Conventional wisdom has gelled, and for once, it is right: Mike Pence “won” last night’s debate by ditching Donald Trump and making it about he, himself, and him. Heck, he even got applauded for it in certain circles of the anti-Trump right:
Of course, a real victory would be one that strengthened the ticket, and on that front, Pence failed miserably. But he didn’t care. He wasn’t about to go down in flames with Trump. Instead, it was the kickoff of his now-obvious bid to get elected in 2020. But does he really stand a chance? Heck no, and the reasons are obvious.
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The Republican Party is split into three mutually exclusive buckets: the tea partiers, the theocrats, and the establishment. During the Republican primary, I tracked the support of all the candidates (using the polling aggregate averages), slotting them into their respective buckets, and was surprised at how consistent the numbers were, regardless of which specific candidate was up or down at the moment:
|
TRUMP |
RELIGIOUS RIGHT |
ESTABLISHMENT |
Undecided |
Jan 7 |
36.9 |
29.5 |
25.8 |
3.7 |
Dec 6 |
34.7 |
29.1 |
25.6 |
7.8 |
Nov 4 |
28.4 |
34.1 |
27.3 |
7.4 |
Oct 4 |
28.1 |
27.6 |
30.4 |
6.9 |
Sep 7 |
31.8 |
27.7 |
23.5 |
6.9 |
Aug 3 |
24.5 |
20.6 |
36.7 |
8.4 |
The establishment started at 36.7 as Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker came out strong out of the gate, but with him gone, that bucket fluctuated between 23.5 and 30.4 percent (thanks to Carly Fiorina’s first-debate boomlet), but was generally stuck in the mid 20s.
The religious right bucket also topped out at around 30 percent. That 34 percent in November? That was Ben Carson’s own little boomlet, as people confused him for someone serious and intelligent. Then he shared his theory of the Egyptian pyramids (among other nonsense), and that was that.
So that leaves Donald Trump’s tea party/’alt right’ wing of the party. These people don’t care about abortion or taxes or reality. They are the Breitbart white supremacist wing of the party, and they are about 40 percent of the GOP. While Ted Cruz made a play for them, Trump pretty much rallied them early and they never left his side.
We can all do the math and realize that 30 percent is not enough to win in a three-way race, and that’s what happens with these Republican primaries these days—they always shake out to a three-man race, with one candidate representing each wing. This year it was Trump-Cruz-Kasich. Last cycle, when the establishment wing still had some juice, it was Romney-Santorum-Gingrich. (In this context, it’s no surprise that Gingrich lined up with Trump, huh?)
And since these three factions have virtually nothing in common with each other, the chances of two factions joining forces becomes remote. Therefore, the Trumpian white supremacist wing of the party will head into the next primary season in the pole position. The party’s demographic composition ain’t changing anytime soon.
So of course we know where Pence would slot in. He’s a theocrat through and through. And even if he were to survive the four or five candidates that will vie for that slot, there just aren’t enough Christian Coalition-types to deliver the nomination. He’s DOA.
Which of course leads us to ask, who can emerge victorious in four years? Well, Donald Trump for one. If he wants the nomination again, he can probably have it. But assuming he’s slunk off to TrumpTV or bankruptcy or whatever, the only other person currently able to bridge any of the divides would be Ted Cruz.
Cruz is obviously a theocrat, but his government-shutdown antics have given him serious cred with the Tea Party crowd. And he’s virulently anti-immigrant, enough so that the white supremacists might even pretend that his last name isn’t “Cruz.” This year, he ran into the Trump buzzsaw. But without Trump’s overly dominant personality in the picture, he’s the natural heir. And the fact that he’s now kissing Trump’s ring is de facto admission that he’ll be back, and that he’ll want Trump’s blessing when he does.
Clinton could only hope to be this lucky in terms of future opponents—but really, it’s not her, it’s the GOP. They’ve become so dysfunctional that their ability to nominate anyone half sane is severely compromised, and nothing suggests that’ll change in the near or mid-term future.
p.s. The “buckets:”
Religious Right |
Establishment |
Tea Party |
None |
Ted Cruz
Mike Huckabee
Ben Carson
Rick Santorum |
John Kasich
Marco Rubio
Jeb Bush
Chris Christie
Carly Fiorina
Scott Walker
Lindsey Graham
Rick Perry
Jim Gilmore
George Pataki |
Donald Trump |
Rand Paul |
Poor Rand Paul was trying to create a “libertarian” wing of the party, but that doesn’t really exist.