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Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Breitbart is Now Officially Running the GOP's Presidential Campaign

As Josh Barro puts it, how does this make the GOP feel?

https://twitter.com/BruceBartlett/status/765900171792244736

As Bruce Bartlett says, Trump is doing the opposite of conventional wisdom. Rather than pivot to the Center he's pivoting to the Right. In other words he's doubling down on being Donald Trump.

As if he's been restrained lately!

https://twitter.com/BruceBartlett/status/765900171792244736

"Trump's campaign shakeup confirms either that Trump is delusional or that he's trying to destroy GOP."

https://twitter.com/ThePlumLineGS/status/765902657366077451

He still believes in being himself and media dominance.

"The big news of the morning — that Donald Trump ha shaken up his campaign and is doubling down on the narrow strategy that worked in the GOP primaries but is failing catastrophically in the general election — would appear to leave only two possibilities."

"Either Trump is delusional, to the point of being entirely incapable of appreciating why he’s currently losing to Hillary Clinton. Or he has a diabolical plan to break apart the Republican Party and pocket a big chunk of it for himself, for post-election fun and profit. My money is on the former."

"This appears to confirm, as I have argued, that Trump remains trapped in the mental universe he inhabited during the primaries. That was a place where the size of his crowds at rallies actually did portend victories over less colorful and entertaining opponents who failed to create a mystique to rival his. It was a place where he really could win through sheer media dominance alone, because the bigotry, xenophobia, and all around depravity and wretchedness that drove that dominance — and with it, the name recognition that allowed him to blot out his rivals — did not alienate large numbers of Republican voters in the manner he is currently repulsing key general election constituencies. Trump now appears determined to prove that the same formula — which basically constitutes whipping up white backlash through rousing rallies and a continued emphasis on ethno-nationalism (leavened a bit by pretend minority outreach gestures) — can work in the general."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/08/17/trump-is-entirely-delusional-about-why-hes-losing-his-new-campaign-shakeup-proves-it/?utm_term=.0272360fea0a

Meanwhile, Trump critics scoff at the latest reshuffle:

"This appears to confirm, as I have argued, that Trump remains trapped in the mental universe he inhabited during the primaries. That was a place where the size of his crowds at rallies actually did portend victories over less colorful and entertaining opponents who failed to create a mystique to rival his. It was a place where he really could win through sheer media dominance alone, because the bigotry, xenophobia, and all around depravity and wretchedness that drove that dominance — and with it, the name recognition that allowed him to blot out his rivals — did not alienate large numbers of Republican voters in the manner he is currently repulsing key general election constituencies. Trump now appears determined to prove that the same formula — which basically constitutes whipping up white backlash through rousing rallies and a continued emphasis on ethno-nationalism (leavened a bit by pretend minority outreach gestures) — can work in the general."

"Donald Trump’s critics on both sides of the aisle scoffed at the shakeup of his top aides, arguing the Manhattan businessman needs to take a long, hard look in the mirror to figure out the root cause of his woes."

"Noted Never Trump critic Bill Kristol mocked the notion that Trump's gambit would pay off in the long run."

"I don’t think it matters because the problem is Donald Trump," the Weekly Standard editor told MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "You know, his unfavorable rating has been consistently too high to win a presidential election. Hillary Clinton’s, you would normally say is too high, but it’s about 10 points lower than Trump’s."

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/trump-campaign-reshuffle-reaction-227105#ixzz4Hb27AEz2

As for Hillary's less than stellar numbers, it's amazing how much those are driven by that book Clinton Cash-which Steve Bannon had a lot to do with.

"As befits someone with his peripatetic background, Bannon is a kind of Jekyll-and-Hyde figure in the complicated ecosystem of the right—he's two things at once. And he’s devised a method to influence politics that marries the old-style attack journalism of Breitbart.com, which helped drive out Boehner, with a more sophisticated approach, conducted through the nonprofit Government Accountability Institute, that builds rigorous, fact-based indictments against major politicians, then partners with mainstream media outlets conservatives typically despise to disseminate those findings to the broadest audience. The biggest product of this system is the project Bannon was so excited about at CPAC: the bestselling investigative book, written by GAI’s president, Peter Schweizer, Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich. Published in May by HarperCollins, the book dominated the political landscape for weeks and probably did more to shape public perception of Hillary Clinton than any of the barbs from her Republican detractors."

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/graphics/2015-steve-bannon/

That was really the only successful thing the GOP did this whole election cycle but it's not nearly enough. And her numbers have risen since the conventions.
Ezra Klein makes an interesting argument: part of why the media is so negative about Trump whereas it normally goes false equivalence is that 'both sides hate Trump'-most GOPers can't stand him either-Klein reveals this is true even of some leading GOPers who have publicly endorsed him.

"Both sides do it (where "it" = bash Trump)."

"There is an idealistic and a cynical reason for automatic equivalence in political reporting. The idealistic reason is that the press isn’t supposed to take a side because the audience needs the news delivered by institutions that will always, no matter what, deliver both sides — and who is the press to choose which side is right, anyway?"

"The cynical reason is that members of the political press need to report among elites from both political parties, and equivalence-based reporting ensures that you don’t lose too much access on either side, and that’s the real game — making sure both parties are willing to talk to you and members of both parties will subscribe to you. Both are true."

"But Trump short-circuits all that. You can criticize him sharply and be applauded, both publicly and privately, by senior Republican figures. The most despairing, hysterical commentary I’ve heard about Trump this cycle has been from Republicans speaking off the record — including Republicans who have endorsed Trump! In this way, the "evenhanded" view of Trump that emerges from traditional reporting is that he’s a dangerous maniac — Democrats say it, and so too do many top Republicans."

"A quick story. Back during the primaries, I published a piece — and recorded a video — calling Donald Trump’s rise a terrifying moment in American politics. The analysis was unsparing."

"Trump is the most dangerous major candidate for president in memory," I wrote. "He pairs terrible ideas with an alarming temperament; he's a racist, a sexist, and a demagogue, but he's also a narcissist, a bully, and a dilettante. He lies so constantly and so fluently that it's hard to know if he even realizes he's lying."

"After the piece published, I got a call from a very conservative Republican member of Congress. He wanted to talk about the article, his office said. I figured he’d be angry. Instead, he congratulated me for speaking out."

"That member of Congress, by the way, has now endorsed Trump."

http://www.vox.com/2016/8/16/12484644/media-donald-trump

1 comment:

  1. Good piece on the Alt-Right = Alt-Reich: racism, bigotry, white nationalism, white supremacy, segregationism and anti-Semitism normalized:
    http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/08/17/alt-right-rejoices-at-trump-s-steve-bannon-hire.html

    ReplyDelete