Ted Cruz has won the Wyoming Caucuses with 66.3% of the vote, picking up 11 delegates. Marco Rubio finished a distant second (or as he calls it, Rubio Gold™) with 19.5% of the vote, while Donald Trump came in third with 7.2%, each of them picking one one delegate.
An additional 14 delegates will be selected at Wyoming’s state Republican convention, and I would expect Cruz to do very well there as well.
Not a surprise, but now it’s official:
Conservatives have had difficulty choosing a champion in the presidential race in part because it has featured so many candidates with very good claims on our support. As their number has dwindled, the right choice has become clear: Senator Ted Cruz of Texas.
We supported Cruz’s campaign in 2012 because we saw in him what conservatives nationwide have come to see as well. Cruz is a brilliant and articulate exponent of our views on the full spectrum of issues. Other Republicans say we should protect the Constitution. Cruz has actually done it; indeed, it has been the animating passion of his career. He is a strong believer in the liberating power of free markets, including free trade (notwithstanding the usual rhetorical hedges). His skepticism about “comprehensive immigration reform” is leading him to a realism about the impact of immigration that has been missing from our policymaking and debate. He favors a foreign policy based on a hard-headed assessment of American interests, one that seeks to strengthen our power but is mindful of its limits. He forthrightly defends religious liberty, the right to life of unborn children, and the role of marriage in connecting children to their parents — causes that reduce too many other Republicans to mumbling.
That forthrightness is worth emphasizing. Conservatism should not be merely combative; but especially in our political culture, it must be willing to be controversial. Too many Republicans shrink from this implication of our creed. Not Cruz. And this virtue is connected to others that primary voters should keep in mind. Conservatives need not worry that Cruz will be tripped up by an interview question, or answer it with mindless conventional wisdom when a better answer is available. We need rarely worry, either, that his stumbling words will have to be recast by aides and supporters later. Neither of those things could be said about a lot of Republican nominees over the years.
Not sure it moves the needle much, since National Review has made its preference for Cruz over Donald Trump clear over the last year, but maybe it will help some of Marco Rubio’s wavering backers push him more strongly to get out of the race.
Here in Texas it’s rained every day this week, resulting in flooding along the Sabine. Try to stay dry and enjoy this complimentary Friday LinkSwarm:
Europe’s population of pensioners, already the largest in the world, continues to grow. Looking at Europeans 65 or older who aren’t working, there are 42 for every 100 workers, and this will rise to 65 per 100 by 2060, the European Union’s data agency says. By comparison, the U.S. has 24 nonworking people 65 or over per 100 workers, says the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which doesn’t have a projection for 2060.
Also this:
The global decline of the blue model stands to inflict even more pain on Europe than on the United States. Europeans are worse at making babies than the United States, worse at integrating immigrants, worse at saving money to pay boomer retirement bills—but no worse at making promises to voters that they will be unable to keep.
(Hat tip: Pension Tsunami.)
Busy working on other stuff, so consider this an “instead of a real update” update:
If you haven’t heard, Cruz is going all-in to deny Marco Rubio a victory in Florida…even if it hands the winner-take-all state to Trump.
Ace of Spades HQ makes a compelling case that this is the right call:
However, let’s look at the flip side — what happens if Rubio and Kasich win? In that case, both men will declare victory — obviously — and then say this proves what they’ve been saying all along, that America is now ready to embrace them, that the map looks better from them starting with Guam, that they’re going to take it all the way to the convention.
And then we continue on with the field unwinnowed, and Trump continuing to win more delegates than Cruz by 43% to 36% margins. Not huge margins — but they’ll get you there, and if you’re not gaining on Trump, you’re losing to Trump.
Thus, the way I see it, the downside to Cruz of delivering Florida and Ohio to Trump is less down than the downside of letting Rubio and Kasich get their stupid fucking Participation Trophy and their excuse (and financial backing) to continue dicking around in a race that neither man can win. Neither of these guys can win more delegates than Trump now; both are hoping just to have a contested convention, and then hope that the Establishment reaches past the 1st and 2nd place finishers to deliver the win to the third or fourth place “winner” — Rubio Gold come literally true, in other words.
This makes no sense from Cruz’s perspective.
It’s time to take them both out, and then take his chances one-on-one with Trump.
Snip.
if Rubio and Kasich stay in, and continue kneecapping Cruz from winning (or winning these crucial Winner Take Alls by 50% – Cruz would be ahead of Trump if Rubio hadn’t played in Texas or Idaho), then there is no shot to get Cruz anywhere near Trump’s tally — and Trump wins the nomination.
So tell me the Truth, guys: Is #NeverTrump a real thing, or is it just a quick dash of new paint on the #Rubio4Ever thing you’ve had going for a year now?
If you want to stop Trump, you need to end these Rubio fantasies and let the only guy with an actual chance of stopping him start getting into two man races with him.
Otherwise, your #NeverTrump slogan is a lie — you’re perfectly fine with Trump. You just are using that as another pretext to lobby for Rubio.
So yeah, from Cruz’s point of view, and frankly from any sane Republican’s point of view (that is, apart from the Rubio and Kasich diehards) — it’s time to cash these two guys out. Out.
These guys are throwing the race to Trump.
And their supporters will not give up on their fantasies until those fantasies are violently torn from their hands, set on fire, and then buried under a swamp.
Clowntime is over. The time for Rubio Fantasy Love Scenarios is over. It’s time for real, tough decisions to be made, or to be made on behalf of those who just can’t get over it.
Cruz won Idaho and was second to Trump everywhere else last night.
It’s past time for Rubio and Kasich to exit the race, but for either ego or strategic leverage at the convention both refuse to do so. So Cruz doing whatever he needs to in order to boot them off the stage is the right call.
Heard about this election day, but Philip Bump in the Washington Post provides more details: Donald Trump won early voting, but Ted Cruz’s percentage of the vote soared on election day:
One of two things happened in Louisiana. We know that the margins between the top three candidates in the state shifted dramatically between votes cast by absentee ballot and those cast on Saturday, the day of the election. That means that either that: 1) A candidate had a very strong get-out-the-vote effort, or 2) There was a broad shift in attitudes about the candidates.
When we looked at this Saturday night, it wasn’t clear which was the case. Now, we have a better sense.
If we look at the votes in counties* for which we have data (culled from the AP’s initial and final vote tallies), you can see that Ted Cruz gained strength after the absentee vote.
Snip.
this looks like the state of Louisiana bailed on Marco Rubio in favor of Ted Cruz. Which could explain why Cruz is targeting Florida all of a sudden. On Saturday night, Donald Trump called for Rubio to drop out of the race. If he can repeat what he did in Louisiana in Florida in just over a week, Cruz will take Rubio out himself.
This pattern mirrors what Cruz did in the 2012 Texas Senate race. Dewhurst beat Cruz by 18% in early voting, but only 3% on primary day, a massive momentum shift that turned into a Cruz victory in the runoff.
Cruz is a smart, disciplined, relentless campaigner, and after Trump’s early successes in open primaries, we’re finally seeing Trump hit his ceiling and Cruz surge ahead as the superior candidate, especially in closed primary and caucus states.
That momentum, and the widespread distaste for Trump, is why many in the Republican establishment are finally, reluctantly, turning to Cruz as the only way to stop Trump.
Ted Cruz has won the Kansas Caucuses with 50% of the vote. Donald Trump is a distant second with a 25.8%, and Marco Rubio an even more distant third with 13.6%.
Cruz is also winning the Maine caucuses with just under 50% of the vote.
I wonder if this news will boost Cruz’s chances in closed primary states that are still voting…
More post-Super Tuesday results and election tidbits.
According to early returns, Donald Trump has won five states on Super Tuesday: Alabama, Georgia, Massachusetts, Tennessee, and Virginia, while Ted Cruz has won Texas and Oklahoma. In states not called yet, it also appears that Trump will win Vermont (over John Kasich) and Arkansas, while Marco Rubio has a very early lead in Minnesota.
I suppose I should be encouraged that Trump didn’t break 50% in any of those races, but it’s obvious that Cruz can’t win against Trump unless Rubio, Kasich and Carson drop out…and possibly not even then.
On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton won everything but Bernie Sanders’ home state of Vermont and Oklahoma. Sanders has a small lead in Colorado and Clinton a small lead in Massachusetts and a slightly larger lead in Minnesota.
If Cruz can’t win in Georgia and Alabama, it’s hard to see where he stops Trump with Rubio and Kasich still on the ballot.
If Sanders can’t win in Massachusetts and Minnesota, it’s simply over for him.
We’re slowly slouching toward a Clinton-Trump Presidential election.
God help us all.
Update: Both Rubio and Sanders win Minnesota.
“Jeb Bush, who sought to join his father and brother in winning the White House, suspended his campaign for the presidency Saturday night after a long year-long slide in the polls and a disappointing showing in the South Carolina primary.”
Trump is winning handily, with Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz fighting for second place.