US Elections: My religion Trumps yours

[Fez]

Just now, DanteGabriel said:

So, uh, Ted Cruz just doubled down on last night. He was live, taking questions from some audience, and saying he wouldn't be a servile puppy to Trump after the personal attacks, especially on his wife and father. Sweet Jesus, I am rooting for Ted Cruz -- maybe in the same way that one might have rooted for Wormtongue knifing Saruman, but still. Ted Cruz's singular assholishness has made him a socially useful figure for once in his life.

It is amazing to watch. Truly, Cruz is the villain we deserve. And with all this emphasis on 'Freedom,' I wonder if maybe he's gearing up to endorse Johnson. That'd be an amazing thing to behold.

I had heard a rumor that at least Jeb, and possibly the whole Bush family, was secretly talking with Johnson; but I've seen no proof and I suspect nothing will come of it.

[The BlackBear]

The BBC said that the worst thing you can do in Ted Cruz's eyes is to insult his father, and that after Trump did he was very unlikely to ever back him. I'm not particularly up to speed on this LHO thing, is there any truth to it?

I guess Cruz is hoping that after Trump loses (assuming he does) he'll be seen as the 'sane man', on which he'll launch his campaign. The risk is him being remembered as the Judas who cost Trump the election.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

9 minutes ago, DanteGabriel said:

So, uh, Ted Cruz just doubled down on last night. He was live, taking questions from some audience, and saying he wouldn't be a servile puppy to Trump after the personal attacks, especially on his wife and father. Sweet Jesus, I am rooting for Ted Cruz -- maybe in the same way that one might have rooted for Wormtongue knifing Saruman, but still. Ted Cruz's singular assholishness has made him a socially useful figure for once in his life.

Eh. While this is true, Cruz is also clearly setting himself up for 2020. So even when he takes a principled stand, it's still mainly just self-serving. 

[DanteGabriel]

8 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Eh. While this is true, Cruz is also clearly setting himself up for 2020. So even when he takes a principled stand, it's still mainly just self-serving. 

Of course it is -- he's been staffing up for 2020 for weeks now. Even with that acknowledged, I give him credit for holding out against an unacceptable and dangerous candidate instead of openly toadying, like Christie, or half-assedly signing on in the most transparently self-serving way, like Rubio.

What else astonishes me about this turn of events is that the Trump operation had pretty clear foreknowledge that Cruz wouldn't endorse, and the "vote your conscience" language was in the speech released to the press beforehand, so they just... let all this happen and play out in public. Did they think this public fight in the party would be useful somehow? Or just not care? In any case, even if Trump were a candidate with vanilla GOP policies, like a Mike Pence type, his organizational chaos would be reason enough alone to consider unfit for the office. Imagine Trump handling a meeting with Putin. His staff would let him agree to play rounds of golf with Putin for Baltic republics.

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

3 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

That line induced maximum levels of cringe. 

That said, Ted Cruz is a sucker. He made Trump look like the bigger man. 

I don't know - I have to disagree. Ted Cruz's odious politics aside, I have a tremendous amount of respect for how he's playing the game. I don't think he's ever going to be President, and I have my doubts that he's even going to end up as the Republican nominee in 2020, but there is just no doubt that he is the only person playing the game at 120% of his actual capacity. He has overcome a lot of personal deficiencies in order to put in a strong second place finish to Trump, despite the Republican establishment hating them both. He knows he has to thread a very careful needle if he ever wants to be the nominee, let alone president. He's betting on a spectacular Trump loss at the polls. I think that's a pretty good bet to take right now. He thinks he might be able to swing back in as the savior of the party's conservative principles. A lot has to line up for this to work, and maybe it won't happen, but he knows that this is the only shot he's ever going to get and he's playing hard to set it up. He's NEVER going to become the nominee by waiting his turn because his colleagues hate him and it will never be his turn. He's swinging wide and it might blow up in his face, but I give him a lot of credit for trying. 

[DanteGabriel]

Okay, following up on what the Trump camp was thinking when they let Cruz speak -- looks like they were prepared for it and actually wanted to boo down a show of disloyalty live on TV (and in the process completely overshadow their own VP nominee's speech). Another display of Maximum Leader Lion-Mane's dominance, a ritual challenge and defeat of the Weasel King, even though he had to step on the throat of the White Boar of Indiana to do so!

[Fez]

7 minutes ago, NestorMakhnosLovechild said:

I don't know - I have to disagree. Ted Cruz's odious politics aside, I have a tremendous amount of respect for how he's playing the game. I don't think he's ever going to be President, and I have my doubts that he's even going to end up as the Republican nominee in 2020, but there is just no doubt that he is the only person playing the game at 120% of his actual capacity. He has overcome a lot of personal deficiencies in order to put in a strong second place finish to Trump, despite the Republican establishment hating them both. He knows he has to thread a very careful needle if he ever wants to be the nominee, let alone president. He's betting on a spectacular Trump loss at the polls. I think that's a pretty good bet to take right now. He thinks he might be able to swing back in as the savior of the party's conservative principles. A lot has to line up for this to work, and maybe it won't happen, but he knows that this is the only shot he's ever going to get and he's playing hard to set it up. He's NEVER going to become the nominee by waiting his turn because his colleagues hate him and it will never be his turn. He's swinging wide and it might blow up in his face, but I give him a lot of credit for trying. 

Yep. It also helps that Cruz has the almost unique ability to truly not care who or how many people might hate him, including large portions of his own party. He's fine being booed at and being a persona non grata for the next four months, that's basically standard procedure for him anyway.

[aceluby]

2 hours ago, Rory Snow said:

Not sure I can say it better than Altherion did. But consider this from a pragmatic point of view, Democrat politicians hate Trump, ok that's to be expected, but so do Republican politicians.. why is that? It's certainly not his policies, or because he's rude and unpolished, it's because they, and I absolutely mean both parties here, are riding a gravy train and they don't want it upset. 

This is one of the most ridiculous analysis you've provided yet.  This is like saying Apple shouldn't put their janitor as CEO because obviously the board wants to just 'ride the gravy train', when the most obvious answer is he doesn't have the skills, demeanor, or experience for the job.  Trump is horrendously unqualified and both sides see it.  This is tin-foil hat level of lazy, fit the script I've already created before starting, crap.

[Maithanet]

Conventional wisdom is that day 3 is always about introducing the VP to the country, and doing so in the friendliest way possible.  The 2008 convention allowed Sarah Palin to look like a rock star.  This Cruz thing completely destroyed that, there is virtually no talk about Pence or his speech at all.  Under normal circumstances, that would be bad.

But for Trump, who knows?  Virtually everything he does should be a disaster, but his poll numbers only improve.  He doesn't want a TRUMP-PENCE ticket, and instead is opting for TRUMP-PENCE.

[The guy from the Vale]

Well, we'll see today. I admit I'm fascinated by this Trump-Pence-Cruzkin drama

[Cas Stark]

7 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Conventional wisdom is that day 3 is always about introducing the VP to the country, and doing so in the friendliest way possible.  The 2008 convention allowed Sarah Palin to look like a rock star.  This Cruz thing completely destroyed that, there is virtually no talk about Pence or his speech at all.  Under normal circumstances, that would be bad.

But for Trump, who knows?  Virtually everything he does should be a disaster, but his poll numbers only improve.  He doesn't want a TRUMP-PENCE ticket, and instead is opting for TRUMP-PENCE.

By all conventional wisdom Donald Trump would never have been in contention for the nomination.  He defies conventional wisdom.  It remains to be seen if he can keep doing that or if the reality of campaigning will eventually catch up to him.

[TrackerNeil]

9 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Conventional wisdom is that day 3 is always about introducing the VP to the country, and doing so in the friendliest way possible.  The 2008 convention allowed Sarah Palin to look like a rock star.  This Cruz thing completely destroyed that, there is virtually no talk about Pence or his speech at all.  Under normal circumstances, that would be bad.

But for Trump, who knows?  Virtually everything he does should be a disaster, but his poll numbers only improve.  He doesn't want a TRUMP-PENCE ticket, and instead is opting for TRUMP-PENCE.

Doesn't it seem that every day the convention is disrupted by negative press? Melania's plagiarism, Third Eye Blind's diss, and now Ted Cruz's stab-in-the-back. I wonder if the news media will adopt that narrative, or if they'll find a way to normalize even this.

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

23 minutes ago, Fez said:

Yep. It also helps that Cruz has the almost unique ability to truly not care who or how many people might hate him, including large portions of his own party. He's fine being booed at and being a persona non grata for the next four months, that's basically standard procedure for him anyway.

You could almost see him feeding off all of the boos and jeers he was getting at the end of his speech. He smiled his crocodile smile and didn't miss a beat. That's impressive stuff. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

22 minutes ago, DanteGabriel said:

Of course it is -- he's been staffing up for 2020 for weeks now. Even with that acknowledged, I give him credit for holding out against an unacceptable and dangerous candidate instead of openly toadying, like Christie, or half-assedly signing on in the most transparently self-serving way, like Rubio.

Eh, he held out more so because Trump insulted his wife and father, not for some principled stand against Trump. I believe that Cruz would have endorsed him if Trump had not attacked Cruz's family.

Also, Rubio went maximum chump last night. 

 

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

9 hours ago, Harakiri said:

At the RNC: "Vote your conscience!" is considered an insult to the party's presidential nominee.

Of course and it would be considered an insult and a snub if Sanders showed up at the DNC, was giving a keynote address, refused to endorse Hillary and said "vote your conscience" instead.

Would have meant the same thing and had the same result.  

[Fez]

27 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Eh, he held out more so because Trump insulted his wife and father, not for some principled stand against Trump. I believe that Cruz would have endorsed him if Trump had not attacked Cruz's family.

Also, Rubio went maximum chump last night. 

I don't think so. Cruz has spent his entire career in pursuit of the White House, and has been willing to burn any and all bridges to get there. Because of how disorganized the establishment was this cycle, he very easily could've become the nominee if not for Trump. More than that, I don't think there's any doubt that Cruz truly believes all the far-right and religious far-right stuff he talks about; and that Cruz believes Trump is lying about everything. 

Cruz would hate Trump anyway because Trump got in Cruz's way and because Trump's playing games with the policy 'ideas' that Cruz believes in. The fact that Trump insulted Cruz's wife and father is just icing on the cake.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

47 minutes ago, NestorMakhnosLovechild said:

I don't know - I have to disagree. Ted Cruz's odious politics aside, I have a tremendous amount of respect for how he's playing the game. I don't think he's ever going to be President, and I have my doubts that he's even going to end up as the Republican nominee in 2020, but there is just no doubt that he is the only person playing the game at 120% of his actual capacity. He has overcome a lot of personal deficiencies in order to put in a strong second place finish to Trump, despite the Republican establishment hating them both. He knows he has to thread a very careful needle if he ever wants to be the nominee, let alone president. He's betting on a spectacular Trump loss at the polls. I think that's a pretty good bet to take right now. He thinks he might be able to swing back in as the savior of the party's conservative principles. A lot has to line up for this to work, and maybe it won't happen, but he knows that this is the only shot he's ever going to get and he's playing hard to set it up. He's NEVER going to become the nominee by waiting his turn because his colleagues hate him and it will never be his turn. He's swinging wide and it might blow up in his face, but I give him a lot of credit for trying. 

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I was the one saying back in September or October that Cruz would be the nominee. And he would have probably won had Trump imploded like everyone expected. I don't think he played the game in any special way, he just reflects the most active and energized part of the Republican base. And if he had done nothing (like just not go to the convention) I think he would be in a strong position for 2020, should Trump fail to win.

You're right though in that he's taking a big gamble. And I think he's betting wrong. Imo it's more likely that this election is going to be close rather than a blow out. And if that's the case and Clinton wins by say 2%, Cruz will get a lot of the blame. 

[DunderMifflin]

10 hours ago, White Walker Texas Ranger said:

I saw Kerry speak in person once. He was actually pretty engaging. A camera makes everyone 50% more boring.

Man this is so true. I saw Bill Clinton speak live when he was campaigning for Obama. I lived through 8 years of his presidency thinking he was just some old dork like every other politician.

Seeing him in person I couldn't believe it. He was sooooooo charasmatic I was hypnotized. It was like seeing a rockstar.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

36 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Eh, he held out more so because Trump insulted his wife and father, not for some principled stand against Trump. I believe that Cruz would have endorsed him if Trump had not attacked Cruz's family.

Also, Rubio went maximum chump last night. 

 

No, I don't think so. Cruz is all about self-promotion. So for him taking the big stage as the lone principled Republican was too good an opportunity to pass. Of course it's a reckless gamble, that will more likely backfire for him, than not. 

[Shryke]

51 minutes ago, NestorMakhnosLovechild said:

Of course and it would be considered an insult and a snub if Sanders showed up at the DNC, was giving a keynote address, refused to endorse Hillary and said "vote your conscience" instead.

Would have meant the same thing and had the same result.  

That's why you close the deal before letting them anywhere near that stage. Clinton made sure she had her endorsement in hand and on camera. Trump is just fucking incompetent.