As you know, next week’s political primaries include both Ohio and Florida. These winner take all states are Mitt Romney and the Republican Establishment’s last firewall to stop Donald Trump. As things stand now, Romney’s gambit is likely to fail. Rubio will not win Florida and John Kasich will not win Ohio.
If Trump wins Florida and Ohio, what next?
Julius Caesar was warned to “Beware the Ides of March.” Caesar didn’t listen and was assassinated on that day, March 15th 44 B.C. This year, the Ides of March will likely claim two political victims: Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz.
Marco Rubio will experience his “Jump the Shark” moment when he loses Florida and will be relegated to political obscurity after next Tuesday. Some advisors clearly want to prevent that by having him get out now. CNN even ran a story yesterday where they sighted sources inside Rubio’s campaign claiming he was throwing in the towel. An hour later a conflicting story came out that Mitt Romney was doing robo-calls in four states to support Kasich and Rubio. Later, Rubio’s folks said the CNN story was a dirty trick by Cruz. This is the second time Cruz has been accused of this same tactic—the other time was during the Iowa Caucus.
I look for reality to set in on Rubio after the vote next week. The old saying that “failure is and orphan but success has many fathers” will be in play by this time next week. This brings us to the political death of Ted Cruz.
George Bush (both of them actually) taught us that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” The unspoken part of this statement is that once we get what we want, the alliance is over and we again become enemies.
This brings us to Ted Cruz. He will be in real peril by this time next week.
It is now starting to occur to some in the Establishment that their best hope to stop Trump is not Rubio but Cruz.
(Yes, they really are this dense and unresponsive to reality or Trump would not be getting the support that he is with disaffected voters.)
GOP establishment creeps toward Cruz
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/03/gop-establishment-starts-to-accept-ted-cruz-220474
Meanwhile, Cruz is opening the door to a contested convention. He was discounting this a week ago but seems to be changing his position.
Cruz OK with a contested convention against Trump
http://www.politico.com/blogs/2016-gop-primary-live-updates-and-results/2016/03/ted-cruz-contested-convention-220482
I’m warning you Cruz supporters that this will be the kiss of death if the Establishment backs Cruz. Another lesson of history is “never look a gift horse in the mouth.” If these Washington Geeks bearing gifts do bow before Ted Cruz and pledge their support; be afraid, be very afraid.
Here’s why…
The Establishment hates Trump.
But the Establishment hates Conservatives more.
They will gladly use Cruz to beat Trump at the convention but then what? They will pay lip service to supporting Cruz for the November election but the reality is when Trump was defeated, they got what they want. The status quo was maintained.
Many in the Republican Establishment have already said they would be OK with Hillary in the White House. They are foremost about keeping their power not advancing the Party or serving the people. Power is more important than winning.
The fact is that if they help Cruz win a Convention fight in Cleveland from that moment on, Cruz will be on his own. They will provide no meaningful funding, infrastructure, or support. They will also actively work to undermine him. This is nothing new; it’s how they do things.
Why? Well that’s easy. They will say that Cruz losing proves a Conservative can’t win the White House, only a moderate can win. This advances their narrative that they won’t waste time backing any more Conservatives.
Thus, Cruz will have no political future and the Establishment can advance the meme that Conservatism is a failure and we won’t support it or candidates that believe in its values.
Conclusion: The elites in the Party Establishment maintain the status quo and simultaneously destroy the dual threats of Cruz and Trump.
If the Elites back Cruz, the best thing California voters could do is vote Trump to save Cruz. Now that’s irony.