I see it as protecting the country more than protecting the party. Trump might have the least damaging effect on the down ballot elections. He will certainly bring in more people into the party.

Just say d'oh!

It's just another of the endless places where ikes just wants something to be true and will die on the hill trying to argue it. He's just seething mad at Trump and probably also rustled he's about to get banned and so is desperate to convince whoever, maybe himself, that the brokered convention/Mitt Romney scenarios that are playing out in the fantasies in his head could really come true. Guy never learns.

I'm not sure how many times I would have to repeat the context in which I said they'd go for a random third person for you to get it, but I don't feel like doing it again.

I think the Kansas and especially the LA results last night have to be very disquieting to Trump. While there was very little polling in KS NOBODY predicted Cruz wafflecrushing.

LA has 3 polls within 4 days of the voting. The RCP average of those polls had Trump + 15.6% and all 3 were coinciding in a very tight range. Trump under performed those polls by 12% with Cruz picking up 10.1 of those points, Rubio 2.5% and Kasich lost half a point.

The negative bombardment of Trump may be having an effect and Cruz seems the biggest recipient so far.

And for the first time today in South Florida, Trump is up on the air with ads.

Dems had very little chance in 08 of a brokered convention because that should require 3 or more candidates with some delegates.

I think there's some chance the party elites convince the delegates that (Not Trump or Cruz) is the best chance to defeat Hillary because that's the main goal.

I mean, when I was looking at the state of things, I figured Trump would go about 3/4, losing KS to Cruz, precisely because Cruz won OK and KS isn't that different. I think losing ME was the far greater surprise, given how well Trump has done in New England and that he had the endorsement of ME's governor.

Sure, but on the flipside, as little as like 3 months ago, Cruz was supposed to have every southern operative and the total Confederacy from Texas to Virginia on complete lockdown. Trump was just trying to win NH and survive to March 15 when the contests moved to much friendly territory for Trump.

Well, we're almost at March 15th and the long game, meta stuff has Trump way overpreforming expectations in those places. I predicted Trump would preform well in the South but thought Cruz would win most of the states there. That Cruz rallied in LA and KS is impressive, it probably is disquieting for Trump -- but those are places absolutely favorable to Cruz.

If Cruz rallies like that in OH/FL/NY/PA/IL he might be in business. But that's tougher to see Cruz picking up the scraps from Rubio's corpse in those places. Trump will probably do better with late deciders there since it's less evangelical and the GOP there are probably more just normal racist types and not especially ideologically conservative. Also most of them are open primaries and not caucuses. All of this is Trump's bread and butter. And since those are all winner-take-all IIRC -- rallying to close 2nd place finishes won't count for much in the end.

With Carson dropping out and Rubio falling apart, I think Cruz has a shot. The press is already anointing him as the anti-Trump and this is a self-fulfilling prophecy. A lot of polling done so far was with anti-Trump votes being split between Rubio and others. A lot of people were voting for Rubio not because they cared about him but because he was the presumed anti-Trump at least according to the media. Cruz has begun to shift this narrative.

I don't even think this is about the popular will or the good of the party per se at this point but something more like a Keynesian beauty contest. Whatever power the party has is divided among tons and tons of people, most of whom are incentivized to back a winner and it's hard to create enough momentum behind one specific candidate out of many plausible options and convince everyone that this is whom everyone else will back. Whoever goes in there with lots of delegates has a good story as to not just why he should win but why he will. And that matters and once you sell the story to enough people, it's easy to convince the rest that everyone else already backed him, so you should to.

I think people ITT are giving party elites too much credit.


It has been obvious for years they don't GAF what the voters want. They get votes based on abortion, guns, racism, and small government argle bargle then deliver corporate welfare and tax cuts for billionaires.


It's been more than 35 years since the elites didn't get the nominee they wanted. Which means the current grandees have ALWAYS gotten their way. I see no evidence they won't at least try this time.



The bigwigs are definitely tone deaf enough to ignore the will of the voters and still expect them to fall in line. Look at them trotting out RMoney. No one with any clue about the average voter would have tried that lame ass gambit.

Looks to me that trotting out Romney may have worked. Cruz's over performance came at the expense of Rubio. Could be Rubio weakness or tactical shifting by Rubio supporters.

ME's governor just talked about the blacks coming up to Maine to deal drugs and have sex with the white girls, in those exact words, and has an approval rating on par with that. I mean, sure, Maine GOP so maybe that's not a huge negative with the party, but losing Maine wasn't a massive stretch.

Lousiana being that close, definitely. But Cruz won't be the guy to claim these votes east of the Mississippi. If Kasich is there he'll do that but then he's a convention threat. If Cruz is HU with Trump he's going to get murdered in states worth another 300 delegates. And California's also no lock. Actually I'm gonna love to see an HU Trump vs. Cruz poll in Cali around late April after we get a month of hot Cruz takedowns and everyone understands exactly what kind of monstrosity the GOP gave birth to. It'll be great.

The value of the trump brand is two tiered. As far as recognizability goes it's definitely at an all time high. In terms of the air of prestige and credibility goes though, i think a reasonable case could be made that it's gone downhill. With all of the dirt from his past coming up and showing his general lack of integrity how are people in the market for condos worth 10s of millions perceive the value of his association? I don't know how heavily invested he is in the high end real estate market but the impact that this election will have had on his ability to leverage his name as a mark of prestige is questionable.


If he wanted to become a regular media figure there's no doubt he'd command the ratings to warrant a huge salary. Whether he actually fully capitalizes on his celebrity appeal is hard to say. He seems to be working harder for this election than he has his entire life, and he still can't be bothered to research the issues he's taking strong positions on.


In related news,

Lines have trump at 3:1 or worse across the board.
Cruz is now hovering around 12:1
Rubio 25:1


Or in terms of the republican nomination
Trump 1:2
Cruz 3:1
Rubio 12:1

Seems like that would be a boost to ME Trump voters.

Don't forget that Cruz is somehow the most broadly acceptable candidate in the field:

http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/poll-trum...hoice-cruz-top

Strategic voters have nowhere else to go and additional Trump gaffes are probably hurting him among those who have him as second/third choice, even as the core support holds strong.

While I think there is something to this it is a bit too simplistic a view IMO. Parties as big as the Dems and GOP are necessarily collections and coalitions of interests. For some faction of the party--even the "establishment"--the social issues ARE the most important. And for the people for whom billionaire tax relief and corporate welfare are most important, it is not entirely clear that going off the board and saying FU to trump and Cruz is the right play.

Yeah the biggest downside to some third candidate is that the base has railed against McCain and Romney for being too moderate and that's why they lost.

I still think there's a chance the party structure and media rallies around a moderate candidate as the last ditch effort to keep Hillary out of the White House, which will be an abject disaster because... Reasons.

Making fun of POWs
Making fun of the disabled
Making fun of Megyn Kelly's period
Advocating for the murder of innocent civilians
Advocating for the use of torture way worse than waterboarding


And talking about his dick ends up being just too much for some GOP voters

Donald Trump
68 %
Ted Cruz
17 %
John Kasich
8 %
Marco Rubio
3 %

just sad. poor lil feller never hurt nobody

TRUMP never made fun of Megyn's period, what are you some sort of deviant?

Vote-stealing scandal incoming.

Trump supporters are not really the typical GOP voters. I do not buy the argument the GOP should give consideration to the fascist populism that Trump is pushing just because it will piss off some non-typical GOP voters.

Popular will is as compelling an argument as just following orders.

I think the GOP needs to emphatically renounce Trump and tell his supporters they need to find a new party to align with as they are no longer represented by the GOP.

Yeah you guys are all on the same page as me: after last night it's time to start thinking seriously about a contested convention. How many qualitatively different scenarios are we talking about?

1) TRUMP is clearly the will of the voters but doesn't have a majority (e.g. TRUMP/Cruz/Other are 45/25/20)
2) TRUMP and cruz with no clear rival (40/38/22)
3) TRUMP and cruz one other viable (35/35/25/5 for trump/cruz/otherviable/therest.

Anything else?