So far. The Texas senator had nine delegates coming into the Land of Equality's GOP State convention to Trump's and John Kasich's one each. Cruz took fourteen more yesterday with four left to be determined.
And he did so on the strength of a very powerful argument: "A vote for Trump is a vote for Hillary".
Testify, Senator, testify:
Ted Cruz was the only GOP presidential candidate to show up to lobby for delegates at Wyoming's State convention on Saturday, telling the fewer than five hundred elected county delegates gathering in Casper that the nation's eyes are on the western State and its possibilities, and urging them to help keep rival Donald Trump from winning the presidential nomination this summer. [emphasis added]
Naturally. Because Trump is evidently too busy trying to avoid a potentially embarrassing underperformance in his home State to bother. Or, in other words, "Strength!"
A Woody Allen saying comes to mind at this juncture: "Showing up is 80% of life".
Those concerned with federal land grabs in the West should perk up at this portion of Cruz's speech:
"As president, I will lead the effort to return the federal land in the West to the States and to the people," he told the delegates, pausing often for applause from the supportive crowd, reports the Washington Post. "America is the Saudi Arabia of coal, and we are going to develop our industry."
Who knows, maybe he'll even pardon the Bundy Gang. To which Trump would reply something along the lines of, "You mean that guy who chopped up young boys and kept their body fragments in his attic? I would NEVER do such a thing, and Lyin' Ted would - call the National Enquirer!"
Here was the afore-teased punchline:
Further, while asking the delegates to vote for his slate, Cruz told the crowd that if Donald Trump wins the GOP convention this summer, Hillary Clinton will become president in November.
Polling Data
| Poll | Date | Sample | MoE | Clinton (D) | Trump (R) | Spread |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RCP Average | 3/16 - 4/13 | -- | -- | 49.0 | 39.1 | Clinton +9.9 |
| FOX News | 4/11 - 4/13 | 1021 RV | 3.0 | 48 | 41 | Clinton +7 |
| CBS News | 4/8 - 4/12 | 1098 RV | 3.0 | 50 | 40 | Clinton +10 |
| McClatchy/Marist | 3/29 - 3/31 | 1066 RV | 3.0 | 50 | 41 | Clinton +9 |
| IBD/TIPP | 3/28 - 4/2 | 819 RV | 3.5 | 47 | 35 | Clinton +12 |
| PPP (D) | 3/24 - 3/26 | 1083 RV | 3.0 | 48 | 41 | Clinton +7 |
| Bloomberg | 3/19 - 3/22 | 815 LV | 3.4 | 54 | 36 | Clinton +18 |
| Quinnipiac | 3/16 - 3/21 | 1451 RV | 2.6 | 46 | 40 | Clinton +6 |
Quite so.
Trump, meanwhile, loudly protested his continuing, stubborn, roaring political sloth and ignorance and deafeningly manifested his hopeless inability to either learn from his mistakes or to lose gracefully:
Earlier on Saturday, Trump lambasted the Wyoming delegate process during an appearance onFoxTrump News, comparing it to Colorado's and commenting that he doesn't "want to waste money going to Wyoming, sending crews for months and months knowing you're not going to beat the bosses. I've beaten the bosses."
Still doesn't have a brain-mouth filter, I see. So what does this mean, Donnie? That 80% of life is NOT showing up? Wouldn't you be better off admitting that you and your cabal had no idea how State nominating processes like Colorado's and Wyoming's and a smattering of others work - pleading ignorance, in other words - than to come right out and publicly admit that you deliberately didn't compete for their delegates because you just arrogantly assumed that they were already in your "pile," and then lamely blame it on shadowy party "bosses" (you know, the ones that your Twitter mobs viciously assault by publishing their personal contact information and home addresses and pelting them with death threats against their families and other noble and upstanding endeavors)? Why does this not cause Trumplicans to do chiropractor-enriching double-takes?
Ah, yes, the universal answer I get from Trumpers whenever I confront them with any truth about their hero: "That's BS!" Well, they are intimately acquainted with that commodity, so I suppose they qualify as connoisseurs.
And if the New York primary produces a final delegate score of, say, Trump 7
Yeah, me too.
And he may not do even that well. Exit quote from RedState:
Every district where Trump falls below 50%, he loses a delegate. Optimus has him below 50% nearly everywhere outside of New York City. As a result of that, this poll has Trump losing twenty delegates to John Kasich and Ted Cruz, according to Phil Kerpen. [emphasis added]
Just in case y'all thought I was making up that delegate score above. And whaddaya know - winning Colorado and Wyoming functionally unopposed almost offsets that Trump margin in New York.
3-D chess versus tiddlywinks. Your choice.
UPDATE (4/17): Here's the latest "Days of Rage" threat hot off the Trump presses:
In his ever-escalating fight with the Republican National Committee, Donald Trump warned Saturday that party leaders should reform its system for selecting a nominee or face a “rough July” when it holds its convention in Cleveland.
“The Republican National Committee, they’d better get going, because I’ll tell you what: You’re going to have a rough July at that convention,” Trump said Saturday afternoon at a campaign rally in Syracuse. “You’d better get going, and you’d better straighten out the system because the people want their vote. The people want their vote, and they want to be represented properly.”
Translation: "Change the rules to lower the delegate count threshold of victory so I can win on the first ballot or Cleveland's gonna burn!"
If my Trumplican readers are outraged by this "BS" interpretation of "face a rough July" - and when AREN'T they outraged? - then kindly explain to me what the f**k he means. Because it sounds to me like it's Trump who is anticipating a "rough July".
Exit quote from Leon Wolf:
[T]his could have all been avoided if Trump had hired even marginally competent people. Trump has enough supporters that he could very easily have done what Cruz has done in terms of getting delegates for other candidates who are loyal to him, and he wouldn’t have this problem. But contrary to his own bluster, he hires crappy, incompetent people instead of good ones, and so we have what we have.
And it all could have been avoided easier still if Trump hadn’t made such a giant jackass out of hismelf that over 60% of the party stubbornly refuses to vote for him under any circumstances.
That way, he would have gotten 50% of the delegates on the first vote and he wouldn’t have these problems. But if he were capable of doing that, then he wouldn’t be Donald Trump. [emphasis added]
No comments:
Post a Comment