Who will get 2016 Republican Presidential Nomination?

[bush_cheney2004]

We are a long ways from the nomination, but I fully expect that Trump will be gone by then. He's performing some very useful service being the bad cop as it were but as things get serious his many flaws will finish him.

Agreed...none of this means anything for the actual nomination process and candidate selection...it is all foreplay. Big money donors are making decisions and most of these names will be gone.

[kimmy]

Most of them are scrambling for donations right now, but one might assume that Trump is in a completely different boat because he could finance his own campaign without donors.

-k

[GostHacked]

Most of them are scrambling for donations right now, but one might assume that Trump is in a completely different boat because he could finance his own campaign without donors.

-k

But I think he will gladly take those donations so he does not have to dip into his own pockets. He knows the game, he's one that threw money at previous candidates. Why? Because he is a business man. Not sure what that means as a president.

[Big Guy]

Walker has accepted reality and has encouraged others to do the same;

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/21/politics/scott-walker-drops-out-2016-election/index.html

"I encourage other Republican presidential candidates to consider doing the same so that the voters can focus on a limited number of candidates who can offer a positive, conservative alternative to the current front-runner," said Walker, referencing businessman Donald Trump. "This is fundamentally important to the future of our party, and, more important, the future of the country."

Too bad. This has been the best soap opera going on this season.

[Derek 2.0]

Walker has accepted reality and has encouraged others to do the same;

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/21/politics/scott-walker-drops-out-2016-election/index.html

"I encourage other Republican presidential candidates to consider doing the same so that the voters can focus on a limited number of candidates who can offer a positive, conservative alternative to the current front-runner," said Walker, referencing businessman Donald Trump. "This is fundamentally important to the future of our party, and, more important, the future of the country."

Too bad. This has been the best soap opera going on this season.

I expect in the weeks ahead more of the candidates, with no chance of winning, to follow suite and their vote share to solidify around Bush and Rubio.

[kimmy]

One of the things that surprised me in reading this article is this bit:

Mr. Walker helped raise about $20 million for his super PAC and $6 million more for a related campaign committee, but Walker advisers were believed to be burning through cash. (His campaign finances will not be made public until mid-October.) The need to raise money has had the effect of turning the traditional state-by-state nomination fights into national contests, in which candidates need to prove themselves to donors across the country rather than merely win over voters in the handful of states that hold the earliest caucuses and primaries.

(...)

Yet campaign bills were piling up, with some vendors complaining that they had not been paid on time. Jeff Kaufmann, chairman of the Iowa Republican Party, said that Mr. Walker was at a disadvantage in a large field of wealthy Republicans who had personal, family or business connections to wealthy contributors.

...and I'm sure the same issue exists for Democrats as well (or it would, if anybody else was planning on entering the race.)

It's starting to look like you can only run if you're either very wealthy in your own right, or very cozy with the most powerful interests.

-k

[Topaz]

The Bush Family have powers...friends of the software for the voting machines, Bush is going to the White House, so get ready for more wars in the ME.

[cybercoma]

It's starting to look like you can only run if you're either very wealthy in your own right, or very cozy with the most powerful interests.

-k

Starting?

[kimmy]

Starting?

Well, from the article I linked above:

The need to raise money has had the effect of turning the traditional state-by-state nomination fights into national contests, in which candidates need to prove themselves to donors across the country rather than merely win over voters in the handful of states that hold the earliest caucuses and primaries. Mr. Walker increasingly tailored his message for Iowans, taking some sharply conservative stands on issues like immigration and same-sex marriage that posed problems with moderates.

“In a different era, Governor Walker could have won the nomination if all he had to worry about was trying to win Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada,” said Matt Moore, the chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party. “But now that the presidential race has become so nationalized, so early, a candidate can run into big trouble if they peak too early and can’t show donors and voters everywhere that they can recapture momentum.”

Now, if I recall, that's how McCain won in 2008. Not by having a massive war-chest to start, but by winning some early caucuses. He didn't have the money to start, he had victories to start, and the money followed. Huckabee did the same, bringing in funding after his early success attracted attention. In 2012, Rick Santorum managed to have a long campaign just by winning enough votes to keep donations coming.

But from the sound of things, that might not work anymore. It sounds as if you can't even win these early caucuses without having a substantial bankroll behind you.

-k

[Derek 2.0]

And Trump is now boycotting FNC

On Wednesday, Trump tweeted that he would be boycotting Fox News because the network had treated him "very unfairly." But a Fox News spokesperson told CNN that Trump only made that claim after Fox canceled his scheduled appearance on "The O'Reilly Factor."

This now, after his drop in the polls, should hopefully be a sign that the Donald is nearing the end of his successful trolling of the GOP establishment .......With now Perry and Walker gone (and I expect others to soon follow), the GOP will start to shift to the more realistic contenders....

[Shady]

And Trump is now boycotting FNC

This now, after his drop in the polls, should hopefully be a sign that the Donald is nearing the end of his successful trolling of the GOP establishment .......With now Perry and Walker gone (and I expect others to soon follow), the GOP will start to shift to the more realistic contenders....

It makes him look pretty weak. Voters are suppose to think he can stand up to Russia and China when he can't even handle FNC? Bad move on his part.

[Derek 2.0]

It makes him look pretty weak. Voters are suppose to think he can stand up to Russia and China when he can't even handle FNC? Bad move on his part.

Without a doubt, the rumor is he wanted O'Reilly to toss him soft balls........which nobody gets.

[Shady]

FNC's press release:

At 11:45am today, we canceled Donald Trump’s scheduled appearance on The O’Reilly Factor on Thursday, which resulted in Mr. Trump’s subsequent tweet about his ‘boycott’ of FOX News. The press predictably jumped to cover his tweet, creating yet another distraction from any real issues that Mr. Trump might be questioned about. When coverage doesn’t go his way, he engages in personal attacks on our anchors and hosts, which has grown stale and tiresome. He doesn’t seem to grasp that candidates telling journalists what to ask is not how the media works in this country.

[WIP]

It looks pretty obvious that Foxnews is trying to stop Trump! It sure as hell can't be any journalistic integrity that makes them the only news channel giving Trump a real interview! If they applied the same standards with the other Republican knobs, it would give them some credibility.

So far, all it means is that the oligarchs who run the Republican Party (Kochs) see Trump as a dangerous outlier. They want yesmen who want their money and are willing to do anything for it! Trump has enough of his own money, and worse: he showed how the secret sauce in today's election process is made, when he bragged about buying favours from politicians (like Bill and Hill) in that first debate). Anyone else notice there were no follow-up questions on that one?

[Argus]

Kevin McCarthy, the likely new Republican speaker, basically admits the whole Benghazi investigation was designed to smear Hillary Clinton.

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-09-30/clinton-camp-senses-moment-to-expose-benghazi-committee

[WestCoastRunner]

Trump and Bush are arguing about whether Bush is responsible for the9/11 attack. What ridiculous statements coming from Trump, however, he seems to be on track to get the nomination.

[GostHacked]

Without a doubt, the rumor is he wanted O'Reilly to toss him soft balls........which nobody gets.

The problem in this equation is O'Reilly. No one in their right mind would want to get on his show.

[Argus]

No one in their right mind would want Trump to be President, either, but that doesn't seem to be stopping him.

[Topaz]

Why would anyone want another Bush in the White House, they are war mongers and I don't think he likes Canada or maybe its was the mail order drugs coming into the US, from Canada cutting into his profits of investments.

[bush_cheney2004]

Why would anyone want another Bush in the White House, they are war mongers and I don't think he likes Canada or maybe its was the mail order drugs coming into the US, from Canada cutting into his profits of investments.

Why would anyone want another Trudeau living at 24 Sussex Drive ? They certainly know a lot about "drugs".

If the Americans elect another Bush, then he shall be president.

[kimmy]

So this woman asks Donald Trump "If you become president, will a woman make the same as a man? And do I get to choose what I do with my body?"

I wonder if that woman has ever asked her own boss "if you become president, do I get to choose what I do with my body?"

Because it turns out, she's a campaign staffer for none other than Jeb Bush, who boasts that he's the most Pro Life governor America has ever had.

-k

[GostHacked]

No one in their right mind would want Trump to be President, either, but that doesn't seem to be stopping him.

And we're stuck with Trudeau for about 4 years.

[On Guard for Thee]

Why would anyone want another Trudeau living at 24 Sussex Drive ? They certainly know a lot about "drugs".

If the Americans elect another Bush, then he shall be president.

The next Bush has all but give up. But hey, you do have a few states that allow drugs. Now if you could just catch up federally. Of course who knows, you guys could probably even elect Trump. Wow!

[angrypenguin]

I wish Kasich would win.

[kimmy]

So Ben Carson might have some wacky ideas about pyramids, but at least he had the sense to pull out of the "religious freedom" conference hosted by pastor Kevin Swanson.

Mike Huckabee, Ted Cruz, and Bobby Jindal weren't as smart.

Kevin Swanson is (as some of us already knew, and anybody with a smartphone and 30 spare seconds could have found out) a raving crazy-person who wants gay people to be executed. Literally. He has advocated for this many times, and did so again at his conference this weekend.

Huckabee, Cruz, and Jindal are falling badly behind in the Republican primaries. Does teaming up with a guy who wants gay people to be execute hurt them, or help them?

-k