How angry are you? The 2016 presidential nominating contest has turned into a game of who can scream the loudest. Republicans are angry at Barack Obama. Democrats are angry about obstructionist Republicans in Congress. And the American people are angry at the entire political system. So, led by a red-haired bombastic billionaire and enabled by a ratings-hungry media, the campaign has become an embarrassing sound-bite driven reality TV show.
Donald Trump is angry that China is ripping us off by devaluing their currency. He’s furious that Mexico is sending drug dealers and rapists to the U.S. (even as acknowledging that some of them are “good ones”). He’s mad that Muslims are allowed to enter the United States. He’s positively irate about the Iran nuclear deal. And he was irate that Fox News’ Megyn Kelly treated him “unfairly” by asking him about his misogynistic statements in the past (and then referred her to her as a “bimbo” the next day).
Ted Cruz is angry that his Republican colleagues in the Senate didn’t shut down the government to defund Planned Parenthood. Marco Rubio is irritated that Cruz keeps making things up. Ben Carson is annoyed that nobody attacks him in the debates and thus he gets virtually no speaking time. And John Kasich is angry that everyone else is so angry.
It’s not just the GOP candidates who are angry. Bernie Sanders is angry at the millionaires and billionaires who are not paying their fair share of taxes. He’s furious at the Wall Street banks. He’s enraged that college tuition isn’t free. He’s livid that the U.S. isn’t more like Norway and Sweden with respect to single-payer health care. And he’s downright pissed off at the Supreme Court decision (Citizens United) that allows Super-PAC’s to spend hundreds of millions of dollars in political ads.
Hillary Clinton is angry too. She’s angry that Bernie Sanders is making her actually work to secure the Democratic nomination. She’s indignant that the Republican Senate doesn’t want to confirm another Obama Supreme Court justice nominee. She’s mad that Republicans keep talking about her private server email scandal (even though it was a scandal of her own making). And she’s vexed that most Americans view her as dishonest and untrustworthy.
Finally, the American people on both sides of the aisle are just plain fed up with the way things work (or don’t work) in Washington, which explains the popularity of Trump and “outsider” Senators Sanders and Cruz.
For the author of this piece, I’m no longer angry. I’m depressed. I’m despondent that a Republican field of 17 candidates has been steamrolled by a narcissistic, thin-skinned, fear-monger who masterfully plays upon the fears and frustrations of the party base, most of which is ill-informed.
I’m miserable at the thought that the front-runner will win the nomination and, because he has alienated the critical Latino vote with his mass deportation scheme, be trounced in the general election by either a socialist or a power-hungry, control freak who is under investigation by the FBI and feels entitled to the presidency because of her gender and last name.
With apologies to the well-informed and well-educated readers who disagree with me, let me say that I get the appeal of the Republican front-runner. I get the idea of a self-funded successful businessman being the right man to shake things up in Washington and maintain a unique independence from the donor and lobbying class. If the billionaire’s name was Michael Bloomberg, I would be intrigued by his candidacy. But his name is Donald Trump and he’s acting like a buffoon.
The particular anger (and boorishness) of Trump would be wildly entertaining if running for the presidency wasn’t so important. As The Donald has used his media megaphone and massive celebrity to drown out his opponents, other candidates have been forced to dive into his verbal cesspool. Florida Senator Marco Rubio didn’t want to play the game this way but obviously felt he had to and thus, in Thursday’s debate on CNN, decided to get into a bare-knuckled brawl with the biggest bully in the bunch.
Rubio, save one 90-second meltdown at the hand of Chris Christie, has been spectacular in the debates and it’s the reason that he’s neck and neck with the angrier Cruz in the race for 2nd place in the GOP field. But, with Trump having won three of the first four contests and the field still five strong, Rubio and his campaign clearly felt that simply being polished and knowledgeable was no longer good enough, that he frankly had to verbally punch Trump in the nose. We saw a different Rubio on Thursday and it was amazing to watch him mock Trump, raise questions about his business past, and expose how vacuous his policy positions are. What was remarkable about the Rubio-Trump exchanges was that the 44-year old first-term senator was able to cut Trump down to size in a joyful manner. I doubt this is the way Rubio wanted to go but felt he had no choice.
Rubio was the smiling assassin, challenging Trump to explain his health care plan beyond “crossing the lines” between states, forcing him to explain his history of hiring illegal immigrants, mocking him for making his ties and suits in China and bringing to light (finally) the fraud of Trump University (in which students paid $3,000 to $35,000 to learn how to become rich through real estate). When Rubio brought up Trump U., I feared it may have been missed by the audience because the real estate tycoon was bellowing over Rubio while Marco was making the case. However, Cruz brought it up again in his usual concise, cutthroat manner. Because it involves Trump profiting at the expense of innocent saps hoping to learn the secrets of real estate success, the Trump University case (in which the Donald is the defendant in several lawsuits) has the potential to siphon away some of his non-Kool Aid drinking support. If you’re curious to learn more about this issue, click on this link to CNN’s story.
Trump had taken barbs from Cruz before in some previous debates (and a some weak jabs from Jeb Bush) but on Thursday he was double teamed by the younger men on his right and left. Most of the attacks against Trump before have been that he’s “not a conservative,” something that his supporters already know and don’t seem to care about. But the line or fire in the recent debate were of the heartless billionaire variety and similar to the attacks Mitt Romney faced four years ago about being a greedy corporate raider. Will his supporters, who have forgiven his past liberal positions, be so understanding about defrauding people in his over-hyped real estate school and about hiring illegal immigrant labor (even while he promises to deport them all)? This in addition to the new media drumbeat (ironically originally started by Romney) for Trump to release his previous tax returns, which he has refused to do.
By the way, because he’s so far ahead right now, I don’t believe that all of these new lines of attack on Trump will keep him from sweeping virtually all of the 11 states voting this Tuesday but it might lessen his victory margins and give Rubio or Cruz (or possibly John Kasich) a path to victory slightly less narrow than it looks right now. Kasich and Dr. Ben Carson, incidentally, did not join the Trump bashing party in the debate, preferring to look like the adults in the room, albeit the adults who barely got a chance to speak.
(AP Photo/LM Otero)
Despite taking incoming on both sides Thursday night, Trump as usual managed to steal the headlines the next day with the surprise endorsement of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and the two men proceeded to make a verbal pinata out of Rubio while Marco started calling Trump a “con man.” One of the things we’ve learned from this campaign is that labels have a way of sticking. Trump called Jeb Bush “low energy” and it defined his campaign. He and Rubio called Cruz a “liar” and it’s caused a sag in his campaign. If the TV and print media pick up on the “con man” mantra and paint it to Trump, it might not siphon most of his supporters away but may add concrete to the ceiling he has and solidify the will of the majority of the party desperate to stop him.
How much will Christie’s support help Trump? That’s very hard to say. The big man from Jersey, he of the Obama embrace a week before the 2012 election, is not especially popular with conservative voters who dominate the southern states voting on Tuesday. My guess is that will embolden the Trumpians and legitimize their love for the The Donald but won’t sway a lot of new voters. Most hurt by Christie hitching his saddle to Trump is John Kasich. Christie, who is friends with Kasich and had nary a bad word to say about him during the campaign, made a point throughout the campaign that the best candidate for president was a governor. Kasich bluntly admitted that he had sought Christie’s support and was surprised by the Trump choice given that he was the only governor left in the field. “Politicians make decisions for lots of different reasons,” Kasich told reporters. “They’re complicated. You just don’t try to figure it all out.”
Kasich was being gracious. It’s not complicated at all. Trump is dominating the field; Kasich is languishing in 4th place with the narrowest of paths to victory. Christie is a political opportunist. He jumped on the Romney band-wagon early in the 2012 race and was reportedly displeased that he wasn’t Romney’s choice for VP. When he gave his convention speech as the keynote speaker at Romney’s official nomination, he spent 30 minutes talking about himself. Christie is either angling to be Trump’s VP or Attorney General. If you believe that Christie’s motives aren’t self-centered, I’ve got a bridge between New York and New Jersey to sell you (and I’ll throw in a traffic jam for good measure).
Kasich got a small consolation prize this week in the Jersey wars with the endorsement of former Governor Christine Todd Whitman. The Garden State governor from 1994 to 2001 and a moderate Republican, Whitman’s endorsement of Kasich included some rather harsh words for Trump:
Christine Todd Whitman
“Gov. Kasich is the lone voice of reason and optimism in a very loud room. His winning combination of tax cuts, balanced budgets and job creation will revive the American economy just like it has done for Ohio.
It is no longer a stretch to compare Donald Trump, and some of the other current Republican candidates for president, to some of the worst dictators in history.
Trump especially is employing the kind of hateful rhetoric and exploiting the insecurities of this nation, in much the same way that allowed Hitler and Mussolini to rise to power in the lead-up to World War II. The parallels are chilling.
— Christine Todd Whitman
Given his standing in the polls and, due to his lack of popularity in the south, the likelihood is that Kasich will gain scant few delegates on Super Tuesday. If Rubio does well, it’s not far-fetched that the two would preemptively form a unity ticket with Rubio as President and Kasich as Vice-President (essentially playing the role that the older Joe Biden played for the younger Barack Obama). That would be dynamite combination of knowledge, substance, compassion and dignity. It will be interesting to see if this idea builds after Tuesday’s results. If your curious about this scenario now, there’s a terrific piece about the idea by Guy Benson in Town Hall. Benson’s scheme includes naming Ted Cruz to the Supreme Court.
Anyway, one thing we can say about the 2016 presidential derby is that it has not been boring even if it’s been a bit distressing. Stay tuned for a Super Tuesday breakdown in the next two days!
Thanks for reading!
Chris Bodig