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Indiana Predictions
Ricochet, let’s have it out. Put it all on the line, and let’s hear the predictions for Indiana. Here is mine: I think this poll from NBC has it close, though I think Trump will exceed the 49 percent victory it predicts. For something closer to the final result, I look at this conclusion from the poll:
But 58 percent of likely Republican primary voters in Indiana say they disapprove of [Senators] Cruz and Kasich teaming up to beat Trump in the Hoosier State, while 34 percent say they approve of the move. What’s more, only 22 percent consider the Cruz-Kasich alliance a major factor in deciding their vote, 15 percent say it’s a minor factor and 63 percent say it would play no factor at all.
That, I suspect, is closer to the final result we’ll see tomorrow. Read together, those two statements indicate to me that the pact between Cruz and Kasich will suppress their aggregate turnout, as voters don’t care for the gamesmanship. Between that and Bobby Knight’s endorsement, I expect Trump to break 50 percent.
What say you? After this, we can all turn our collective minds to figure out what the heck just happened and why.
Published in Politics
Why is the world pretending this is the first time two people have made a political alliance?
Is Trump going to complain when he talks to the EU that they are ganging up on him unfairly?
What in the world is happening?
Yes.
The exasperation in the comment is another example of how so many, including the powers that be (such as it is) in the Republican Party, have been so bad at convincing the electorate in a national election. If I understand the tenor of the comment correctly, you seem to be confused about why this is playing out the way that it is as it seems contradictory to the logic you are used to using to understand politics. What in the world is happening?
What is happening is that this cycle is showing exactly why the conventional wisdom emanating from the right has been wrong for a long time. People actually thought that Cruz had a chance. People actually thought (think?) that Cruz could jerry-rig convention delegates and win. Nope.
No one is pretending this is the first time a political alliance has been made. Trump is just completely keyed into the Republican (American?) electorate, and he knows instinctively that the voters will associate the Cruz-Kasich partnership as more political gamesmanship, which he then can turn into more ammunition against Cruz as being an insider. That is why Trump loudly complains about the alliance. It is not because he is offended or upset or thinks its a threat. Exactly the opposite. It’s because he knows how to create the association between Cruz and “Washington politician” by complaining about it, while simultaneously reinforcing his own dominance by telling everyone it won’t matter. He just turned what Cruz thought was a winning tactic into a full-on failure.
How did Cruz not understand this? Because he is suffering from the same inability to understand the electorate as conservatives generally. It’s because when it came to the important things in an election, Cruz isn’t terribly bright – he failed to foresee how the alliance is actually a bad tactic. Cruz has made so many messaging errors that he thinks were the bananas but were in fact massive failures. Which just reinforces the argument Trump is making – they are all idiots.
He is not bumbling through this campaign. Sooner or later, the “smart” set in the conservative intellectual elite are going to figure this out and start trying to learn from it.
Again. This belies a fundamental misunderstanding of what he is doing. Complaining to the EU when they gang up on him is not something that would be consistent with how he is acting.
He complains about the pact because in an election, and particularly this election, he knows exactly how to spin that into votes and support.
He is not complaining because he actually thinks its unfair. In truth, he probably thinks the alliance is a gift. He is complaining because he can create support from it in an election.
That has no application to the EU. The fact that people make these “logic” comparisons as if they are some sort of insight just shows how little is understood about what he is doing.
Meh. Trump just whines about everything and thinks the solution to every problem is to give him complete power.
So, yes, he will whine about every treaty, every agreement, pretty much everything.
Who cares a whit for “Bobby Knight”? The guy coached kids playing a stupid game. Come on, get a life.
I’m a Trump sympathizer in Indiana who will vote for Cruz tomorrow. This is totally strategic; I don’t want Hillary to win, but if she does I don’t wanna lose Congress. HOWEVER, if Trump wins, then I will be in your face pro-Trump, and no one will be able to say that I didn’t do what I could to keep Trump from winning the nomination.
Red Fish Blue Fish,
I too was seduced by the wall and controls on Islamicist immigration (so long as we are in a hot war with ISIS/al-Qaeda and Islam doesn’t have its house in order).
I’m not blind to why Trump is popular in certain segments.
My comment is what has happened to people’s ability to reason? To analyze?
On economics Trump lands somewhere between a Mercantilist and a Corporatist. Like every leftist before him, he believes those tinkerings with the economy didn’t work because he wasn’t the one doing the tinkering.
On foreign policy, he is doubling down on Obama’s lead from behind.
As much as I want that wall, as much as I want controls on Islamicist immigration, I don’t want to destroy my fortune and safety.
I watched Morning Joe this morning. They kept playing the clip of Cruz approaching a bunch of Trump supporters holding signs.
In normal times, they would have honored a candidate who stayed polite, who was willing to engage, who brought up only issues. It was a courageous act of retail politicking.
Instead, they applauded the people who yelled names, who mocked and cursed him. As if that’s what should carry the day in a conversation.
It proved to me again that the ability to reason and analyze fairly has been melted in the heat this election is generating.
Collapsing social trust is like that.