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How Rubio Wins
On the Main Feed of late, Peter has been badly hiding his desperate hope that Marco Rubio catches fire and somehow wins the nomination, saving the GOP from the epic implosion and chaos of a Trump candidacy. Well, I can’t promise Peter that he has reason for hope, but I can offer a guess about how Rubio could pull this rabbit out of his hat.
After seeing his final debate and his gradual but steady rise in the polls in Iowa this week, along with what seems like a very energetic and well-timed final campaign push this weekend, I think it’s possible Rubio will finish a strong third at the caucuses tomorrow, less than five percent behind the second-place finisher and no more than 7-8 percent below the winner. That will surprise a lot of people and show that this is indeed a three-man race. Coupled with that is a recent decline in Cruz’s luster: his slide in the Iowa polls, his weaker-than-expected debate performance, and the bizarre stories about Cruz’s campaign tactics in Iowa that popped up over the weekend. It all adds up to a second-place finish for Cruz in a state where he placed a huge chunk of his chips. Just by performing below expectations, Cruz will be weakened going into New Hampshire.
The underperformance in Iowa will probably drop Cruz out of second place in New Hampshire. Over-performing in Iowa, on the other hand, will give Rubio a bump in the Granite State. He will probably build on that with a similar all-out last week campaign push, and find himself able to pull away from the rest of the establishment-lane candidates. He could earn himself a strong second-place finish. By that point, I think just about every uncompetitive candidate, except Bush, will have seen the writing on the wall and dropped out. The winnowing of the field will turn South Carolina and the next group of states into a four-man contest.
In South Carolina, Cruz may be able to bounce back a bit, although weak performances in the first two states might so weaken him that he begins sinking. What’s most likely is that with Jeb still in the race, Rubio and Cruz won’t be able to overtake Trump. Cruz will probably do well enough to prove he has the support to soldier on to the SEC primary. Rubio, meanwhile, could score a solid second-place finish in South Carolina because of his momentum in Iowa and New Hampshire. Jeb will be able to win some votes in South Carolina because of his family connections there and by trotting out W to stump for him. It won’t be enough to get him over the hump, though, and his campaign will start to resemble a toothless zombie that can’t catch its prey.
Going into Nevada, assuming Rubio’s second-place result in South Carolina, it will start to feel like a two-man race between Trump and Rubio. Cruz will be campaigning hard in the southern states at play in the SEC primaries, though, so it won’t be over yet. In Nevada, Rubio may be able to eke out a victory over Trump, but even if he doesn’t, he will probably be a very close second, and his momentum will continue to grow. Then he can plausibly claim that without Bush and Cruz in the race, he’d be winning.
Assuming all of the above going into the SEC primaries, we’d probably see Trump sweep the southern contests and a real mess in the results for the second-through-fourth place finishes. At this point, Cruz will have gone all-in trying to win the south, and when he doesn’t break through or show that he can pull away from Rubio, he may have to hang it up. Bush will have been an abject disappointment just about everywhere until now, but he’ll be able to keep limping along because of all the money he has. He’ll keep his sight set on Florida, the first winner-take-all contest and his home state — as well as Rubio’s.
Jeb will make his last stand in Florida and throw everything he has into the state to win. But he and Rubio are such well-known quantities there that the voters will probably decide to get behind the guy who seems like he has the momentum and ability to win in November. So, odds are that if the script has played out as I’ve speculated, Rubio will deal the death blow to Bush here.
Unfortunately for Rubio, though, because of Bush’s final charge in Florida and what’s apt to be a completely spent Cruz hanging on for one desperate last-ditch effort to stay viable as well, Rubio won’t be able to win the state, and the first winner-take-all result will go to Trump. The good news will be that it will be obvious to all at this point that it’s truly a two-man race, so the competitions after Florida will probably be straight-up contests between Trump and Rubio.
My guess is that after moving out of the south, after Florida, and with all of the non-Trump vote consolidated, Rubio will start ticking off victories and the Trump train will start to slow. As the race proceeds, Rubio keeps building more and more momentum, and by the middle of May Rubio will have things pretty well sewn up.
Now, just to be clear, I’m not predicting this will happen. But if Rubio has a chance to win the nomination, it will probably happen in a manner pretty close to this. There are no doubt many unexpected twists and turns ahead that may defy my theorizing here, but if my scenario pans out, I fully expect a steak dinner from Peter. I live less than a half hour away, Mr. Robinson!
Published in Politics
I support Cruz, but I agree with your analysis – Rubio must come within 5 of the second place finishers to emerge from the Jeb Kasich Christie Cruz log jam in NH.
Also, Cruz’s campaign warchest is large, and Cruz’s SuperPacs are keeping the promise. Tea Party Patriots endorsed today as well, so movement conservatives and evangelicals are all in for Cruz. He’d have to seriously underwhelm in IA, like lose by more than he is now down in the Des Moine Register poll (lose to Trump by more than 5 points), to completely fade long-term as you have described. Why are so many people telling pollsters they support Trump? I have not personally met a single person who takes Trump seriously, or is at least willing to admit it.
I don’t think Cruz will really fade until after South Carolina. I do think a weaker than expected performance in Iowa drops him from number two in New Hampshire, which is a state that he is not well suited for at all in the first place. Two stronger than expected performances from Rubio in IA and NH just gets the establishment to consolidate behind him and he starts to look like the strong horse, even though Cruz will still have lots of loyal support as well. What I ultimately think hurts Cruz will be his inability to steal voters away from Trump. If he can’t land a serious body blow to Trump before the SEC primaries, I think his support starts to split into people whose second choice is Trump and supporters of his who don’t think he can overtake Trump and decide to jump on the Rubio bandwagon.
Well, that’s what Pauline Kael said about Nixon supporters. The big question in my mind isn’t whether they exist, it’s whether they vote. And we really have no way of knowing if they will. Guessing whether they’ll turn out is pretty pointless when tomorrow we’ll have real data about them.
This all sounds plausible. But so do a number of unpleasant scenarios. If it all works out I’ll drive 2500 miles to participate in that steak dinner if you don’t mind. On me.
I’ve got a strange feeling Trump will drop out early if it looks like anything other than a coast to the nomination — a final bizarre look-at-me event, with his brand bigger than ever.
I think Rubio is well ahead of rogue governor’s ball. Time will tell by Valentine’s day, by how much.
Where Trump may have a ceiling due to his negatives Rubio has a ceiling with is immigration priorities. He isn’t going to energize the right and bring enthusiastic support it will take to win as long as keeps hammering amnesty.
From your lips to God’s ear. Not that I want his brand bigger, but if his ego requires a final stunt, so be it. Then leave.
You are correct, sometimes my frustration with Trump’s ability to scuttle decades of conservative policy work with empty rhetoric boils over into general expressions of frustration. My having not met them says more about who I socialize with and less about those supportive of Trump.
You don’t think people will not worry about Gang of 8 because he saved us all from Senator Charlie Crist? That’s the most remarkable thing about Rubio, he kept Charlie Crist out of the Senate and may have ended Crist’s career in politics. That was no small feat.
I am a Rubio supporter, but I have noticed that he has an annoying habit of going one sentence too far, in a way that diminishes his point rather than driving it home. Consider, for example, this quote from the last debate:
“We want to be the United States of America?” No kidding? As if we wouldn’t have understood his point just from “We don’t want to be like the rest of the world.”
Wouldn’t the quote have been better if he had said:
Come on, Marco. Start giving your audience some credit. You don’t have to spoon feed us the simple points. Go for some style, instead of simplistic repetition.
That is fine, but then he turned his back on a lot of people that supported him in that effort.
Whether someone prioritizes immigration or not the reality is that it matters in this election and Rubio is on the wrong side.
It’s been a three way race for weeks. Rubio is the most likable of the three and will benefit most as he collects endorsements from the bottom 5 or 6. Cruz, for all his conservatism, independence and courage, has alienated himself. It’s difficult to represent a party you’ve routinely treated with contempt, even if it was for the right reasons. His only ally is Trump, whom he spared the full force of his derision. They may yet merge their efforts. Rubio stands to collect the rest of the party’s support. So Rubio’s viability in great part rests on Trump and Cruz splitting the tea party, working class and evangelical votes leaving Rubio to peal away enough of that support to cobble together a majority from the remainder of the party regulars. Or it could come down to the convention, where Trump and Cruz have not a chance in hell.
An astute analysis–thank you!
Are you referring to the caucus tomorrow? That’s a source of real data? Well it is data, but its utility is problematic.
Too bad Bucky doesn’t live close to me, as I could break his losing streak!
And, I’m so appreciative of the introductory GIF interlude that nobody can irritate me this fine Sunday morning.
Tom, what most excites you about the prospect of a President Donald J. Trump?
I see Kasich get perpetually ignored. He’s just the kind of guy NH voters like, he’s polling well there, and spending all his time on the ground there. He will show better than you think. Then the question is, is he running for president or vice-president? If he’s really running for President he stays in through Ohio/Florida on the 15th. He could prove a perpetual drag on Rubio’s campaign till then.
You give too much weight to Jeb! Yeah he will stay in through FL, but he is polling at 2% in Iowa and behind almost everybody in NH. Jeb! is increasingly seen as a deluded non-candidate by the electorate despite all his ads and money.
It is essentially a three man race, the longer it remains a three man race the more likely Trump is to win.
I don’t know if you missed it, but reports are that Jeb fired the exclamation point.
I think Kasuch is going to fade this week after Iowa clarifies some things and a couple of also rans drop out. Rubio and others will put on the full court press on the ground and I think Kasich withers.
I think Kasich has a respectable NH showing but will not play well outside of NH. The whispered word about Kasish is that if he does not outright win NH he will probably just drop out of the race. All of Kasich’s eggs are in the NH basket, in my view.
My guess is Santorum and Huckabee bow out and in a mini-coup throw their support behind Rubio. I’m guessing in NH Jeb and Christie stay in the 5 to 10% camp Rubio, Cruz and Kasich form a second pack under 20%, with Cruz trending down and Rubio/Kasich trending up, and Trump takes the win at around 30%.
Rubio is trying to play to an inside straight. Impossible to win? No. Unlikely. Very unlikely.
Cruz goes down because Trump pummels him and not Rubio. If (not when) the time comes, Trump pummels Rubio and Rubio goes down.
This is Trump’s to lose and he has a far better grasp of politics than Rubio or Cruz or any of the others.
You think politics is about policy. It’s not. Trump has a far better grasp on what is involved in politics. And he is demonstrating it.
The only ones I can picture really going after Trump long-term would be Ted Cruz and Chris Christie and maybe Carly Fiorina and Rand Paul, but Rubio somewhat like Paul looks like a kid when confronting Donald Trump. People say that the Ted Cruz burned his bridges in Washington, but Rubio really seemed to do this by not running for re-election, so maybe he can dig out some extra motivation. Bob Dole did that during his run for president, but it didn’t work for him.
Sorry for the delay; went to see The Revenant. Crikey!
What excites me the most are two things: he understands the criticality of border control, and he has tossed PC and the political rule book in the gutter. The squatters in DC, of all occupations and party affiliation, are in a panic. Schadenfreude on stilts.
That said, I prefer Cruz.
TOM RIEHL
Your use of German, spot on. Your assessment of Trump’s utility, ditto. Your preference for Cruz is mine as well, but with some doubt as to his national appeal. I recognize the traits and presentation that drive people nuts about him. I have very good friends with whom I am in agreement on about 95-percent of the time. When it comes to Cruz however, they are totally frigid.
Honestly I have no clue where this is headed.
More than plausible, BThompson, and thought through in such compelling detail that I’m sure I’ll be dreaming about it all night tonight. Thanks. I needed this.
Um… So nothing about Trump’s conservatism or his ability to govern well, etc… Sounds like a pretty short-sighted reason to support someone who could do serious long-term damage.
I honestly *still* have no idea who I’m going to caucus for here in Nevada. I don’t know anybody else who does either. We all seem to be waiting to see what happens in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina.
But I know this: his actual beliefs completely aside, Trump seems to have the American people’s number. It may take someone like Trump – a master of media exploitation and news cycle spin – to actually win a presidential election as a Republican in the early 21st Century. And I honestly believe only he and Cruz have the intestinal fortitude to stand up to a year of relentless, brutal personal attacks on themselves and everyone they’ve ever cared about by the Democrats and their allies. Because they are, to be blunt, kind of bastards. Bush, Rubio, and Carson all seem too… nice, you know? Like Romney. A nice guy.
Who was crushed in the general election.
I know this: right now to actually win the presidency you have to want it so bad you can taste it. You have to be willing and able to do and say literally anything to get it. You have to be hungry: and Trump, Cruz, and Clinton all look hungry to me. Nobody else really does.
(Cue to Eye of the Tiger by Survivor)
Ryan, I understand your concern, but the fact is that this year the bar is very low. My choice is definitely Cruz for all the right reasons, but if Trump somehow outlasts his bluster, I’ll happily vote for him in opposition to anybody from the treason party. We must remember that these are primary contests now, not the general. Cruz is the adult in the room, and my hope is that he prevails.