Posted on 03/18/2015 6:22:03 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
From the Morning Jolt: Why the Rush to Pick a Favorite in the 2016 Field? Breitbart.com’s Matt Boyle goes in to overdrive, insisting that Scott Walker is ensnared in a massive, race-changing scandal because his newly-hired strategist, Liz Mair, has… er, dual citizenship.* (Hey, if that’s a big deal, what about Ted Cruz’s former dual-citizenship status? What, is the senator some sleeper agent for the poutine menace? “The Manitoban Candidate”?) This morning, Liz Mair departed Scott Walker’s campaign – presumably not because of her dual-citizenship status than from the vocal whining from Iowa Republican Party officials over her previous mockery of the state’s first-in-the-nation status. This is perhaps the first major mistake of Scott Walker’s nascent campaign, with quite a few folks who know Mair incredulous that the guy willing to stand up to the unions in Wisconsin would knuckle under to the griping of state GOP officials.
It’s March 18, 2015. We have ten months to go until anybody casts any votes that matter, in the Iowa caucus tentatively scheduled for January 18. And yet somehow, some folks – who aren’t political professionals, and who don’t have a financial or career incentive — are energetically jumping onto candidate bandwagons and making their choice and attempting to derail other ones. Where is this impatience in political junkies coming from? I can see having favorites or guys you like already. If you follow politics – and if you’re reading this newsletter, it’s a safe bet you follow politics – you probably already have an opinion on Scott Walker, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Bobby Jindal, Rick Perry, and the other names being mentioned.
You may have strong opinions already. But are you ready to pick your guy now? Do you feel like you know so much about all of the candidates already that you don’t want or need to see anything else from this crop of candidates? No debates? No policy proposals? No watching them on the stump? Maybe this impatience is a reflection of our impatience for the end of the Obama era. Hurry up and get it over with, so our country can get on the road to a real recovery.
It also may reflect that rank-and-file Republicans aren’t looking forward to the next ten months. Ten months of opposition research dumps. Ten months of attack ads, and then candidates denouncing attack ads, and candidates insisting that they can’t control the independent expenditure committees running the attack ads.
Ten months of candidates making off-the-cuff comments while trudging through New Hampshire or Iowa snowdrifts, and the media treating those comments as major gaffes.
Ten months of campaign staffers insisting that the other guy’s poorly-worded off-the-cuff comment represents a giant game-changer that will swing a lot of votes, while their guy’s poorly-worded off-the-cuff comment is an irrelevant nothing-burger.
Ten months of arguing about whether a four percentage-point change in a poll represents momentum or just statistical noise.
Ten months of Frank Luntz’s focus groups of totally-objective, totally-undecided likely voters being treated as the Oracles of Delphi.
Ten months of complaining about who gets invited to the debates. Ten months of complaining about who gets the most time to speak at the debates. Ten months of complaining about the questions at the debates. These next ten months don’t have to be an awful experience for all involved. We may know the basics of the big names running in 2016, but we don’t know their life stories.
We don’t know every major factor and influence that made them into the people they are today. We don’t know the details of when they’ve most been tested as a leader, and what they learned from it. We don’t know what they regret and what they would do differently if they had a second chance. We don’t know their agendas in detail. We have a general idea of how they would be a leader – i.e., Rand Paul isn’t likely to invade anyplace – but there’s always room for more details – details they may or may not want to share or elaborate upon.
Who knows? You may learn something you don’t like about the guy you liked, and you may learn something you like about the guy you didn’t like. Those bandwagons aren’t going anywhere. * This is where I’m supposed to disclose that Liz Mair is a friendly acquaintance; even if I didn’t know her, I’d still think that Boyle’s investigative avenue is as dumb as a box of rocks.
2016 is not all that distant anymore. After we hit labor day this year, it’s ON! Offically.
Good question......will never understand why so many here fall for the same mistakes over and over again
Yep. Conservatives are going to bitch about the electable conservative because he has a couple of warts. The true conservative won’t go anywhere or will be destroyed early, and the rest of the field will get split up and the liberal Republican is going to get the nominee.
The first states up are Iowa and then New Hampshire. Iowa doesn’t even pick a committed delegate. Neither of those states mean squat. No need for a bandwagon until at least after them. Chill.
And lobby the RNC to make some other small states go first, maybe in some kind of rotation.
Funny, I listen to Rush every day and don’t know as I’ve heard him endorse anyone. Speaking highly (and rightly so) of the successes of a sitting Governor, last I checked, doesn’t exactly make you an operative.
The FR bandwagoners want us all to jump on the Walker bandwagon before we even know if he has evolved enough on the illegal alien question. We need to know for certain if he is on the side of the rule of law and the citizens or on the side of the illegal aliens and their employers.
Most of the GOP is on the side of the illegal aliens and their employers, including the Chairman of the RNC. Who is also from WI.
Ok, scratch that. Misread the headline. Feel like a dumbass.
As a n00b, are you certain you know Freepers well enough to be defining segments of us? ... I smell something vaguely familiar with your posts.
I’ve been reading here for long enough to remember some of the folks who got purged. I hope that doesn’t happen again, I think open debate and discussion is healthy. I also think bandwagons this early aren’t healthy.
Walker has flip flopped more than Romney on the illegal invaders.
I agreed with the notion on bandwagons, but it is what it is.
I consider it celebrity worship in a screwed up kind of way.
Thanks Newbie for telling us what Freepers are thinking and doing.
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