In 1994, Mario Cuomo, governor of New York, was challenged by the Republican George Pataki. As a pro-life Catholic, I found Pataki’s avowed devout Catholicism at odds with his pro-choice stance. I determined that, much as I loathed Mario Cuomo, I could not, would not, pull the lever (how I miss those lever machines) for George Pataki. I knew the election would be close, I knew that I hated what Mario Cuomo stood for with every fiber of my being, but I could not vote for George Pataki, and I voted for the Right to Life candidate that year. (No, I have no idea who that was anymore.)
I was torn — I hoped that Pataki would lose by the margin of the Right to Life vote. I hoped that Cuomo would lose. Both these things were clearly not compatible. Pataki won, and won re-election four years later, and the Right to Life party is no longer on the ballot in New York.
At last, Lindsey Graham 
This won’t be another debate recap post. An army of pundits (Please note: Worst. Army. Ever.) has already dissected last night’s proceedings and the emerging consensus seems about right to me: Carly Fiorina dominated, Marco Rubio and Chris Christie both had some pretty good moments, and Donald Trump’s pilot light kept shutting off. Everyone else was basically treading water. In the undercard debate, Bobby Jindal and Lindsey Graham both looked serviceable, but c’mon — it’s not that big of a deal
The forlorn campaign of
The first GOP debate just wrapped up — not the one with Jeb! and The Donald, but the B-team. These are the seven candidates who didn’t have enough juice in the polls to make the main debate coming at 9 p.m. ET. All of them entered this JV debate hoping to make enough of an impact to enter the top tier the next time around. I wish Fox News had set it up so the winner of this contest immediately reported to the prime time debate, but alas, this is politics, not “Top Chef.”
Now that Scott Walker’s in the race, with John Kasich on tap for next week, the GOP’s 2016 field soon will total 16 presidential candidates. We can rank them, 1-16. Or go by tiers. Or pick names out of a hat. My choice: divide the field into four brackets, four candidates apiece, which I’ve done in
June having dawned, we’re beginning to get a decent sense of what the (enormous) GOP presidential field is going to look like. By my tally, we’re probably going to end up with approximately 15 relatively prominent candidates. That’s four sitting governors — Christie, Kasich, Jindal, and Walker; four former governors — Bush, Huckabee, Pataki, and Perry; four sitting senators — Cruz, Graham, Paul, and Rubio; Santorum, the lone former senator; and the two who’ve never held elected office, Carson and Fiorina. I know everyone’s focused on how you get all these people onto one stage, but I’ve been thinking about another dynamic: there are 14 people in that group who aren’t going to be the Republican nominee. What do they do next? Here are my thoughts for each of these candidates should they fail to win the big prize. Add yours in the comments.
The GOP presidential field continues to swell like Elvis’ waistline in the 1970s. Former New York Governor George Pataki jumped into the fray on Thursday, a day after former Pennsylvania Senator and 2012 contender Rick Santorum