Shock: The Establishment is Trying to Take Out Cruz, and Talk Up Trump, In Order to Boost the Chances of... Marco Rubio

Gee I never would have guessed!

John Krashaar:

The thinking goes as follows: If Cruz loses Iowa, he peters out in New Hampshire and doesn't pose a risk of finishing in a respectable second place. That allows the establishment winner out of the Granite State to build momentum aas the anti-Trump alternative. A decent number of Cruz's supporters, when asked to choose a second candidate, gravitate towards Rubio. Polls show many more of Trump's supporters, by contrast, would support Cruz. And even with Trump's improving favorability numbers within the GOP, there are more Republican voters who wouldn't vote for him under any circumstances than say the same about the senator from Texas.

These strategists are looking at Trump's increasingly bellicose attacks against Cruz with glee. In their view, only Trump can sucessfully put a dent in Cruz's sky-high favorability among Republicans, which is a precondition to blocking him from the nomination.

Of course, that risks simply handing Trump the nomination.

Meanwhile, David Limbaugh notes that Cruz has been right all along -- which is why the Establishment so despises him.

You don't get angry at a guy who was wrong when you were right. That guy, you just laugh at.

The hatred comes with a guy who was right when you were wrong. That's when the mind begins searching for every possible character flaw in the object of the hatred, as a psychological defense to one's own ego.

Grassroots conservatives have wanted someone to stand up to Obama and stand up for our nation — and they are sick and tired of Beltway politicians and pundits alike patronizingly assuring them that nothing extraordinary is occurring and to calm down. "We'll take care of it after we're re-elected." Sure.

Yes, some of these establishment, moderate or, if you prefer, unexcitable types have finally come around, belatedly acknowledging Obama's intentions but failing to admit they were slow on the uptake, much less that they're sorry for branding the rest of us who caught on years before they did as mean-spirited, extremist or kooky.

...

I appeal to the rest of you to review recent history in this light and to reconsider the wisdom of Ted Cruz's approach, even though it was rejected by the majority of other Republican politicians, whose very party is on the ropes because of their conceit, arrogance and tone-deafness.

Cruz was right, and grassroots conservatives were right. We should have stood up to Obama then and didn't, so Trump was born and is flourishing. With Ted Cruz we know what we're getting and we know it's the reverse of Obama's infernal effort to fundamentally transform America. Say what you want about Ted Cruz, but about this there is little doubt.

The establishment is now taking a second look at Obama, albeit without much humility. I'm not naive enough to think they'll take a second look at Ted Cruz, but how about you?

I would suggest that anyone who is up for grabs between Trump and Cruz in Iowa casts their vote for Cruz, for a few strategic reasons:

It keeps Cruz in the race. If Trump just wins in NH and Iowa, Cruz is not much of an alternative, and that means that someone like Rubio will probably rise to be Trump's main competitor.

Keeping Cruz in the race keeps Rubio, or some other Establishment stalking horse, out of it.

You don't want Trump's main competitor being Rubio, unless you kind of want Rubio to have a pretty good shot of actually winning.

(I assume Trump is already going to win NH, without any need of strategic voting.)

In addition, you're going to want to keep Trump dishonest. Right, I said dishonest, because I have no illusions he's really a conservative. I'm okay with that, as long as we can force him to stay dishonest, and stay in his current pretend mode as a conservative.

Trump is going to run to the middle, in all likelihood, as soon as he can. You're going to want him to continue to having to play to the right, to make as many specific promises as we can wring out of him, before he runs to the middle.

Cruz is your best hope for that -- so even if you support Trump, assuming you'd like the conservative version of Trump he's currently selling you on, you're going to want Cruz forcing him to stay to the right.

So strategically, if you're okay with either guy, even if you favor Trump, it makes sense to vote for Cruz in Iowa, and make this a two-man race with neither man one that the Establishment can live with.

Think of how wonderful that will be:

Republican leaders are growing alarmed by the ferocious ways the party’s mainstream candidates for president are attacking one another, and they fear that time is running out for any of them to emerge as a credible alternative to Donald J. Trump or Senator Ted Cruz of Texas.

Leaders of the Republican establishment, made up of elected officials, lobbyists and donors, are also sending a message to the mainstream candidates, such as former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida, that they should withdraw from the race if they do not show strength soon.

The members of the party establishment are growing impatient as they watch Mr. Trump and Mr. Cruz dominate the field heading into the Iowa caucuses next Monday and the New Hampshire primary about a week later.

The party elders had hoped that one of their preferred candidates, such as Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, would be rising above the others by now and becoming a contender to rally around.

When the frontrunner, be it Cruz or Trump, is someone the Establishment hates, and the only opposition is someone the Establishment also hates -- finally, we can bring them to terms, and tell them how it's going to be going forward.

They will not listen until they have, literally, no other choice available to them.

posted by Ace at 03:00 PM

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