2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumThe G.O.P. Presidential Field Looks Chaotic. It’s Not.
The 2016 Republican candidates can already be sorted into roles that tell us a lot about their chances of winning the nomination.
The Republican primary battle has been called a wide-open contest the deepest and strongest field in many cycles. It is full of the partys rising stars and hopefuls, like Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Chris Christie, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz and Bobby Jindal, alongside the most formidable name in Republican politics: Bush.
But the campaign is not nearly as open as it looks. Many of the candidates who have received the most news media attention have little or no chance of winning the nomination. Instead, two figures Jeb Bush and Mr. Walker have quickly moved to the head of the pack. Perhaps only Mr. Rubio has a good chance to join them at the top. . .
This article is a guide to the roles that this years candidates have already assumed. Based on the levels of elite support and broad acceptability, we place the candidates into three categories Invisible Primary Leaders, Mainstream Options and Factional Favorites and explain how they align with historical comparisons.
If you keep this framework in mind over the next year, itll be easier to make sense of the Republican campaigns.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/10/upshot/-2015-04-10-2016-elections-upshot-the-gop-presidential-field-looks-chaotic-its-nothtml.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
Warpy
(111,396 posts)The drumbeat of god, gays, guns, and gynecology is the same from idiot to idiot. They all know what Republicans want to hear and they're all saying it. The only difference is which face the voters will choose and dream of chiseling into Mt. Rushmore.
NYC Liberal
(20,138 posts)Cracklin Charlie
(12,904 posts)They love chaos.
They thrive on it.
Their power is attained through chaos.
blkmusclmachine
(16,149 posts)qwlauren35
(6,150 posts)It seems weird to know who all of the contestants are before they jump into the race. Every single one of them frightens me, some more than others. I did not realize that Scott Walker had such a good shot at the presidency. That's just sick.
I really hope the Democrats can find a "perfect" candidate to inspire the Independents to vote for him or her en masse.
DonCoquixote
(13,616 posts)The Koches are throwing money behind him, and that is it. Jeb has been percieved as the moderate brpother, which he is NOT, in some ways, he will be worse then W. as he thinks he is smart enough to run the show, instead of sucking his thumb and doing whatever papa Dick tells him to do.