The coming train wreck (Trump v Cruz and the convention)

WaPo ^ | 04-07-2016 | Charles Krauthammer

[NRx]

No excerpt. This needs to be read in its entirety.

[WildHighlander57]

Many thanks, Mr Robinson !

NRx
I won’t click on the article link.

[VerySadAmerican]

Bingo. And Cruz will be owned forever. Or forever forgotten. Either way he will have his mouth taped shut.

[HLPhat]

Meanwhile...

http://www.newsweek.com/putin-gloats-dutch-voters-rattle-european-unity-445023

Looks like that train’s running on time in the context of our predictable quadrennial Circus.

[Mechanicos]

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/04/07/campaign-ad-new-paul-ryan-video-raises-questions/

Wanna bet?

Whatever deal Cruz made with the GOPe apparently did NOT include him winning the nomination.

[Mechanicos]

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/04/07/campaign-ad-new-paul-ryan-video-raises-questions/

[sargon]

If Trump doesn’t show up with 1,237 delegates, Cruz will be nominated on the second ballot.

Yeah, I remember when I had my first beer...

[altura]

It’s not the Trump delegates so much but there are a lot of other delegates pledged to Rubio, et al who may switch.

[VerySadAmerican]

Why can you not see that Cruz IS a gopE rino? The rinos are financing him and they’re pulling the strings. He’s been a fraud since day one.

So, don’t be surprised to see him get the nomination and the presidency. And in a few years all who supported him will say “What the hell! We’ve been fooled again!”

[Trod Upon]

I voted for the guy, but that’s hilarious.

[SeeSharp]

But Cruz is not exactly Mr. Popularity with the same party bosses

You're right. It's hard to imagine them trying to insert someone who hasn't run in the primaries, such as Romney or Ryan, though. They could try Rubio, Kasich, or Lil' Jebbie, but they are all proven losers. I think it will be Cruz if Trump doesn't close the deal in the primaries. Trump can still do that and I wouldn't bet against it just yet.

[Ouderkirk]

Cruz will be nominated on the second ballot

I don't disagree with you.

But something doesn't feel right about that. I can't say why. It just doesn't seem have the feel of a likely potential outcome because the behavior of the GOPe has been to try and deny Cruz too.

The unicorn theory is the more likely scenario if Trump doesn't get enough delegates. The GOPe may hate Trump, they hate Cruz more. They've been floating Ryan, and Walker. I'd almost want to say that Bush, who's been the GOPe's boy all along would get shoved down our throats.

I'm more inclined to go with Romney on a second or third ballot since his paperwork for president has already been filed.

[NRx]

See my # 30.

[WildHighlander57]

That pic looks like a cross between Alfred E Neuman and Spock

[SharpRightTurn]

“You really think a large chunk of Trump’s delegates are going to flip to Cruz? You think the Donald won’t walk out of the convention and take his followers with him?”

Very good questions, NRx.

And, while I don’t expect Cruz to walk out of the convention if he doesn’t get the nomination, will a significant number of Cruz’s supporters stay home or vote third party if Trump wins the nomination?

If either Cruz or Trump is going to win, they will need the votes of the other’s supporters. Will they get it, or will the supporters of the losing candidate take the “my way or the highway” approach?

[LucienCA13]

From the article: “It’s no longer business; it’s personal. Cruz has essentially declared that he couldn’t support someone who did what Trump did to Heidi Cruz.”
_____________

While I agree with that statement, I still don’t understand the outrage which Cruz exhibited over a re-tweet. Let alone why the pundits and media keep echoing it. IMO, there was no assault on “my wife and family” as Cruz repeatedly screamed..it’s a myth, a lie.

[altura]

Why can’t people understand this?

I know math is hard.

Trump has to get a certain number of delegates to win on the first ballot.

He is not in a good position to do that now.

On the second ballot, most changed votes will go to Cruz.

He has earned them because he has good people on the ground working on this.

It is ridiculous to say dramatic stuff like it will divide the Republican party forever.

A Cruz win would actually unite the party and have an excellent chance of beating Hillary and the dems.

[Trod Upon]

And Hillary wins and gets to shape a Supreme Court that will effectively repeal the Bill of Rights. I may just cash out and head to a remote part of South America. Raise goats or something.

[PROCON]

There is no party unity, we're fighting against each other just like the 'rats want us to.

I'm a Cruz supporter but, as usual over the past 20+ years, will be voting AGAINST the communist, tyrannical 'rat candidate.

[nathanbedford]

Some of the sentiments expressed below are taken from a reply by Longbow 1969, used without his permission and without specifically identifying which sentiments are his; the responsibility for the whole is mine:

If Trump were a real conservative leading a movement that could stand the test of time conservatives would be willing to get behind his candidacy even if we knew he would not win this time around. But Trump isn't a movement, he's not even a conservative. This is a one off for him and his policies

All of this misplaced faith in Donald Trump is in the service of an unworthy cause. In fact, there is no cause apart from the cause of Donald Trump himself. This is not Goldwater in 1964 courageously defining conservatism to young Republicans like me, this is a rogue off the reservation who is simply on the make. Trump is founding no new political philosophy, no movement, nothing worthy of the destruction he is bringing down on all of us.

There is no movement to be founded by Donald Trump because the entire campaign is a sham and the cynical application of reality television to the stump. It is shameless at its core because it is utterly selfish.

The destruction Trump is visiting on us comes if he is nominated because he will be slaughtered by his own negatives in a general election and it comes if he picks up his delegates and walks out of the convention as you suggest he should. Either Way, Trump gets his way but we are shattered and leftism triumphs.

Either Way, Hillary Clinton becomes the next president of the United States and the petulance of Trump's followers, matching the petulance of their leader, will have sacrificed conservatism to the altar of Donald Trump's ego.

Trump's debacle "would be a pointless loss since Trump represents nothing lasting." That is because Trump supporters on a gut level support the man and not a coherent set of conservative policies. When will we conservatives finally learn our lesson and properly vet candidates according to conservative bona fides? We are whoring after a contrived reality television image with no integrity. We will get not a conservative but a narcissist. This is so unnecessary when we have a bona fide conservative in Ted Cruz.

So Ted Cruz parachutes into the Republican Party, conducts the dirtiest campaign in living memory, all in the service of his own ego, leaving the party either with himself as a flawed candidate doomed to lose or divided because in his childishness he walks away from the convention or runs as a third-party spoiler.

Trump supporters will have a lot to answer for when the Final Judgment is administered.

[JBW1949]

The only “unity” in the GOP is the unity of the “establishment elites” to each other...Not one of them could give a good, solid ratshit about any of the voters...If that is not obvious to people, then there is little hope....