
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Where’s the Rubio-blank bill? Where’s Rubio’s term as Governor of Florida? Where’s the *beef*?
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I know our host is fond of Rubio, and I agree that he has an excellent voting record and is a gifted orator ..
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…and while that’s sufficient to win the Dem nomination, it’s not good enough to win the GOP side .. for better or worse.
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Mew
Cruz should offer Rubio the VP slot, get those delegates on board and ruin Trump’s victory all in one fell swoop. Tomorrow the media won’t be able to talk of anything else so steal Trump’s thunder.
… when’s the next set of primaries? Cruz should hit that within 48-72 hours before the vote.. but should drop hints between now and then.
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Mew
Rubio’s has family and as of now has no job, get ’em while their down has it’s good points. Moreover Trump’s going to be looking for those delegates. The way to beat a wheeler-dealer is to make the deal first.
A Moe’s gotta do what a Moe’s gotta do.
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A cat, on the other paw, isn’t endorsing anybody.
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Yet.
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Mew
“So… Ted Cruz for President, and may God defend the right.”- so it’s war then? Sorry didn’t notice before. Fine by me I’ve been there for a while.
I believe I’ll have that drink, now.
I have a question about Pennsylvania lawsuit involving Gov. Kasich eligibility to appear on the ballet. The lawsuit was filed by one of Senator Rubio’s supporters, and now that he has left the stage, will the lawsuit go forward or will it quietly disappear (or encourage to disappear)? Granted, it is in Senator Cruz best interest if it did go forward but it has been a weird year.
I’m on my third rum&coke of the night.
Cruz or lose.
I think I’m already done. I can’t believe we’re seeing Obama play out all over again. The only difference is the politics are on the right and Obama was prettier.
I used to believe the low-information voters lived mostly on the left. I was wrong.
A lot of them are moving. We’re not supposed to be noticing this, but part of what’s happening this cycle is that a bunch of the people who lost the latest Democratic faction shoving match (blue-collar whites) have decided to show up here. The problem is that they’ve got Trump as their standard bearer, and he’s happy to pander to their absolute worst interests. If, say, Jim Webb was the public face of this folk-migration then we’d be having an easier time of it.
This doesn’t really mean the end of the Republican party – but if Trump’s the nominee then it will lead to a disastrous 2016 season, because what these new voters DON’T understand is that there’s a critical portion of their new party that really would rather lose, or quit, than compromise our fundamental principles. And I really do think that enough of those new voters don’t understand that, based on the people I see on Twitter and social media. It’d be almost entertaining to watch them suddenly have to come to grips with their problem, except that it’s basically not, and I’d have already left anyway.
That makes sense, but I haven’t seen much written about it. I was right there with Christine last night. I though we’d have learned our lesson after Obama to vote on more than just platitudes.
As for the R party. Part of the problem to me it seems is that if you live in a state that tends to go R on a national level or a district that is strong R, you can end up with Rs that look a lot like Ds.
… there’s a critical portion of their new party that really would rather lose, or quit, than compromise our fundamental principles.
As if surrendering to an even worse opponent would leave those fundamental principles intact and triumphant.
“I told you so” does make a decent, if underutilized campaign slogan..
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Mew
“there’s a critical portion of their new party that really would rather lose, or quit, than compromise our fundamental principles. ”
Man, after hearing how I had to support McCain and Romney no matter how awful they were, I don’t have a lot of sympathy for #NeverTrump–but I try not to bring it up here for obvious reasons.
:mildly: I didn’t want either, either.
And yet, I took quite a bit of crap – not from Moe – over my John McCain nose plugs…
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Mew
Here’s a weird factoid . Looking at 2016 as a landslide akin to 1972 , the D’s in ’72 actually picked up two seats in the Senate to run their majority to 56 : go figure , as in all politics are local .But I’m looking at Majority Leader Schumer and a SCOTUS that don’t do no starry discus ( sic) and we lose Heller and MacDonald and a whole lots worser . And more and more one hears supposedly intelligent types being informed the debacle that a Trump nomination will be and they just don’t care , they just don’t care ….
2006 and 2008 cured me of the delusion that strong conservatives had any particular regard for the Republican party as an independent institution, as opposed to being a handy delivery mechanism for their beliefs. I happen to think that that attitude’s a bit of a mistake generally, but in this particular case it’s going to come as a really nasty surprise to the folks who haven’t had that particular anagnorisis yet.
I believe that this is the first time I’ve seen “anagnorisis” used in a blog post. Next thing we know, you’ll be flinging “peripeteia” all over the place…
I got it from Trail of Cthulhu. It’s a good word.
just so we don’t lose SAN from using it. or is it another of those words that attracts a Great Old One?
It just more or less means “transforming realization.”