Republicans don't know what to do about The Donald; Democrats THINK they do

The Donald makes rabbit ears!

by Ken

On Wednesday, as I dared to "dream of a day when we won't have The Donald to kick around anymore," I quoted a couple of chunks from Noah's June 17 post, "Political Groundhog Day: This Time Trump Actually Officially Declares He's Running":

I expect The Donald to do well in these here upcoming Clown Car Debates that everyone is talking about. He is, if nothing else, a crowd-pleasing entertainer. His jingoism, simplistic quarter-baked answers to complex multi-layered problems, and his extensive bigotries play well to the brainwashed pitchfork-and-torch crowd that drives the Republican Party. His substance-lacking one-liners will get cheers and ratings from the single-digit-IQ GOP yahoo base. . . .

Trump says what most republicans think. He speaks for them, and he spoke for them loud and ugly in his announcement. The republican mind comes from Bizarro World, and Trump is a perfect manifestation of its bizarro code. The Trump campaign will be a farce, and let's hope the joke doesn't end up being on all of us.

Since Wednesday, I'm bound to report, an inordinate amount of "inside" campaign chatter has focused on . . . The Donald's poll surge! The Washington Post's Philip Rucker, for example, penned a piece headlined "As Donald Trump surges in polls, Democrats cheer," noting that "the flashy real estate mogul with a big bank account and an even bigger ego has rocketed into second place in recent national polls and in the early nominating states of Iowa and New Hampshire."

Later Philip gshares some specifics (links onsite):

In Iowa, Trump is tied with Ben Carson for second place behind Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker with 10 percent, according to a Quinnipiac University survey released Wednesday. In New Hampshire, a CNN-WMUR poll last week had Trump in second place behind former Florida governor Jeb Bush with 11 percent.

Trump also comes in second behind Bush in a new national CNN-ORC poll released Wednesday.

In Iowa, Trump is tied with Ben Carson for second place behind Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker with 10 percent, according to a Quinnipiac University survey released Wednesday. In New Hampshire, a CNN-WMUR poll last week had Trump in second place behind former Florida governor Jeb Bush with 11 percent.

Trump also comes in second behind Bush in a new national CNN-ORC poll released Wednesday.

Matt Davies, Newsday

BELIEVE ME, I DON'T WANT TO WRITE ABOUT HIM
ANY MORE THAN YOU WANT TO READ ABOUT HIM

Yet at the moment the subject seems kind of inescapable, for two reasons.

First, crazy as it sounds, it's not absolutely impossible that this snowflake could actually win, not just the GOP nomination but the whole enchilada. Crazy things happen. As Noah wrote in an e-mail the other day while we were kicking this stuff around:

Personally, I think that if Minnesota elected Jesse Ventura, Texas elected George Bush and Rick Perry, New Jersey elected Chris Christie, etc. we should not take Trump lightly. We live in a society where Kardashians are celebrated for absolutely nothing and even Steve Doocy can get a high-paying job.

Second, and this is a reason-twofer, the kind of appeal The Donald is having -- to the unapologetic haters of the Republican base, just as Noah foresaw -- not only reminds us of some ugly truths about the American electorate but poses serious problems for the Republican Party with regard to the 2016 presidential election and every other election the party wishes to participate in.

Here we need to back up a bit, because in quoting Philip Rucker, I've jumped over his starting points, which have to do with what Philip then refers to as The Donald's "antics," starting with the guns-blazing assault on Mexican immigrants in his announcement speech and proceeding through his hardly less inflamatory responses to the pretty intense backlash.

The comments — and many more since — have prompted an uproar among Latino groups and acrimonious breakups between Trump and various corporate partners. His outlandish rhetoric and skill at occupying the national spotlight are also proving to be dangerously toxic for the GOP brand, which remains in the rehabilitation stage after losing the 2012 presidential race.

And the sentence setting out The Donald's boffo poll results, as quoted above, Philip begins by saying, "Despite -- or perhaps because of -- such antics."

Looking at the lineup of the 50 (or is it closer to 60 now?) 2016 GOP presidential wannabes, one notes several dozen who probably wish it coulda been them, and are chafing at The Donald's mogulistic fearlessness in saying things that are part of their core beliefs and probably as much part of their personal style as of the mogul's. These are, in all likelihood, they say when they're talking strictly among intimates or known political sympathizers.

They also know, however, that you can't say that stuff publicly, at least not without a whole lot of verbal camouflage. The Donald dispensed with the camouflage and gave the base a hard-on, or pehaps what they get instead of ("even better than") a hard-on.

As Philip writes:

Trump, who claims to be worth $9 billion, has staked out populist-sounding ground in the campaign so far, railing against the impact of illegal immigrants, particularly from Mexico, on the U.S. economy and vowing to “build a great wall on our southern border” to keep them out. That message, along with promises to restrict Chinese imports and other protectionist measures, could resonate particularly well with some white, blue-collar male voters, angry over the slow economic recovery and suspicious of elite opinion in Washington.

John Darkow, Columbia (MO) Daily Tribune

MIGHT THE DONALD LIVE TO REGRET HIS FEARLESSNESS?

What's more, it's hard not to wonder whether The Donald is paying a way higher price than he imagined. The only reason I can imagine for him to have gotten involved in all these presidential campaign chat-ups is for the publicity. And while I'm sure there's ego involved here, I think it has more to do with his sense that it's a relatively cheap way to score publicity of a kind you really can't buy anyway, and since he fancies himself as king of the deal-makers, the payoff comes in the form of a growth spurt in his deal-making.

But what he has been experiencing since his campaign announcement is a heap of deal-losing. Philips hits the highlights:

Univision said it would not air his Miss Universe and Miss USA beauty pageants; Trump sued the Spanish-language television network for $500 million. NBC­Universal severed all ties to him this week; he called the network “so weak and so foolish.”

And on Wednesday, the Macy’s department store chain dumped him, saying it would no longer sell his menswear line. Trump said the retail chain had “totally caved.” Later Wednesday, Trump’s luxury hotel chain said it had been alerted to a possible credit-card breach.

Since Philip wrote his piece, Serta has announced that it won't renew its Trump-brand mattress-selling deal. Noah passed along this news with the question "Trumpy to lose sleep?"

Is it possible that it didn't occur to The Donald when he decided to just let his mouth run free that he could make himself, and the Trump "brand," this toxic to present -- not to mention future -- business partners? Univision and NBC-Universal and Macy's and Serta all went into business with Trump because they thought they could make money together. Now they don't seem to think so. And it's not just that Spanish-speaking people are part of NBC's target viewer base and Macy's and Serta's hoped-for customer base, although goodness knows that would be bad enough. You'd expect that all the companies that are fleeing The Donald like the plague are discovering ripples of resistance expanding to wider sections of their customer base.

To put it baldly: Can the base haters who salivate at hearing Latino immigrants ridiculed and reviled buy enough mattresses to offset the ill will attaching to Serta's brand? Again Noah made an intriguing point about our boy: "The same arrogance/foolishness that caused him to declare bankruptcy for various of his enterprises caused him to lose his business deals."

Clay Jones

WHAT THE HECK CAN OTHER REPUBLICANS DO?

But that's a problem for The Donald, and I don't think many of us will shed tears for him. I'm not sure many DWT readers will shed tears either for Republicans who have to figure out how to respond to The Donald's "antics."

Philip quotes David Axelrod:

Every Republican candidate now has to calculate how they deal with him, particularly in the debates. If he says something outrageous and no one challenges him, that’s bad for them and bad for the Republican Party.

No matter how those other Republicans feel, they have no easy path.

• Many (most?) of those dozens of GOP presidential candidates who have no substantive disagreement with The Donald likely aren't happy about being forced to declare a position.

Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, told reporters last week that Trump’s comments were “not helpful” to the party’s efforts to reach more diverse voters. But, he added, “we don’t get to pick and choose who runs, who doesn’t.”

• And it's just as big a problem for GOP candidates, presidential and otherwise, who aren't quite that far gone but now face this immense challenge to match The Donald hate-for-hate in the battle for the hears and minds of the GOP base. Think of the candidates who are already accused of "not being conservative enough." How eager are they to make it perfectly clear that they don't share Mr. Trump's views.

Democratic strategist Paul Begala has advice for Republicans who "don’t know what to do about" Trump:

The truth is, it’s very simple. What they say to friends in private is what they ought to say to the country in public, which is, ‘That guy’s out of line.’ ”

At last count, the number of GOP presidential candidates who have made such statements is approximately zero. Of course if those gleeful Democrats think they can ride the Trump Problem to victory, they may be kidding themselves, as long as they're content to present themselves as The Party That's Less Awful Than That Other Party.

John Cole, Times-Tribune (Scranton)

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