REPUBLICAN

    verses    DEMOCRATIC CONVENTIONS

UPDATE: May 5 2016

Well, well, well, Donald Trump has actually made it, hasn’t he? Yes, unless he falls under a New York tram he will be the next Republican Presidential Candidate later this year – but nobody expects such luck with a tram, do they?

This unpredicted and unexpectedly early conclusion of the Republican nomination race a month before the end of the Primaries, came about late yesterday when Ohio Governor John Kasich dropped out of the presidential race after Ted Cruz had also jacked it in for failing miserably in the Indiana Primary (Trump got all the 57 delegates in the end).

While Kasich had only won his home state he nevertheless had hoped to lobby for his candidacy at the then potentially ‘Open’ Republican convention in July as he believed he was the best candidate to win there – perhaps as a man of faith he relied too much on God, eh?

On the eve of the Indiana vote he had said though that he planed to remain in the race ‘whatever the result’ – BUT Cruz’s shock decision was the final straw that forced him to give up the struggle, and who can blame him?

To all the Conservative observers in Europe who are aghast at this outcome, there could be some crumbs of comfort, couldn’t there?

Yep, for a start the hierarchy in the Republican Party, and moreover its financial backers, are unlikely to take kindly to their party being high-jacked and lambasted  in the way it has by Trump, so are not prone to be fully behind his Presidential bid. Where is the treasure trove for a Presidential campaign to come from, eh? Trump’s riches (and borrowing power) has self-funded his Primaries, but that can’t go on for the next battle against the Democrat Candidate, can it? No doubt also, Trump will be looking to enhance his chances by attracting a respected Running Mate from the political scene, but who? Will the likes of Cruz [who most recently labelled Trump a serial philanderer, a narcissist at a level the country’s never seen, and an utterly amoral phony], really swallow his pride to endorse Trump, so be willing to let bygones be bygones, ignore the recent jibes of that Cruz himself was unhinged and desperate, lacking the temperament to be President, just to get the chance of running to be Vice President in a predicted to be sad dirty campaign which is expected to fail?

A further adverse impact that Trump could have on the political scene will, to the chagrin of the Republicans and the delight of the Democrats, be on the Congressional elections this November. Trump’s unpopularity he has provoked among the broader electorate with his rhetoric on women, Hispanics and other groups, could hit hard through a voter backlash against the Republicans, don’t you think? This could easily mean that the Democrats could regain control over the Senate, when already they were ‘already’ in a good position to make gains and only need half a dozen from the 24 Republican held seats up for grabs. Furthermore, there could be a similar effect on the House of Representatives election where the Democrats will now be looking to steal just thirty of the Republicans 246 held seats – if they succeed and so take control over what has been a major power for the Republicans with a historically large majority since the last election 4 years ago, it will be a game changer, won’t it? The Republicans up for election to Congress, particularly the vulnerable ones, are expected to distance themselves as far away from Trump as possible, because they will share the same ballot as him, won’t they?.

The Democrats are rubbing their hands in glee at the prospects of both holding the Presidency and controlling the Congress at one and the same time, aren’t they. If they get it they then will truly rule America, won’t they?

[For the Republican presidential nominee process the fat lady ‘has’ sung, eh?]

ORIGINAL: May 4 2016

The two who performed well in Indiana were Republican Donald Trump who won soundly and Democrat Bernie Sanders who surprisingly clearly won as well.

As we have come to expect from Donald Trump, he had relentlessly vocally milked and hyped-up his poll lead in the Indiana Republican Primary before yesterday’s vote. Also he went further to predict that his win would finish his rivals and they would be gone – his dreams were partly answered, eh?

The half hearted pact to stop Trump between Ted Cruz and John Kasich operated here, with Kasich ‘off-stage’ to give Cruz a better chance of securing maximum Indiana delegates, which he failed miserably to do as he got zero (so far), but we had all long suspected that the ‘block-Trump’ game plan would not be effective, as ‘not actively campaigning’ isn’t the equivalent of full ‘tactical voting’, is it? The Indiana result amply demonstrated the disarray of the party traditionalists and the lack of quality of the 2016 Republican candidates for nomination, unfortunately?

Trump seemed to be politically naive to believe his own rhetoric that his win here would represent delivering a knockout blow that would demoralise his two rivals, wasn’t he? Well, it appears that he was right as Cruz, to the surprise even of Trump, immediately stacked, didn’t he? It seems inevitably though that this race will still go on unless he actually breaks through the winning tape – Kasich (Governor of Ohio) will probably carry on even if not seen as serious opposition won’t he?

Certainly, there seemed to be insufficient delegate numbers here (57) to really mean it was a make-or-break result, but it did didn’t it? Despite this latest and seventh straight win though, Trump is still nigh-on two hundred “bound delegates” short of being the outright winner. However, the chances now are that he does actually crawl over the line by the end of the Primaries in a month’s time, and so avoid facing a likely ‘anti-Trump’ contested Convention in July, doesn’t he?

It had been said that Cruz had run a ‘do-or-die’ campaign here, when moreover his real chances of winning the State were surely far-fetched, and so it turned out, didn’t it? In American politics, misplace over-confidence and blind faith seems to be endemic, doesn’t it? Notwithstanding that he got over a third of the vote , he got no more delegates for his troubles, so he gave-up on struggling further down the trail.

The expert pundits say that leaves Trump the presumptive nominee, but nevertheless if he doesn’t get over the freshhold before then, the others get a last throw of the dice in the large-scale Californian Primary on 7th June – that may well yet hold the key that decides the Republican Nomination, perhaps?

On the Democrat side the polls had predicted that in Indiana Hillary Clinton was as near a certainty to win as possible, while her rival Bernie Sanders was far-off success with his attempt to reclaim the momentum that he had lost. But the polls were wrong again and Sanders secured a good but shock win that will boost his supporters, but that may not be enough, eh?

The consequence of the Indiana result is that Clinton still picked up nearly half the delegates available so relentlessly trundles on towards securing the Democrat nomination and she is certainly within touching distance with well less than a couple of hundred delegates to gain, while Sanders (Senator for Vermont) still faces a sheer cliff to scale with nearly a thousand short.

[The Americans seem to agree that Clinton and Trump will be their respective party’s nominees, but as their American saying goes “it ain’t over til the fat lady sings”, is it?]

–ooOoo–

[The World is clearly very much paying attention to who just might be the next US President. Britain has particular concerns as well, because it has had a long-term predominantly close relationship with America

            The President of the United States