Blog post

April 5, 2016 [LINK / comment]

Wisconsin badgers front-runners

After another week overflowing with disgusting "verbal diarrhea" from the leading Republican candidate, Donald Trump, along with reports that the leading Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, may soon be questioned by the FBI, voters in both Wisconsin party races went against the grain, strongly favoring the number two candidates: Rafael "Ted" Cruz and Bernie Sanders. As a result, the chances that there will be a contested convention on the Republican side have risen significantly, and the prospects for such a scenario on the Democratic side are slightly greater than before. No one doubts that there is profound angst among voters in both parties, and huge distrust of both parties' "establishment" leaders.

Convention chaos?

As mainstream Republicans become more petrified at the mere thought of Donald Trump becoming their party's nominee, the candidacy of Ted Cruz has been greatly rejuvenated. Only a few weeks ago, Cruz was languishing with few electoral victories to boast. But more and more commentators have relegated the third-place candidate John Kasich (who still lags behind Marco Rubio in total delegates) to "also ran" status, preferring Cruz as the only viable alternative. To me, that's a shame. There is talk of a compromise candidate from outside the current field, focusing on Wisconsin's own Paul Ryan as the proverbial savior on a white horse. But Trump has already threatened violence if he is denied the nomination, and any such initiative would surely meet with screams of outrage from the party's "Base." That's what you get for years of pandering to "low-education voters," whom Trump proudly welcomes. The whole idea of a convention is to choose a candidate that is most acceptable to the greatest number of party members. It is not supposed to automatically confer nomination upon whichever candidate is the number one choice of more voters than any other.

At present, many Trump supporters refuse to accept Cruz as the GOP nominee, and vice versa. Are those sentiments rock solid, or merely transitory? Obviously, many people (including me) abhor the mere thought of Donald Trump as president, and wouldn't even consider voting for him in November.

I'll explore possible solutions to this bitter conundrum in the near future, but I readily acknowledge that chances for unifying the party are virtually zero. Of course party leaders such as Reince Priebus, as well as the candidates and leading members of Congress pay lip service to party unity, but Donald Trump has pretty much killed that.

New page: Decision 2016

Since this primary election season is unusually dramatic and unpredictable, I decided to create a new Web page with the state-by-state delegate counts, including the preliminary Wisconsin results tonight: Decision 2016: The Race to the White House!. I computed the totals based on the individual state data, and also show the "reported" totals, which include delegates who were unbound by candidates who dropped out, etc.