Poll indicates support for Trump fading
Of course, polls can be wrong, and opinion can change – sometimes rapidly. But my gut tells me that this is substantially correct:
The poll finds Trump deeply unpopular at 30% favorable, 62% unfavorable. That places him well below Joe Biden at 46%/50% and Kamala Harris at 36%/52%. In a rematch between Trump and Joe Biden, Biden wins easily, 47% to 40%.
Perhaps equally important, Ron DeSantis leads Biden by 47% to 43%. Only 25% of respondents want Trump to run in 2024. Among Republicans and Republican leaners, DeSantis is favored over Trump by 56% to 33%.
Deserved or not, the last couple of years in particular have taken a harsh toll.
Dan Gelernter (at AmericanGreatness) has written a very interesting piece entitled “DeSantis 2024 Is a Trap” about the critical importance of addressing the many problems in our highly “problematic” electoral system, while also arguing that the young and excellent governor should be willing to wait until 2028 (when he will be a still youthful fifty). Many shrewd observers also contend that DeSantis is being held up as an alternative to Trump by the MSM (the old strategy of “divide and conquer”) and by GOPe (one should bear in mind the unhinged hostility to B Masters and Kari from NationalReview) in an attempt to split the conservative vote, thereby sabotaging the chances of victory for a strong alternative to the current destructive administration.
My concern (among many) is that if DeSantis were to beat out Trump in the primary, will Trump’s diehard supporters become so embittered that they decide either to not vote at all in 2024, or vote for Biden (or Newsome or whomever) in a “burn it all down!” protest sort of thing.
That poll is off the most ignorant also largest mail fraud so go with it
Nonapod:
Of course, there is an inherent problem no matter who is nominated. Some Trump supporters with vote for no one else. Many other voters in the middle or on the right refuse to vote for Trump.
j e:
See my comment right above this one. Also, no “attempt” to split the right is needed. The right is ALEADY split and has been for ages. Reasoning like that of the article you site is ignoring the reality. The real question is who can best unite the party in 2024, and gain votes in the middle? At the moment it looks like Trump is not that person and Desantis has a better chance. I find the campaign on the right against him to be highly counterproductive and potentially favoring the left in the end.
Trump is a proud and competitive man. That’s been helpful in the past. Now it would be for the good of the many for him to devote his life to his businesses. And I’m hoping Melania and Ivanka can persuade him to do that.
I would vote for Trump over **ANY*** Democrat.
I would vote for Desantis over **ANY*** Democrat.
I would vote for a bent trashcan over **ANY*** Democrat.
See a pattern there?
But then again, until we get the voting systems fixed in this country, it won’t matter. In blue states they’ll just truck in enough votes so the democrat wins. In any close race, they’ll just keep counting over and over until the Democrat wins.
The businesses they are trying to actively destroy wake up and smell the pungent wastewater
Both sides of the swamp has an overpowering interest in disappearing Trump.
It’s sad to see how well they can still manipulate us. Let the peons fight while we continue to not do anything whatsoever to address obvious voting irregularities.
I don’t disagree with the advice that it might be better for DeSantis to run for president in 2028. The problem is, who could win in 2024? This is much larger than any personal feelings about Trump one way or the other. We must have a Republican president in 2025, and we must have both the House and the Senate.
Trump has had his shot. I’d like someone who can organize, put together a team, and knows how to use a broom. Trump isn’t that guy. I’d would rather have DeSantis in 2024. I do fear Trump may be a spoiler, but I think his announcement that he was running was too early and that allows plenty of time for him to run his ship onto a reef.
Neo
My feeling is that for every Trump supporter who decides to sit it out that we lose will be replaced by far more Independents (and suburban women) and Republicans who do not want Biden but were not going to vote for Trump because of all his bagggage. Why should DeSantis wait until 2028 as so many things can happen between now and then? This will be Trump’s thrid run for the presidency which is one too many.
Retailers of high-end goods in San Francisco have seen thugs burst into their stores in broad daylight and steal huge quantities of their most valuable items. The authorities do nothing, and the thugs come back, time after time, until the store shuts down. It has happened so often that people are moving out of San Francisco.
There’s an obvious parallel. The citizens’ most valuable political items are their votes. We’ve seen them stolen, time and again, and we know who the thugs are. We do nothing. And there’s no place to move to.
To me, there is no point DeSantis waiting until 2028; it will be too late by then. Any Democrat who wins in 2024 will cement the uniparty permanently in power. DeSantis running in 2028 means he loses. At least in 2024 he MAY have a chance, despite all the Democratic election shenanigans that will happen.
I agree that the advice that DeSantis wait for 2028 is out of touch with the nature of the situation.
The Trump/DeSantis question came up at Thanksgiving with a couple of the super Trump fans in my family and they asked me what I thought and I said ‘I want to win’ and I was encouraged that they agreed Trump couldn’t win.
Who can actually win is by far the most important question for me.
I wonder how many of the pollsters who want deSantis over Trump are concerned not about policy but about electability.
We don’t want to run a likely loser….no matter how foul the means of his being a likely loser are.
Personally I’ll support either one.
A journalist asked [Harold MacMillan] to identify the greatest challenge to his administration, and he replied:
“Events, my dear boy, events.”
________________________________
As usual, the story of the quote is more complicated than one might like.
I suspect the coming twelve months are going to be so jam-packed with events that a year from now the current Trump discussion will seem quaint.
Don:
I assume you mean in the general. But what about the primary?
Trump had his chance and he blew it, albeit with a lot of help from Ivanka, Jared, and the media. I’m undecided about DeSantis. He could be a real nationalist conservative, but until he proves that, the safe way to bet is that he’s another !Jeb!.
One thing is for sure: the 2024 general election campaign is going to be the dirtiest and most dishonest election we’ve yet seen. There is going to be voter fraud on an industrial scale, and unless I am mistaken (and I hope I am) the GOP will lose while wringing their hands and congratulating themselves on how they “didn’t stoop to their level.” The National Review crowd can go on their cruises after the election and hear the “brain trust” talk about how the tens of millions of “refugees” and illegal aliens who have shown up since January of 2021 represent an “opportunity,” while glossing over the fact that the middle class is furious that their country is being conquered without DC even putting up .a fight
I think huxley @ 5:21 is right that events will overtake this squabble.
Sgt. Joe Friday
DeSantis has absolutely nothing in common with the Bush’s. He kept his state open while all the Blue States did draconian lockdowns, he stood up to the Florida teacher’s union, he took a stand against illegal migrations by showing the hypocrisy of the Left by flying some to Martha’s Vineyard, he fought back against Disney – why on Earth do you (and the Trump supporters) think he would be another Jeb Bush???
Roy @3:31 pm.
Amen brother.
The primary. Let the voters decide. I will support Trump in the primary if it looks like he can win in the general. That’s why we have primaries. The voters look the e4mtrants over and vote accordingly. I want to win and will go with whoever looks like a winner.
The general. Whoever has the R after his/her name.
If the MSM/Dems/DOJ/etc. have their way, Trump will be too enmeshed in court battles to run. So, we’ll have to see how those proceeds. On that score, Huxley has it about right.
Polls showed that prior to the election, 65-84% of Americans polled agreed that the country was headed in the wrong direction, yet a majority effectively voted for the status quo. Other than hope, upon what basis might we imagine that post 2024 will be substantively different than pre-2022?
“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.” Alexis de Tocqueville
“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.
The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From courage to liberty; From liberty to abundance; From abundance to selfishness; From selfishness to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage.” Alexander Fraser Tytler
Liberals are enabling the fashioning of the ‘chains’ of their future bondage. But they will not be bonds of iron, their bondage will consist of digital bondage. Trudeau’s seizure of the trucker protester’s income and financial assets was a trial run.
JJ:
I believe that Netanyahu ran and won while being enmeshed in court battles – a corruption trial. See this.
BrooklynBoy:
They don’t think he’d be another Jeb Bush. They just want us to think it, in order to help Trump and hurt DeSantis.
huxley:
Events eventually catch up to even the ever so evil.
https://mereorthodoxy.com/vengeance-is-the-lords/
i’ve read enough of sundance since 2012, when he was one of the lone voices challenging the sanford narrative, to understand his thinking I think he’s mistaken,
but I understand how he comes to it,
geoffrey’s reservations are well founded, why have not a small number chosen to refit themselves with the serf’s collar, that what voting for hochul, shapiro and whitmer entails, lets leave out the fraud calculus for a moment,
Come what may Trump will be Trump.
DeSantis 2024.
I am sick and tired of bloggers like Neo who are being influenced and yes, brain washed by the Enemedia.
It is truly amazing that you and many other “conservatives” have gone off the deep end and now believe all the bull crap that the enemies of MAGA are pushing.
Please tell me exactly what “baggage” President Trump has that disqualified him from running again for the office that was STOLEN from him just a few short years ago?
Is it any worse than what FJB is carrying around? The current fake President is a treasonous traitor who has made many, many millions by selling out our country to the Chinese, the Ukrainians and everywhere else that he can peddle his influence. The man is demonstrably a degenerate CRIMINAL yet nobody on our side seems to be concerned about that.
Instead, go ahead and believe everything that you read coming from the Neocon warmongering thugs.
President Trump is the ONLY actual leader on the political scene today. He is the ONLY man who literally can get thousands of people to show up at his rallies who are loyal to him and the MAGA cause.
Ron DeSantis is great for the future but if he tried to get in the game now, he will get his ass kicked.
Never give up on Trump. Never.
Queen of the Jingle, quite the debut. Time will tell. Events, queenie, events.
Queen of the Jungle:
Since this is your very first comment here – and a sterling example of the genre it is – if you’re so sick and tired of it why not go elsewhere?
When I read comments like “Queen of the Jungle” it reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend prior to the Republican primary in 2016. Like her, he seemed to view Trump as some sort of a god, and swore to me that if Trump didn’t win the primary he would vote for Hillary instead. I was a Cruz fan, but when Trump won the nomination I voted for him, and was glad I did. Trump was a great president. Also, I agree that the election was “stolen” from him.
Having said that, I won’t address the rest of her rant (I’ll leave it to other commenters) other than to say that like nonapod at 2:52- my concern (among many) is that “if DeSantis were to beat out Trump in the primary, Trump’s diehard supporters will become so embittered that they decide either to not vote at all in 2024, or vote for Biden (or Newsome or whomever) in a “burn it all down!” protest sort of thing.”
I have always believed that Trump loves this country, but I fear that his ego is such that if DeSantis or someone else wins the Republican nomination, out of spite Trump will encourage his worshipers, like Queen of the Jungle, to sit out the election. I hope that I’m wrong.
It occurs to me that Queenie is a Dem plant; divide and conquer.
om:
That sort of thing has occurred to me many times in the past about similar comments. There’s no way to tell, though.
Chris B:
Many don’t need encouragement to sit it out.
This has been going on long before Trump, too. There were many people who said they would be sitting out 2008, or sitting out 2012, because of RINO McCain and RINO Romney. While I didn’t think a whole lot of either candidate, both were obviously better than Obama and I voted for them.
I’m not persuaded by the argument that we have to nominate Trump to keep his his diehard supporters onboard. There is a risk that Trump’s diehard supporters will sit out 2024 if (when?) Trump fails to win the Republican nomination.
Based on 2018, 2020, and 2022, however, we know that there is a large group of independents and weak Republicans who will not vote for for Trump or MAGA candidates, even when the alternative is Warnock, Shapiro, Whitmer, Biden, etc.
I suspect that the group who will not vote for Trump is bigger than the group that won’t vote for anyone other than Trump, but this may be a “damned if you do and damned if you don’t” situation for the GOP.
Powerline headline: “SUPPORT FOR TRUMP COLLAPSING”
Hinderaker has taken a decided negative attitude towards Trump, and President Trump has had a bad few weeks including apparently being played by Milo. I think the unforced error was letting Fuentes in the building. Trump has known West/Ye for some time and he’s more in the crank category than an influencer with his antisemtic tirades. When you’ve lost Alex Jones….
I’m not sure how reflective the poll is, especially of Republican primary voters as 45% of respondents had a favorable view of Biden. Also nearly 12% of respondents had incomes less than $20,000. It also underrepresented voters over 65.
IMO, President Trump announced way too early– but I wonder if he felt that was necessary because of the hounding by his enemies in the inJustice Department.
He did appear somewhat subdued when he announced. Still incredible energy for his age, but he needs to get back his wry humor. Given what he’s been through since he left office, I’ll cut him some slack.
He may need to get back on Twitter, to broaden his message.
Whether his supporters will get behind another candidate in the unlikely event Trump were to lose the nomination, depends on the dirty tricks department of the Republican party.
Neo: “I believe that Netanyahu ran and won while being enmeshed in court battles – a corruption trial.”
Yep, and it could happen with Trump. I’m not hoping for legal matters to take Trump out of the campaign, but you can be sure that’s the Democrats’ intent. Him being under indictment would not improve his chances, unless we had an objective MSM. If we had a fair MSM, many people would now be seeing how the 2020 election was tampered with by social media and the government. Trump might well win while being indicted under those circumstances. But we know that’s not going to happen.
How about this? Trump/DeSantis 2024?
While I am very pleased with the job Mr. Trump did in his Presidency, I fear he is past his sell by date. I think he would do the same level of work, in a second term, the media will not let him have it. They do as their Democrat masters bid them to do, as they have not the brains to think for themselves.
I also believe that Mr. Trump was actually reelected, until the mysterious shut downs in the counting revealed enormous blocks of Biden votes. The media will never allow Mr. Trump to be vindicated.
I shall vote for whoever wins the Republican primary, and I hope it is Mr.Desantis at this time. I also think this is the last chance we are going to get to save ourselves.
One bad poll is an accident.
Twice is happenstance.
It takes at least three to indicate enemy action — or a genuine measurement.
Here is a contrary take.
https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/donald-trump-inflation-genius/
physicsguy writes “ To me, there is no point DeSantis waiting until 2028; it will be too late by then. Any Democrat who wins in 2024 will cement the uniparty permanently in power.”
I’m looking at the Ruling Class fixing to control states like Nevada and Georgia, in addition to Michigan and Pennsylvania.
Because of THIS, I’m growing convinced that it’s already too late, and that no genuine revolutionary (I’d, right-wing reformer who’s outside the Swamp) will be allowed to win.
If I bother to vote, then I will vote Marxist Party in order to burn it all down ASAP.
They already wanna see it all razed. Why pretend to try otherwise?
A lot of speculation on this (of course), but one thing caught my eye—the supposed response of Trump supporters should DeSantis win the nomination in 2024.
Once again, EVERYTHING here is speculation—EVERYTHING—but I will say the following without qualification and with absolute confidence:
Should DeSantis be the 2024 GOP candidate for president, then DJT will support him full-heartedly.
This, because when all is said and done, Trump loves his country.
QED.
(Could I be wrong about this? Of course…)
Looks like Queenie is actually a Dem heiffer.
What about the Florida voters who do not want to lose DeSantis as their governor and are Trump supporters? My Aunt is one of them. Florida is becoming a magnet for disaffected conservatives and DeSantis is a component part of that circumstance. Most of the other states have proven lackadaisical in terms of voting for the status quo no matter how corrupt or destructive. I speak as a Californian. But I could easily be speaking for Arizona, Georgia, Michigan etc etc.
}}} Deserved or not, the last couple of years in particular have taken a harsh toll.
The problem is not Trump, it’s a combo of factors.
1 — I think too many people have been mislead by the lying merdia to have him be electable again.
2 — even inside the party, he is too polarizing a figure.
3 — He did not deserve what happened, but it’s reality, not The Land of Liberals (where what one wants or “deserves” is relevant).
4 — I think he’s actually a bit old for the job. He may be in great shape now, but can we assume he will be in 2y? 4y?
5 — I think he’s better suited to remaining a gadfly for the left’s ire, while DeSantis takes over.
I don’t class him as “unfavorable”, as much as “not preferred”.
om – I’ve often wondered whether Trump is a Democratic plant. He acts like the cartoon villian version of what the wokesters believe conservatives to be. He’s a walking stereotype confirmation for them (and for many on the center-right and center-left). FWIW, I don’t think he is a plant. I don’t think that the left would have traded the Supreme Court for anything.
I do, however, think that the left has been playing the same game with Trump that they played with Todd Aiken in Missouri and with all the MAGA candidates that the left spent so much money on the 2022 Republican primaries. Trump’s 2016 primary campaign was more or less launched by all the free media that he received from mainstream (i.e., left-leaning) sources like CNN and Morning Joe on MSNBC.
They were burned in a big way when Trump actually won in 2016. Losing the Supreme Court was a major blow, but other than that, the left is arguably in a stronger position now than it would have been without Trump. The left will be in a stronger position still if they can sucker the GOP into nominating Trump again in 2024 or if his core supporters do decide to stay home or vote for Biden or whoever is the Democrat’s nominee.
As long as there is any chance to make the elections trustworthy we are still at this.
“Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.”
concerned condervative™ posits The Great Orange Whale as a Dem plant. Well that is truly a unique perspective. There were questions regarding Trump based on his statements and associations before he was elected. But after HRC’s defeat at the hands of the Roosians (farce) he actually proved to be a Dem plant herbicide. Of course those afflicted with OMB cannot recognize these things but still sow concern.
Events leave evidence.
Martin – Whoa there! Before talking about revolution, we should at least try running candidates that don’t repulse significant portions of the electorate. Actually, GOP candidates that don’t repulse big chunks of the electorate did pretty well in 2022, despite any voting shenanigans. Every GOP statewide candidate in Georgia won (except one). None of the other GOP candidates even had to go to a runoff. Several GOP statewide candidates won in AZ (except for two very prominent candidates). The GOP won the governorship in NV.
The left maneuvered itself into the position it has today because of its Gramscian march over the course of decades. The MAGA crowd seems to think it can undo all of that with one election.
Some Dem plant:
https://nypost.com/2022/12/13/bidens-return-to-normalcy-brought-us-crazy-instead-like-sam-brinton/
But, but, but OMB!
Like the jibbering golem i wasnt a fan of dr oz but hes a reasonably sentient being that was just the icing on the cake personally i think warnock is the most offensive because what he has done to kings parish ebenezer baptist in addition to being an ally of every us enemy for a quarter century
Sbfs pac spent 10 million of ftx in oregons 6th district primary. It was a full beto in georgia he spent 3 in newts old district with a carpetbagger lucy mcbath
om – You didn’t read what I wrote. And no, pointing out that Biden is bad doesn’t help. The whole “binary choice” argument only works after it’s too late to pick a different nominee.
We should thank our lucky stars that Trump is blowing up now instead of waiting until 2024. That’s about the only thing Trump has done since the 2020 election that didn’t play directly into the hands of the left.
That was a smart vizzini like move
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/russian-oil-sold-india-below-price-cap-buyers-market-2022-12-14/
Queen of the Jungle
I think that Trump had you in mind when he said that he could shoot a person to death on 5th Avenue (in NYC) and his fans would still vote for him. Trump frankly is an embittered has-been who is still obsessed with the 2020 election while the voters are looking forward. He cannot control his impulsive temper and mouth which costs him tens of thousands of votes. For the record, I voted for him and donated $200 to his campaign, yet he still lost to a vegetable despite a good record of achievement. The Left hates Trump so much that they had him banned from twitter which actually was a favor for Trump because his tweets with all their rage and misspellings (Covfefe?) worked against him.
Some observations (not necessarily new):
– I will vote for Trump, or Desantis, or any Republican over any Democrat in 2024 (Biden, Harris, Newsome? Just listing the names induces nausea).
– Job #1 beyond Trump v. DeSantis or anyone else is fixing the voting system.
– Trump hasn’t done much lately to help himself. Regardless of media bias, what was the point of meeting with Kanye let alone allowing Milo and Fuentes to tag along?
– For now I favor DeSantis but I understand the point of Trump supporters who feel that only Trump is known to stand up for the full MAGA agenda.
– The MAGA agenda is bigger than one man. Or should be.
OK, now that I have brought up the “MAGA agenda”, what is it exactly? I think stripped down to its essence it is *economic* nationalism. Not just nationalism.
Trump’s two bedrock issues in 2016 were trade and immigration. And on these he took the positions that had previously been held for decades by the industrial (not public employee!!!) labor unions that had been the backbone of the *Democrat* base for decades. Something neither party wants to talk about. They opposed illegal immigration because it was cheap labor undercutting Americans’ wages. And they were skeptical of so-called “free trade” because they saw American jobs going overseas.
Even more broadly Trump won in 2016 because of worker frustration with decades of job losses. Specifically he won the electoral vote by flipping strong labor union states that hadn’t voted Republican in decades – Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. If Trump is too toxic now these people still need to be appealed to for Republicans to win in 2024 (along with truing the vote).
“…we should at least try running candidates that don’t repulse significant portions of the electorate…”
It doesn’t work that way.
“If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve.”
– William Tecumseh Sherman
concerned conservative™ and the other non-Dem OMB-afflicted just might consider that without the Great Orange Whale and his mean tweets the country would never have learned about the magnitude of corruption and unconstitutional criminality that the media, Silicon Valley, and the federal and state bureaucracy were and are willing to do to maintain and expand their power. A milktoast, go along, get along politician would have and will not pose any impediment to them. concerned conservatives™ continue to ignore this basic history of the last 6 years, insisting that we must never upset the political apple cart again. Larry Hogan, Chris Christie, or some other palatable nonentity are what is needed.(sarc)
Right om.
“Trump’s two bedrock issues in 2016 were trade and immigration. – FOAF
MAGA includes much more than that. Rather than narrowing it to “economic nationalism”, I would say it’s more a general national sovereignty expressed in the populist slogan, “America First”.
President Trump wasn’t an isolationist per se, but skeptical of our need to spend vast sums projecting power around the world. The intelligence community/military industrial complex convinced him otherwise or it might be proper to say they reached a negotiated settlement on the issue.
As to unfettered exodus of manufacturing jobs abroad (mistakenly called free trade) and an unfettered influx of illegals depressing entry low skilled jobs along with an assortment of bad characters importing drugs/gangs/crime, and more generally “foreign policy” we know on which side President Trump resides.
Any candidate that wants to carry on the MAGA/America First banner needs to firmly reside on the same side of the divide, regardless of whatever principles he/she may favor.
I ran across this comment I wrote sometime ago about the same subject:
“I am Spartacus” calls the battle in the GOP between Corporate Globalists vs. the Economic Populists.
I agree, though I might term it Corporate Globalists vs. National Sovereignty or National Populism.
Using the term Nationalist might be a trigger word, arousing immediate suspicion by how the media has muddied the term with supremacist. I’m a nationalist. I’m white. But I’m hesitant to call myself a white nationalist, even though there is nothing wrong with the term, the media has conflated that with white supremacy.
Nationalism has become a dirty word for many people. The media has achieved their objective, since is it even a country when its citizens aren’t allowed to express any affection for their country?
Anyway, I think the battle can be summed up as one of National Sovereignty.
What is involved in the term National Sovereignty– expressed as America First?
1. Control of national borders. We expect each country in the world to act in the best interests of their citizens.
2. Trade policies that benefit American workers. America First is the opposite of what Lee Smith in The Thirty Tyrants called “globalism—that is, the freedom to structure commercial relationships and social enterprises without reference to the well-being of the particular society in which they happened to make their livings and raise their children.”
America First means Americans care about American well being. Trade policies need to consider the economic benefits of all Americans, where possible. All trade relationships among countries will include tradeoff– favoring on segment of the economy over another. We want our trade policies to consider the effects of that.
Here’s a reminder of the battle:
“For my last column I (Lee Smith) spoke with The New York Times’ Thomas Friedman about an article he wrote more than a decade ago, during the first year of Barack Obama’s presidency. His important piece documents the exact moment when the American elite decided that democracy wasn’t working for them. Blaming the Republican Party for preventing them from running roughshod over the American public, they migrated to the Democratic Party in the hopes of strengthening the relationships that were making them rich.”
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/the-thirty-tyrants
I don’t know how many it will be, but I’d bet a lot of money the number of OnlyTrump voters out there is larger than the NeverTrump section of the GOP.
Trump’s not going away on his own. He’ll have to be beat in the Republican primaries and it absolutely will be an ugly fight. And Trump won’t disappear afterwards. He’ll continue to command plenty of media attention, especially when he starts second-guessing and criticizing the GOP candidate. And when…5%…7%…10% or whatever REFUSE to turn out and vote for the Republicans in November 2024, then what?
The refusal of so many (not necessarily here) to think even one step ahead is an almost perfect demonstration of the political and personal degeneracy that summoned up Trump in the first place.
Mike
“Before talking about revolution, we should at least try running candidates that don’t repulse significant portions of the electorate.”
Like George W. Bush…or John McCain…or Mitt Romney.
I’d like to know why all this energy wasn’t focused on getting rid of Mitch McConnell? It would have been a much easier task and is at least as justified as getting rid of Trump.
Mike
I am with om. McConnell protecting Lisa Murkowski did me in. Doing that, getting ready to ram a spending bill through, and even THINKING about Amnesty is why I am hesitant to even support the party anymore. Trump opened our eyes. Why do we want to close them again??
wendybar:
I doubt that the first time your eyes – or our eyes – were opened were with Trump’s candidacy or presidency. I’ve heard much the same as what you’re saying long long before Trump was president.
But in answer to your question “why do we want to close them again?”: supporting the GOP, as well as its most conservative members, can be done with eyes wide open. What’s more, conservatives turning away from voting would warm the cockles of every leftist’s heart.
MBunge:
When you say more energy should have been focused on “getting rid of” Mitch McConnell, what specifically do you think should have been done? Are you talking about primarying him in his last election, or opposing him for Leader? As far as the first goes, he was primaried in 2020 (his most recent election) but his popularity in Kentucky is huge and the efforts were doomed. And in the general, he won by 20 points. So there was no chance of getting rid of him that way.
As far as the leadership goes, he has no real rivals. It’s a very powerful but in some ways thankless job that makes you a lightning rod for criticism, and it takes special skills that not everyone has. He had no viable opponent. See this.
This comment isn’t about Trump. But if these lawsuits fail, especially the one by Kari Lake, Neo might title the post “Chances of Republicans ever winning again Fading”
Two court battles could change the death grip the left has on our elections.
One, “Moore v. Harper” has been argued before the SC last week and we won’t know the outcome until sometime next year.
The other, filed by Kari Lake is ongoing and its importance can’t be understated. Unlike the failed attempts to get a hearing in 2020, it appears a judge is taking the case seriously.
Also, Lake has prepared a better case outlining two specific problems with the election, and the problems stem with violations of Arizona law, having to do with signature verification and chain of custody– both having consequences that would throw the results of the election into question.
Both are related to the use of Runbeck. Runbeck scans the envelopes of mail-in ballots for Maricopa County.
Those scanned signature images are then compared to a digital signature on the voters registration card using automatic signature verification software. It’s not clear where this part of the process occurs, but most like at the Maricopa county election center.
In her lawsuit and based on whistleblower testimony, Lake alleges that approximately 130,000 ballots were rejected because of mismatches and were supposed to be cured (a process where voters are contacted and allowed to correct the signature). According to her lawsuit this process wasn’t followed and the ballots were counted.
Washington state has used mail-in voting only for about 15 years. Last winter they did an audit of the 2020 election, ostensibly looking for bias in the process of signature verification. (They found none.) But when describing their methodology, they revealed something interesting. They took a sample of 7,257 ballots and ran them through automatic signature verification software (SignatureXpert by Parascript). The software rejected 542 signatures or around 7.5%. The auditors then compared the signatures and eventually decided that 158 did not match, or about 2.2%. (The statewide rejection rate for 2020 was 0.72%).
So what does this have to do with the case in Arizona? There were 1,570,000 votes case in Maricopa county. Using a similar rejection rate that auditors in Washington state found that would lead to approximately 120,000 ballots being rejected– which is close to the amount Lake is claiming in her lawsuit. Supposing those ballots had been cured and something around the 2.2% of the total votes cast were found to be fraudulent. That is 34,570– twice the difference between the two candidates.
Now Washington isn’t Arizona. But it is evidence that Arizona needs to allow the Lake lawyers access to the envelopes for comparison and have them thrown out.
If this lawsuit is rejected, the left has won. You can throw election integrity into the wastebin of the Marxist march through our institutions.
More on Lake court case:
https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/judge-sets-dates-next-steps-lakes-challenge-election-results
By the way, here’s a story alleging the same lack of signature verification in 2020:
https://neonnettle.com/news/15686-arizona-county-skipped-signature-verification-requirement-on-mail-in-ballots-auditor
“When you say more energy should have been focused on “getting rid of” Mitch McConnell, what specifically do you think should have been done?”
I’m saying that almost all of the people advocating an extremely destructive fight between DeSantis and Trump couldn’t even be bothered to talk about a much less damaging effort to get rid of McConnell as Minority Leader. Where was the National Review’s “McConnell Must Go” issue? Where was the uproar and outrage at the leading Senate Republican spending millions of dollars to defeat the GOP nominee for Senate in Alaska? Where is the universal criticism of McConnell for negotiating a spending bill BEFORE the GOP takes over the House?
Mike
MBunge:
If you’re expecting to read it in the National Review you’ll have a long wait.
That’s like asking it of Romney, or McConnell himself.
There was plenty such talk elsewhere on the right.
“…The software rejected 542 signatures or around 7.5%. The auditors then compared the signatures and eventually decided that 158 did not match, or about 2.2%. (The statewide rejection rate for 2020 was 0.72%)….”
IIRC, this is precisely one of the ways the Democrats were able to harvest extra votes in 2020.
That is, the rejection rate was—somehow—reduced significantly when compared to previous elections.
Might one guess to which party those non-rejected votes went?
I’d like to see McConnell sent to the back benches, but the people who can do that are in the Senate Republican caucus and about 3/4 of them don’t give a rip about Republican voters as far as I can see. McCarthy’s not much good, either, but he’s not a nefarious and repellent creature in the manner of his Senate counterpart. Someone introduced the Britishism ‘gormless’ in one of these threads. It’s a fine term for the leadership and most of the Republican caucus in both chambers.
One thing I do not think Neo acknowledges is how anomalous is McConnell’s position. He’s headed into his ninth term as Senate Republican leader, he is 80 years old, and he is bereft of accomplishments. Whether they’re in the majority or minority, the Senate Republican caucus gets nothing done (other than fellating donors and sabotaging reform legislation passed by the House Republicans, perhaps).
Unless he keels over dead in the next 20 days, he will be the most abiding occupant of the floor leader’s position in the history of the U.S. Senate, Democratic or Republican. The only people in either chamber who have led their caucus (as floor leader or speaker) for a period of time longer than he have been Joseph Martin (House Republican boss, 1939-59), Sam Rayburn (Speaker or Democratic floor leader, 1937-61), John W. McCormack (Speaker or Democratic floor leader, 1940-47, 1949-53, 1955-71), and Nancy Pelosi (Speaker or Democratic floor leader, 2003-23). With the exception of Pelosi, all of these people were younger than McConnell is now when they shuffled out of office. If McConnell is still knocking about in two years, he’ll be older than is Pelosi now.
I don’t think with regard to these other four you could find in their career anything analogous to the shenanigans McConnell has been engaged in of late. I loathe the Senate Republican caucus for saddling us all with this grifter. They do it because they’re not worth much either.
Barry Meislin,
Part of the audit included a lot of criteria that might show bias. Very simply, they used the addresses on the envelopes to infer characteristics about the voter. It wouldn’t be hard to allow ballots of signatures that didn’t match or no signatures at all from certain neighborhoods or reject ballots from other neighborhoods.
This would only have an effect on close races. It’s hard to say how many D or R extra votes might be added or subtracted using addresses as the criteria. I saw a precinct in the Georgia senate race that voted 90% for Warnock. That’s pretty high. Most heavily D precincts were in the 70-80% range.
like the apocryphal fish on a bicycle, scratch that, said fish would have discouraged voting for garland, austin and mayorkas, which murkowski did, as well as let haaland out of committee, could anyone else have done worse, handing the keys over to schumer, in a 50/50 senate, how much sbf’s shilling influenced that situation is gravy,
He had no viable opponent.
What the louts had to do some time in the last 15 years was add seven new caucus rules: (1) anyone who will reach their 80th birthday during the incoming Congress shall be debarred from standing for floor leader or whip; (2) should it be the case that during the course of the incoming Congress one would arrive at a point where one has held the position of floor leader for more than 11 of the previous 12 years (w/o regard to whether one was the majority or minority leader), one must stand down and not run for the position at the opening of Congress; (3) in re the position of whip, ditto; (4) the caucus at which the floor leader and whip are chosen shall consist of returning and incoming Senators ONLY; (5) balloting for floor leader and whip shall be confidential and the options shall consist of the candidates nominated and ‘None of the Above”; (6) when there are two options, you have a first-past-the-post ballot and when you have more than two, a ranked-choice ballot; (7) when all your nominated candidates lose to ‘None of the Above’, you have to hold a new ballot with new candidates, and these losers are debarred from standing.
“…they(Democrats) will oppose Ron DeSantis or whoever is the Republican nominee for president in 2024. They will rig the system in ways you, dear reader, haven’t even thought of yet. Even as you read this, they are talking (again) about lowering the voting age to 16. Why not 14? And they will try to keep the border porous and turn a blind eye to illegal aliens voting in order to disenfranchise American citizens. And they’d like to let resident foreigners vote, too, as the District of Columbia already has!”
“Where will they stop? That’s just it. They won’t stop. They’ll never stop. Because Democrats seek power, not good government, and certainly not justice.”
“But someday, the woke madness will stop. When the people have had enough. When they take to the streets. Democrats know full well that the people have the power. They have the means so feared by the Left: approximately 400 million “means” are in private hands for resisting the tyranny of the woke Left.”
https://amgreatness.com/2022/12/12/donald-trumps-mad-pursuit/
Brian, I don’t think we disagree that much. My implicit point was that not only is MAGA based on economics as much if not more so than on “blood-and-soil” nationalism but that this fact has been deliberately downplayed by the MFM and NeverTrumpers for the purpose of portraying Trump and his supporters as racists. Your comment at 4:01pm doesn’t contradict most of what I said.
Fun fact: Cesar Chavez, the Hispanic Martin Luther King (Mexican-American? Chicano?) was vehemently opposed to illegal immigration. Explained very easily by the fact he was a labor union guy, remember the grape boycott? One left-wing newspaper reviewing his biography fretted “He sounds like a right-wing militia nut!” lol
I voted for Trump in the 2016 primary (MA) and for POTUS twice, and will vote for him in 2024 if he is the nominee but I do not see how he wins in the general election. Two years from now Biden will be in a much stronger position politically than he is now, provided he’s still alive, and should cruise to victory over Trump. Biden will be able to say, “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?”. DeSantis would have a better chance against Biden, with none of the political baggage of Trump, because of his record as governor of FL.
Because mcconnell has enabled more horrors to rise from the senate another gun ban maybe a full scale war with Russia a social credit system theres no telling how rotted the country will be in two years
Carried over
Progs are like the blight from interstellar or the real predators in edge of tomorrow about 40 years ago reagan rose they would not allow that to happen again amnesty was a part that both he and poppy endorsed the first wave of globalization undermined white and black working class voters eventually california was contaminated despite prop 187 clinton and obama worked their dark arts serving soros piven schwab it scarcely matters california infected the west coast washington and oregon and even places like colorado and new mexico arizona is next on their vector list
Mr. Deco,
(7) when all your nominated candidates lose to ‘None of the Above’, you have to hold a new ballot with new candidates, and these losers are debarred from standing.
This has been my position on any form of compulsory voting: ‘None of the Above’ must be on the ballot, and (7) above applies.
FOAF, I agree we don’t disagree. I think the use of national sovereignty as the descriptor avoids the pejorative use of nationalism and includes the issues of foreign policy under that umbrella. I also may just be overly sensitive.
I would like to think most conservatives aren’t opposed to immigration, just illegal immigration. Given our low birthrate, the country needs immigrants. In the near past, we had very low unemployment, and yet the labor participation rate was also declining. If we’re going to have a sustainable manufacturing economic sector, we need to have a sufficient labor pool.
Brian E,
I disagree. I think most on the right want almost ALL immigration stopped for decades at least. I have heard Issaquah locals sneeringly call their city Mumbai (guess why). Labor force participation is falling because of high cost and high taxes. We have an app we developed. We were going to sell it. Between the high state cut, the high Fed cut and the high Apple cut, we decided it was not worth the effort. So, we are considering giving it out for free and embedding adverts.
First, stop paying people not to work. Every person I have ever known that went on unemployment, stayed there until it ran out. End welfare. Period.
End welfare. Period.
Define welfare.
First, stop paying people not to work. Every person I have ever known that went on unemployment, stayed there until it ran out.
Per the Employment and Training Administration of the Department of Labor, the mean time as a beneficiary in 2019 was 15 weeks. (Shy of half those out of work qualify for benefits).
Chases Eagles:
Find better friends?
You sure are fond of stats from a government that lies about everything.
I am somewhere between Brian and Eagles on immigration. I don’t think there is overwhelming opposition to all immigration even on the right but there is a lot more skepticism than there used to be. I believe illegal immigration has undermined legal immigration. In part simply because of the numbers but also because it has corroded the idea of assimilation to American values and culture which is crucial for immigration to benefit the country.
Somewhat OT on “nationalism”: think of the principle of subsidiarity, that government is best when it is more local and closer to the people. In the past nationalism had a bad reputation because it implied the concentration of power in central governments away from local entities. Today however it is seen by many as a protection against concentration of power by even more remote global players. Incidentally, Brian, I myself have no problem with the word “nationalism” though it has often been derided as a code word for “fascism”. A word that has been even more abused.
Chases Eagles, the primary reason for the declining labor participation rate is the aging of the population. No doubt some have learned how to game government benefits. And the idiocy of shutting down the economy and overpaying people to not work has created perverse incentives.
But long term, we need immigration. I think it would be in our best interests to tie it to economic growth, so it wouldn’t act as a drag on low wage jobs.
I’m not sure why anyone would want to live in Issaquah, but apparently that was the best the Mumbians could do. 🙂 But seriously, are these Mumbians working?
I was in Bridgeport recently, and at the local gas station two middle easterners, possibly Persians, were running the place. It was kind of odd, because the last place I would think they would immigrate to was Bridgeport. And I doubt there is a large middle eastern community there.
What I want from immigrants is they will adopt our values of self-reliance, hard work and entrepreneurship– assuming those are still a thing here.
You sure are fond of stats from a government that lies about everything.
If it helps you feel better, make up the numbers. Just don’t bother other people with your made up numbers.
But long term, we need immigration.
Whenever you state a need, you have a purpose in mind. Your purpose is what?
I think we might benefit from a modest immigration stream to give people who wish to sign on to this country and what it stands for an avenue to come here and settle. Some new blood from well wishers abroad. And sometimes Americans do cross paths with foreigners they’d like to marry and sometimes seek to adopt from abroad. That’s all. Immigration is not necessary to avoid suffering among the extant population.
Note, if you have immigrants here, policies in places as to how they are received are crucial and assiduous efforts to deport problem people are also crucial. Don’t be France.
Also, immigration streams must be modest. Limit the stock of temporary residents to 0.33% of the population, balancing inflow and outflow to calibrate the annual issuance of permits. Temporary residents should be accredited employees of foreign governments, authentic refugees admitted retail, students, teachers, and dependents of each of these. Not one guest worker should be recruited.
Limit the annual issuance of settler’s visas to 0.125% of the extant population. Require English proficiency (written and oral) of all over the age of 14 ‘ere they can enter.
And limit naturalization to those who have been lawfully and palpably present for the majority of their natural lives.
Chases Eagles, the primary reason for the declining labor participation rate is the aging of the population.
The employment-to-population ratio has not seen a secular decline. It sees shocks now and again (the 2008-09 panic; the COVID disaster).
I don’t believe I have provided any numbers, made up or otherwise.
I don’t believe I have provided any numbers, made up or otherwise.
Read your own bloody words. The number you provided is ‘100%’.
Brian E, Microsoft, Boeing, Costco Hq. Yes, they are working.
Before there was Trump and MAGA, there was the Tea Party. Both movements were of normal, working class American citizens of all colors, shapes, and sizes. Tea Party-supported candidates got the same treatment from the GOP establishment and the Elites as the Trump-supported candidates did in 2022. Concerned commenters and pundits made the same comments then that they make now: “too crazy”, “not ready for prime time”, etc, etc, etc. “Past the sell-by date” is a new one, but not the “not our type, dear” sentiment.
As to rock star Republican governors, does anyone remember Sarah Palin? Scott Walker? Palin got the too icky, not ready for prime time treatment soon after McCain lost. She got the Trump treatment long before there was an (R) Trump, and she didn’t survive it in office (she had a young family, like DeSantis, and that was the reason given, if I remember right). Scott Walker was given the (R) Trump treatment in WI – they hounded him too, and he even survived a recall election, but then lost to the Dem in the next general. Neither one is governor of their state anymore, and I am not sure about AK, but WI is Dem now. Why do we think it’s gonna be any different with DeSantis? I lived in FL when it was under Dem control and I hated that governor. Bush was a breath of fresh air compared to that one, and he was no DeSantis. And until we fix voting issues and get some kind of quality control on mail in voting, it won’t matter who we run in 2024. Trump is a convenient excuse for why we lose now.
(D) Trump was a jovial NY blowhard that donated lots of cash to all the right thinking people – Clintons, Al Sharpton types, everyone loved his money. He wasn’t Hitler until he swapped out the (D) for an (R), and even then the media still supported him so that he’d beat all the other (R)s. And even then he wasn’t Hitler, Not My President, and Orange Man Bad until he beat Hillary.
For all his faults, Donald Trump loves the United States and what it has stood for, and will take the US side internationally, and has done just that as president. That’s pretty much all I want in a US president. I’m sure DeSantis loves the country too, just as I’m sure he will become Hitler, and the media and Elites will “find” all sorts of dirt on him and drag him and his family through the cesspool if he gets the nomination. It’s not the Trump surname that’s the problem, it’s the (R). Doesn’t matter who the (R) is. They gave Mitt Romney the Trump treatment when he went up against Obama, and he didn’t have any mean tweets.
Art, you got me there. But your source is a *** damn fucking liar.
Art Deco and Chases Eagles:
Please elevate the tone.
Chases Eagles, that makes more sense. They live in Issaquah to find affordable housing?
The only Indians I have interacted with were engineers. Very sharp.
Brian E, Issaquah is not that affordable. Median house sales price for last 12 months is something like 900K.
But your source is a *** damn fucking liar.
What did the employees of the Employment and Training Administration do?
“Whenever you state a need, you have a purpose in mind. Your purpose is what?” – Art Deco
Population growth rate has been declining the last 20 years, from 1.15% in 2000 to 0.49% in 2020
Employment to population ration was 62.5% around 2000 to 61.1% in 2020.
Employment grew 14% from 2002 to 2020. Population grew 14% in the same time period. But as population growth is slowing, we need more immigration to counter this. Unemployment rate is too low during economic expansion resulting in employers finding it difficult to hire qualified persons.
If we want to return manufacturing jobs to US, we need a ready source of semi-skilled to skilled workers.
Your suggested immigration rate of 0.33% is too low, especially in times of economic expansion.
I would suggest the rate be tied to economic expansion which would account for labor needs.
I would like to apologize for my comment the other day regarding this article, especially since it was my first time in this forum.
If nothing else, it was bad manners on my part and I regret letting my political passion get the best of me. The negative remarks were not in good taste, especially on one of my favorite blogs which I started reading a few months ago.
As with most everyone else, I have been extremely upset with all the horrors that we are experiencing as we watch our once great country get destroyed by the Biden Junta and assorted other devil villains.
I feel that President Trump had the election stolen from him in the same way that Kari Lake looks to be a victim of the same forces.
Anyway, this is not the place to cast any negative aspersions, especially on Neo, and I hope that there are no hard feelings.
Thanks for all the hard work you do in running this blog.
Sincerely.
So, I’m not misunderstood, I’m totally opposed to illegally entering the country.
But there is a necessary place for legal immigration.
But as population growth is slowing, we need more immigration to counter this.
That would not be your first resort, but your last. Your first resort is taking actions to enhance the total fertility rate. The actions you would take would be as follows: amending income tax codes to rebalance tax burdens ang grant relief to larger families, providing for more school choice at the primary and secondary level, rejiggering higher education’s degree architecture and financing modes, and relaxing regulations on car seats. A general prohibition on abortion would likely help some, but boosting fertility rates is not why you do that.
Your suggested immigration rate of 0.33% is too low, especially in times of economic expansion.
That wasn’t my suggested rate. That was my suggested level for the stock of temporary residents at any one time; the inflow would be a function of the verified outflow in order to maintain the stock at a given level.
My suggestion for the flow of settler immigration was 0.125% of the total population per annum, or just north of 400,000 settlers per year. That would make up for any fertility deficits at this time, though I think we would do well to amend incentives to promote fertility.
But there is a necessary place for legal immigration.
Legal immigration is an option, seldom a necessity.
The declining birth rate is cultural, not economic. The US birthrate is now well below replacement rate at 1.6.
We need to increase the number of jobs in the US to absorb the cost of government largess. That requires an increasing population.
There is a difference between desired and required.
There is also an assumption that additional population will increase revenue more than expenditures or entitlements.
The declining birth rate is cultural, not economic. The US birthrate is now well below replacement rate at 1.6.
Embrace the power of and.