The Iowa Caucus is the ritual that begins a presidential year. We are now on the cusp of that ritual happening in the year 2024. Any way you cut it, this Iowa Caucus and this presidential election are not going to be like any in America’s history. That’s a prediction that you can take to the bank. What will happen, precisely, is totally up for grabs. Nobody can tell you that. But that it will be strange, unprecedented, jarring, ne’er heretofore seen, on all that you can depend.
Tonight Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis, aka Birdbrain and Meatball, among other epithets, will have a final debate of sorts with one another. It will be interesting, for openers, to see what that looks like. DeSantis actually did throw a knock out punch at Trump a few days ago in the form of a critical ad. This is not DeSantis’ style. Many were saying “too little too late,” or the more optimistic, “better late than never.”
Haley has done herself a certain amount of harm by not saying definitively if she would consider taking the VP spot on Trump’s ticket. Perhaps that will be mentioned in her debate with DeSantis tonight. Nobody knows. That’s one thing that makes this purported debate depart from the norm. In any other year, it was a given which topics the candidates that were still left would go toe to toe on, to see if they could best one another at the last minute before the actual Caucus on January 15. This year, it really doesn’t matter. It’s all more or less a Kabuki dance, a ritual, as the real GOP contender, the front runner, the elephant in the room, Donald Trump, is expected to walk away with all the caucuses and the nomination.
As to Trump, he’s set to do counter-programming, on Fox News, no less, also in Iowa tonight. This is no small event. Especially now, the day after Trump got clobbered and publicly humiliated in his presidential immunity hearing. Bear in mind, we’re talking about a peeved, amped up Trump, on live TV.
The relationship between Mr. Trump and the Rupert Murdoch-owned network has featured more drama than a season of “Real Housewives.” But Wednesday’s event is not only a turning point and a potential ratings winner for Fox News: It is also the former president’s first live interview on any major news network since he went on CNN last May, an event that drew harsh criticism for the volume and velocity of his unfiltered false claims.
Mr. Trump has not exactly been silenced. He refused the invitations of several networks to participate in live Republican primary debates. And he has agreed to numerous pretaped interviews, including an appearance on NBC in September that also prompted complaints from viewers who berated the network for providing him a platform.
His relationship with Fox News, however, is especially complicated. In fact, it wasn’t that long ago when parts of the network seemed to be moving on.
Back in 2022, Fox News snubbed Mr. Trump’s rallies while offering admiring coverage to a rival, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida. After Mr. Trump announced in November 2022 that he would again run for president, the network kept him off its airwaves for a full five months. When Mr. Trump did return, for a taped interview last March with Sean Hannity, he received a cool reception from other Fox hosts; one network contributor called his appearance “absolutely horrific.”
The slights angered Mr. Trump, who has harbored resentment toward Fox over its early projection of Arizona for Joseph R. Biden Jr. on election night in 2020. Over the past year, the former president has lobbed crude insults at Mr. Murdoch and denounced Fox as “fake news” and “hostile” in posts on Truth Social, his preferred social media platform. He has also grumbled to allies that the network erred in settling the defamation suit brought by Dominion Voting Systems, saying it offered ammunition to other potential litigants.
In an interview, Bret Baier, Fox News’s chief political anchor, who is moderating the Wednesday event alongside the anchor Martha MacCallum, did not shy away from acknowledging the volatility of the relationship.
“We’re one Truth Social post away from some different feeling,” he said.
It could be a wild night. Bear in mind, Trump has not appeared for a live interview on Fox News since April 2022. Moreover, as stated, it’s also his first live interview on a network since last May’s CNN debacle. Trump was under nowhere near the pressure last May that he’s under now and he didn’t just suffer a major legal setback and public humiliation.
I think it’s safe to say that in the volatile mood that Trump is in, anything can happen. Whether it affects the Iowa Caucus, we won’t know until we see what he does. But I think you can bank on nothing normal happening tonight. Trump’s on the ropes and the stage is set for surprises.
Maybe together they can figure out slavery was the cause of the Civil War, and that it wasn’t a benevolent job training system.
Nahh – it was the fact that the people elected a president that them God fearing Southern Baptists didn’t like;)
Mark you, I’m still trying to work out what job a housemaid, summoned to her owner’s bedroom, was being trained for.
Meh….very tired of the RW BS.