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The FOX debate…

04 Aug

FOX has announced the 10 candidates for the GOP nomination who will appear in the first primetime debate.

The first primetime debate of the Republican primary race on Thursday will include ten candidates, according to FOX News: Donald Trump, Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Mike Huckabee, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Chris Christie and John Kasich. 

FOX, which is hosting the debate in Cleveland, Ohio, announced the list of the top 10 candidates based on recent national polling on air at 6pm ET Tuesday. 

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who earlier last week was at risk of missing the cut for the primetime debate in his home state, made the cut at the 10th spot, edging out former Texas Gov. Rick Perry. 

Candidates that did not make the cut will participate in a separate debate earlier on Thursday. Those Republicans are: Perry, Rick Santorum, Bobby Jindal, Carly Fiorina, Lindsey Graham, Jim Gilmore and George Pataki. 

First off, I think it’s somewhat ridiculous for FOX to enforce an arbitrary cut-off for the debate. This isn’t American Idol. No one has voted yet, and they’ve already set a distinction between major league and minor league candidates, which I think effectively ends the campaigns of everyone in Tier 2. Yeah, they’ll have a “separate debate” earlier in the day, which about as many people will watch as will participate. It’s almost like the singles table at a wedding: “Bobby, I think you and Lindsey will get along smashingly. Yes, you just met a half hour ago but you’re both polling poorly, so you have that in common.”

Let’s also take a moment to consider that four governors (Gilmore, Jindal, Pataki, and Perry), and two senators (Graham and Santorum), who despite what you might think of their politics have some practical experience, won’t be on the same stage in a primetime debate for the GOP presidential nomination with the former star of The Apprentice. That is Trump’s occupation, by the way. That’s why most voters even know his name. It’s not like Steve Jobs is still alive and is running. No one sits down to watch Hulu on their “Trump Tablets.”

And Trump is arguably still the most appealing of the “major league” candidates. I suppose Bush is supposed to get credit for being the only closeted asshole of the bunch.

 
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Posted by on August 4, 2015 in Political Theatre

 

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More on Trump…

03 Aug

From Politico:

A new Monmouth University poll has Trump at 26 percent, easily topping his competitors. The next-closest candidates — former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker — are at 12 percent and 11 percent, respectively. 

Both the new Monmouth survey and an average of the five most recent live-caller polls — Fox News’ criteria for whittling the list of Republicans down to 10 candidates for Thursday night’s debate — reinforce the tiers that have developed since Trump upended the race by surging to the top.

Beneath Trump, Bush and Walker are five more candidates who are hovering around 6 percent in the poll average (and scored between 4 percent and 6 percent in the Monmouth poll): pediatric neurosurgeon Ben Carson, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

I suppose the theory (or at least the hope from the Bush campaign) is that majority of GOP primary voters will eventually unite behind Jeb. But the folks supporting Cruz, Huckabee, Paul, even Carson and Christie seem more likely to back Trump. He is more similar to all of them in temperament and rhetoric. I wonder if the GOP establishment will at some point pressure Walker or Rubio to withdraw as their supporters seem likely Bush voters.

I know it’s almost a year until the GOP convention but gee, Jeb, your dad and your brother were both president. You were governor of a state for a while and now you’re losing to Donald Trump by 14 points? That’s only acceptable if the poll was conducted by Trump himself.

 
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Posted by on August 3, 2015 in Political Theatre

 

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