Where does the time go? I haven't blogged about the Republican race in almost three months. What's most remarkable is how little has happened in that time. Of course there's been a steady stream of gossip and gaffes but the only changes have been the elimination of candidates who were never going to win the nomination. (For the record, I thought Huckabee and Santorum might over perform in Iowa, but they very much did not and now they are gone.)
What we have left is nine candidates that are pretty easily divided into three tiers of three candidates. Each candidate is listed by their chance of winning the nomination. (With the change from December in parenthesis.)
I. Three Contenders.
1. Marco Rubio 55%. (Up 1 from 54%).
The establishment has clearly rallied to him. He now has the most significant nomination in the field, although as the video above shows they haven't all been very helpful. Most impressively he got the media to believe that his third place finish in Iowa was somehow a bigger story than Ted Cruz winning or Trump coming second. If he comes 2nd in NH, the establishment will do black flips to line up behind him.
2.. Donald Trump 20% (Up 3 from 17%).
Six months ago a 2nd place finish in Iowa would have seemed like an unbelievable accomplishment. But he underperformed slightly and I do think there's something to the idea that he has a ceiling for how many people are willing to vote for him. He will win New Hampshire, but the most important number will be what percentage of the vote he gets. If he gets under 30% in a state that is his best chance for a win will not be a good sign.
3. Ted Cruz 15% (Down 2 from 17%)
Winning Iowa should be a boost but it has become very clear in the last few months that the establishment doesn't merely dislike him, they loathe him and they worry about him becoming the face of their party. If he comes in the top three in NH and wins South Carolina, then he will bill be around for months. But NH has a history of rebuking the Iowa winner and I thin he is going to be somewhere in the middle of the pack on Tuesday.
II. Three Middlers.
4. John Kasich 5% (Up 4 from 1%)
I've always been a little bullish on Kasich. I think he's the best candidate for the GOP because he will carry Ohio and it will be harder for the Democratic nominee to portray him as an extremist. He has placed all of his chips on New Hampshire. If he doesn't finish 2nd or 3rd, then he will probably drop out. But a second place finish will be an enormous boost to his campaign and it would probably prevent the rest of the establishment from rushing to endorse Rubio. He also has a winner take all primary in Ohio that has 99 winner-take-all delegates waiting to be won by someone. He's a long shot, but he has a chance of being the big story on Wednesday morning.
5. Jeb Bush 1% (Down 1 from 1%)
I never thought I could feel sorry for a member of the Bush clan but the repudiation of this man's campaign is painful to any observer. He is much smarter than George W. Bush and it must be very frustrating to know that he will never be the political equal of his idiot older brother, but that's life.
6. Chris Christie 0% (Push).
His greatest contribution to the race is the above video. His second best contribution would be to do poorly on Tuesday and get the hell out of the race. He's an abrasive jerk but even in a year of abrasive jerks, I am glad to watch him flame out.
III. Three Also-Rans.
7. Carly Fiorina: I think the GOP made a mistake by excluding her from the last debate but I for one am glad to never have to hear her voice again. She might have been a decent stealth VP candidate, but her grating style and her willingness to lie about anything under the sun are disqualifiers. She will not be missed.
8. Ben Carson: I'm still not sure if he ran for President because he wanted to win or because he wanted to make money by elevating his public profile. Either way, he will not be president. But I think he is angry at Ted Cruz' stunt in Iowa and that might make him hang around a little longer to split the evangelical vote. If that tips the nomination away from Cruz, the party will be grateful to him.
9. Jim Gilmore. Twelve votes in Iowa, surely hundreds to come in New Hampshire.
New Hampshire predictions.
Trump will win. I think he will get about 32%. If Rubio comes second, he heads south as the heavy favorite. If Kasich comes 2nd, the race will be re-oriented. Cruz just needs third place.
The upshot of NH will be that four candidates will be left: Trump, Rubio, Cruz and whoever does best among Bush, Kasich and Christie. I think Bush and Carson will stay in, no matter how poorly they do in NH. SC should be a good state for them. Christie will drop out unless he finishes in the top four. I hope that Fiorina also drops out, but she probably doesn't have much else to do with her days so maybe she'll hang around for awhile.
Whoever wins SC and or NV will be very strong going into Super Tuesday. But I think those states will not be won by the same person and mostly likely there will be three or four candidates winning states well into the spring months. I think a brokered convention is a real possibility. If you add up the probabilities of the candidates above you get 96%. I'm leaving a little wriggle room for a brokered convention that turns to a consensus compromise candidate that all remaining camps can live with. Right now the only name that I can think of filling that role is Mitt Romney.
Five possible nominees, in order: Rubio, Trump, Cruz, Kasich and Romney.
Last night the GOP held its fourth debate of the 2016 cycle. Only eight candidates made the main stage, while four were relegated to the kiddie table and three candidates failed to qualify for either event. The pared down cast improved the show by allowing the plausible candidates to have more time. Almost immediately I notice that the most sense was coming from the far ends of the stage, from the two candidates clinging for dear life to their right to be on that stage at all. So for this review of the state of the GOP race, I will evaluate the candidates by how they were paired up on stage.
1. The Outliers (Kasich and Paul). Here is a sentence I never expected to write: I thought Rand Paul was the best candidate in that debate. He obviously has decided that his only hope for relevance is to reignite some love for his watered down Libertarianism by shitting on the ridiculous neconservative fantasies that pass for policies among the serious candidate. He also corrected Trump on a very stupid factual mistake related to free trade.
From the other end of the stage, John Kasich came thundering to the defense of reason and in opposition to the truly insane, unsustainable tax policies of his competitors. He was impolite and sensible, so not surprisingly he was booed by the crowd and roundly panned by the right wing media figures today. At one time I thought Kasich might become the establishment candidate that the base could put up with if they became convinced that he was their best shot at carrying Ohio and taking the White House. That seems very unlikely now.
Neither Kasich nor Paul will be the Republican nominee next year. Paul has apparently decided to speak up for his ideological preferences and Kasich for pragmatism. Paul will probably benefit from this choice and get a modest bump. But Kasich is officially doomed. If he keeps u this rationale nonsense he just might play his way out of what should be a very strong chance at becoming the Vice-Presidential nominee.
2. The Lamestream (Jeb! and Fiorina).
Sixty days ago I'm sure that both Jeb Bush and Carly Fiorina believed they were likely to become the nominee and probably thought they would more likely than not become the 45th President of the United States. It is quite obvious that this will not happen. Jeb is a terrible candidate who managed to finish dead last in microphone time for yet another debate. When he did speak he was boring and way off-message. He doubled-down on the invasion of Iraq for the 947th time and that did him no favors.
Someday Carly Fiorina will be an amusing piece of presidential campaign trivia. She vaulter herself from the kiddie table to the primetime debate with a well-rehearsed shtick as the anti-Hillary. The base took a good look at her in this fall but she did not complete the sale. She is playing out the string.
In some alternate reality, these candidates are not stuck in the 5th and 6th spot. But I don't see either of them moving up, barring a profound implosion by a couple of the heavyweights.
3. The Finalists (Rubio and Cruz).
Rubio and Cruz have run the most intelligent campaigns in this cycle. They still have not come close to closing the polling gap with the nominal front-runners, but they have built steadily and they have not alienated anyone. The establishment and the donor class are ready and even eager to support Rubio. Cruz does very well among evangelicals and working class Trump voters. He is well positioned to take the votes from Cruz and or Trump should they fall from grace.
Six months from now, this race will probably be whittled down to these two men. Both are intelligent, ambitious and willing to fight. One of them is a sociopath. But my money is on the other guy, even if he sometimes uses the wrong credit card in Las Vegas.
4. The Cincinnati Bengals (Trump and Carson).
The weirdest part of the geometry in Milwaukee was that the center-most podiums felt the least relevant to the process. Dr. Carson and Mr. Trump dominate the national and state-level polling. They typically combine for a bare majority of the responses while every other candidate in the field is delighted to be at or near 10 percent. But nearly everyone expects an implosion for them once real voting happens.
Dr. Carson did not even try to look prepared. Most of his answers were the rambling word salads of a very bright man talking about a subject he knows nothing about. Imagine a Supreme Court justice holding forth on quantum physics. It almost sounds serious, but when you parse it out, there's just nothing there.
Trump was his usual self but that really is beginning to wear a little bit thin. Which does not mean he will slide in the polls. A certain kind of voter just loves his shtick. But part of his appeal is the arrogant confidence that will be destroyed by coming in third in Iowa or New Hampshire. If he has a setback like that, he'll probably leave the field with a lot of huffing and puffing about how great he did very early next year.
The Cincinnati Bengals have been one of the better teams in the AFC over the past half-decade. Since Marvin Lewis became their head coach they have won 55% o their games and made the playoffs six times. But they lost their first playoff game all six times. This year they are undefeated at 8-0 but no one can quite take them seriously given their track record And that's how you have to feel about the candidacy of Trump and Carson. They are crushing the competition but it's hard to shake the doubts that they will fold when the campaign begins in earnest.
The Updated Forecast
There is not a lot of movement in this one. Rubio inches up slightly and Cruz improves his odds form 8 to 1 to about 6 to 1. Carson, Trump and Bush slip slightly and I've officially given up on Fiorina's chances. If she was going to win the nomination she would have built on the momentum she had coming out of the first debate. She has not.
There are 4 candidates who will have the option of going beyond the early states. But I think Trump and or Carson may tire of this game by then. I am hoping we get a middle stage of the primaries with Rubio and Cruz having to deal with Trump on a stage that only has three podiums. But eventually this will come down to a fight between the establishment choice of Rubio against the Tea Party's favorite Cruz. That will be tough emotional waters for me because I loathe Ted Cruz. But I fear Marco Rubio.
In my previous post on the GOP field I created a new taxonomy for the candidates. This taxonomy included four categories: Outsiders, Serious, Niche and Charity. My thesis was that the traditional "tiers" model could not accurately capture the dynamics of the 2016 GOP primary. The Outsider candidates (Trump, Carson and Fiorina) were dominating the polling but nearly everyone still believe the nominee would be a more conventional candidate. Two weeks and one debate later, the polling number of the Outsider candidates remain strong but I'm still skeptical of their chance to be nominated.
At the start of this process I thought there were three candidates (Walker, Rubio and Bush) who had roughly equal chances at being the nominee. Since then Walker has dropped out and Bush has imploded. I now believe that Marco Rubio is a better than even money bet to win the nomination. The bookmakers at Paddy Power agree that he's the heavy favorite but not by as much as I do. (The have him as a 2.37 to 1 shot, which translates into a 30% chance of being the nominee. I have him at 52%.)
Before I write about my updated handicap, I want to look at the recent polls for this nomination process. In the earlier post, I added up the Real Clear politics averages of the candidates in each of my categories. There has been almost no movement among these groups in this time. The Outsiders are a majority, the Serious Candidates are fighting over 1/4 of the voters and the rest of the field is right around 10 percent. Whoever gets the nomination will get them by convincing undecided voters or persuading votes away from the Outsider candidates.
Category
Oct. 18
Nov. 1st
Outsiders
54.3
54.8
Serious
26
25.4
Niche
10
8
Charity
1.1
1.6
II. Individual Candidates
Two big themes emerged in the post-debate coverage. The first was that Marco Rubio crushed Jeb Bush in a head to head confrontation over his voting record. The second was that the candidates complained about the toughness of the questions. The questions were pretty tough, but no more than than during the first two debates on Fox News and CNN. What was different this time was that the moderators did a terrible job of controlling the candidates. We saw a lot of interruptions and cross-talk, which of course is how CNBC sounds during most of its broadcast day. It made for bad television and gave the GOP an excuse to whine about the event. I think this whining may bounce back on them as they came out of the hulabaloo looking like a bunch of men who promise to thrash ISIS but are incapable of withstanding CNBC.
We also saw another predictable theme with regards to the front-runner. After each of the first three Republican debates, the punditry has been quick to declare a setback for Donald Trump. After the first two, his numbers slipped slightly for about a week and then rebounded. I expect that pattern to repeat this time. But I think Trump did fine. The moderators for this debate, unlike their predecessors at other networks, didn't give him an excessive amount of questions and he faded into the background a little. But he didn't need to dominate the conversation. He just needed to be himself. And he was, especially during a rousing final speech about how he saved us all from the event being 30 minutes longer than it was. (If future generations are reading this blog post on a recovered Internet cache, just trust me on this. The front runner got rousing applause by bragging about keeping the event short.)
But they were right about Jeb Bush. He got crushed. I have come to the conclusion that he is a lousy candidate and that people just don't like him. The conventional wisdom at the start of this process was that Jeb would have to work hard to overcome the stigma of his name. I didn't really buy that because the Republican base never really blamed Bush for all the horrific things his presidency led to. I thought Jeb could bill himself as the smarter, wonkier version of his older brother. But he's not even getting that chance. People don't like him, which probably explains why he lost his first crack at becoming Governor of Florida. He still has a lot of institutional support, so I'm not completely writing him off. But it is hard to imagine the narrative he would corral to get back into this race. When John McCain was faltering in the polls we all knew he had an extremely remarkable biography to fall back on. Jeb's biography is remarkable but not for reasons that could ever make him credible as a plucky outsider. He is no maverick and he probably needs to get used to living with the fact that his idiot brother achieved a pinnacle that he will never reach.
In my original forecast, I gave Bush, Rubio and Walker a combined 89% of being the nominee. I know have Rubio at 52, Bush at 3 and Walker has left the race. I gave Trump a 2% chance and Carson and Fiorina none at all. Today I have them with a combined 31% chance. So they have gained nearly all of the probability lost by my three original front-runners.
The only other significant movement has been the emergence of Ted Cruz. Given just 1% in my first forecast, I now have him at a solid 12%. He has played the game well. His fund raising is strong and he has positioned himself to pick up a lot of Trump/Carson voters should one or both of them implode sometime between now and Super Tuesday.
Here's the Updated Forecast:
Candidate
Pre 1st debate
Post 1st Debate
Pre 2nd Debate
Pre 3rd Debate
Post 3rd Debate
Change
Trump
2
1
8
12
18
6
Bush
34
31
24
17
3
-14
Walker
32
29
22
--
--
--
Rubio
23
28
26
46
53
7
Huckabee
3
3
1
1
1
0
Santorum
1
1
1
1
1
0
Paul
2
1
1
0
0
0
Cruz
1
1
2
10
12
2
Kasich
1
2
6
3
2
-1
Carson
0
0
3
5
7
2
Christie
0
0
0
0
0
0
Jindal
0
0
0
0
0
0
Fiorina
0
2
3
2
1
-1
Graham
0
0
0
0
0
0
Perry
0
0
--
--
--
Pataki
0
0
0
0
0
0
Gilmore
0
0
0
0
0
0
The Field
1
1
3
3
2
-1
III. Process and Very Premature Delgate Math
The first delegates will be determined four months from tonight in Iowa. The field has been pretty stable up until now but I'm sure we will see a flurry of changes as that date draws near. Some of the minor players might drop out, although it's hard to say who. Christie and Paul should throw the towel in but they both seem too stubborn to do so. I think Paul finds value in espousing his vaguely libertarian ideals in these forums. All of the field seems to enjoy the attention. Even absurd long shots like Jindal and Pataki have access to national microphones that will be gone forever once they drop out.
Jeb is too well-heeled and connected to drop out soon. He probably believes that he can weather this storm and that most people will eventually come to their senses on Trump and Carson. But he also seems weary of the process. He might drop out before Iowa, but only if he thinks the nomination is going to be won by someone he respects. I think that's a short list. Kasich for sure and presumably Rubio too. The most likely outcome is that he hangs around through the early states and hopes to swoop up some delegates on Super Tuesday.
Individual Contests.
1. IOWA: MOST LIKELY WINNER; BEN CARSON.
Iowa seems likely to be won by either Trump or Carson. I think Carson might benefit from the same dynamic that helped Obama in 2008. Iowans are nice people and I know that Iowa takes some pride in the role it played in electing the first black president. I think that pride has rubbed off on the Republicans there and unless Carson says something disqualifying or the competition succeeds in portraying him as a fraudster for selling snake oil supplelments and then lying about it, he will be in a strong position there.
Rubio and Cruz should battle for third place but this contest has previously been won by two of our long shot candidates-Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee. I think some odd ball like that will get a surprising third place or a very strong 4th. That person will be able to survive New Hampshire.
2. NEW HAMPSHIRE MOST LIKELY WINNER; DONALD TRUMP:
Trump is dominating the polls here. NH has a long history of shunning the Iowa winner so it might be in Trump's best interest to lose close in IA, then sweep up in NH. In fact, that seems likely. Bush, Kasich, Rubio, Christie will all be vying or 2nd place. If Kasich doesn't get that, he'll probably drop out and wait for his phone to ring in July. If Christie finishes lower than 4th, he will probably drop out too.
3. SOUTH CAROLINA: MOST LIKELY WINNER: DONALD TRUMP
South Carolina votes on February 20th, Nevada on February 23rd. I think the field will split after NH with most candidates focusing on one of these states and ignoring the others. Rubio and Cruz will try for NV, Trump, Carson and Bush for SC. The hangers on will each take a shot somewhere but they won't have much chance of medaling in either place.
The most interesting scenario is if Trump manages to wins South Carolina. His outer boro obnoxiosness should not play in the south, but I think it will play to this crowd. He is currently leading the polls there by 13 points and I think he will win there next February. That will begin to push Carson to the margins.
4. NEVADA: TOO CLOSE TO CALL
Nevada could be won by Rubio, Cruz or Trump. If Carson has pulled the upset in SC, then this race could pull him back into the lead ahead of Super Tuesday. There has only been one published poll of this race in he last 90 days. Trump led comfortably but I suspect some of the lower-tier candidates will try to ramp up a presence there in December and January.
DISCLAIMER: The picture beyond these early states is very murky. I'm going to go through the rest of the states in order to create a record of my predictions, but the truth is, if Kasich or Bush pulls an upset in NH, the rest of my predictions will look foolish. The underlying premise of everything else is that Trump, Carson, Rubio and Cruz all come out of the first 4 contests with at least some delegate and one or more strong performances in an early state.
5. SUPER TUESDAY: 12 States Voting on March 1st, 2016.
Twelve states vote on March 1st. The states are from all over the map but more than 2/3 of the available delegates come from Southern states. (And that's with counting Oklahoma as a Midwestern state, although its politics are a lot more like the former Confederate states than the great plains.)
Southern: 408 delegates from Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia
Western: 57 delegates from Alaska, Wyoming
Northeastern: 58 delegates from Massachusetts, Vermont
Midwestern: 81 delegates from Minnesota, Oklahoma,
By this point, Trump will either have burned out, dropped out in a fit of pique or gained national credibility. I suspect the latter is most likely but Cruz and Rubio will be well-positioned to get a lot of delegates in the Southern and Western States.
I suspect after these contests that Rubio, Trump and Cruz will all have enough delegates to seem like plausible candidates. Carson also could be viable then. Bush, Kasich and Fiorina will have needed one or two big upsets to still be around. Santorum, Huckabee and Jindal will be playing out the string but why not hang around for 4 more days
6. MARCH 5th: Old Home Saturday. Caucuses in Maine, Kansas and Kentucky. Primary in LA.
By now we will be playing for pride. Every contest before March 15th must award its delegates proportionally. Jindal and Paul will be hoping for home state wins to corral some delegates. That will be the last we hear from them. And it's hard to imagine Maine and Kansas resolving much.
7. MARCH 8th; The Last Proportional States; Idaho, Hawaii, Michigan and Mississippi.
Cruz could win Idaho and Mississippi, Trump should win Michigan and Rubio will probably compete in all Four States.
8. MARCH 15th: The Field Will Thin.
With apologies to Puerto Rico (March 13th), the nomination very well may be decided on the first day of Winner Takes All Contests. Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Florida and North Carolina all go to the polls. If Rubio holds home court in Florida, those 99 delegates will probably get him at or near the lead in the delegate count. Trump will need to win Ohio and Illinois, Cruz will be banking on wins in NC and MO. If Rubio wins any of those other states, he will have the delegate lead.
If Kasich has hung on to this point, he could throw the math off by winning Ohio's 66 delegates. But this seems increasingly unlikely. He may stay in the race at that point only if he thinks he can keep Trump from getting those delegates.
I know I've been discounting Carson through all of these predictions. I guess I just don't see him having the wherewithal for a long political fight. I know Cruz and Rubio have that. Unless one of them is shut out on March 15th, they will soldier on to the next contests. Trump will probably be neck and neck with Rubio for the most delegates, and ready to go scorched earth on the young Senators.
9. The Rest of the Races:
March 22nd: I think Rubio will win UT because he is far and away the most polite candidate of the three left standing. Arizona could be a sprawling three way race.
April 5th: Wisconsin. This will be 2 weeks where Scott Walker wishes he didn't give up so easily. 42 delegates to either Trump or Rubio
April 19th: New York. If Trump is still running, he wins. If not, it's Rubio's. Cruz could be on life support after this race.
April 26th: Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island. So THIS is where the establishment has stashed the sane states. That's 172 delegates and I think Rubio does well in all of those states. Cruz will probably have to concentrate in MD and PA. If he wins those 2, then the race is still too close to call.
The Delagate Math So Far:
I don't know the exact mechanics for distributing delegates int he proportional states. But I just tried some very crude back of the envelop math on how the delegate counts will look after April 26th. What I have is a very competitive three way race. Here's the very inaccurate projection:
Trump 694
Rubio 534
Cruz 520
Carson 58
Paul 21
Jindal 15
Bush 3
Huckabee 2
Santorum 1
I have Kasich at 0 but that is likely to be off by a lot if he does better than expected in the early states and is able to win all 66 delegates by squeaking out a win in his home state of Ohio. He may have an incentive to stay in if the math is this close, because those 66 delegates might be the difference between getting the needed majority and not. And the VP Slot is not too much to ask in that scenario.
10. What the Heck: Why Stop Being Wrong Now?.
I was going to write some boring paragraph about the rest of the races being too early to call but let's face it, this blog is just for fun and almost certain to be wrong. So no half-measures tonight. Here's how the rest of the races will go, with the winner's haul of delegates in parenthesis.
May 3rd
Indiana Rubio (57)
May 10th: This could be Cruz' last stand. He will need a win that day but I don't think he'll get one.)
Nebraska Turmp (36)
West Virginia Trump (34)
May 17th Oregon Rubio (28)
June 7th Each of the 3 candidates could get a win here but only 2 of them can win more than one race. If Trump and Rubio both go all in for California, Cruz would be wise to concentrate on the other states and hope to finish the day in 2nd place. More likely they will all fight for CA and Rubio will win.
California Rubio (172)
Montana Cruz (27)
New Jersey Trump (52)
New Mexico Rubio (24)
South Dakota Trump (29)
June 14th:
District of Columbia Rubio (19)
The Dates to be Determined.
Obviously the timing and spread of these contests will affect who wins where. But I'm assuming none of these will go before March 16th and I'm taking my best guess at who will win.
North Dakota Cruz (28)
Colorado Rubio (37)
Washington Rubio (44)
America Samoa Rubio (9)
Guam: Cruz (9)
N. Marianas Trump (9)
Virgin Islands Trump (9)
10. Final Delegate Math (A Political Nerd's Dream Come True)
Rubio: 933 37.8%
Trump: 853 34.5%
Cruz: 584 23.6%
Others: 100 4.1%
A brokered convention is too good to be true. If the math begins to shape up this way the party would put enormous pressure on Cruz to drop out and let Rubio vanquish Trump mano e mano. But Cruz has big ambitions and he won't come cheap. He also probably prefers Trump to Rubio if only because he's more likely to inherit Trumps supporters in 2020 should he not stick Trump in the back. So next July in Cleveland might be the first brokered convention of my lifetime, but I know there are powerful forces dedicated to preventing that. I'll try to update my Math as we get past the early states and have real voting data to work with.
IV. FINAL THOUGHTS
We could get through the four February contests with eight candidates who still believe they can be the nominee. The early states are not important because of the delegates they allocate. They are important because the media ignores and the donors stop supporting the candidates who do poorly there. This year's Republican field is twice the size of a typical nominating process which means that the votes will be distributed across many more candidates than usual. In 2012 John Huntsman dropped out after only getting 17 percent in New Hampshire. Any candidate other than Trump would be delighted with that number this time around. I can foresee five or even six candidates vying for double digits there, and a couple other candidates might do well in Iowa and/or South Carolina. Even little Bobby Jindal has reason for optimism this week after an Iowa poll put him at a whopping six percent.
Iowa's most likely outcome is Carson first, Trump second and Cruz third. If Huckabee and Jindal break double digits there, they will soldier on to South Carolina. Trump, Carson, Rubio and Cruz will all set their sites on winning new Hampshire. Kasich, Bush Christie and Paul will all be hoping to edge out the others to finish a strong fifth. That's ten candidates who will choose between SC and NV to get one more respectable finish. Lindsay Graham will have to choose between accepting reality or hoping to play spoiler with a 4th place finish in his home state.
Then it will come down to personality. I can see Kasich getting discouraged, maybe Huckabee and Christie too. Bush might succumb to reality if he hasn't yet medaled. Pataki and Santorum (barring another Iowa miracle for him) will pack it up. But the other seven will probably move on to Super Tuesday if only for lack of something better to do. And only when the race moves to winner take all contests will we know who the real contenders are. Trump, Rubio and Cruz will almost certainly still be standing. Carson could be out by then, but he also could be the front-runner. Bush, and Crhistie will probably be gone by then. Paul, Jindal and Kasich might be tempted to try to steal their home state contests to influence the process in the summer. Or they might clear the field to prevent the Trumptacolypse.
The biggest news from the first debate is that Fox News has turned on Donald Trump. For all 7 years of the Obama presidency they have happily given him a platform to pronounce how terrible the Obama administration is. Once or twice a week he would phone into "Fox & Friends" and plug up some air time with his droll commentary about where Obama was born and why China was "beating" the United States at everything. It was a symbiotic relationship.
Once Trump announced he was running for president, they had to scale back his presence on the shows. But the Fox team seemed to enjoy the early moments of Trump mania. But eventually it got out of hand. By the time of the first debate, he was doubling the nearest competitor in all the early state polls. (He actually has a 3 to 1 lead in South Carolina, a state not known for loving Yankees.)
The debate was crafted to make Trump look as bad as possible. They started with a show of hands question designed to make the crowd boo him. Then Megyn Kelly called him on his sexism. The very same shtick that her network has ridden for ratings glory the past 7 years was now being used as a cudgel against his orange-quaffed head. Things didn't get much better after that. By the end of the night, Mr. Trump was staying up at his beautiful, classy, luxurious, Cleveland hotel room tweeting about how mean Megyn was to him. Thirty tweets in all, between the hours of 2:30 and 4:30 AM.
The next day he continued the attack against Fox pollster Frank Luntz, calling him a loser who once tried to beg for consulting work with Trump's empire. Priceless stuff. The best outcome of this nuthouse in-fighting has been the new conspiracy theory that the Trump campaign is actually an outgrowth of a collusion between Trump and the Clintons to get Hillary elected. This has the very ring of all the right-wing conspiracy theories. Trump won't be the nominee. But he might run as a third party candidate. Now he might just run to spite Fox News. And next year, if Hillary wins with say, 50% of the vote, to Rubio or Bush's 46% and Trump's 3 or 4 percent, the teeming masses of low-information votes will know who to blame. But there will be plenty of blame to go around, for both Dr. Frankenstein and the Monster he waited too long to kill.
On a happier note, two candidates stood out during the debates. Marco Rubio was the clear winner on substance in the prime-time debate. He still comes across as a little too green for the Oval Office, but he had the best night. And in the earlier debate Carly Fiorina stood out for her ruthless ability to say mean things about Hillary Clinton. She is having a moment, and I expect this will lead to her making the prime-time debate next time around, probably at the expense of Chris Christie. Christie was 9th in the polls before Cleveland but Kasich also had a solid performance and Christie was obviously underwhelming to the Republican crowd. I think he will slip to 11th.
Fiorina now has a path to the nomination. It is remote and it will probably go away as people begin to look at her dreadful record as CEO of Hewlet-Packard. But she connected with the base and she has a certain "Little Engine That Could" feel to her now. If Fox News continues to turn on Trump, she may become their new darling.
Before the prime-time debate I went to Paddy Power, an Irish betting web site and wrote down the betting line for each of the top ten candidates to win the nomination. I post them below next to the current odds, about 36 hours after the first debate. There has been very little movement after the debate among the top ten, although Walker and Kasih got modes bounces. I did not note what Fiorina's odds were before the debates, but I'm sure they were longer than 20 to 1. She has had the most buzz in the past 48 hours, and I'm sure the punters have noticed.
Paddy
Power
Pre-debate
Post Debate
Trump
8 to 1
8 to 1
Bush
5 to 4
5 to 4
Walker
4 to 1
5 to 2
Rubio
6 to 1
7 to 1
Huckabee
20 to 1
25 to 1
Santorum
n/a
40 to 1
Paul
10 to 1
10 to 1
Cruz
25 to 1
25 to 1
Kasich
16 to 1
14 to 1
Carson
16 to 1
20 to 1
Christie
n/a
16 to 1
Jindal
n/a
33 to 1
Fiorina
n/a
20 to 1
Graham
n/a
66 to 1
Perry
n/a
40 to 1
Pataki
n/a
66 to 1
Gilmore
n/a
66 to 1
Now back to my subtective forecast. I have 4 columns this time, fore my pre-debate numbers, Nate Silver's pre-debate numbers, my current numbers and the change in my numbers before and after the debate. I don't think Nate Silver has updated his subjective forecast yet. He's not very big on subjective and I suspect he'll only do it again right before Iowa.
Candidate
Pre-debate
Nate Silver
Post 1st Debate
Change
Trump
2
2
1
-1
Bush
34
28
31
-3
Walker
32
28
29
-3
Rubio
23
21
28
5
Huckabee
3
3
3
0
Santorum
1
0
1
0
Paul
2
3
1
-1
Cruz
1
1
1
0
Kasich
1
6
2
1
Carson
0
1
0
0
Christie
0
3
0
0
Jindal
0
1
0
0
Fiorina
0
1
2
2
Graham
0
1
0
0
Perry
0
0
0
0
Pataki
0
0
0
0
Gilmore
0
0
0
0
The Field
1
1
1
0
There are only 4 crooked numbers in that last column. These reflect Rubio gaining a bit at the expense of the other 2 top tier candidates and Carly Fiorina getting her boomlet.
Tomorrow night in Cleveland the glorious spectacle that is the 2016 GOP presidential primary begins in earnest. There are currently 17 announced candidates who are fighting for the right to be a 2 to 1 under dog in the general election. But only 10 of them have earned a spot in that prime time debate. The other 7 will have to fight for scraps at the 5PM kiddy table.
Of course, most of these folks, including a majority of the 10 with seats at the big boy table, have no chance of being the nominee. But ever since Mike Huckabee parlayed a 2nd (or 3rd, depending how you count) finish in the 2008 GOP primary into a multi-million dollar TV deal, there is clear value in just running for president.
I wrote my first assessment of the field almost a year ago, before any candidate formally announced. Now the field is set and there has been a lot of movement in my rankings. In that first ranking I broke the filed into three tiers: Contenders (6), Pretenders (4) and Niche Candidates (6). Eleven of those sixteen prospects are now in the field, including all ten from the top two tiers. But there's been a lot of movement between and among the tiers. Here are the updated rankings:
I. Three Contenders.: Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio and Scott Walker.
There are only three candidates that I can realistically see winning this nomination. Among the three, I give Bush a slight advantage over Walker. Rubio has yet to get his feet but he is a plausbile nominee for reasons that I will discuss below.
1. Jeb Bush. This country has felt destined to wake up to the reality of another Clinton versus Bush election. The first one was in 1992. Since then we have had 8 very prosperous years under Clinton, eight terrible years under Bush and a prolonged if uneven recover from that Bush disaster. But all of these ups and downs have only solidified the natural rift in our politics. The Red States still like the Bush philosophy-plain spoken slightly less rabid than other options in that party, and bereft of any hope for a better tomorrow. Hillary Clinton has been scarred by the various proxy wars and nontroveries of the past quarter-century, but she's still standing, and she's virtually certain to be her party's nominee. Sadly, the most likely outcome of this nominating process is the son of Bush 41/Brother of Bush 43 fighting the wife of Clinton 42 for the right to be #45. Rank Last Time: 1st (No change) Odds of being the nominee: 34%. (Up from 23%)
2. Scott Walker. As this field takes shape, it has become clear that Scott Walker has the widest appeal. He is acceptable to every substantial demographic in the party. Billionaires Snake Handlers and War Mongers all seem to find him palatable. He's also done very well with fund raising and I think that has more than a little to do with his electoral track record. He can say, with a straight face, that he has won 3 statewide elections in a Blue State. No one else on this list can claim that.
But there are problems ahead. Put simply, the candidate is not very bright. This would be a complete deal breaker in a rational party, but fortunately for Scott, he's running for the Republican nomination. One of the most interesting things to look for tomorrow night is which candidates go after Walker. The media attention will swirl around Trump, but Walker is the real threat to win this nomination. Trump is Tattaglia. Walker is Barzinni. Rank Last Time: 9th (+7) Odds of being the nominee: 32%. (Up from 1%) Note: the last time I forecast the field Walker was still facing a reelection campaign in Wisconsin. If he had lost that, he would have been done, which is why I ranked him so low then.
3. Marco Rubio. I think Marco Rubio would have been better off sitting this one out. He could be the nominee in 4, 8 or even 12 years time. Running against Hillary after 12 years of Democratic rule or for an open seat after 16 would be ideal. By then the Republican fever will have broken and they will be so desperate to regain power that they will be ready to nominate a candidate that championed immigration reform. Indeed, they will no option but to do so.
But Marco correctly figured that he has a path to the nomination this time, and he went for it. He looked bad changing tracks on immigration but that won't kill him in the primary and come next year the party might let him walk that back a little in the general election. The Republican party also have a long track record of being a royalist party. If Rubio finishes second this time, he instantly becomes the favorite for 2020.
He just does not look mature or confident yet. He's not quite ready for the nomination but maybe the next few months will light a fire under him. Stranger things have happened. Rank Last Time: 6th (+3) Odds of being the nominee: 25%. (Up from 1%)
II. Two Pretenders: Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum.
4. Mike Huckabee. Huckabee has strong support among the Christianist wing of the party but Wall Street and the Club for Growth Crowd have their doubts. So far he has run a very ineffectual campaign and I'm not sure he wouldn't prefer to be back doing his weekly Fox News show.
But the Republicans have a long history of nominating a previous runner up. (Reagan was runner up in 76, nominee in 90. Bush 41 did the same in 88/80, Dole in 96/88 McCain in 2004/2000 and (arguably) Romney in 2008/2004. I say arguably because although Mitt Romney got more votes than Huckabee did in 2008, Huck won more delegates. He sat out the last election to make easy money on FNC, but he's back in the ring now and theoretically has a path to the nomination. He has to finish strong in Iowa and wipe up in the South. His biggest advantage is that he's the only true Southern boy in the field. (Texans and Floridians are only quasi-southern.) Rank Last Time: 4th (Unchanged) Odds of being the nominee: 3%. (Down from 12%)
5. Rick Santorum. Last time around he snuck up on everyone and wound up being the runner-up. This campaign has started much more roughly for Senator Santorum and not making the first debate is a big setback. But voting for a candidate is a habit, and there are 4 million Republicans who vote for him in the last primary. They can't all go elsewhere. He needs another miracle in Iowa, and he needs Huckabee to drop out fast. There is a route there, but it's a long shot. Rank Last Time: 3rd (-2) Odds of being the nominee: 1%. (Down from 13%)
III. Twelve Niche Candidates (And the Niches they Represent).
6. Donald Trump (Assholes)
You can see why he's leading the polls; his niche is the biggest in the party. Trump has made the race fun and he has energized the low-information voters by giving them exactly what they want: the same stupid rhetoric they've been hearing on Fox News and talk radio for seven years. But let's keep things in perspective: he can not win. Four years ago the runaway leader was Rick Perry. Four years before that it was Rudy Giulliani. This man will come back to the back and then fall down to earth The only open question is how the eventual nominee handles him in the early going. He could be somebody's Sister Souljah or he could be their Willier Horton. Rank Last Time: Unranked Odds of being the nominee: 2%.
7. Rand Paul (Libertarian-lites)
Rand Paul has always struck me a lazy dofus. He inherited the family business, running for president on a vaguely Objectivist platform of calling the Federal Reserve the boogeyman. Thanfully he's less charming than his father.
I will give him credit for one thing. He seems to understand that the Republican party needs to attract minority voters. He also knows that the present system does not serve the needs of inner-city black folk well at all. I admire him for reaching out to those people and asking for their vote. Eventually, some Republican will convince them to vote for him That person's name is not Rand Paul. Rank Last Time: 5th (-2) Odds of being the nominee: 2%. (Down from 10%)
8. Ted Cruz (Tea Party Purists)
Let me begin by saying that he makes my skin crawl. Every time he tells the crowd that he is "the son of an immigrant" I have to yell "You ARE an immigrant." But he'll keep doing it.
I could vent about this guy's naked hucsterism for hours but he's not worth the time. So I'll just leave one anecdote here. When Ted Cruz was a first year student at Harvard Law School, he refused to study with anyone who was not a graduate of Harvard, Yale or (like himself), Princeton. Standford, MIT and Columbia were not good enough for young Ted. But when he wanted to announce his campaign for presidency he did so at Liberty College, a diploma mill for home-schooled teenagers who think human being used to put saddles on dinosaurs.
This man only buys from the best. But he'll sell to anyone That's a hustler. Rank Last Time: 4th (-4) Odds of being the nominee: 1%. (down from 10%)
9. John Kasich (Sane People)
You can see why he's struggling. This guy is by far the most competent and sensible candidate in the field. He also is the governor of a state that the Republicans must win next year. I suspect that he's running to be Joe Biden, the centrist candidate who gets wiped out in the primary but winds up on the ticket. Depending on the nominee, he might have ended up their without this run, but he's probably holding out some hope that he can distinguish himself in the early debates and let his resume carry him to the nomination. If Trump, Walker, Bush and Rubio all win large numbers of delegates, he could be the best compromise candidate. But the days of brokered conventions have gone the way of three man pitching rotations. That won't happen in 2016. Rank Last Time: Unranked Odds of being the nominee: 1%. (Up from 1%)
10. Ben Carson (People Who are Not Racist and Aim to Prove it to their Snippy Grandchildren)
Ben Carson is a great surgeon who became famous by being very rude to the President of the United States at a Prayer Breakfast. This gave him a certain amount of cache to the Fox News crowd and he has parlayed it into decent poll numbers. He will probably get more votes than some of the people ranked above him in this list, but he simply will not be the nominee. Rank Last Time: 12th (+2) Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Unchanged)
11. Chris Christie (Dallas Cowboys Fans From New Jersey)
A year ago he seemed like a plausible nominee but the base simply has not and will not forgive him for appearing in public with President Obama during the response to Hurricane Sandy. This deflated his shtick of being the no-nonsense guy who will tell anyone and everyone what he thinks. That problem was compounded when the genuine article wafted into the race on monogrammed solid gold comb over. He's toast. Rank Last Time: 2nd (-8) Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Down from 20%)
12. Rick Perry (People Who Think Glasses Make You Smart.)
Perry's resume is reasonable but everyone remembers the train wreck of his 2012 campaign. I think he wants to erase the memory of that, but early signs are not encouraging. Not making the early debates was probably the last nail in his coffin. Rank Last Time: 5th (-7) Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Down from 10%)
13 Bobby Jindal (People Sick of Being Called Racist but Who Think Ben Carson is a Little Too Militant.)
Running for president can be a joke, but it can also hurt real people. (Ask Ricky Ray Rector about that.) What's really said is when a joke candidacy hurts real people. Two days ago Bobby Jindal announced that the state of Louisiana would cancel it's medicaid contract with Planned Parenthood over their practice of donating fetal tissue for reimbursement. (I mean, selling baby parts to get filthy, filthy rich.) Never mind that the Planned Parenthood clinics in question do not perform abortions, a stand had to be made, and he was going to make it! Everybody wins, other than the poor women of Lousiiana who rely on Planned Parenthood for contraception, cancer screening and HIV testing. Rank Last Time: 7th (-6) Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Down from <1 p="">
14. Carly Fiorina (Women and the Fiscally Incompetent)
I know of no earthy rational for this woman running for President. She was a tech CEO oversaw the loss of more than 50% of her companies valuation. And she got clobbered in her only previous run for office. But onward and downward, I guess. Rank Last Time: Unranked Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Unchanged)
15. Lindsay Graham (War Hawks and Closet Cases.)
I at least understand why he is running. He really likes scaring the shit out of people about Iran and John Bolton decided not to. Best of luck, Lindsay. Rank Last Time: Unranked Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Unchanged)
16. George Pataki (Rockefeller Republicans)
Remember Rockefeller Republicans? Like January Jones' 2nd husband on Mad Men? Yeah, they were fun. Rank Last Time: Unranked Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Unchanged)
17. Jim Gilmore (The Entire Gilmore Family)
I lived in Virginia during half of this man's tenure as Governor of the Old Dominion. I can't tell you the first blessed thing about him. Best of luck, Jim. Rank Last Time: Unranked Odds of being the nominee: 0%. (Unchanged)
JUST FOR FUN: My Odds against Nate Silver's: About an hour after I posted this blog I came across Nate Silver's "completely subjective" odds for the GOP Nomination, as expressed in the 538 Podcast. So here's where my numbers stand against Nate Silver.
