Posted on 10/05/2015 2:58:14 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Over the past week, responses from political scientists to my recent feature critiquing The Party Decides have poured in — see Seth Masket at the Pacific Standard, and Hans Noel and Jonathan Ladd at Mischiefs of Faction here on Vox. And one common point made by them is quite true — it's still early, the theory is about who will actually win, and polling conducted around this time has frequently failed to predict who will win. Clearly, we can't settle that question now.
Yet my skepticism isn't just about what's unfolding this year. It's about what's happened over the past 12 years of presidential primaries, and how I think that should inform our view of the parties' strength.
For instance, Ladd summarizes the theory as stating that "support from party insiders and organized party factions" determines who wins the nomination. But — according to the authors' own metric, of public endorsements from party insiders before Iowa — that isn't what happened for Democrats in 2004. Or for Democrats in 2008. Or for Republicans in 2008.
Obviously, none of these races ended with a nominee as alien to the party establishment as Donald Trump (or Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina, or even Bernie Sanders).
All the same, the lack of successful elite coordination in three of the past four presidential primaries makes me skeptical whether it's true that, as Ladd suggests, "the Republican nominee is highly likely to be Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio, the only two remaining candidates who are broadly acceptable to party insiders."(continued)
(Excerpt) Read more at vox.com ...
I don't think anybody's had much positive to say about Jeb or Marco lately.
I guess they would make an interesting Batman and Robin, though.
I guess that settles it, then.
Savvy observers have a history of being wrong — of ending up losers.
I think he misses the essential pattern of recent Repub races, which is:
1. Winner-take-all primaries
2. A lot of conservative candidates and a main GOPe candidate
3. A majority of the vote being split among the conservatives, with the GOPe candidate winning most of the delegates by plurality.
This year, that doesn’t seem to be shaping up, since the GOPe candidates are so weak.
So it doesn’t look like it’s going to be Jeb or Rubio. They’re starting out too weak.
You can say that again !
I would guess that these are the only two that would be even remotely acceptable to these pundits. Doesn’t mean they would support them in the general election. Just that they would feel less bad about these two winning. IMHO.
Well if this is true, then the election is 100% rigged.
So we never had a chance.
I don’t think this is the case. It’s wishful thinking from the Establishment in the desperate hail mail attempt to try to defeat Trump. There are simply too many people for Trump on all sides of the Aisle.
Your source is "VOX". Therefore the article is concentrated idiocy. You will get brain damage from reading anything from "VOX".
“Still trying to manipulate the voters, that’s all.”
We already have a winner. No further comments needed.
I don't agree because right now about 90% of Republicans want someone other than Bush or Rubio.
I and my family won’t vote for either. Screw the GOPe and the US Chamber of Commerce and their amnesty.
Here’s the summary:
“The nominee could be Bush or Rubio, or it could be someone else.”
More great insight from Vox.
They know how to make Sanders look pretty good, don’t they?
Not when 2/3 of the Republican electorate says the party insiders have “betrayed” them. They are terrified of losing their cushy jobs at the RNC.
Down to which one is going to drop out first?
Won’t vote for either one. Especially Bush!
I think it’s down to Trump and Fiorina
Carly Fiorina’s charity has given half a million dollars to Planned Parenthood since 2011
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3344961/posts
I’m not saying I support her, but I think these will be the last two standing.
Exactly, Ted Cruz isn’t going away. He has a huge amount of grassroots money that the establishment can only dream to compete against with their lame candidates.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.