For months, the GOP professional class assumed Trump and Carson would fizzle with time. Voters would get serious, the thinking went, after seeing the outsiders share a stage with more experienced politicians at the first debate. Or when summer turned to fall, kids went back to school and parents had time to assess the candidates. Or after the second, third or fourth debates, certainly.
None of that happened, of course, leaving establishment figures disoriented. Consider Thomas H. Kean Sr., a former New Jersey governor who for most of his 80 years has been a pillar of his party. His phone is ringing daily, bringing a stream of exasperation and confusion from fellow GOP power brokers.
“People usually start off in the same way: Pollyanna-ish,” Kean said. “They assure me that Trump and Carson will eventually fade. Then we’ll talk some more, and I give them a reality check. I’ll say, ‘The guy in the grocery store likes Trump. So does the guy who cuts my hair. They’re probably going to stick with him. Who knows if this ends?’
There is even talking of doing an end-run with Mitt Romney. If it hasn’t worked in the past, why should it work now? Romney has also said no. Why would he want to do that to his family again?
Will people seriously vote in Carson or Trump? I find it difficult to believe that people would vote for either of these candidates. It’s like the two least qualified candidates are beating out those people who seem normal, with plans for leadership. Carson seems to be clueless. Trump is out of touch with reality. For example, he thinks he can round people up to deport them–people who have not committed crimes. Who does this sound like?
I expect more out of the American people. Please explain to me why someone would support or vote for either of these poorly qualified candidates.
If either of those two bozos becomes the nominee, it would be an almost certain sweep for the democrats all over the nation next year. The republicans would almost certainly lose the senate as well as the White House.
People are willing to vote for Carson because he is a decent, good man, unlike the current President or Hillary. And he’s not a socialist like Sanders.
They are willing to vote for Trump because he is saying everything that they want to hear, while ignoring the fact that almost everything he supports comes right out of the Democrat party. People are fed up with the way the government not only allows illegal aliens to stay here, but the way the current administration has invited more, and aided and abetted the invasion. The people want someone that will fight for the interests of Americans. The mainstream GOP is seen as spineless.
I really resent you saying that Obama isn’t a good and decent man. What does it take to be a good and decent man, in your eyes?
Obama is a good father and husband for starters. Hillary is a decent person also.
You might disagree with their politics but that doesn’t mean they aren’t good and decent.
How would you get rid of illegal aliens? I am curious. I also do not believe that the current administration has invited more. Please give me an example since the rate of illegal immigration has declined since Obama took office.
Surely you aren’t speaking of children? You are aware that US law says that the children from noncontiguous countries have to be admitted? We can’t just turn minor children over to another country (Mexico)? You know that unaccompanied Mexican children are not given admission?
I will say that under the Obama administration, students with good grades aren’t being deported. I heartily approve. That isn’t inviting them in. They are already here.
The RNC has learned nothing from 2012.
This debate/campaign season has confirmed one thing to me – the Republican Establishment has created a new definition of low information voter. It has also confirmed to me that all the candidates (D & R) are deeply flawed.
Donald Trump flips belt buckle to mock Ben Carson – CNNPolitics.com
Washington (CNN)Donald Trump on Thursday told Iowa’s voters that those who support Ben Carson are “stupid” to believe the “crap” that is his life story, part of a stunning 95-minute tirade that included his most aggressive attack yet on his closest competitor.
The real estate mogul’s pugnacious demeanor was a stark departure from the far more restrained Trump on display at Tuesday’s debate, when he declined to attack Carson while standing right next to him. He criticized the retired neurosurgeon repeatedly, said Hillary Clinton is playing the “women’s card big league,” ridiculed Marco Rubio as “weak like a baby” and vowed to “bomb the s*** out of (ISIS).”
Toward the end of his wide-ranging complaints about the country and competition, Trump mocked Carson’s narrative about his violent temper as a youth that was calmed only when he prayed to God and asked for deliverance, an event that Carson describes as a miracle. That story of redemption has underpinned much of Carson’s support in the Hawkeye State.
At one point, Trump walked away from the podium and flipped his belt buckle up and down to ridicule what Carson has described as a key event in his life: that Carson, as a boy, once tried but failed to stab someone only to have the knife broken by a belt buckle.
“So I have a belt: Somebody hits me with a belt, it’s going in because the belt moves this way. It moves this way, it moves that way,” Trump told the crowd, which laughed in response. “He hit the belt buckle. Anybody have a knife? Want to try it on me? Believe me, it ain’t gonna work. You’re going to be successful, but he took the knife and went like this and he plunged it into the belt and, amazing, the belt stayed totally flat and the knife broke.”
Moments later, Trump told the crowd in Fort Dodge that he could not possibly understand why anyone supports Carson, who is essentially tied with Trump for support in the first-voting state.
“How stupid are the people of Iowa? How stupid are the people of the country to believe this crap?” he asked.
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/11/12/politics/donald-trump-ben-carson-iowa-belt-stupid/index.html?sr=fbCNN111315donald-trump-ben-carson-iowa-belt-stupid0839AMVODtop
Haha! Can’t disagree.
You may not like what he does but judging a persons character requires a bit of interaction. Unless you are omnipotent. Some people belive they are.
@Moon-howler
“I really resent you saying that Obama isn’t a good and decent man. What does it take to be a good and decent man, in your eyes? ”
Oh…let’s start with not lying to our faces about Obamacare. Then, lets talk about not being dishonest in general whenever he whines on TV. He hasn’t been honest since he “wrote” his book. He’s willing to throw American lives away for no reason at all. See Afghanistan. See Benghazi. Then he lies to cover it up.
He promotes public policies that he knows will harm America and then illegally attempts to push them by executive decision.
I see it very different than you do.
I pretty much think what you described describes George Bush. However, unlike you, I still think he is a good and decent man. I just don’t agree with him.
@Moon-howler
“How would you get rid of illegal aliens? I am curious. I also do not believe that the current administration has invited more. Please give me an example since the rate of illegal immigration has declined since Obama took office.”
“Surely you aren’t speaking of children? You are aware that US law says that the children from noncontiguous countries have to be admitted? We can’t just turn minor children over to another country (Mexico)? You know that unaccompanied Mexican children are not given admission?”
Those “children” have been invited. The illegal aliens coming from Central America have been invited. That is what the immigrants say and what ICE is saying. As for the children….. some of those children are gang members. How did the children get here without adults? Did the small children suddenly become able to cross Mexico on their own? Accompanied? BS.
Illegal immigration has not gone down. They’ve changed the way that they count deportation in order to artificially raise Obama’s “count.”
Actually the children haven’t been invited. That is just wrong minded to say that. So tell me….why would Obama invite central American children and not Mexican children? that’s ridiculous.
Some of the small children came with their mothers, some with older siblings. Some came with coyotes.
Who is this mythological “they?” Deportation is deportation.
You must absolutely make yourself miserable hating Obama. What are you going to do when Hillary wins?
What gets ME is, how the Iowans could sit there and be told
that they are stupid and not boo the jerk out of the building.
He keeps saying that we’re all stupid, yet, he is up in the polls.
Have we really become such saps? Is that the kind of leader we want?
Punchak, I wondered about that myself. I guess they think he means everyone but them.
@Moon-howler
Shouldn’t that be “if” Hillary wins?
When long-time, main-stream Republicans ask me why I think Trump and Carson are doing so well in the polls, I tell them it is a result of “political physics”, action/reaction. We are nearing the end of an experiment in democratic-socialism, with major parts of our economy now under government control. The ranks of the poor have grown, and a tremendous number of US residents are either partially or totally dependent on the government for their subsistence. The most fundamental institutions of our society have either been radically changed, or are threatened. The international stage holds increasing threats.
This is the natural stage for the populist. The question is, will we elect a socialist populist, or a conservative populist.
Hillary Clinton is neither. But, the DNC nomination process is rigged by the whole “super delegate” scheme. Sure, there will be primary contests, and there will be votes, and delegates will be awarded according to the individual state’s primary rules, but this will be as genuine as an election in North Korea.
Let’s push partisanship aside for a moment. Unless the Republicans come forth with a real candidate, I don’t think we need the word “if.” More than 50% of the voters in this country are simply not that dumb.
Let’s not hang the great recession on the Democrats. Many people simple haven’t recovered from the recession.
I am trying to think of some things people “get” under Obama than they did not “get” under George Bush. I am coming up blank.
Dangers in the world? I suppose that depends on where in the world you live. Is our country safer? Maybe about the same. Perhaps the dangers have shifted a little. The biggest problem in this country is that we have a congress that simply will not work with each other.
Moon,
How can you “push partisanship aside” in what is a purely partisan exercise? That’s like saying “let’s push sand aside” when talking about the beach.
Are people dumb enough to vote for Hillary, when she stands a good chance of being indicted for the email scandal? One could make the argument that the Congressional investigation is partisan, but how about the FBI investigation?
Is there anyone on the GOP side who is acceptable to you, and could win the nomination? The only one even remotely acceptable to me on the Dem side has already dropped out.
Yes, a couple are semi acceptable to me as a matter of fact–just not those two.
I doubt that Hillary even comes close to be indicted.
Could you really see yourself voting for Trump?
@Moon-howler
No. I can’t see myself voting for Trump. But I can’t stomach the idea of Sanders, Clinton or O’Malley as president either.
Could you vote for Carson? I just see him as off the grid.
I see those two as people who just are too far off. The rest of the R candidates don’t hit me that way, including Santorum. I couldn’t vote for him because he is too far from my values and political beliefs but I don’t see him as off the grid.