I did this yesterday and everybody told me I was wrong.
Rounds of voting continue past the deadline for printing ballots and the Democrat wins by default.
Trump should make sure he meets every one of his delegates, face to face. I know who you are, I know where you live, and I know you'll stick with me, and not chase after Lyin Ted or some Lackey.
If he holds his delegates for a second ballot, he wins the nomination.
I think the fact that the press has locked themselves into honestly reporting on just how crazy/stupid Trump is, which they haven't for Cruz, would make it more satisfying for Trump to win. I'd like to see some Republican-on-Republican rioting first, though, so maybe no one on the first ballot, an official projection that Cruz will win followed by a huge screaming fit on the convention floor that prevents a second ballot (repeated for a few days of breathless 'shit-these-people-aren't-right' coverage, ideally). And during that a whole bunch of ratfucking that screws over a lot of Republican politicians for future races, followed eventually by a surrender by the Republican power brokers and a Trump nomination. (And then absurdly massive blowout which flips the house*.)
*Well, you didn't ask about the likeliest possibility.
And uncertainty about that, I think, is the biggest barrier to a clean deal. No one will know what the third ballot will look like til we get there: the Cruz people have done a good job at sowing the notion that some number of Trump delegates are stealth Cruz delegates. Enough to win? That's not ascertainable.
So, what is your personal favorite outcome for the Republican Convention?
It gets hit by a largish meteorite?
Some of us are in reasonably close physical proximity to the convention.
OK, a smaller but better targeted meteorite, then.
I would believe that Cruz has some delegates stashed away in other peoples' delegations. The thing that's made him so successful in this primary so far is his political organizing skills and cleverness at picking up opportunities/exploiting rules/etc. That's why even as personally repulsive as he is I'm not at all comfortable with him as the nominee - he's good at suddenly turning out to have a really good organization driving turnout under the table, or picking up votes where people didn't see them before. If there's anyone planning ahead for dirty tricks it's going to be Cruz.
7: An extremely large but relatively slow-moving meteorite, in that case. Then when the dust settles you have a huge Sudbury-type lump of high-quality nickel-iron sitting conveniently close to your moribund metal processing industry, on top of a thin film or paste composed of Republican convention delegates.
I have no confidence that Ted Cruz will "get his ass handed to him in the general". The issue I was worried about 2 months ago has only gotten worse, that everyone spends all day talking about Trump and nobody really has any strong opinions about Ted Cruz. The guy is completely amoral and ruthless and has a state-of-the-art campaign operation of people who actually want him to be president, and we all know he was a college debate champion. And Trump is pretty much the only possible Republican candidate whose stature will not be elevated by the inevitable Islamic terrorist attack(s) later this year.
4 sounds great, but I think we are in an Iran-Iraq War situation here, and unlike in 1988 there actually is a way for both sides to lose.
Trump fails to get a majority on the first vote, then over the course of several more rounds of voting enough of his delegates slough away to give Cruz a slim majority by, say, the seventh round. Rioting breaks out in the convention venue and Trump storms out through the clouds of CS gas, announcing on the steps that he will run as a third-party candidate. He does so and strips out 10-15% of the electorate away from Cruz. Trumpist candidates further down the ballot do the same in the Senate and House races. Clinton storms to a 49-state sweep with a House majority and 66 Senate seats. Cruz becomes the least successful Republican candidate since Goldwater and Trump is on worldwide TV as the man who lost to the loser.
Trump should find the second ballot too uncertain, and make a deal with Kasich to win on the first ballot. VP, approval of all new regs (I'm thinking of a mechanism like Quayle had), supervision of the relationship with the Hill -- what more could he even want?
At this point I'd bet on Cruz winning the primary, narrowly. By this point in the election season the low-information and uncommitted are taking things more seriously, and the not-Trump vote has coalesced on one candidate by now. The bad news is, in comparison to Trump, he looks sane. The good news is, the brownshirts will be dispirited, Trump will make noises about a third-party run and may actually do so, and whether or not he'd actually get on the ballot anywhere he'd definitely drive down turnout for Cruz. In a two-person race I'd be scared of Cruz winning the general election but not in a three-person race.
8, 10: There are many closer than me.
I am not too worried about that because Clinton will be starting the general in a strong position - inheriting the winning coalition of Obama 2012, which has (demographically) only got stronger in the last four years. Which bits of that is Cruz going to take away from her? He's certainly not going to encourage lots of new voters in - Trump might have done both, with his appeal to the hard-hat Stillson Democrat voters and his reality-TV audiences. Cruz - evangelicals? Maybe, but the evangelicals had record-high turnout for Romney in 2012 and he still lost.
Being in continual, close contact with American voters, I will continue to be worried about the general election until after the votes are counted regardless of what the polls or past experience say.
16: Along with several commenters living in the Cleveland area there are also the precious relics that could be lost forever -- a hand towel with Elvis Presley's authentic sweat, a tissue with genuine John Lennon snot, etc.
Plus, the only remnant of a pastrami sandwich that Meatloaf started on.
Trump can't realistically get on the ballot as a third party candidate at this point, right? Or does the reform party still have ballot access?
...I think we are in an Iran-Iraq War situation here, and unlike in 1988 there actually is a way for both sides to lose.
This alleged witticism has never made much sense to me. When I imagine a war where both sides lose, something like the Iraq-Iran war is exactly what comes to mind...
There are different deadlines for different states to get on the ballot as an independent candidate. The earliest is 9 May, Texas.
For a write-in you just have to file some paperwork; independent candidates need to hit various deadlines with various numbers of signatures.
23: ironically, yes. But the remark was made while the war was still going on, so one side winning still looked possible.
There are a reasonably large number of states where he'd be too late to get on direactly: DE, FL, GA, IL, IN, MI, NV, NM, NC, OK, SC, and TX. Some of those have minor parties that he might be able to hijack: DE (Independent Party), FL (many options, including Tea Party and America's Party), MI (U.S. Taxpayers Party), NV (Independent American Party), NM (Independent American Party), and SC (many). I'm not sure if his campaign has the competence to successfully pull off all of those, and I don't know what the dates are for those minor parties to pick their candidates. He'd definitely have to go with write-in for GA, IL, IN, NC, and TX. He wouldn't have any options in OK, where write-in candidates aren't allowed.
SC also doesn't allow write-ins, so if he failed to hijack one of their minor parties he'd be out there too.
I forgot to factor in "sore loser" laws. For example, it appears that it'd be illegal for him to hijack a minor party in MI, which would move it to the "write-in only" column.
Plus, the only remnant of a pastrami sandwich that Meatloaf started on.
I call bullshit. Meatloaf is a vegetarian.
Upetgi: so was what I linked to in 25 wrong? Or am I misreading it?
31: Was a vegetarian for about 10 years according to this...
from ew.com [undated]: What would a vegetarian Meat Loaf be like?
I was a vegetarian for 10 years. There've been vegetarians who wouldn't speak to me because of my name. I was sitting with Jon Bon Jovi at one of those awards things, and I say, ''Oh, man, I love k.d. lang. I'd really like to meet her.'' They went to find out if it was okay, and she goes, ''No. His name is Meat Loaf.'' I stopped being a k.d. lang fan after that.
•from wikitalk [undated] : I just heard an interview with Meat Loaf on radio and I think he said he was a vegetarian from '81-92 but has since gone back to eating meat.
http://www.ivu.org/people/music/meatloaf.html
Well, according to no less an authoritative source than The Sun, he was upset about being served Mead Loaf as recently as 2010.
Heh... "Mead Loaf." I'd like to try that.
I would do anything for loaf, but I won't do that.
A Mead Loaf sounds vegetarian to me. It should taste a bit like a Malt Loaf, but possibly better.
Treating this as a primaries thread: I was just reading the Daily News interview with Bernie Sanders. My gosh are his answers to the questions about breaking up banks terrible. It may have just been an off day for him, but I can see why people are saying that it he did not look good.
That should be: "his answers" . . . "[were] terrible."
I only got halfway through the article. I'm not saying his answers were brilliant, but "terrible" is overstating it. I know he's taking a lot of shit for this interview (as in, the front page of WaPo "WOOOHOO! Bernie Sanders gave a bad interview!!!"), but I'm not really seeing it.
I know he's taking a lot of shit for this interview . . . but I'm not really seeing it.
I'm sure he's taking undeserved shit for it, and I defend people's right to have an off day, so I don't want to put too much weight on it.
That said, this is the sequence that caused me to start shaking my head.
Daily News: So if you look forward, a year, maybe two years, right now you have...JPMorgan has 241,000 employees. About 20,000 of them in New York. $192 billion in net assets. What happens? What do you foresee? What is JPMorgan in year two of...
Sanders: What I foresee is a stronger national economy. And, in fact, a stronger economy in New York State, as well. What I foresee is a financial system which actually makes affordable loans to small and medium-size businesses. Does not live as an island onto themselves concerned about their own profits. And, in fact, creating incredibly complicated financial tools, which have led us into the worst economic recession in the modern history of the United States.
Daily News: I get that point. I'm just looking at the method because, actions have reactions, right? There are pluses and minuses. So, if you push here, you may get an unintended consequence that you don't understand. So, what I'm asking is, how can we understand? If you look at JPMorgan just as an example, or you can do Citibank, or Bank of America. What would it be? What would that institution be? Would there be a consumer bank? Where would the investing go?
Sanders: I'm not running JPMorgan Chase or Citibank.
Daily News: No. But you'd be breaking it up.
Sanders: That's right. And that is their decision as to what they want to do and how they want to reconfigure themselves. That's not my decision. All I am saying is that I do not want to see this country be in a position where it was in 2008, where we have to bail them out. And, in addition, I oppose that kind of concentration of ownership entirely.
You're asking a question, which is a fair question. But let me just take your question and take it to another issue. Alright? It would be fair for you to say, "Well, Bernie, you got on there that you are strongly concerned about climate change and that we have to transform our energy system away from fossil fuel. What happens to the people in the fossil fuel industry?"
That's a fair question. But the other part of that is if we do not address that issue the planet we're gonna leave your kids and your grandchildren may not be a particularly healthy or habitable one. So I can't say, if you're saying that we're going to break up the banks, will it have a negative consequence on some people? I suspect that it will. Will it have a positive impact on the economy in general? Yes, I think it will.
He's asked a specific question and he deflects it, the interviewer follows up and, again, he goes immediately to a comment about general principles which doesn't actually answer the question.
That's something every politician needs to be able to do but that bugged me when you consider two thinks (1) That his interest in breaking up the banks has been a major campaign theme for months and (2) he's campaigning in NY, where the banks are located. It's one thing to not get bogged down in parochial concerns, it's another thing to completely brush off somebody who's asking, "you're proposing major changes to an important local industry, what kind of affect do you think that will have?"*
That is a completely fair question and he absolutely brushes it off.
* That isn't the only reason the question matters, or even the most important; his answer also makes me concerned about his ability to negotiate his policy goals with the various stakeholders, but that is the reason why he should absolutely have had a better answer.
A defense.
That is a useful article, but it doesn't address my concerns. The questions may have been muddled, but I don't think they're unfair or traps -- they're fairly direct, reasonably policy questions.
His answers don't sound like somebody who's being confused by, "You said 'Fed' when you meant 'Treasury' what do you actually mean?" It isn't like he starts to give a detailed answer and then gets knocked off stride.
Mike Konczal also had a defense.
I believe that Mike Konczal is following both the race and financial reform more closely than I do. So he's probably correct. Nevertheless, I'm not quite sure how to respond to this.
Bernie Sanders gave some fairly normal answers on financial reform to the New York Daily News editorial board. Someone sent it to me, and as I read it I thought "yes, these are answers I'd expect for how Sanders approaches financial reform."
Because I read it and it immediately seemed off to me. So, while I accept his judgement that the answers are substantively solid, I feel like he's missing something if he can't see why people are making a big deal of the interview.
I suspect what's happening is that Konczal, having more prior information read it and thought, "his answers are correct and don't contradict any of his positions." Whereas I read it and thought, "he's really not engaging with the question at all." I was expecting something different.
I don't want, or expect, Sanders to turn into the SNL parody of Carter. Of course Sanders shouldn't start giving details about what exactly would happen to JP Morgan -- how many employees should be let go, how it would divest assets. But I still think that he should have more of an answer than he does, and it makes me concerned about his ability to find a common language to be able to negotiate with people who have a stake in the things that he wants to transform.
How about, the convention allows open carry, Cruz and Trump end up in a duel, and both end up fatally shooting each other. The party ends up nominating Romney, which leads to widespread rioting. Romney loses in a landslide, bringing the down ticket races and basically the entire RNC down with him, and democrats control the legislative and executive branch. With the Republican party permanently destroyed, the Democrats split into a center and left branch, which then become the right/left parties in the US, a la the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats. Hillary governs at the left with of the center/right (sort of a Merkel), and then gets replaced by a more leftist president on the Social Democrat model 4-8 years later. We get single payer health care, paid maternity leave, and a $15 national minimum wage.
There are ten duel commandments.
Can the GOP be convinced to change the needed delegate total to 1337?
With the Republican party permanently destroyed, the Democrats split into a center and left branch, which then become the right/left parties in the US, a la the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats.
What happens to the 48% of voters who currently support hard right candidates?
Or maybe it's only 35% who really "support" the hard right, plus another 13-ish percent that enable them... Either way. Who do they end up voting for?
51
They adapt or flee to somewhere in South America, similar to the Southerners who refused to give up slavery.
I guess I don't see it as a dodge. Bernie is arguing that the Banks need to figure out how to unwind themselves, and I think he's right about that: The government's role is not to micromanage the bank's break-up - rather its to force the banks to take on the task of breaking themselves up.
Maybe he didn't explain it well because he sounds a little caffeinated in this interview, and he tends to overwork the bit picture a bit, but what he said is not actually wrong.
51: They adapt to a new tribal identity? A lot of those people support those policies because those policies mean that they're part of whatever particular tribe they identify with. When that shifts their policy preferences do too, and pretty quickly.
Also re:50 - From what I know most of the rules are decided by the delegates prior to the balloting in a separate set of votes. So it's possible that they could just go ahead and unbind all the delegates or change the needed number or whatever. That's not much different than the Nuclear Option in the Senate, and almost certainly a bad idea unless the change they make is very subtle/not about something the press has talked endlessly about like the number of delegates though. (It is one thing to wonder about if you suspect Cruz has a bunch of supporters tucked away among Trump's delegates though.)
fwiw, Dean Baker defended Sanders' remarks along the same lines this morning at his Beat the Press blog.
It sounds kind of like the DN was frustrated because they saw themselves as asking indirectly "isn't this going to cause layoffs, how do you respond to that?", but their actual wording was more like "what precisely would happen as a result of breakup?" and Sanders responded more literally/vaguely than they wanted.
46- I'm having a hard time seeing how an honest answer to the question doesn't cause him more problems than dodging it. If he got his agenda though the financial industry will be making less money and spending less in New York. Of course he is going to try to finesse that, any politician would.
I'd be very happy with the scenario in 4.
43: I thought Sanders' answers were fine, and that he was fairly explicitly acknowledging that there would be some pain associated with breaking up the big banks, but that the country as a whole would be better for it.
Maybe he didn't explain it well . . . but what he said is not actually wrong.
I agree with that (and that was Konczal's point in the post that nosflow linked). But, having thought about it, let me explain what concerns me.
A scenario that worries me is President Sanders talking to NY Senators and Representatives and saying, "here's what I'm proposing for the big banks, I would like you to support it." In that case he's talking to Democrats who are, presumably political allies, and he's asking them for active support -- to make a speech, to sit behind him at a speech that he's making, to act as a surrogate reassuring the local constituencies, or helping to advance his agenda in Congress. Does he have the ability to make that pitch? To say, "I understand that this could put you in a tight spot, but here's what I need from you, here's why it's important, and here are the ways that I am going to do everything that I can to not cause unnecessary difficulties for you." I think that requires showing people that you can speak their language, and understand the political constraints that they're working with.
I also think that it's hard to ask candidates to demonstrate that ability on the campaign trail. That sort of conversation is, by definition, a closed-door negotiation. So, as a voter, I have limited ability to assess that, but that interview made me concerned.
So I understand that what I'm looking for is asking a lot from a candidate for a random interview in April. But that's why I think it matters that the section of the interview interview is, as I said, (1) about a major campaign issue, (2) of enormous local interest to (3) a crucial upcoming primary state. He has an incentive to want to demonstrate that he's sensitive to the concerns that a NY audience might have, and he doesn't do that at all.
46- I'm having a hard time seeing how an honest answer to the question doesn't cause him more problems than dodging it. If he got his agenda though the financial industry will be making less money and spending less in New York. Of course he is going to try to finesse that, any politician would.
I think that's true, but does 61 explain my concern more effectively?
I realize that I'm asking him to do something difficult. But, here's the thing, I didn't go interview with that in mind. I read the interview, thought, "oh, that's a terrible answer" and am trying to figure out the thought process that lead me to that conclusion. So I would start from the position that if he was trying to finesse it (which does make sense), he didn't do a very good job.
Nothing Bernie Sanders could say would make Chuck Schumer like this idea.
Woah, I didn't hear about that MetLife decision. What the fuck, federal judge who's name I'm too lazy to google?
62- I'm picking up what you are putting down. I'm a die hard Bernie supporter, but I've thought for a while that he's a little less quick on his feet than the most successful presidential candidates are. I hope I am as sharp as he is at his age, but 70 year old people usually aren't that good at thinking on their feet. I feel like he comes to the right conclusions after he has a chance to think about things and that is actually more important for the president, but this probably isn't the last time he is going to have trouble like this.
64 -- the judge was Regan's head of the mine safety and health commission from 1981 to 84, and then general counsel of the NLRB from 1984 to 88, and a GWB nominee, which pretty much tells you all you need to know.
I would agree with that assessment. He has all the right principals, but he doesn't have the situational dexterity of Obama or Bill Clinton. And he's never going to be able to go LBJ on the New York delegation.
Regan's head of the mine safety and health commission from 1981 to 84
I'm sure the mines were never healthier.
missing the "a" in Reagan, as was important in the 80s.
Apparently now they are going with "Antonin Scalia Law School." Charles Koch and an anonymous donor paid $30 million for the name change. That's fucking horrible.
Its still pending approval by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. I don't know who's on the council, but how awesome would if be if they blocked it?
Right, now it's Antonin Scalia Law School. But it'll always be ASSlaw to me.
It's not really horrible, it's frankly truth in advertising from George Mason.
Antonin Scalia School & House Of Legal Education.
It was going to be ASSoL. But really for any law school that's just truth in advertising.
It's not really horrible, it's frankly truth in advertising from George Mason.
Names matter. If you name the place after Scalia, all people who are decent and good will choose to go somewhere else, leaving it to fester like a conservative boil on the ass of America. If you think there is evil coming out of GMU now, just wait 20 years.
Eh. They've probably risen about as far as they can based on their "law school for right wingers" philosophy, and the name locks them into it forever. Other more ideologically pluralistic law schools will continue to eat their lunch, and their graduates will (mostly, obviously great and smart and good people can come from any law school) have the same mediocre or wingnut welfare prospects that they do now.
I agree with Tigre here. As it stands, not many people raise an eyebrow when they hear about some lunacy that came from GMU. But if something comes out of the ASSoL...
Nothing Bernie Sanders could say would make Chuck Schumer like this idea.
He's never going to be able to go LBJ on the New York delegation.
That is part of what makes the Sanders candidacy interesting. I believe that if a mainstream democrat was pushing for a plan which would have major impacts on the financial industry they would want to at least have Schumer involved in the conversation, even if he wasn't a fan of the idea.
I assume that would be partially out of deference to his position as a senior Democratic Senator but also because New York, generally, and the financial industry, specifically, are a big source of money and power within the Democratic party, and Schumer is well connected to that.
What makes Sanders exciting is that he's correct to say that the Democratic party is too cozy with the finance industry, and that it deserves less deference.
On the other hand, you can see why that might put him at odds with the part leaders (and why the might not appreciate him making an analogy between finance and fossil fuels as industries which make a lot of money but which may also harm the country).
That gets talked about a little bit in the broad conversation of, "could Sanders actually accomplish anything?" But I think the question of, "which Democrats is Sanders willing to piss off" is an good one, and also one that the Democratic party doesn't have much interest in talking about because they don't want to be publicly taking the position, "of course we have to take care of the financial industry."
I guess I'm just tired of all the public infrastructure in Northern VA being named after horrible Republicans. Its bad enough they got both the airports, they shouldn't also be able to buy off the universities.
61: If Bernie were able to convincingly empathize with Wall Street, why would anybody vote for him?
80: To be fair, most of the Confederate generals with highways named after them were Democrats.
It's weird that something as reactionary as a ball is named after a socialist, but I've never been to a Debs Ball to see what happens.
Maybe the Pennsylvanians can provide some insight on this bizarre story.
That's the other end of the state. Here, it's all about Wendy Bell. Also, Clinton. The line to get into to her rally (which I saw from the bus on my way home) was huge. Maybe a quarter mile long, five or six wide.
Huh, I hadn't heard about Bell before.
You probably never had a kid play soccer against her kid.
Up here our controversial TV journalists are more about secretly reporting on their own political activities then dramatically quitting on air after the reveal.
We have serious debates about racism.
Racism is much worse than an annoyance.
I can eat salted fleisch on a slice of white.
Back to the election, when was the last time the primary was this drawn out for either party? It looks increasingly clear that Trump can neither cross the 1237 threshold nor be mathematically eliminated from doing so before June 7.
It's also interesting how many people have been pointing out that what we may be seeing in Cleveland should really be called a "contested" rather than "brokered" convention, since the national party is no longer remotely capable of successfully brokering a compromise over the nominee. Maybe they should nominate some sort of businessman known for making deals.
Too bad the only businessman available to them is known more for muscling people out of his way than making deals.
That really depends on how you define "known." He had a bestselling book and everything.
How about, the convention allows open carry, Cruz and Trump end up in a duel, and both end up fatally shooting each other.
And then somebody writes a musical about it.
Is Hamilton really all that? I've seen a ton of buzz about it but I've yet to give it a listen.
I'm no judge of either musicals or hip-hop, so my opinion isn't worth much. But I think I know only one person who's seen or listened to it who wasn't head over heels.
I find the soundtrack good but not near as good enough to justify the large number of times some people play it in a single weekend.
So it's no Hello, Dolly! is what you're saying?
They probably won't use a song in a mayonnaise commercial, if that's why you mean.
Maybe "Raise a glass to the four of us, tomorrow there'll be more of us" is somebody develops drinkable mayonnaise.
I think Trump is going to win on the first or second round of ballots at the convention unless Cruz pulls something spectacular. I'd like to see Cruz sweep the delegates from candidates who've dropped out and maybe beat Trump after a few rounds of voting, leading to a Trump walkout and third party run. I think the odds of that at this point are not bad, maybe around 25% or so. More likely is a clean Trump victory followed by a rout in the general (unless something horrible happens like a Paris level terrorist attack).
The great thing about the impending Republican Convention is that whoever loses is going to be pissed. Party Unity My Ass! (But for real.)
Despite the fact that people have been talking about it ever since like August I really have trouble believing that Trump would run as a third party - I think that was always an empty threat. The level of effort and caring-about-being-president is way too high when it comes to actually running that way. And even he can't possibly believe he would win like that. If he wants to act as a spoiler it wouldn't be hard for him to denounce the convention as cheating (it kind of would be) and yell about how people who support him should refuse to vote for whoever wins.
Going out with a "I would have been the president but I was stabbed in the back!" thing would probably be his best option at this point in the race anyway. He gets to save every bit of his ego, rile people up in his defense, and not have to actually risk losing legitimately (possibly even in a landslide) to Clinton.
110: but you're assuming here that Trump has a rational view of his own chances. I'm not sure that's a safe assumption. Why shouldn't he think he can win as a third party candidate?
I'm not sure that Trump wants to be President - he just likes being the center of attention and winning.
Exactly. If he leaves in a huff after the convention, he's a quitter and no one will pay any attention to him. They'll all be paying attention to Clinton and Cruz. If he runs as a third-party candidate, then for the next four months he can still have rallies and interviews and he'll be in all the debates and everything. Even if he didn't expect to win but just liked attention, that's still attractive. And why wouldn't he expect to win?
I mean, Ross Perot ran as a third-party candidate. He had a sincere belief in the plausibility of his winning. Do you think Perot was more deranged than Trump?
Was Perot actually deranged? He claimed Bush family operatives disrupted his daughter's wedding, but that doesn't sound particularly unbelievable or even unlikely.
But it all depends on the kind of derangement - Trump certainly believes (most evidence to the contrary) that there's a silent majority out there to sweep him into power if he's the nominee. But I'm not convinced he thinks he can still win if he has his support stolen from him. I still believe in the power of the right wing victimization complex, and that he'd resort to spite and nastiness but not to actually trying to construct a whole presidential bid without any already existing infrastructure.
Also his mastery at the press makes me think he could stick around for half the race just by issuing statements and holding rallies anyway, without being on most/any ballots and without the intention of winning (like Sarah Palin occasionally does). He wouldn't be running but he'd definitely still be screwing over the people who stole the nomination from him. And it's hard to look at Trump and think "there's someone who probably isn't vindictive to the point of a personality disorder".
But if you're going to be holding rallies and making speeches and so on anyway, why not run? Yes, there's a bit of extra effort involved in terms of collecting the signatures required to get yourself on the ballot, but you're already holding a rally for 50,000 of your fans; the additional admin burden of getting them all to sign a bit of paper is not huge. The major expense of campaigning is the campaign. (cf. Mitchell & Webb on faking the moon landings.)
Actual campaigning costs money; giving big speeches can make it.
Actual campaigning doesn't cost Trump money, though. He's barely had to spend any because he gets his TV advertising for free.
Doesn't actual campaigning require more disclosure. Does he need to release more if he runs in the general?
116. Either Donald Trump or Ted Cruz is going to be the official Republican candidate for POTUS and you're worried about whether Ross Perot was deranged?
123: We're just trying to come up with a basis for comparison.
Speaking of crazy, does anybody remember when Charlie Sheen toured the country doing a one-man show after he got fired ? Am I right to think that somewhere between 90-100% of the people that paid to see those shows are now Trump supporters?
125: I wouldn't mind you slandering me if you only spelled my name correctly.