This is an interesting spin. Do not look to me if you want to see somebody lionizing Ronald Reagan. I knew at the time when he abrogated the Fairness Doctrine that nothing good would come of it but I must confess, I never dreamt of the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Fox News and right-wing media. If I had known those things would result from Reagan’s ill advised action, I might have had a heart attack. Then there was his insane trickle down economics theory and the fact that the IRS, under himself and H.W. became positively terrifying. They were going after everybody who owed even small amounts of money and terrorizing us. I remember it well. Twelve years of Republican reign scarred me. But that said, if the images of Republican heroes of the past will galvanize voters into making the obvious distinction between wanna be tyrant Trump, then who am I to argue?
Maybe the Lincoln Project is on to something here. One thing that is for sure, Nikki Haley’s campaign is getting a kind of very odd traction. This I have never seen before and I’m not sure we’ll ever see it again. The Dispatch:
A few days ago, Nick Catoggio speculated in The Dispatch that perhaps Ms. Haley had concluded “she’s obliged as a matter of principle to go on trying to rally conservatives as best she can, to show the new populist GOP establishment that the Reaganite bloc is stronger than they think.” When I put that to her, she said, “Well, I think there’s something to that; that look, there’s a group of Republicans that are begging to get everyone’s attention that Donald Trump, you know, is chaos on so many levels.”
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By Saturday evening, when the votes were in, she was able to put a number on the size of that group: 40 percent.
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To be clear, it is not the case that 40 percent of Republicans want a nominee other than Trump. Haley’s strong-ish showings in New Hampshire and South Carolina are due to her landslide margins among independents who voted in the GOP primary, winning that cohort by around 20 points in both states. Among actual self-identified Republicans, she’s been crushed to the tune of 75-25 or so.
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But if these first few primaries and caucuses are representative, it may be close, or closer, to the truth to say that 40 percent of all right-leaning voters prefer a nominee other than Trump. After all, many independents who showed up for Haley were former Republicans who’d left the party at some point over the last eight years, presumably unhappy with its direction. Her candidacy has given them a rare opportunity to make their voices heard within the GOP again and they’ve taken full advantage.
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Increasingly, Haley seems to recognize what’s happening. The most interesting thing about the aftermath of South Carolina is how she’s begun to conceptualize her bloc as a discrete dissident faction of the right, referring to them repeatedly in a campaign appearance in Michigan on Sunday as “the 40 percent.”
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All weekend, pundits wondered why she insists on remaining in the race when she keeps losing badly in state after state and hasn’t a prayer of catching Trump for the nomination. The standard theory is that she’s hanging around in case his health, or the law, catches up with him, but I don’t think that’s it. Trump has already taken to branding her as “essentially a Democrat,” and the Republican Party isn’t going to nominate someone who’s “essentially a Democrat” if he can’t run.
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The truth is simpler. To my surprise, and possibly to her own, Nikki Haley has become the “no peace” candidate. Her voters are using her campaign to show that the American right isn’t united behind Trump after all, and Haley evidently feels an obligation to continue to provide them with that outlet.
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Any help to defeat Trump is welcome. Any rationale. Anything at all will do to save democracy. This is war.
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She’s just another Nazi in a skirt. With her background, it’s truly surprising that she turned hard right, ever.
The truth? She’s another racist, child killing nazi! Oh and throw in being a spineless liar who will support a rapist and pussy grabbing murderer. We need to stop soft peddling these assholes…that we lost 400,000 boys in WW2 to stop the last time. Wake the phuck up America! We already have enough innocent blood on our collective hands! FACT!!!