Kasich does look good compared to the rest of the GOP field. he sounds reasonable. Until you realize he's a hard money guy. If the Fed had followed a hard money policy in 2009 and since, we'd be worse off than the EU. Or at least as bad as them.
There's nothing reasonable about the guy who wants to "punch Russia in the nose" and have ground troops in Syria. He's just another warmonger paid by the banks, etc.
^ Yeah, Rubio really has fallen about as quickly as I can recall occurring in politics. Lucky for the GOPers they are finding that out sooner than too later. I thought this was amusing:
I kinda feel for the guy when I see these. I don't count it against him. Being comfortable spouting off nonsense shouldn't be a prerequisite for the presidency. So he has issues communicating things on stage? so what. You have idiots like Trump & Cruz & Sanders who could say a bunch of BS all day up there. So what- that'll make good entertainers not presidents
The polls are not to be trusted this year. Anger drives people to the voting booth in a year like this and disgust keeps them away on election day. I could see Trump winning the election at this point once he ditched the "crazy ranting guy" persona and became more moderate in his statements and presentation as the field narrowed. So if you get a GOP electorate that is angry and fed up and a Democratic electorate that is disgusted and fed up you could have an unusual wave towards Trump and the GOP by the fall. I think Sanders might well be the better candidate against Trump in the fall. The GOP is more likely to have a significant percentage of their electorate disgusted by the choices and not angry at the opposing candidate and the Dems are more likely to have a significant percentage not disgusted by the choices but angry at the opposing candidate.
As a general matter I entirely agree with you, but I don't think that is the issue with Rubio. I have long been perplexed by what I don't see in his campaign, which is the logic of why people should support him and hope he, instead of others, is the candidate and ultimately the president. I know there's some talk that some in the Democratic Party feared him most in the general election, but that assumed he would show competence in his campaign. He has not. The problem is not that he sweats. It is that he has no real compelling argument or message. He returns to canned lines because his campaign knows this and so he tries to turn his whole act into an over the top criticism of Obama at every turn even when directly asked to provide that logic. Given the crazy turns of this campaign so far, I am not going to predict he's done this year. In fact it may not have been his plan all along to win the nomination this year, and he may have been sort of practicing for 2020. At that point he may have some actual accomplishments to point to, unlike now. But I would not be the least bit surprised, of course, if he continues to go down and ends up losing out sooner than later. Here's a thought - given the way he's done, and not done, up til now, he may be better off doing a slow fade out than risk another showing that just would confirm his lack of competence if he stays in and tries to raise expectations. As a last note I am obviously not in agreement with any of the GOP candidates. But there is also a certain way of looking at them relative to each other that I find interesting. For example I find it fascinating that some GOP voters like Cruz despite his arrogant elitist attitude, and how they expect him to be effective when everyone even in his own party hates him. Stuff like that. For Rubio, he seems like he's an obvious faker and an empty suit. Jus sayin...
Imo it's too early to predict. But Sanders's current standing has been achieved before anyone in the GOP attack machine has had him in their sites. If he somehow were to achieve the nomination, that would change in a huge way, of course. The GOP haters have been attacking Clinton for 25 years. That she still is standing is a testimony to her strength. Would Sanders do as well? I do not assume he would. And there would also be all the hammer and sickle ads. You know it's coming if it comes to that.
I think you underestimate the number of unaligned voters out there who are really suffering in this economy. I think you underestimate the number of nominally Republican or aligned Republican voters who are really doing poorly in the red states. If Sanders was a straight up the line socialist/liberal I think he would be completely unelectable. However he's Pro-Gun rights. He's also got a tax plan that would address the deficit while not raking the rich over the coals in the process. He's got Warren Buffet's plan to make the wealthy actually pay taxes at a rate similar to the people who work for them. We'd get down near election day and the GOP would be trying to paint him as a Communist and people like Buffet and Jim Webb and Joe Biden would be endorsing him and calling his plan for America the sensible plan to begin to fix our problems. On the flip side Trump would be going through a hailstorm of past statements thrown in his face and muck-raking about his past in the NYC Real Estate industry and talking about his past wives and generally making the things that make him stand out right now negatives by election day. I think Sanders could beat Trump. I don't think he could beat an establishment GOP candidate who had already been vetted thoroughly but he could beat Trump. I think Hillary could beat the establishment but I'm not at all convinced she could beat Trump. Every angry Trump voter would turn out and every angry anti-Hillary voter would turn out and they could easily be 50+1 for Trump. The angry Trump voters won't all vote for Trump. Some of them will vote for Sanders in the end. Those will be the angry white guys being slowly submerged by the economy, once they actually get to look at what the numbers in Sanders proposals are. Free healthcare, free college for their kids and a very small tax raise for some of them as the price.
If Sanders gets the nomination, which is highly unlikely, then someone like Bloomberg will most likely run as an independent and take away plenty of liberal votes for GOP to win.
