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On Ali Velshi's MSNBC show on Saturday, former RNC chairman Michael Steele, turned virulent anti-Trumper, defended Democrat meddling in GOP primaries, describing the meddling as a tool “to try to get to a position where you have the best competitive advantage going into a general election...of trying to put the best players in front of you that you’re going to go up against.” And when Steele described the meddling as an attempt to to get "the best players" as opponents for the Dems, he, of course, actually meant the ostensibly worst, most unelectable, players. Get the rest of the story...

If they truly believe beating Hillary Clinton is the real goal for Republicans, Ted Cruz and John Kasich have to suspend their campaigns and go home. The voters have spoken and rejected them. For months many honest-and some not so honest-people backed the candidacy of Texas Senator Ted Cruz in the Republican primaries. They stood by Cruz as the façade of his “impeccable” conservative credentials crumbled when even mildly questioned. They were with him when he acted in a very un-conservative manner in Iowa. They defended him as he built his campaign war chest with shady arrangements with Citi Bank....

After getting a thorough shellacking in New York, Ted Cruz faces an almost equally bleak battlespace in the upcoming primaries in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Delaware. Cruz’s strategy seems to be to concede the latter three states to Donald Trump and fight it out in Pennsylvania and Maryland. The former state elects mainly unpledged delegates, so Cruz will use his organizational wizardry to woo most of them to his corner. In Maryland, the senator from Texas will try to get some delegates on the congressional district level.

In sports we use the “magic number” formula to describe a team’s chances to either clinch a pennant or be eliminated. Ted Cruz has a “magic” elimination number. When either Donald Trump or John Kasich win a combination of 184 delegates, Cruz’s mathematical chance to win the nomination with 1,237 delegates is gone. Since the number of available delegates left to be won is a zero sum game; every delegate not won by Cruz moves him closer to his “magic” number downward. Even if Cruz sweeps Wisconsin, which is not a sure thing because Trump is either leading or close,...

We can save the bother of waiting a year, and spending a lot of money and time on a primary season, by just giving the nomination to Jeb Bush now. His grandfather was a senator, his father was president, his brother was president. It’s in his genes. But on top of all that, he has genuine accomplishments of his own; Jeb Bush is a successful two-term governor of a critically important state, the electoral college powerhouse and sometime swing state of Florida. Add to all this the fact that his marriage to a Hispanic wife gives him some undefinable cred...

With his penchant for ripping Republicans rather than Democrats, Joe Scarborough likely long ago ruined his chances of winning a Republican primary. But the Morning Joe host today jokingly acknowledged how particularly tough it would now be, after Harry Reid yesterday approvingly quoted him on the Senate floor. Ever since Newton, Scarborough has been waging a daily campaign for gun control, repeatedly scourging Republicans for their opposition to President Obama's proposals. Quoth Reid: "Scarborough tears into GOP filibuster on gun bill, and I quote, 'is anybody awake in my party?'" View the video here.

Immigration wasn't the top issue on the minds of Iowa voters today. But it is worth noting that they chose as their clear winners the two top contenders who have taken the most unequivocal stands against amnesty -- Romney and Santorum. The other two top contenders were Paul and Gingrich who came in third and fourth and each has backed a limited but sizeable legalization for illegal aliens. Paul has proposed giving many illegal aliens "green cards with an asterisk" while Gingrich has proposed giving them "red cards." In both cases potentially millions of illegal aliens would be allowed to...

NEW YORK — Third party candidates could upend two major races in off-year elections Tuesday, and the success of those candidacies is a warning shot fired at both major parties by voters angry at government and disillusioned by politics as usual. In the New Jersey governor’s race, independent Chris Daggett has gone from afterthought to player in a contest pitting the unpopular incumbent, Democrat Jon Corzine, against Republican Chris Christie. In New York’s 23rd Congressional district, where longtime Republican Rep. John McHugh stepped down to be Army secretary, prominent national Republicans have snubbed GOP candidate Dede Scozzafava, a state assemblywoman...