Posted on 11/30/2015 12:47:05 PM PST by ghost of stonewall jackson
THE presidential candidate who has most harmed American politics this year is Donald Trump, a bully who has prospered by inciting rage. Yet from the narrower perspective of the Republican Party, the most dangerous candidate of the 2016 pack may just be Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who is rising in the polls by telling conservative activists a seductive but misleading story about how their party wins elections.
Since launching his presidential run, the 44-year-old Texan has built his campaign around a simple pitch: assuring the most conservative third of the Republican electorate, from born-again Christian voters to hardline members of the Tea Party, that they form a natural majority of the conservative movement, and indeed would decide general elections if they would only turn out and vote. In his telling, this stirring truth frightens a cowardly Republican establishment in Washington, which urges conservatives to run to the middle as "Democrats-lite"—whereupon, Mr Cruz argues, "We get whipped." By way of proof, the first-term senator informs Republican crowds that in 2012, when the party nominated Mitt Romney, roughly half of all born-again Christian voters and millions of blue-collar conservatives stayed home.
New polls show Mr Cruz rising to second place behind Mr Trump in Iowa, which will hold the first contest of the presidential primary season on February 1st.
(Excerpt) Read more at economist.com ...
Cruz can turn these five back to Red.
Florida, Ohio, Virginia, Colorado, Iowa and Nevada
Well, you don’t need all that half that stayed home to show up. All you need is more of your disaffected orphan voters to show up than the other side turns out from their orphan disaffected voters. Also, it is much easier to drive up turnout than it is to lure new voters.
Stonewall is ashamed of such horsehockey and tired of rolling over in his grave.
Because its always a good idea to take advice from people who hate you.
Well then, if you can’t dazel them with brilliance, baffel them with truck loads of ink.
More often than not in the last two decades Republicans have lost the White House.
So, yes, it sounds like the writer is correct.
Of course a lot depends on how you define "moderate," but the point -- writing off voters that aren't committed conservative is a losing strategy -- is valid.
Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania for starters.
Most Americans, even early nobababots are so tired of nobama and the dem libs peeing in the well that most any Repub is going to landslide in 2016. We might as well have one that is going take names and kick butts.
Believe it or not Maryland is worth trying next year.
Plenty of Conservatives in central Maryland.
What reason do you have to expect the same level of passionate enthusiasm from that voting block in 2016?
Election results for the last 35 years.
1980. Conservative Reagan wins landslide
1984. Conservative Reagan wins another landslide
1988 GOP wins on strength of Reagan legacy
1992 Moderate Bush lose 3 way race due to splits in GOP vote.
1996 Moderate Dole lose 3 way race due to splits in GOP vote.
2000 Self Proclaimed “Conservative” Bush wins barely.
2004 Bush wins by turning right at end of campaign in Oct and away from initial “moderate” positioning.
2008. Moderate McCain loses
2012 Moderate Romney loss
So looking at 35 years of Election history your “moderates win” theory has no supporting data to back it up.
In fact, to find any evidence to support your theory, you have to go all the way back to 1964.
Sorry but pretty weak reasoning to spin a whole “Moderates win” theory around a single 51 year old election.
I like Ted Cruz but having now observed him over a period of time I don’t think he’s ready for the Whitehouse. And I think he would have a real hard time winning the general election because as you say he is just too conservative for moderate voters.
The Average GOP and Independent voter is middle of the road to slightly right of center. A much better fit for Trump. Trump will also peel off the Reagan Democrats.
Yes last 2 decades, “Moderates” Dole, McCain and Romney lost/
True, but there's the problem. Is Ted really going to bring more conservative voters to the polls for him than liberal voters against him?
I'm not sure about that "blue collar conservative" thing. Republicans already have those votes. If you're talking about disaffected and discouraged blue collar voters, most of them aren't committed ideological conservatives.
Some conservative policies are likely to turn them off just as other conservative policies will win them over. Is Ted really the guy with the magnetism and energy to bring those votes to the GOP.
I subscribed to The Economist years back when the other ‘choices’ of weekly news magazines were Newsweak and Time. It was the correct decision and it still is far better than the current ghosts that remain. Still, like the British Tory / Conservative Party, they are only conservative in comparison to their rivals like Labour and The Guardian.
The Economist was absolutely in the camp of the Democrats for the 2006 elections and then Obama in both ‘08 & ‘12. The columnist ‘Lexington’ always struck me as being an inside-the-Beltway left-leaning journalist since I started reading the magazine. The fact that he is unfavorable towards Senator Cruz undoubtably reflects the antagonism the WaPo & NYT cliques are deep-dipped in.
What I really would like to find would be the equivalent report on a previous GOP candidate a few years back, Gov Ronald Reagan. As I remember, he too was considered wildly radical and unelectable against the ‘popular’ incumbent James E Cater and that was played big by his GOP rivals, like G H W Bush! History does not repeat - except when it does!
Good sign with Cruz is forcing them to expend ink on trying to smear him.
And .. as further proof .. when GW ran for re-election; and the base saw what happened in the 2000 election; they turned out in droves (4 million [approx] and the left was staggered by the number of people who voted.
And .. as further proof .. this has motivated Obama to try to bring in at least 5 million new voters (Mexico/Arabs), in order to be able to win .. just in case the base decides to vote again.
This year we are motivated by the Trump and Cruz .. which is precisely why the left has been hitting both of them so hard. And .. confirms to me the vote will go to the right candidates.
We’re supposed to worry about Cruz”not being electable” while the world is on fire?
“writing off voters that aren’t committed conservative is a losing strategy”
Who says they are “written off”? There are more options than just pandering to them or writing them off.
How about appealing to them on the basis of our principles? We believe those principles are correct, and if we are right, we should be able to state our case and win over some people who don’t agree with us. If we don’t believe our principles can win people over, then why do we bother to believe in them?
That was the "security mom" election. People didn't trust the Democrats on foreign policy.
Republicans had the advantages of incumbency. Also the economy was doing alright and Kerry was a terrible candidate.
If W. had done everything the same and lost people would be saying it was because he wasn't a conservative. Because he won, it's harder to say that.
Please tell me which states Romney lost in 2012 that you believe Cruz can win.
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