Trump confronted his opponents last night.
When Cruz said Trump would appoint liberal judges Trump interrupted and said he was a liar, one even worse than Jeb Bush. Pow!
When Bush said Trump supported evicting a woman from her home to build a space for limousines Trump interrupted to say his facts were wrong and that Bush's family had done worse things. Bam!
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| Getting hit. Hitting back |
Trump directly confronted the legacy of former president George W. Bush, saying the war in Iraq was counterproductive and that the assertion that Jeb's brother "kept us safe" (made by Jeb, repeated by Rubio and affirmed by the applause in the audience) was dead wrong. The catastrophe of 9-11 was plain and obvious. He did not keep us safe, Trump said.
And Trump confronted the audience. The boos from the audience directed at Trump and the sustained applause for Jeb and Rubio were semi-apparent to a TV viewer. But reports from people in the 1,900 seat arena are could observe that the crowd seated was very lopsided in who they supported. Trump openly dismissed the audience, calling them "donors and lobbyists".
They jeered that characterization. In fact, per several different news stories about the selection process, audience members were mostly hand picked local activists who represented long standing GOP supporters, the "establishment", and they supported Jeb and Rubio.
(I have a bit of experience with signing up to be in a debate crowd. Debates are a hot ticket. One earns ones way into such an arena. I did not get into the arena for the Republican debate in North Charleston, SC in January. I applied and was not selected. A $1,000 contribution to the local Jackson County Democratic Party got me a front row ticket and photo with candidate Obama in Medford in April 2008. A similar contribution got me a handshake and photo with Bill Clinton, stumping for Hillary, in Medford in May 2008. It isn't a mystery and it isn't complicated. Strangers don't get in; good supporters do; generous donor supporters sit up front.)
The interesting thing to me wasn't that the crowd was stacked. Of course it was stacked, since crowd selection is about party loyalty, not "even-seven-fairness".
What is interesting is that Trump openly confronted the crowd and characterized them as "donors and lobbyists " and then at least twice made the case that he was self funded. Trump pointed at the candidates on the stage and said that all these other guys up here are beholden to lobbyists and do whatever they say. I am the only person who represents the American people, he said. And this was the theme he returned to in his 60 second closing remarks, his independence from the self-interested string-pullers.
This is the "punching up" theme in Trump's populism where he sounds the same theme as Sanders. The political system is corrupt.
A second interesting thing that happened is the on-line polling of who won the debate. Trump won.
I have no idea if there is any validity whatever to such a poll. For all I know a person can vote thousands of times and Trump has paid someone in Mexico a penny a vote to vote 360 times an hour $3.60/hour--great money in Mexico, now that it is 19 pesos to the dollar, and his vote totals are both bogus and the result of offshoring. (I tease here suggesting Trump offshore the jobs but, in fact, this isn't a scientific poll. I voted twice in order to get this screen shot. But the poll is up, it is public, and Trump is calling attention to it.)
I realize this is the Drudge Report, which some people consider biased and unimportant. Of course it is biased. It is openly and proudly conservative, which is the target audience for the Republican primary voter. But it is not unimportant. Quite the opposite Drudge and The Blaze are essentially tied for 2nd as the most popular political news sites in America. Drudge is number 1 site for referrals to CNN, Fox News, Roll Call, the New York Times, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, POLITICO, the Associated Press and Reuters. Remember, this is the Republican primary. Drudge is huge.
By the way, the Time Magazine poll has similar results. But apparently someone is marking the boxes for Trump.
A third interesting thing that happened in the debate was that, for better or worse for Trump, Trump is positioned as the moderate in the debate. This may not help him in a Republican primary, especially one in which his authenticity as a conservative is in question. Trump said that he has moved and gotten wiser as he aged, like Reagan. People may accept this.
But Trump broke from Republican orthodoxy. Again, Trump--not Kasich--is the moderate.
Trump openly opposed the Iraq war from the start which is now acceptable for a Republican since nearly everyone agrees that deposing Saddam Hussein was a disaster. But Trump asserted a truth that Republican voters generally deny: that there were no weapons of mass destruction and that Bush/Cheney intentionally misled the public. It is uncomfortable for Republicans to think their president misled them and they prefer to think it was an honest mistake done out of caution, erring on the side of safety. Trump said they lied, that they misled us. After the fact reporting shows that Trump is accurate. But he is telling an unpopular truth.
Trump also asserted that Planned Parenthood does a lot of good and that abortion is a small part of what they do. This is undeniably accurate. I am on the board of the local Planned Parenthood affiliate. I know what we do, and a big part of it is reducing the incidence of unplanned and teen pregnancies. Nearly all we do is contraception, sexual infections screening and treatment, and sex education for young people. Everyone old enough to read this blog knows where babies come from. Contraception and infection control aren't controversial, are they? (People do question whether teenagers should be kept as ignorant as possible. Planned Parenthood disagrees. Ignorant teens get their sex education from equally ignorant peers, to their peril.) Republican audiences I observed have decided that Planned Parenthood is terrible and should be destroyed as an organization. Trump said he was against abortion, yes, but liked the good things Planned Parenthood does. He will get flack for this.
The fourth interesting thing that happened in the debate was that Trump was openly rude. He interrupted a lot. I observed in South Carolina a surprising and pleasant politeness. Drivers gave me a break and let me change lanes in places where Californians would have hit their horn, not their brake. South Carolinians spoke respectfully at the checkout lanes in grocery stores. They were helpful. People called me sir. Folks nodded and smiled. It wasn't a subtle matter. People in South Carolina are more polite and considerate to strangers than are people in Oregon. As an Oregon Financial Advisor I would often need to call New York trading desks and help lines to do business. There was a widespread understanding about New York style: blunt, direct, abrupt. It wasn't that they hated you; they simply didn't care about your feelings, with no concern about "social graces." When a transaction was completed over the phone they did not ring off by saying, "Thanks, good bye." They said, "We're done" and hung up.
Trump was criticized for using the word "shit" and "pussy" in earlier Town Halls. I think this will hurt him, certainly around parents who told their children they would wash their mouths out for cursing. Last night he avoided those words but he was openly impolite to his opponents. It seemed very "New York rude" to me and I suspect it will be experienced as especially so to Republican voters in South Carolina.
I have observed that Trump fails a "seeming Presidential" test among some Republicans I know, particularly those in the cohort of educated, country club, Rotarian Republicans, the Main Street establishment wing of the GOP. I suspect that Trump's rudeness will be read by the South Carolina versions of the same wing as especially bad at seeming "presidential."
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| Drudge PollThe |
This is the "punching up" theme in Trump's populism where he sounds the same theme as Sanders. The political system is corrupt.
A second interesting thing that happened is the on-line polling of who won the debate. Trump won.
I have no idea if there is any validity whatever to such a poll. For all I know a person can vote thousands of times and Trump has paid someone in Mexico a penny a vote to vote 360 times an hour $3.60/hour--great money in Mexico, now that it is 19 pesos to the dollar, and his vote totals are both bogus and the result of offshoring. (I tease here suggesting Trump offshore the jobs but, in fact, this isn't a scientific poll. I voted twice in order to get this screen shot. But the poll is up, it is public, and Trump is calling attention to it.)
I realize this is the Drudge Report, which some people consider biased and unimportant. Of course it is biased. It is openly and proudly conservative, which is the target audience for the Republican primary voter. But it is not unimportant. Quite the opposite Drudge and The Blaze are essentially tied for 2nd as the most popular political news sites in America. Drudge is number 1 site for referrals to CNN, Fox News, Roll Call, the New York Times, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, POLITICO, the Associated Press and Reuters. Remember, this is the Republican primary. Drudge is huge.
 |
| Time Magazine On Line Poll |
A third interesting thing that happened in the debate was that, for better or worse for Trump, Trump is positioned as the moderate in the debate. This may not help him in a Republican primary, especially one in which his authenticity as a conservative is in question. Trump said that he has moved and gotten wiser as he aged, like Reagan. People may accept this.
But Trump broke from Republican orthodoxy. Again, Trump--not Kasich--is the moderate.
Trump openly opposed the Iraq war from the start which is now acceptable for a Republican since nearly everyone agrees that deposing Saddam Hussein was a disaster. But Trump asserted a truth that Republican voters generally deny: that there were no weapons of mass destruction and that Bush/Cheney intentionally misled the public. It is uncomfortable for Republicans to think their president misled them and they prefer to think it was an honest mistake done out of caution, erring on the side of safety. Trump said they lied, that they misled us. After the fact reporting shows that Trump is accurate. But he is telling an unpopular truth.
Trump also asserted that Planned Parenthood does a lot of good and that abortion is a small part of what they do. This is undeniably accurate. I am on the board of the local Planned Parenthood affiliate. I know what we do, and a big part of it is reducing the incidence of unplanned and teen pregnancies. Nearly all we do is contraception, sexual infections screening and treatment, and sex education for young people. Everyone old enough to read this blog knows where babies come from. Contraception and infection control aren't controversial, are they? (People do question whether teenagers should be kept as ignorant as possible. Planned Parenthood disagrees. Ignorant teens get their sex education from equally ignorant peers, to their peril.) Republican audiences I observed have decided that Planned Parenthood is terrible and should be destroyed as an organization. Trump said he was against abortion, yes, but liked the good things Planned Parenthood does. He will get flack for this.
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| SC Senator Graham: modest, gracious, polite |
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| A frequent pose for Graham: head slightly down |
Trump was criticized for using the word "shit" and "pussy" in earlier Town Halls. I think this will hurt him, certainly around parents who told their children they would wash their mouths out for cursing. Last night he avoided those words but he was openly impolite to his opponents. It seemed very "New York rude" to me and I suspect it will be experienced as especially so to Republican voters in South Carolina.
I have observed that Trump fails a "seeming Presidential" test among some Republicans I know, particularly those in the cohort of educated, country club, Rotarian Republicans, the Main Street establishment wing of the GOP. I suspect that Trump's rudeness will be read by the South Carolina versions of the same wing as especially bad at seeming "presidential."
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