Before the primary, Buttigieg said his campaign had the ‘strongest momentum.’ AP Photo/Mary Altaffer Daniel Palazzolo, University of Richmond and Ernest B. McGowen III, University of Richmond “I’ve got the ‘Big Mo,’” said George H. Bush after winning the Iowa caucuses in 1980. “We are the campaign with the strongest […] Read more »
GOP’s Three-Way Split Could Lift Social Conservatives
The quest for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination has turned into a race with three big lanes – establishment voters and social conservatives, plus Donald Trump‘s coalition of blue collar GOP voters. In setting the stage for a possible three-candidate showdown for the GOP nomination, this split bodes particularly well […] Read more »
In a fast-changing culture, can the GOP get in step with modern America?
… Across the cultural landscape, the national consensus is evolving rapidly, epitomized by this year’s convulsions of celebrity, social issues and politics — from the acceptance of Caitlyn Jenner’s gender identity to Pope Francis’s climate-change decree to the widespread shunning of the Confederate flag. Then came Friday’s landmark Supreme Court […] Read more »
A GOP conundrum: How does a 2016 candidate play the gay marriage ruling?
… Republicans running for president face a choice in responding to the court’s ruling. They could try to use the strong emotions same-sex marriages evoke as a way to mobilize conservative voters in primaries, but potentially at the cost of undermining their campaigns in next year’s general election. Or they […] Read more »
Rick Santorum Denounces Fox News Curbs on Debate
… A day after Fox News announced that its Republican presidential primary debate in August would include only the 10 candidates polling the highest in national surveys, Rick Santorum denounced the criteria on Thursday. … “The idea that a national poll has any relationship to the viability of a candidate […] Read more »
Bush and Rubio might swing Florida for the GOP. It probably wouldn’t matter, though.
… Consider this: four potential Republican nominees come from sizable swing states that could – who knows! – swing the presidential election. Florida is home to Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, Wisconsin to Scott Walker and Ohio to John Kasich. Only one potential Democratic candidate hails from a traditional swing […] Read more »