Centuries ago in August of 2015, the first Republican debate for the current presidential clusteryou-know-what started with one of those questions where the moderator asks the candidates on stage to answer with a show of hands. He asked them if they would all pledge to support the nominee of their party and to not mount a third-party campaign. Only Donald Trump declined, though he later took that pledge and — who knows? — might still even intend to honor it.
I wonder what would happen if they started the next debate with this request: "Raise your hand if there's anyone on this stage you might be hesitant to fully support if that person was the nominee of the Republican party."
If I was a candidate and still wanted to beat Trump, my hand would shoot up. First off, how do you beat Trump if you're saying he's an acceptable candidate? That trivializes all the issues you want to raise to assert that you'd be so much better.
Secondly, several candidates are distancing themselves from that "ban all Muslims" suggestion of his. Again, you can't run away from that and pledge to work for the guy's election at the same time.
And lastly, even if you're fine with that, what about what he's going to say tomorrow? Or the next day? Or the next time some poll suggests his lead might be slipping away? What's he going to say to fire up his base if it looks like he might do poorly in Iowa or New Hampshire? Or if he does?
Seems obvious to me what What Trump Says has little to no connection to What Trump Would Do. He says what gets cheers from his audiences (as long as they're not Jewish non-negotiators) and doesn't give a thought to what he'd do if he won and someone expected him actually do some or all of those things. He'll build a giant wall but he really has no idea how he'd build that giant wall. He'll deport all the illegal aliens but he really has no idea how he'd deport all the illegal aliens. He'll keep Muslims out of the country but he really has no idea how he'd keep Muslims out of the country…or deal with the fact that it's almost certainly unconstitutional.
Donald Trump has two main strengths and they've served him well throughout his career. One is that he's really, really good at self-promotion. Look how much he was in the news and how often you heard his name even before he was actually running for Chief Exec. There are richer people we never hear much about. There are developers who do bigger projects and we never see them on TV. But we all know Trump. He is his main product and he promotes it well.
And then his second strength is that he doesn't care if a majority of people think he's a flaming a-hole as long as he gets the deal he wants from the minority. Which is why I don't think he'll be the nominee, let alone the winner. You can make great business deals if most people hate you but you can't become the President of the United States.
This is not obvious yet because as Nate Silver notes time and again, most voters still aren't paying that much attention to this race…nor do they have to. There's plenty of time to get serious about a candidate…plenty of time to pick from whoever's still in the race a few months from now. People are taking this way too seriously, panicking that Trump might win the Iowa Caucuses. That means forgetting that the last two winners of the Iowa Caucuses were Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum, neither of whom got anywhere near their party's nomination.
Jeb Bush and Chris Christie and whoever else still might think they have a shot must know they can't beat Trump when it comes to being Trump. They might be able to beat him by convincing voters that Trump would be a disaster for the party and even the nation. Pledging to support him would be a great way to not be able to do that. It also puts a candidate in an awkward position when Trump, worried he's not sufficiently dominating the news cycle, says something even more outrageous. Which, of course, he will.