Is Trump in Trouble With Conservatives Over His Attacks on Cruz?

It seems that Trump is again falling a foul of a number of conservative talk show hosts, movement types etc.

Rush has no problem with Trump criticizing Cruz-he gets it's a campaign. But he says that Trump is criticizing him the way a Democrat would.

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2016/01/18/trump_is_making_a_strategic_mistake_in_the_way_he_s_going_after_cruz

He says that Cruz is not a nasty guy and this could hurt Trump. He talks about how Trump got booed by his own audience on Saturday for going off on Cruz. It didn't stop him, he doubled down.

He also seems to think that Cruz's attack on 'New York values' is legitimate. So he seems to be taking Cruz's side though not as stridently as Mark Levin and other movement conservatives.

But Rush also noted that Trump's base is not just conservatives-he has a number of other supporters too.

"Now, there are some conservatives in the crowd in Myrtle Beach; there are conservatives in Trump's coalition, of course. And they are conservatives and supporting Trump for specific reasons. Among them, Trump is fighting back against what they perceive to be a common enemy, and that's Washington, the establishment, the people who are working and looking out for themselves and not the rest of the country. But Trump's coalition is 20% Democrat, maybe more."

"There are a lot of Hispanics. There are a lot of African-Americans. There are a lot of women. People who are traditionally not thought of in the Republican coalition. So Trump's cross-section of people is pretty diverse, but it's not uniformly conservative. So when you say NBC reporting on Trump being booed, they think it's big news inside conservatism, but it's not. To those of us who are conservative and know the movement and know people in it, we've long been aware that there are conservatives that do not like Trump and some stridently do not like Trump."

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2016/01/18/trump_is_making_a_strategic_mistake_in_the_way_he_s_going_after_cruz

Rush admits that he doesn't know for sure if Trump's tactics will hurt him-that Trump knows his own base better than Rush does. This is why Rush's analysis of this is pretty good. He doesn't pretend that Trump is a conservative or is simply imitating himself or something.

So Trump's base is a little more diverse-I'm not sure that he's getting so many African-Americans as Rush implies. I'm not sure about the 20 percent Democrat number; though I do agree he appeals to a certain kind of Democrat: basically, he appeals to Dixiecrats.

The kind who supported George Wallace, etc.

For this reason his Cruz attacks may not hurt him as much as you'd think listening to some conservatives.

Rush does touch on something that's accurate: why Cruz rubs a lot of people the wrong way.

"And whether or not it's gonna hurt Trump, it isn't going to help. Or, wait. Could it? Could it, actually? You might have to consider something that's unthinkable. Do not discount it. I mean, do not discount the possibility that all that you've heard about how unliked Cruz is... I mean, it is real. It is baffles me. I have to say, it baffles me. I've met Cruz a couple, three times. The criticism I hear most often about Cruz is that he doesn't seem natural, seems like he's just constantly... What's the word? Earnest all the time."

"He just never seems relaxed, doesn't seem casual, ever. And it unnerves people. I think what that is is Cruz is just so smart, and he knows exactly who he is and what he thinks and is proud of it. And he knows the kind of attacks that conservatives get and have always received. And he knows that moderating his behavior to please contradicts does not mollify contradicts. You can't change who unresponsive and the way you act and have people who criticize you all of a sudden like you, particularly if they're liberals or Democrats or members of the Republican establishment."

"He's just decided he's gonna be who he is. I just think it unnerves people, like it unnerves people whenever you encounter somebody that's so damn sure of themselves. "That's just not possible. Nobody could be that certain of everything." It's not natural people, it's not natural to be that sure of yourself, not natural think you've got all the answers. And they end up getting offended or feeling some other insecurity or what have you. "

I think that people think Cruz's earnest poise is a poise-but I actually think there's something to the argument that it's not a poise: he's a True Believer.

Rush also touched on an interesting dynamic we've seen lately. The GOP Establishment is beginning to think that given a chance between Cruz and Trump, it may be that it's Trump who is the lesser of the two evils.

"They think they can peacefully coexist with Trump because they can moderate Trump or make deals with him that are not ideological in nature. But they know, they are fairly certain, that Cruz is not gonna compromise what he believes in order to strike deals or have peaceful relations with 'em, to have a relationship. That scares them."

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2016/01/18/the_establishment_sidles_up_to_trump

"That makes sense actually. This is the point I've made with Tom. I'll take the egotistical opportunist over the True Believer any day of the week and twice on Sunday. But this applies to Bernie as well who is a kind of Ted Cruz of the Left."

The idea that Trump might be preferable to the Establishment over Cruz is gaining wide currency and is discussed in this National Review piece.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/429952/ted-cruz-donald-trump-gop-establishment-prefers-trump

P.S. So what is Trump hurting himself? I don't know. I mean I agree there are risks in the strategy. Limbaugh-and more forcefully-Mark Levin is telling him to 'cut the crap.'

It can't ever be a good sign if your own audience starts to boo you. But then as we noted above, Trump's base doesn't' wholly correlate with Cruz's movement conservative base so he may not pay such a price.

And at the end of the day, so far we've seen Cruz's numbers, not Trump's come back to earth when he started the birther rap.