If…If Trump does manage to become president I hope he chooses a viable VP. If he is as incoherent and inconsistent a president as he has been outlining what he believes in, then he’s a great candidate for impeachment and conviction. Finally maybe we’ll find something 2/3’s of the Senate can agree on.

I agree with that in the sense that few people are going to support Trump simply because Christie does. But I think that a number of people are going to start thinking maybe it’s ok to support Trump,, and that in itself is a big deal.

I guess opportunism and this alt-right backlash or activism must explain some of the other backers. They want their piece of the pie or they want to burn the whole thing down.

And, this from Boxty: These are folks that have been fighting for conservatism for decades, if not their whole careers. Ask yourselves what is it that they get that you Johnny-come-latelies to conservatism don’t?

I will be working on answering that question Boxty. I have only gotten on board since around 2008-2010 so I have learning to do. But this Trump thing is a weird one.. I could not have foreseen this.

I do think Neo you were obviously right in what say said about the GOP coming undone and folks becoming angry after the Romney defeat. It could go in many directions I guess, maybe we are only beginning to see the shifts.

I think people are really desperate. The economy sucks for many. And, yes, immigration and globalization are making our lives difficult for many reasons.

Andrew Johnson destroyed the Democrat-Republican party…

Birthing the Democrat party.

He was deemed vulgar — almost universally so.

He was declaimed WRT his hair — quite a fuss over the trivial.

As far as the Founders were concerned, he destroyed the republic as they envisioned it.

He also crossed swords with Big Banking — something that I figure is a Lock to happen with Donald Trump IF he makes it.

It will be remarkable if the markets don’t swoon this year.

I’m expecting a do-over of 2008.

We are back to 2008 levels of bubble — globally.

I believe Beijing has reached the end of the road — and ‘the can’ has grown to biblical proportions.

Red China ran a simulacrum of an economy.

For, at a national level, they did not economize.

Red China has aped the West — without adopting the price signals — internally — that are the essence of a market based economy.

Weirdly, under Greenspan, Bernanke, and Yellen our credit masters have aped Red China.

So, now WE have a largely deluded economy – – a command driven economy.

Fortunately for the markets, a simulacrum of price discovery still holds the aura of prior honest trading.

When that faith is lost…

We tank.

Not everyone can succeed.

But everyone can screw up.

He’d virtually replicate the Kennedy-Johnson ticket.

For those who remember, that was a brokered deal.

That ticket was no love fest.

Prove to me that immigration isn’t the issue that trumps all others this election and maybe I’ll listen to your other arguments on Trump. Until then, he’s still the strongest candidate on immigration. I don’t care what he thinks on other issues as long as he can shut down the border.

Parker: your age means nothing. Berne Sanders has us beat by many decades and he is still a fool. Rubio and Cruz are also in their 40’s and are much more competent than Sanders or Clinton.

That’s how the GOP should be “fundamentally transformed”, from the bottom up. The Tea Party did a bang up job of it in 2010 and 2014 picking up 900+ seats at all levels. What’s happened?

1) Is the Presidential campaign sucking up so much media that we’re just not hearing about other national elections?

2) Has Trump’s Cult of Personality absorbed many of the original and potential Tea Party members? I know one fairly notable TP founder has endorsed him.

3) Did the battering the Tea Parties and their donors took from the IRS enervate the entire movement beyond recovery?

Any other ideas?