The Republican Race - Trump or Cruz?Five days to go and Iowa is on a knife-edge. A Fox poll two days ago had Trump 34-23 ahead of Cruz in the State, but a university poll yesterday had him just 31-29 ahead. Cruz is campaigning hard and has a much better ground operation in the State, so Trump spent yesterday in.........New Hampshire. He is well ahead there and there is another week after Iowa before NH, but that's where he was. Maybe he is very confident. He has recovered the lead in Iowa that Cruz nicked a few weeks ago, but victory is far from certain.
Things do seem to be coming together for Trump, though. The voters, the party leaders and most of Congress are coming on-side. Okay, the latter two groups are not actually on his side so much as anti-Cruz, but they will live with Trump if they have to. This is bad news for Rubio, with party leaders (who would prefer him) seemingly abandoning him for Trump. Trump has also collected some endorsements that should naturally belong to Cruz - Jerry Falwell, Sherriff Joe Arpaio, Sarah Palin - all crazies, but all hugely influential.
The party leaders hate Cruz mainly because he ignored all the established ways of behaving in Congress. He arrived in Washington with an arrogant attitude and refused to serve his time working his way up the party, he insulted everyone in public, told his own leaders that they weren't conservative enough and they were giving Obama and the Democrats an easy ride, he called Senate Majority (ie Republican) Leader Mitch McConnell a "flat-out" liar on the floor of the Senate and he managed to close down government for sixteen days against the wishes of both parties (I still can't figure out how he was able to do that). They regarded his grandstanding as being largely for outside consumption, to make himself appear as the anti-establishment campaigner who was taking on the vested interests in DC, rather than working for the good of the country. There has been tons of stuff said by just about all the senior Republicans about him (and by him about them). Just a flavour:
John McCain: 'You're wrong. You're crazy.' Also called him a 'wacko bird'.
John Boehner (Republican Speaker of the House): 'That jackass'
George W Bush: 'I just don't like the guy.'
Bob Dole: 'I don’t know how he’s going to deal with Congress. Nobody likes him.'
Possibly even more critical is that many in the general body of Republican Congressmen seem to have given up on winning the White House. There are many other elections held the same day as the Presidential one and they are worried about the negative coattail effect that Cruz would have, as the Republicans could lose their majorities in the Senate and maybe even in the House of Representatives (and some are personally at risk for their jobs). They reckon that Cruz alienates people and appeals only to a narrow very conservative element, whereas Trump has more crossover/mainstream appeal and might result in fewer GOP losses. Trump will undoubtedly morph into a liberal as soon as he secures the GOP ticket, and they seem okay with lending the party to him for a few months in order to come out with a better situation after November.
But it's not only anyone-but-Cruz - there are anyone-but-Trump advocates as well. There is a concern that, if Trump takes Iowa, he will pick up NH and will then be unstoppable. Even Cruz has admitted this
http://cbn.com/tv/embedplayernews.aspx?bcid=4721418480001 (ever watched Christian Broadcasting Network before?). So it has been suggested that whoever you support, you should vote for Cruz in Iowa, being the only candidate who can keep the race alive.
Rubio/Bush/Kasich/Christie are all pinning their hopes on doing well in New Hampshire, and we should see some drop-outs after that, which will help whichever of them survives, as they are currently splitting the mainstream vote. The best strategy for the mainstream is obvious - they need to agree on a single candidate soon or they are going to lose a bunch of States. One of them would expect to attract the majority of the others' support (and would free Congressmen to come out with endorsements for them). But no-one really knows which of them is best-placed. Paul/Fiorina/Santorum/Huckabee have no chance in New Hampshire and are polling 1-4% in Iowa. Iowa is a Bible-thumping state, so if Santorum or Huckabee can't make an impression there, you have to wonder what is the point. For some reason, Carson is still raking in donations, but his candidacy must be a lost cause. Rubio has received the endorsement of the Des Moines Register, which is worth more than you might think and he is hoping to capitalise. He is the clear third-placed candidate, both in Iowa and nationally but his organisation in Iowa is light, so a surprise on Monday seems unlikely.
Another reason people are not dropping out is the Koch Brothers. They own the second-largest private company in the US and, along with some others, have pledged to spend almost a billion dollars on the election, but no-one knows how much candidates would get each. They summoned Bush, Cruz and Rubio (and Walker) to two beauty-parades in 2015. Paul was at the first but bombed and was dropped from the second. They have since expressed admiration for Fiorina. That kind of funding would put you in the Trump/Bloomberg league and could resuscitate a struggling campaign (paradoxically, Trump hasn't spent much so far as he getting all the publicity anyway).
In other news, Hillary's camp has apparently concluded that Trump is nailed on for the Republican ticket and has commenced 'research' on his past activities. Really. I'd have thought that everything would already be known about someone like him, but things do come up......