The recent NYT article “Party Rules To Streamline Race May Backfire“, written by Jonathan Martin, showcases two distinct disconnects: #1) an actual understanding of what’s going on, and #2) the NYT bubble-perspective on the GOP motives.
However, it does provide an excellent tool to showcase bias and reality:
LOS ANGELES — When gloomy Republican Party leaders regrouped after President Obama’s 2012 re-election, they were intent on enhancing the party’s chances of winning back the White House. The result: new rules to head off a prolonged and divisive nomination fight, and to make certain the Republican standard-bearer is not pulled too far to the right before Election Day.
FALSE: It should read “intent on insuring the establishment GOP chances of winning the White House“. The GOPe don’t want a conservative, they want a uni-party team player. Look toward their actions – not their words.
[…] But as the sprawling class of 2016 Republican presidential candidates tumbled out of their chaotic second debate last week, it was increasingly clear that those rule changes — from limiting the number of debates to adjusting how delegates are allocated — have failed to bring to the nominating process the order and speed that party leaders had craved.
FALSE and TRUE: False because the establishment “GOPe” apparatus intentionally put nine of the candidates into place. True because despite their efforts it’s failing to bring their chosen GOPe leader, Jeb Bush, to the forefront.
[…] In interviews, Republican leaders and strategists said that rather than having a presumptive nominee by early 2016, who could turn to the tasks of raising money and making the case against the Democratic candidates, it was doubtful that a candidate would be in place before late spring — or even before Republicans gather for their convention in Cleveland in July.
FALSE: should read “it was doubtful their candidate would be in place before late spring”…
[…] And they said they were increasingly convinced that Donald J. Trump could exploit openings created by the party’s revised rules to capture the nomination or, short of that, to amass enough delegates to be a power broker at the convention.
TRUE: The GOPe are indeed aware and afraid of the coalition that Donald Trump has put together.
[…] “You’ve got a set of unintended consequences that weren’t planned for,” said Richard F. Hohlt, a Republican donor and Washington lobbyist. “So it’s going to be harder for a candidate to get to the magic number, which could open up the process to a convention situation.”
TRUE and FALSE: Yes the consequences are “unintended“. However it’s entirely possible for Trump could reach the magic number far quicker than anyone else. Hence, the GOPe despair.
[…] To some extent, this reflects forces beyond the party’s control. Conservative activists have shown little appetite for Republicans who play by traditional rules. They, and the right-tilting candidates they are supporting, may be in even less of a mood to acquiesce at a time when Republican leaders in Washington, despite controlling both houses in Congress, have been unable to stop or even slow Mr. Obama’s nuclear accord with Iran, and are struggling in their bid to deny funding to Planned Parenthood.
FALSE: Should be “have been unwilling to stop or slow”.
[…] More than ever, too, the party is grappling with campaign finance laws that allow candidates with wealthy private backers, such as former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, to stay in the race even if they do poorly in early nominating contests in Iowa and New Hampshire.
FALSE: Laughably false. The GOPe apparatus itself set up the finance laws to increase by a magnitude of SEVEN how much an individual donor could give to the party apparatus. In addition, it’s the GOPe apparatus itself which created the Super-PACs for the original nine GOPe splitters (See: Austin Barbour and Rick Perry, and Andrew King for Lindsey Graham as examples.) The Super-PACs are all run by party insiders.
[…] But the evolving Republican landscape also suggests that the party’s changes, like squeezing primaries into a shorter period in hopes that one candidate would break through, are proving no match for a field this big and rambunctious, powered by the forces of populism and anger at Washington, and financed by wealthy benefactors.
[…] As a result, the campaigns are preparing for a marathon delegate battle, and have begun building organizations in territories as far-flung as Guam and American Samoa. An adviser to Mr. Cruz’s campaign, Dennis Lennox, has island-hopped through the Pacific this month, discussing local issues like the airfares between Honolulu and Pago Pago, in search of a stray delegate who might support the senator. And on a conference call with donors the morning after Wednesday’s debate, Danny Diaz, the manager for Mr. Bush’s campaign, ran down its operations in states well beyond New Hampshire and Iowa, according to a participant on the call.
FALSE: The establishment GOPe has always planned for a marathon delegate battle. That’s the entire design of the rule-changed road map.
[…] The prospect of a long and contentious nomination fight is only one reason for concern. The three-hour debate, at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library near here, suggested that Republican leaders had yet to realize their hope of keeping primary contenders from moving far to the right, complicating a general election bid, as happened to Mitt Romney in 2012. The candidates staked out conservative positions on a variety of topics — immigration, abortion, same-sex marriage and vaccinations for children — that, if appealing in such early Republican states as Iowa and South Carolina, could prove problematic in a general election.
In the starkest sign of how unsettled the situation is, what once seemed unthinkable — that Mr. Trump could win the Republican nomination — is being treated by many within the Republican establishment as a serious possibility. And one reason his candidacy seems strong is a change by the party in hopes of ending the process earlier: making it possible for states to hold contests in which the winner receives all the delegates, rather than a share based on the vote, starting March 15 — two weeks earlier than in the last cycle. Ten states have said they would do so.
TRUE and FALSE: True because they are indeed freaked out by Trump’s insurgency. However, false because they designed a longer primary process specifically to assist their chosen candidate.
[…] If Mr. Trump draws one-third of the Republican primary vote, as recent polls suggest he would, that could be enough to win in a crowded field. After March 15, he could begin amassing all the delegates in a given state even if he carried it with only a third of the vote. And the later it gets, the harder it becomes for a lead in delegates to be overcome, with fewer state contests remaining in which trailing candidates can attempt comebacks.
TRUE: However, not because Trump only gets one-third per se’; but rather because one-third is larger than the 15 to 20% they always anticipated Jeb Bush being able to win with. In addition, key state-by-state polling shows Trump doing more than enough to win in district-by-district races holding margins more than triple Jeb.
[…] “Somebody like Trump, who is operating in a crowded field, could put this contest away early if the crowd doesn’t thin out,” said Eric Fehrnstrom, who was a senior adviser to Mr. Romney.
FALSE: Patently false premise/assumption. Fewer candidates BENEFITS Trump, not more. Only Jeb Bush benefits from the large number of candidates in the race. Head-to-head matchups -with bold contrasts- spell doom for Jeb; Bush needs the watering down of pale pastels and shades of nuance.
[…] Steve Schmidt, a senior adviser to Senator John McCain of Arizona when he ran for president in 2008, said Mr. Trump could also be helped by the fact that candidates like Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina, with thinner financial resources and therefore likelier to run out of money, are, like Mr. Trump, political outsiders. So their supporters would be more inclined to fall in behind Mr. Trump than, say, Mr. Bush or Senator Marco Rubio of Florida.
FALSE: False on many levels. First, Steve Schmidt-for-brains, is the guy behind the failed race of Rick Perry. Second, GOPe/Jeb planned for “outsiders” or “grassroots” candidates to run out of money; hence the entire structure of the race to be longer in duration. The continued existence of any “non-Jeb” candidate is the risk – it just so happens the biggest “non-Jeb” is also the biggest guy in the entire race. That’s what has messed up the plan.
[…] “There is a bubble of delusion among Republicans and Democrats in Washington, D.C., with regard to their parties’ respective nominating processes,” Mr. Schmidt said. “There is no magic date upon which the air will come out of the Donald Trump balloon. The notion that Donald Trump cannot be the Republican nominee is completely and totally wrong.”
TRUE: And you just know ‘Schmidt-For-Brains’ had a ‘splodey head on that admission.
[…] The Republican rule changes reflected the lessons learned from Mr. Romney’s defeat, after a long primary fight left him short of money and pulled to the right on issues, weakening him among undecided voters when he faced Mr. Obama. The party compressed its nominating calendar to try to make the process end sooner, limited the number of debates, moved the convention to July from August, barred all but the traditional early nominating states from holding contests until March and shortened the period in which states could hold primaries or caucuses that award delegates proportionally.
FALSE: By the designers (rule changers) own admissions as mentioned before. The GOPe planned a long process; the GOPe planned for a long-process to benefit weakly-supported Jeb Bush. They wanted to block a “momentum” candidate.
[…] But this was a remedy for a very different campaign from the one now being waged. With 15 candidates in the field, and Mr. Trump at the center of the action, the debates have become ratings bonanzas for the networks and drawn record-setting viewership. And many states, eager to play a more influential role, seized the opportunity to schedule their nominating contests earlier. Eight states in the conservative-dominated South, where insurgent candidates like Mr. Trump could do well, have created a Super Tuesday on March 1, when delegates must still be awarded proportionally.
TRUE: everything in that paragraph is factually accurate.
[…] “It’s going to go on for a while,” said Karl Rove, a Republican strategist, noting how many delegates will have been distributed after the March 1 contests. “What happens if you have 30 percent of delegates already allocated and nobody has more than 25 percent of them?”
MAYBE: Interesting in that Karl appears to be HOPING FOR this outcome now. Because, if you read between the lines of that quote, Rove is fearful that Trump could gather all the various coalitions and win quickly – the exact scenario they tried to avoid.
[…] In Washington, some longtime Republican hands have initiated conversations about how to handle a race that could last through the last day of voting on June 7, when five states representing about 15 percent of all delegates, including California and New Jersey, cast their ballots.
(read more) “Hey, Karl”
