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Trump not running

No ticket no laundry. Unfortunately there is always a place in politics for the money man, probably everywhere but certainly in this country.
 
Les Grossman said:
Agree 100%. Arlington's politics are clearly getting in the way of his analysis on this issue.
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Disagree. I doubt you really know my politics, but let me say that my "politics" are usually about winning elections. I have no real animosity towards Palin, but if I were a Pub strategist this go around, I'd keep her well off the podium if possible.

IMO, Palin's visibility now hurts the Pub brand for the upcoming general, where elections are won in the middle. She's the ultimate turnoff to moderate voters. For 2010? She's your horse. She fires up the base and raises money for obscure races that are basically all about turnout. You stoke the base because that's who votes in midterms. But the right-wing base generally needs no stoking for a presidential election -- turnout is almost completely a Democrat concern in a general -- especially one run against the least respected liberal candidate in the lives of most of the modern right- the intolerable and a-bit-scary Barrack H Obama. The people Palin inspires are already well within the Pub pocket. The key now is to get a candidate through the primary that can actually win, and Palin provides the opposite leverage- a forceful voice for a crop of sure hard-right losers. This is why she is, in fact, currently being disenfranchised by the entirety of the right's intelligentsia. She's already basically persona non grata with the Pub party establishment.

The money will be there for whoever gets the Pub nomination, but the party strategists DO NOT want a hard right primary. At all. Everyone interested in winning will run to the middle for this election, unless they only care about winning the primary and giving a concession speech. That's why the Becks, Palins, and Olbermanns of the world are getting kicked aside. They turn off the middle, and the middle determines who wins presidential elections.
 
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In an election where most think Obama should win easily, it will be vital for the pubs' base to show up for them to have any chance.
 
Palin can easily bring out more anti-GOP than pro-GOP.
 
Les Grossman said:
In an election where most think Obama should win easily, it will be vital for the pubs' base to show up for them to have any chance.
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I agree, but there should be virtually no concern that Pub base will fail to show up against Obama. The right-wing base detests Obama, and cannot wait to vote against him. To me, worry about their presence seems like worrying about whether you can give away free beer at a high school house party.

IMO, any pop Palin gives you with your base is more than offset by the distaste she puts in the mouths of independents, and those are the votes you need to win. The goal has to be to win the presidency, not to have a really inspiring primary. Which is why I still maintain that the Tea Party is an overall net negative for the conservative movement. They have just enough votes to put bad candidates through the Pub primaries, but not nearly enough to win general elections. Palin is the face of this dysfunction.
 
Les Grossman said:
In an election where most think Obama should win easily, it will be vital for the pubs' base to show up for them to have any chance.
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Bingo.

And part of that is making sure there is enough chatter among the base that they'll think it's not a done deal for Obama entering November.
 
PhDeac said:
Bingo.

And part of that is making sure there is enough chatter among the base that they'll think it's not a done deal for Obama entering November.
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Short-term, primary-based thinking, IMO.

Palin stirring the base is only going to get you a candidate that is ruined for the general. Even McCain, who had pretty outstanding moderate credentials pre-2008, was tainted by having the hard right drive the primary process. Many independent and moderate voters saw him diving toward the Tea Party platform in the 2008 primary, changing many of his core moderate beliefs, and thought, "that's too bad, I might have voted for the 2000 version of this guy, but now he's jumped in bed with the right fringe."

Bringing Palin front and center for 2012 virtually assures that either your nominee will be an unelectable fringe righty, or a formerly moderate candidate who's had to pander away from moderation to appease the portion of the base that Palin would stir up. In terms of losing the middle, it makes no practical difference which occurs.

Sure Palin will give you better speeches and drum up some cash, but, IMO, relying on her influence to pick or shape a candidate is the surest path to a concession speech you could find. If the Pubs want to win -- which isn't likely, I'll grant -- they'd better just assume the hard right will show up because they detest Obama and work to make the primary about getting closer to the middle.

Just my two cents.
 
Arlington is correct -- no one in the GOP is worried about making sure Palin's out there firing up the base. The base will be there, the key will be not turning off the middle. Any serious GOP candidate would cringe if Palin endorsed him (and then graciously accept the endorsement for fear of turning the base against him).
 
The right wing base may not need stoking but the party does need money and Palin can deliver a lot of it for the party at large (not necessarily for any one candidate). That money would go to help campaigns nationwide. That's all most anyone here is saying. She does have some minor support but I think few people actually expect her to run. She's no more hurtful to the party than Trump...that is to say not hurtful at all. I'm interested to see where her support goes when she announces she's not running. Huckabee was polling 15-16%, Trump 12-14. Palin about 10. So that's 30-40% of the field up for grabs between Romney, Paul, Gingrich and X (Pawlenty?). I expect Gingrich to pull out and don't expect Palin's numbers go to up sharply with the dropouts so basically you're looking at Romney vs. Paul unless someone emerges. Shockingly, Paul may have a real shot at this. Even if Paul loses but polls well and is in it through Super Tuesday, it's a huge shot in the arm for the libertarian/small government movement that last election I thought was going to be a 30-40 year story.
 
I don't think the GOP is going to put a ton of resources into the presidential election per se. They're going to focus on the senate elections and maintaining the house. In fact, it may be better for them in the presidential election is perceived to not be competitive because more Dems might stay home and help them win close senate battles.
 
The shame is that Palin claims to be tea party when she is just a mouthpiece for the establishment/neocon wing of the party. She is RR, war monger like Bush and Cheney. The only thing tea party about her is that she wants less taxes and less spending except for the military. A formula doomed to fail.
 
Lawrence O'Donnell (who is very arrogant) actually picked the exact date and reason for Trump to end his fake campaign.

They showed several clips of O'Donnell it would happen yesterday when NBC announced the return of The Celebrity Apprentice.

He hit it right on the head.
 
Marietta Deac said:
The shame is that Palin claims to be tea party when she is just a mouthpiece for the establishment/neocon wing of the party. She is RR, war monger like Bush and Cheney. The only thing tea party about her is that she wants less taxes and less spending except for the military. A formula doomed to fail.
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This is one reason why I hope she doesn't run and I hope her supporters gravitate to Paul. She does have some tea party support and I agree it's mostly misplaced.

Ph, you could be right, but I don't think they're to that point yet. They would really like to get Obama out and right now the polls don't preclude that possibility. Arguably, maintaining control of the House is more important.
 
Just saw polls that have Obama at around 50-36 vs. Romney and Pawlenty. That looks like a pretty tough task for the Republicans. The smart play would be to spread the money around to state and local races and build a coalition of big money folks ready to spend for 2016 in another open election vs. what at this point doesn't look like much of a Dem field.
 
PhDeac said:
Just saw polls that have Obama at around 50-36 vs. Romney and Pawlenty. That looks like a pretty tough task for the Republicans. The smart play would be to spread the money around to state and local races and build a coalition of big money folks ready to spend for 2016 in another open election vs. what at this point doesn't look like much of a Dem field.
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IF the pubs took the Senate and kept the House you would see a lineup similar to Clinton's second term. Government gridlock is usually good for the country.
 
With their votes to kill Medicare, what could legitimately happen is the GOP could win the Senate and lose the House.
 
PhDeac said:
Just saw polls that have Obama at around 50-36 vs. Romney and Pawlenty. That looks like a pretty tough task for the Republicans. The smart play would be to spread the money around to state and local races and build a coalition of big money folks ready to spend for 2016 in another open election vs. what at this point doesn't look like much of a Dem field.
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Granted it isn't terribly recent but the last Obama vs. Paul poll was 52-45 and it was a RV poll, not LV or A. The last RV poll for Romney was 47-42.
 
It's bizarre when you get neg repped anonymously on the politics board, because you can't engage the person that commented. on the issue. Why not just post your thoughts?
 
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