I wonder if Ron DeSantis is burning up the phone wires to Ted Cruz these days? Or, if Ted is volunteering his condolences and sharing his experience of being Trump’s premiere target in 2016? Because if one thing is getting clearer and clearer as the days go by, DeSantis is to 2024 what Cruz was to 2016. Look out.
Ron is in Northern Nevada at the Basque Fry that his buddy Adam Laxalt puts on there, about 50 miles south of Reno. Here’s Trump’s take on it.
I’m not bored with this primary yet. pic.twitter.com/xeUpmlp2DE
— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) June 17, 2023
The bottom of the tweet is cut off, but it says, “bipacreview reports that Team Trump mocks DeSantis ‘looking for a set of balls.'”
That’s it? Desantis went to NV to pour beers for a dozen Trump voters at the VFW, attend a rodeo where people ignored him, and these people waiting for fried lamb’s testicles? FL may be “where woke goes to die,” but NV looks like the place where the Desantis campaign goes to die. pic.twitter.com/93kxQyrqhj
— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) June 18, 2023
And speaking of Adam Laxalt, he has some words for Donald Trump. Laxalt says Trump can’t win in Nevada in 2024. Insider:
Trump also lost Nevada — one of the fastest-growing states in the country —by narrow margins in both 2016 and 2020, which has given many Republicans hope that it is winnable for the former president.
But former state Attorney General Adam Laxalt, a onetime Trump backer who lost a close contest to Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto last fall and now serves as the chair of the Never Back Down super PAC aligned with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, told NBC News that he didn’t see a way for the ex-president to win the state in the general election next year.
“Trump hasn’t won Nevada the last two go-arounds,” Laxalt told the news outlet. “I was a two-time Trump chair. I don’t see a path for him to win Nevada in a general election. Those voters are not coming back.”
That prompted a nasty rebuttal from Team Trump.
“So Adam Laxalt, who lost the governor’s race in ’18 and lost the Senate race in ’22, is lecturing President Trump?” LaCivita told NBC News. “That’s the pot calling the kettle black.”
Trump easily won the 2016 Republican presidential caucus in Nevada, when he was fresh on the political scene. And the Nevada Republican Party awarded all of its delegates to Trump in 2020.
But next year’s Republican nominating contest is slated to be a primary instead of a caucus, which could give a boost to Trump’s GOP challengers. The Nevada Republican Party has sued the state to restore the caucus system next year.
And DeSantis, who in the weeks since announcing his campaign has ramped up his appearances in front of likely Republican primary voters, is working to eat into Trump’s existing electoral advantage among conservatives.
Trump easily won the 2016 Republican presidential caucus in Nevada, when he was fresh on the political scene. And the Nevada Republican Party awarded all of its delegates to Trump in 2020.
But next year’s Republican nominating contest is slated to be a primary instead of a caucus, which could give a boost to Trump’s GOP challengers. The Nevada Republican Party has sued the state to restore the caucus system next year.
And DeSantis, who in the weeks since announcing his campaign has ramped up his appearances in front of likely Republican primary voters, is working to eat into Trump’s existing electoral advantage among conservatives.
We’ll see what we’ll see. Here’s the brief outline of things: DeSantis is right that the GOP needs to move on from Trump. Whether he’s the one who has what it takes to lead the party is the glaring question.
And the equally glaring fact which Trump has been quick to rub DeSantis’ nose in, is DeSantis is dropping in the polls. At some point this is going to become something that needs to be addressed. Right now the DeSantis campaign is in the honeymoon stage and everybody is out there fresh in the public eye for the first time. But even so, the appearances are taking on a pattern of being underwhelming. Eventually, that’s going to catch up.
I give it three, four more DeSantis appearances and that many more polls to see what’s actually going on. Team DeSantis is going to get worried at that point, very worried.
One thing I think we can say with certainty and that is that the 2024 GOP convention is going to be an even more surreal shitshow than the 2016 one was. And I never thought I’d be able to make that statement.
Remember the 2016 convention? Entire delegations walking out, delegates taking their credentials off their necks and hurling them to the floor, screaming? It’s going to get weirder than that. Mark my words.
In 2016 you had the weirdness of weak sister Ted Cruz being toppled by the game show host outsider. Now you’re going to have the multi-indicted, (possibly convicted felon) ex-president game show host being challenged by an entire field of desperate bottom feeders. DeSantis believes he’s going to be the shoo-in candidate when Trump’s legal baggage becomes too much for the market to bear, but that’s a pretty slim straw upon which to base a presidential campaign, that you’re going to be the guy standing there when the guy with all the poker chips collapses, and the game is yours. Not sure it’s going to work that way.
However, since Trump is in the mix and if he’s good at one thing it’s setting the laws of political physics on fire, anything is possible.
I think at the next one they should have an old fashioned acid test party with two punch bowls labeled electric kool-aid, and run the Grateful Dead on continuous loop. It’d be like the old days in San Francisco with kesey, hunter and the gang. Couldn’t be any weirder than being delusional and drunk.
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro. Hunter S Thompson…seems appropriate for Vegas.
DeSantis should make a commercial with two steaks. One way overdone the way Trump insists on, and one cooked medium rare or even rare. Ron then proceeds to narrate as he cuts the normal steak, the kind regular folks, GUYS (including and especially MAGA guys) and says “THIS is how real men like their steaks” as the camera goes close up to show a normally cooked steak as DeSantis cuts off a bite. The camera pulls back as he chews is and takes a swing of beer after swallowing. As the camera moves in on the Trump style overcooked steak DeSantis said this is how someone like Trump, who only pretends to like a good steak has them cooked. Overdone to the point of being burnt so it doesn’t have that good beef flavor. The camera pulls back to show DeSantis pouring a massive amount of ketchup on the Trump steak. And DeSantis goes on to say “In fact, losing most of the flavor isn’t enough for Trump – he hates the taste of beef, a good old-fashioned steak he does THIS so he doesn’t have to taste the beef at all! The camera pulls back as DeSantis cuts another bit of regular persson steak and he nods to each steak and says “this is how guys like you and I eat our steaks. This is a Trump steak. All the flavor cooked out and to be sure of no beef taste drowned in ketchup. And he calls HIMSELF a man’s man?”
Trump would go bat-sh*t insane!
giggle
From Team Trump: “Trump easily won the 2016 Republican presidential caucus in Nevada, when he was fresh on the political scene. And the Nevada Republican Party awarded all of its delegates to Trump in 2020.”
Um, wow. Someone’s memory is just a bit skewed here. Yes, Trump got the most delegates and the most votes but he didn’t WIN the state, if we’re being accurate. He got 14 of the state’s 30 delegates because the state awarded on a proportionate basis (he managed to get 45.7% of the caucus vote); Cruz and Rubio combined received 13 delegates. As for 2020, well, I wouldn’t be boasting since ZERO people actually voted or participated in the Nevada caucus since the state’s GOP cancelled it; that’s the reason the “Nevada GOP awarded all its delegates to Trump.”
Bending tne truth to fit Drumpf’s narrative? That’s Team Trump for ya, fer shur….
“DeSantis believes he’s going to be the shoo-in candidate when Trump’s legal baggage becomes too much for the market to bear, but that’s a pretty slim straw upon which to base a presidential campaign, that you’re going to be the guy standing there when the guy with all the poker chips collapses, and the game is yours. Not sure it’s going to work that way.”
Why do GOPers continually forget that Trump BOASTED of killing someone in Times Square and being able to get away with it? Every time they think his “legal luggage” is going to hurt Trump, they seem to forget that Trump picked up even MORE support from the chowderheads with that bragging. For NORMAL people (and who among today’s “Party of Trump” cultists in the GOP qualifies as “normal”?), that would be a clear disqualifying point–even as a joke. But today’s GOP voters genuinely seem to believe that they should be above the law in ALL matters–or, at the very least, the law should treat them more “respectfully” than those “others” (Democrats, Blacks, gays, etc) who refuse to recognize their inherent superiority.
There’s a misconception there – TFG bragged that he COULD shoot someone at a location (Fifth Avenue, Times Square, whatever…) and get away with it, bragging about his legal “teflon”.
Regrettably, he had a point – up to this year, he HAD BEEN getting away unscathed with his various acts of malfeasance. AAaannnd, while these indictments are closer to accountability than he has ever come to date, convictions are NOT YET been rendered… We seem closer to that desired end than ever, but it’s NOT YET a done deal. I still have hope…
True that, TFG’s base believes that regardless of the immoral, unethical, or illegal nature of his actions, it’s OK with the cult because HE did it.