Posted on 03/19/2016 2:19:03 PM PDT by reaganaut1
Republican leaders adamantly opposed to Donald J. Trumps candidacy are preparing a 100-day campaign to deny him the presidential nomination, starting with an aggressive battle in Wisconsins April 5 primary and extending into the summer, with a delegate-by-delegate lobbying effort that would cast Mr. Trump as a calamitous choice for the general election.
Recognizing that Mr. Trump has seized a formidable advantage in the race, they say that an effort to block him would rely on an array of desperation measures, the political equivalent of guerrilla fighting.
There is no longer room for error or delay, the anti-Trump forces say, and without a flawlessly executed plan of attack, he could well become unstoppable.
But should that effort falter, leading conservatives are prepared to field an independent candidate in the general election, to defend Republican principles and offer traditional conservatives an alternative to Mr. Trumps hard-edged populism. They described their plans in interviews after Mr. Trumps victories last Tuesday in Florida and three other states.
The names of a few well-known conservatives have been offered up in recent days as potential third-party standard-bearers, and William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, has circulated a memo to a small number of conservative allies detailing the process by which an independent candidate could get on general-election ballots across the country.
Among the recruits under discussion are Tom Coburn, a former Oklahoma senator who has told associates that he would be open to running, and Rick Perry, the former Texas governor who was suggested as a possible third-party candidate at a meeting of conservative activists on Thursday in Washington.
Mr. Coburn, who left the Senate early last year to receive treatment for cancer, said in an interview that Mr. Trump needs to be stopped
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
If this passes for conservative, I don't want any part of it.
Hopefully Cruz will be the nominee. But if Trump is the nominee...and I know that this has become tantamount to heresy on this site...I would also vote for either Coburn or Perry.
By the way, I sure hope Cockburn and Perry are ready for what will be coming at them if they try this stunt.
Trump just may do what he keeps being accused of and cut his people loose on them and those around them. And if he does, I can’t say I’d blame him - providing that Trump wins nomination outright. After all, THEY SIGNED THE PLEDGE (or at least Perry did).
Didn’t Perry already get sifted to the bottom of the candidate pile early in the primary? Hasn’t he already lost to Trump, technically speaking? What kind of conservative is okay with this kind of game with the American people?
Trump, who is not a conservative. ////
Your opinion. What makes you the authority on conservatism? Palin, Schlafly, Sessions, et al, and other battle hardened conservatives, would disagree with you.
One thing we can agree on is that Trump is more conservative than hilllry. And he has a better chance of beating her than Perry or Coburn
I am no longer a member of the Republican Party, so I have no say in what they might decide to do. Trump appears to be executing a hostile take over of the Republican Party and he has been buying up shares in primaries and caucuses like his hair on fire.
Of course, the current leaders of the Republican Party want nothing to do with this takeover because they will be thrown to the curb. The shareholders in this drama are the rank and file party members (the voters), and they seem to be quite happy about the takeover, they think that they will benefit from the change at the top. The problem for the Republican “shareholders” is that they don’t control the Convention and the rules can be modified to reduce their votes to zero.
The big risk to the establishment is that the rank and file, if the value of their “shares” are reduced to zero, may walk out the door leaving the establishment with nothing more than a bunch of ballons, signs, and hats with little else.
Thanks for slandering decent, hard-working Americans who just want the federal government to be looking out for America's interests.
These are people from all walks of life who are supporting Trump.
I think Cruz can pull it off. Trump’s support is unwavering but neither is it growing.
But I would love to vote for Rick Perry ... I was for him in 2012 and still have scars from how I was treated.
If Rick had been nominated instead of Mitt, we wouldn’t have had the last 4 years of Obama.
Why post at all, Eddie? If that’s all you can come up with?
Your dumbassery knows no bounds. Trump’s taken the pledge and affirmed it on the debate stage multiple times. It was a fair fight. If you’re for Hillary and the destruction of the country what are you even here for and on what planet do you deserve that handle?
One other card Trump can play is to simply tell his people to NOT VOTE AT ALL if it appears that the GOPe is being successful in handing the presidency to Hillary.
Should he do that, the Republicans in the House and Senate would be WIPED OUT IN A BLOODBATH. But considering how useless the Republicans are in Congress...it really won’t make a difference, and MILLIONS OF US will support Trump DOING JUST THAT.
In other words, don’t get too excited, this strategy can BACKFIRE, and BACKFIRE BAD.
No, the polls are even more strong now that Hillary would defeat Trump.
We need to get behind a candidate who can win — Ted Cruz.
But as far as that kind of deal goes, no one has spoken more adamantly against that kind of shenanigans than Ted Cruz.
When is Cruz going to do this winning you speak of?
If Trump is so conservative why did he donate $60,000 to Mitch McDonnell’s program to defeat the Tea Party.
You can like Trump all you want but you can NEVER prove he is conservative.
Perry? Nobody would vote for oops guy. They may get less then 1 percent. Coburn? Not even in politics anymore. Ok 2 percent for him.
Back to the drawing board.
I think he has been a registered republican since 1980.
Rick Perry is actively supporting and working for Ted Cruz.
Because his name got thrown out there does not mean he is a part of them scheme. He is not.
The 3 annoying Cruz supporters on FR need to go.
Mr. Trump registered for the first time in New York as a Republican in July 1987,
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