Forget Trump. Paul Ryan is the likely GOP nominee "... Here's why: First, a truly brokered — or open — convention is not really what's happening when you have one candidate very close to the needed delegate count with several others very much behind. That's simply a situation where a few deals need to be made to bring about an inevitable coronation. The best example of a convention like that was the 1976 Republican confab, where President Ford was able to use an appeal for party unity to win Ronald Reagan's support and secure the nomination. It helped that Ford had a strong delegate lead and there was never enough rancor between the two candidates to make joining forces impossible..." http://www.cnbc.com/2016/04/05/forget-trump-paul-ryan-is-the-likely-gop-nominee-commentary.html
It will be the end of the republican party if they force this loser on us. As I cited in another thread, he is a passionate open borders/amnesty advocate, fully supports the neo-con endless war policy, wants to cut popular middle class entitlements and use the money to pay for benefits for welfare leeches and immigrants. The Trump and Cruz delegates will have the ability to vote on convention rules. They can make it impossible for someone to get nominated who has not won primaries. The current Rule 30 was adopted by Romney delegates and requires that a candidate has to have wo a majority of delegates in at least 8 states to be put into nomination. Only Trump and Cruz would make that cut. There is some confusion about whether the rule would bar the nomination of someone after the first two ballots, when most of the delegates would have been released. I suppose it is always possible that they could change the rules during the convention as well. I have changed my mind about this. I thought it looked like they would try to steal it, but I now think they realize it will be difficult to do that against a unified Trump/Cruz front, and the most likely result would be a bloodbath all up and down the ticket.
at this point I am losing confidence for a future as dems are rightly gaining it. I am not sure Trump can hold it together long enough to beat a democrat. He really messed it up last week. And I am not sure he is going to do what he says because I am not sure what he really believes. I have no doubt he would better than Ryan or these establishment sellouts... but is he really going to seal the border? I suspect Cruz has skeletons so I wonder if he could beat a democrat. Any of these other possible choices except Ron Paul are probably going to be establishment open borders losers from the get go. Hillary is going to jail. They won't let Bernie be the nominee.
The best article I have seen on the subject. If people think there is anger now, wait until the next presidential election. The blood is rushing to people's head each and every day that this game continues. The primaries are rigged "America is in the midst of a brutally honest primary season that lays bare what the elites of both parties think of their members — and of the country at large. Because honesty and political process are odd bedfellows, we are likely witnessing the last few primaries as we know them. By 2020, the system will likely reflect either the will of party leaders or the will of party members, with little pretense of trying to serve both. Getty Images Voters cast their ballots at the polling place at Fairfax Circle Baptist Church during Super Tuesday voting March 1, 2016 in Fairfax, United States. The Democrats designed a top-down system to provide an illusion of inclusiveness while maintaining the power of the party elite. The Democratic National Committee mandated that each state allocate its delegates proportionally among candidates who receive at least 15 percent of the votes. It also, however, designated roughly 15 percent of its total delegates as "superdelegates," party stalwarts who place a thumb on the scale in favor of establishment candidates. This structure mimics the Democrats' approach to governance. As a coalition of the nation's super-elite, wealthy, professional classes and the nation's poorest, least educated classes, Democratic governance typically promotes elite opinion allegedly "for the good of" the poor, though with the curious side effect of perpetuating and exacerbating poverty while locking in elite power. Many, but not all, Democrats prefer to keep this elitism quiet. Cass Sunstein, former head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Obama White House, wrote an entire book advocating regulations that "nudge" people to alter their behavior "for their own good." Trump’s real problem? Math Unfortunately for the DNC, their superdelegates are proving decisive in Hillary Clinton's inevitable nomination. While the Democratic elite is likely to prevail, its detached paternalism is not sitting well with disenfranchised progressives who are "feeling the Bern." The superdelegates are thus revealing truths that the DNC would far prefer to keep quiet. The Republicans look even worse. The Republican National Committee's decentralized system allows each state party to write distinct delegate allocation rules. While the RNC reserved no superdelegates, it preserved significant elite power in the form of intricate and complex convention rules. Should no candidate secure a majority on the first ballot — an outcome that appears increasingly likely — only those capable of navigating the complexity can possibly succeed. Forget Trump. Paul Ryan is the likely GOP nominee This approach is characteristic of Republican governance — though again, inconsistent with the party's self-image. Republicans often talk a good game about decentralized authority but rarely simplify government; the Code of Federal Regulations grew by nearly 20,000 pages (about 14 percent) during the Bush years. Republicans primaries suffer from the same incoherence and inconsistency as our overly complicated regulatory codes: Their goals are vague and their methods embody no theory capable of reasonable resolution. The designers of both primary systems seem unaware that primaries are not classic American elections to fill an office; their purpose is to select a slate of delegates who then function as part of a large nominating committee. If anything, they are far closer to Parliamentary elections than to the winner-take-all-systems to which Americans are accustomed. Yet America's political elite has created the illusion of democracy to serve the not-necessarily-democratic goal of selecting convention delegates and party nominees. Why Hillary needs to crack down on Wall Street The Democrats erred by holding elections in which establishment and upstart candidates compete on unequal terms — a likely sore point among Democratic voters still seething over losing an election despite winning the popular vote sixteen years ago. The Republicans failed to note that when electing a slate rather than an individual, winner-takes-all makes little sense. A state allocating 100 delegates after a 60-40 race should split its convention slate 60-40, not 100-0. There is an entire economic field devoted to the study of voting systems. The current Republican primary system violates all of its key findings. Finally, primaries "open" to independents and members of the opposing party make no sense. The national Democratic and Republican parties are coalitions of factions and interest groups oriented around competing views of the world, society, and governance. Those leading the coalitions are right to seek candidates who reflect those views. A nomination process that party stalwarts dominate, a series of state conventions, or a closed proportional primary in which only pre-registered party members vote, would all serve that goal. Primaries open to non-members, winner-take-all votes, or systems designed to look open while actually remaining closed are prescriptions for disaster. American voters — Democrats and Republicans alike — are experiencing that disaster. Because "disaster" is the only fair way to describe a system capable of elevating candidates as widely disliked as Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump to positions of dominance..." http://www.cnbc.com/2016/04/08/the-primaries-are-rigged-commentary.html
Great article, up until the last sentence. Trump has garnered far more votes than any other candidate and has demonstrably brought in a large number of people who would otherwise never vote republican.
Dude, seriously? Do you just read what is on ET? Everyone that votes for either Hilary or Trump admits at the exit polls they don't particularly like either of them, but they just hold their nose and hope for the best. Even the people that come on the corrupt corporate media that support Trump say that he says at least one thing a day that makes them cringe. Very very few people that voted for the Bern say that about him, and very likely John Kasich. Ted Cruz is probably somewhere in the middle.
Tell that to my friend who showed up at my band's gig wearing his "Let's Make America Great Again" hat. I have run into numerous people who are enthusiastically supporting Trump, and these are business owners or white collar workers, not just the "poorly educated". fan27
This is the interesting part to me. They try to pass off Trump as only supported by uneducated white voters. I live in a neighborhood which primarily consists of upper middle class RTP workers - most with Masters or PhDs. We had a comedian at the clubhouse about a month back doing some political humor -- and it became quickly apparent that over 50% of the audience of about 300 supported Trump. This surprised me (note I am not a Trump supporter). People (and the media) trying to make a case that support for Trump is limited and that he has no chance in the general election are simply hyping their hopes and not the reality on the ground.
I couldn't care less if Trump makes fun of some dirtbag like Rosie O'Donald or flips off some drama queen like Megyn Kelly. He is the only candidate who appears to give a damn about actual Americans, as opposed to Washington insiders, CEOs, the Chamber of Commerce, the assorted leftwing pressure groups, etc. Don't tell me Bernie cares because he is for amnesty and open borders, which is the single worst thing you can do for poor Americans. Who is the candidate who actually is against bringing in large numbers of unvetted muslims? Trump. Who is against trade deals that have gutted our manufacturing base? Trump and Bernie. Who will build a wall? Trump. Who is against more middle eastern adventures? Trump and Bernie. Who wants to make our allies pay their fair share of defense? Trump. Who isn't afraid to put the screws to some terrorist we grab who may have info on future attacks? Trump. Trump cares about the country. The rest have a different agenda.
Is that why in 1860 there were 233 needed to win and on the first ballot Seward had 173.5 delegates and Abraham Lincoln had 102 delegates? This is just another Nitro post where he had absolutely no idea what he is talking about.