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Binary Option: Anyone on the Public Right Publicly Not Supporting Trump is Supporting Harris
The simple binary outcome of this election is that either Trump or Harris will win. What we have, again, is many on what I am calling the Public Right declaring Trump unfit for office or that they will not vote for him. This helps Harris get elected. There is no squirming out of that. They can say they are being principled all they want to. It does not matter. They can sleep soundly at night, knowing their principles dictated helping Harris, who in theory, stands against everything in which they believe, win.
Thus, I will lay part of the blame for a Trump loss at the feet of the Public Right who did not support him. These include all the Never Trumpers at NRO, and anyone with any voice, any sense of public communications. In the battleground states, a few votes may make the difference. Those few votes could well be swayed by hearing the anti-Trump Public Right come around to supporting Trump.
It is clear to me that those not supporting Trump on the Public Right just don’t care. They don’t care what Biden has done to the nation, they don’t care what Harris will do. It’s all OK. No worries. All that is important is they feel good about themselves. Ironically, this is just like the voters on the left. All that matters to them is feeling good about themselves.
Maybe the anti-Trump Public Right is not so on the Right after all.
Published in General
Seems to me a big part of the message – perhaps most or even all of it – is something like “We voted for your McCain and Romney, now it’s your turn to vote for our Trump. And if you won’t, it’s ‘screw YOU,’ not us.”
It depends on percentages.
What a bizarre message. Who is it that wanted you to vote for McCain and Romney? Not me. Frankly I don’t understand this, maybe because I vote based on my own judgement and assessment of the situation. I don’t vote a certain way because I’m told to (and who is this that is doing the telling?). Your mileage may vary.
I personally don’t want to argue about this anymore, but here’s where I think he’s coming from. Years ago, that fat jerk Karl Rove said that Shrub didn’t have to worry about the conservative vote because they “have nowhere else to go”. We have been taken for granted enough. Some of us have decided to just spend election day away from the polls. My two cents. Now, I’ll take a shower and have a good night’s sleep.
I used to hear the same nonsense back when I was told that not voting for Bush was the same as voting for Gore, or later when I was told that not voting for Bush was the same as voting for Kerry.
Makes me feel younger to be hearing the same stuff again.
Comment deleted.
It’s pretty simple math, the only reason someone wouldn’t understand it is if they are even simpler.
Not voting for the Republican, WHOEVER it is, in ANY election, is a net +1 for the Democrat, WHOEVER it is.
Actually voting for the Democrat, as some self-proclaimed Republicans have done, is a net +2 for the Democrat.
And, a reminder:
Ricochet was co-founded by a witty writer of sitcoms, and even a cyber-eternity later, there’s a lingering appreciation for the eternal comedy rhythm of set-up-joke, set-up-the-next-joke. We get it.
But sometimes, come on. Who are we kidding? When we wander off into complaining about the war-nographers who the GOPe gang left in charge of GWB’s hollow administration, out of thousands of R> members, who looked at the blatant flaws in that political coalition and said, yeah, this time it’s Kerry, or Obama, or Clinton, or Biden? A relative handful of people.
I ask because there’s an awful lot of amnesia out there about the post 9/11 world. Yeah, we can gripe about the neocon worldview and what it did to American priorities about spending and about foreign relations. But don’t gripe like the Martians made us do it.
That’s interesting. Maybe a separate post?
You have really convinced yourself of this? Your response is more about you than about DeSantis or Haley.
I like neither Romney nor McCain. Either would have left the country in much better shape than Obama.
A vote for Trump is a vote for Trump. A vote for Harris is a Vote for Harris. Not voting, or voting 3rd party is not voting for either. You don’t know Math. I use Math every day in my profession.
I truly believe most Republican candidates would have done better than Trump. He barely beat the most hated woman in America (Hillary), lost to a serial loser and brain dead idiot (Biden). The Party did not do well under him in 2018, 2020, and 2022.
Trump is truly the most deeply loved person in American politics. He is also the most deeply hated. On net, in the general populace ( including non Republicans), I am not sure if he pulls in more people to vote for him or pulls in more people to vote against him. Strong in the Republican party, but not a strong general election candidate – at all. Nominating him was suicide.
When Trump loses, we all lose. Including both Trump supporters and Trump opponents. Knock off the profanity.
Horrifying point I wish I could disagree with.
It does seem to me that much of the Public Right is on the side of the Blob.
Public Right not supporting Haley would be supporting Harris.
Now, as Haley is a more to the liking of the Public Right, I doubt there would be what we see now.
I did not “insult” anyone. I stated a fact. Someone on the Public Right who comes out against Trump is supporting Harris. I don’t see what is so insulting about that.
Not sure where the “disdain my vote” comes from. Who did that?
The Public Right who is Against Trump(tm) explicitly called for Trump to support the eventual Nominee in 2016. Then those same people refused to support Trump.
Do you consider yourself part of the Public Right, Jean? I don’t think of you that way. You are a poster and moderator on an Internet BBS.
How true.
I wonder then, how it is, that members of the Public Right won’t support Trump and therefore support Harris.
I find this discussion amusing and enlightening.
Conclusions:
The voter base for both political parties varies in viewpoint from state to state.
This was true at the Founding as well and the Constitution included specific language about where the authority rest for electing the President and that Constitutional provision remains intact: State legislatures.
Americans have cleaned up many of the things the Founders didn’t quite put the finishing touches on but this one they messed up when it was moved to statewide popular vote. Two others were the 16th and 17th Amendments.
These moves were big deals in terms of how the country has been shaped politically.
They create the arguments we see in these comments coming from voters who live in completely incomparable communities, but, for the most part, they only get this binary choice unless they sit it out.
The founders set the choosing of the POTUS to be a decision of the people’s elected state representatives and if we still did that we would not have this discussion.
People will not think and act the same across such large swaths of diversity.
To those folks who think they’re taking a principled stand by not voting for Trump:
Is it principled to allow evil to flourish? Because if the Democrats win, you can bet we’ll be living in a deeper Hell than we are now . . .
Well, I am really here talking about the Public Right, not John or Jane Doe Voter.
Until last night, I didn’t know there was such a thing as a Public Right.
What’s funny about the behaviors of the Public Right is it is they who gave us Trump as President in the beginning.
This is true. By the GOP taking the voter base for granted, not delivering on promises, the consistent support of the Public Right helped to create Trump.
Had the GOP and the Public Right addressed the needs of the social conservatives and actually tried to fight the culture war, maybe we would not be here.
Nominating Nikki might have been suicide as well. I’m reasonably sure that there were more people who would not have voted for her than just myself and Rand Paul.
Read more carefully.
Maybe. And would Bryan be insisting, as he does now, that it’s a binary choice, and not voting for Haley is the same as voting for Harris? That those who won’t vote for Haley don’t care about the country, or how Biden and Harris have hurt it?
I doubt it. The real message is very simple – vote the way I want you to vote, or you stink. Great message. Very compelling.
I might have found it harder to vote for her than for Trump. She was good on only one issue, and she was very bad on some others.