It seems that they have their theory-this is not how primaries, work; the party decides its candidate, Trump has absolutely zero support from party insiders so he can't win.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/donald-trump-is-doomed-andor-invincible/
I grant them this is usually true. What I hold against them is they are refusing to admit that this primary so far has been different in any way. I mean they sound like RBCers in economics. No matter what the empirical data shows they just come back to 'Well, theory says the RNC decides, so no matter what the polls look like, Trump can't win.'
Listen, I admit it is hard to imagine Trump winning. But then I think about Jeb winning which seems just as hard if not harder and Rubio doesn't seem that easy to imagine either.
But then Nate and his buddies claim that Trump hasn't gone through the scrutiny stage which is just absurd. Early it was easy to blame the media, but since the second debate, the media got much more negative towards him and it hasn't changed much.
The claim that the voters aren't paying attention is wishful thinking. When before Iowa are they going to start paying attention? Thanksgiving? Christmas? The NFL playoffs? The Super Bowl? If they aren't paying attention yet, how come Carly Fiorina went through discovery, scrutiny, and decline in a couple of weeks?
Rick Perry did the same thing in October last year followed by Herman Cain. To claim that it's too early for scrutiny is absurd. By this time last year the process had weeded out Perry and was close to weeding out Herman Cain.
My theory is that yes, normally, it's true you need the party insiders behind you, but the GOP is not a normal party anymore. Whether you're looking at the Presidential race, or the fact that the GOP can't even elect a Speaker. This is a party where the institutional establishment is wholly vilified by the base and has less power all the time.
The GOP is slouching towards pure anarchy and this is why this time may really be different.
Compare Silver with what Steve Schmidt, long term GOP insider says:
“Trump has sustained a lead for longer than there are days left” before voting begins in Iowa, says Steve Schmidt, who managed John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign. “For a long time,” Schmidt says, “you were talking to people in Washington, and there was a belief that there was an expiration date to this, as if there’s some secret group of people who have the ability to control the process.”
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/10/gop-establishment-thinks-unthinkable.html
Thank you. If the establishment is going to take control of this thing, there isn't so much time left to do so until Iowa. New polls today show Trump leading Carson by six in Iowa and 14 in NH. Nate Silver sounds like he believes in this secret group of people in a room somewhere who at the last minute will save the day.
When does Jeb or Rubio take control? Listen to Pat Buchanan, the unreconstructed Paleo Conservative, game it out:
"Trump is leading Carson in Iowa, running first in New Hampshire, crushing the field in Nevada and South Carolina. These are the first four contests. In Florida, Trump’s support exceeds that of ex-Governor Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio combined.
If these polls don’t turn around, big time, Trump is the nominee.
And with Thanksgiving a month off, then the Christmas season, New Year’s, college football playoffs and NFL playoffs, the interest of the nation will drift away, again and again, from politics.
Voting begins Feb. 1 in Iowa. Super Bowl Sunday is Feb. 7. And the New Hampshire primary will likely be on Tuesday, Feb. 9.
We are only three months out, and Trump still holds the high cards."
http://buchanan.org/blog/can-trump-be-stopped-124186
Buchanan's point is well-taken. There really is not a lot of time to straighten this out by Nate Silver's secret group of people. Indeed, as Chris Cilliza documents, Jeb's people are beginning to sound like the Ron Paul 2012 campaign-not exactly where he wants to be.
They are saying since most GOP primaries aren't winner takes all anymore. Jeb can maybe amass the delegates while not winning any primary!
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/10/20/jeb-bushs-allies-are-starting-to-sound-like-ron-pauls-in-2012-thats-not-a-good-sign/
If Jeb's campaign plan is for him to lose NH, Iowa, South Carolina, and Nevada and still having a clear path to victory after that, then Houston we have a problem.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/donald-trump-is-doomed-andor-invincible/
I grant them this is usually true. What I hold against them is they are refusing to admit that this primary so far has been different in any way. I mean they sound like RBCers in economics. No matter what the empirical data shows they just come back to 'Well, theory says the RNC decides, so no matter what the polls look like, Trump can't win.'
Listen, I admit it is hard to imagine Trump winning. But then I think about Jeb winning which seems just as hard if not harder and Rubio doesn't seem that easy to imagine either.
But then Nate and his buddies claim that Trump hasn't gone through the scrutiny stage which is just absurd. Early it was easy to blame the media, but since the second debate, the media got much more negative towards him and it hasn't changed much.
The claim that the voters aren't paying attention is wishful thinking. When before Iowa are they going to start paying attention? Thanksgiving? Christmas? The NFL playoffs? The Super Bowl? If they aren't paying attention yet, how come Carly Fiorina went through discovery, scrutiny, and decline in a couple of weeks?
Rick Perry did the same thing in October last year followed by Herman Cain. To claim that it's too early for scrutiny is absurd. By this time last year the process had weeded out Perry and was close to weeding out Herman Cain.
My theory is that yes, normally, it's true you need the party insiders behind you, but the GOP is not a normal party anymore. Whether you're looking at the Presidential race, or the fact that the GOP can't even elect a Speaker. This is a party where the institutional establishment is wholly vilified by the base and has less power all the time.
The GOP is slouching towards pure anarchy and this is why this time may really be different.
Compare Silver with what Steve Schmidt, long term GOP insider says:
“Trump has sustained a lead for longer than there are days left” before voting begins in Iowa, says Steve Schmidt, who managed John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign. “For a long time,” Schmidt says, “you were talking to people in Washington, and there was a belief that there was an expiration date to this, as if there’s some secret group of people who have the ability to control the process.”
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/10/gop-establishment-thinks-unthinkable.html
Thank you. If the establishment is going to take control of this thing, there isn't so much time left to do so until Iowa. New polls today show Trump leading Carson by six in Iowa and 14 in NH. Nate Silver sounds like he believes in this secret group of people in a room somewhere who at the last minute will save the day.
When does Jeb or Rubio take control? Listen to Pat Buchanan, the unreconstructed Paleo Conservative, game it out:
"Trump is leading Carson in Iowa, running first in New Hampshire, crushing the field in Nevada and South Carolina. These are the first four contests. In Florida, Trump’s support exceeds that of ex-Governor Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio combined.
If these polls don’t turn around, big time, Trump is the nominee.
And with Thanksgiving a month off, then the Christmas season, New Year’s, college football playoffs and NFL playoffs, the interest of the nation will drift away, again and again, from politics.
Voting begins Feb. 1 in Iowa. Super Bowl Sunday is Feb. 7. And the New Hampshire primary will likely be on Tuesday, Feb. 9.
We are only three months out, and Trump still holds the high cards."
http://buchanan.org/blog/can-trump-be-stopped-124186
Buchanan's point is well-taken. There really is not a lot of time to straighten this out by Nate Silver's secret group of people. Indeed, as Chris Cilliza documents, Jeb's people are beginning to sound like the Ron Paul 2012 campaign-not exactly where he wants to be.
They are saying since most GOP primaries aren't winner takes all anymore. Jeb can maybe amass the delegates while not winning any primary!
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/10/20/jeb-bushs-allies-are-starting-to-sound-like-ron-pauls-in-2012-thats-not-a-good-sign/
If Jeb's campaign plan is for him to lose NH, Iowa, South Carolina, and Nevada and still having a clear path to victory after that, then Houston we have a problem.
I wouldn't write off Nate.
ReplyDeleteIt's not a question of writing him off just that I think his analysis here is just silly. Trump has no scrutiny yet? Fiorina already did. By this time last year, We had seen the discovery, scrutiny, and decline of Rick Perry and Herman Cain.
ReplyDeleteYet Nate claims voters aren't paying attention yet? Well considering that Iowa is in early Feb, when do they start?
This is late Oct. We have Thanksgiving, XMAS, New Years, NFL playoffs and the Super Bowl coming up. When is this magic moment they start paying attention?
It seems to me that he's just sticking to his theory that the establishment is invincible regardless the facts.
Yet if ever there were a moment that it really is different it may be this year's GOP. Whether we look at the Speaker race or the Presidential race.
My take is that Nate hasn't admitted to himself that this is no longer a normal party. This is why he was dead wrong about Scott Walker.
ReplyDeleteMike, you might enjoy this RedState post as much as I did:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.redstate.com/2015/10/21/donald-trump-becomes-blatant-911-truther/
I especially savored the comments. This makes me want to cheer Trump on. Do you sense any love for Jeb in there? I don't. Yet it's physically painful for them that their frontrunner (Trump) is making statements like this about 9/11 and Iraq. Meanwhile they'll have to hear Coulter, Ingraham, Levin, and Breitbart cheer lead for the object of their scorn.... and they'll have to watch ad campaigns from the Club for Growth boost the prospects of the other objects of their scorn (the establishment). Trump is the bull in the china shop and hopefully when he's done he'll have split the GOP into as many mutually loathing tiny shards as possible. (I love for example that Coulter has recently attacked Catholics: there was a time in the US when no candidates talked much about their religion because the Baptists hated the Catholics who hated the Lutherans, etc... I'd like to see a return to those days). Their resentment and dejection is almost as much fun to read about as the panic amongst the GOP establishment. The more fragmented the GOP the less likely it is they'll pick a candidate that any of them like. We want a dejected, uninspired GOP electorate by November 2016, and I catch a hint of that in the air here.
My favorite quote:
"If, a few months ago, you had told me that a statement by the leader of the GOP presidential primary accusing President Bush of knowing in advance of 9/11 would be made on a major (well, sorta, it was CNN) television network and it would NOT be front page news I would have though you to be a lunatic. But there we are."