Republican Party

Rod Dreher points to the findings in the latest NYT/CBS News poll, noting that Trump is tightening his hold on the GOP. 46% support Trump nationally, which is equal to the support for the other two candidates put together. Compared to last month’s survey, Trump has gained 11 points and expanded his lead over Cruz to 20. (A combined 72% of Republican primary voters support candidates loathed by the party leadership.) Trump’s support has continued to grow, which was always likely to happen as he won more contests and more candidates dropped out.

Terrible news for the GOP establishment out of the CBS News/New York Times poll. Donald Trump is solidifying his hold on the party.

Forty-six percent of primary voters said they would like to see Mr. Trump as the party’s nominee, more than at any point since he declared his candidacy in June. Twenty-six percent favored Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, and 20 percent backed Gov. John Kasich of Ohio.

Fully three-quarters of Republican primary voters expect Mr. Trump to be their party’s nominee.

Submitted by David Stockman via Contra Corner blog,

It’s actually pretty easy. At an apt moment very soon, Trump should offer Governor Kasich the VP slot and Senator Cruz the vacant Supreme Court seat.

Earlier this month in “GOP Leaders, Tech Execs Plot Against Trump At Secret NeoCon Island Meeting,” we discussed the American Enterprise Institute’s annual World Forum, an event held on Sea Island, Georgia.

It’s a notoriously secretive affair and is off limits to the press. “We can’t even get a snow update,” Bloomberg joked last year.

One of the things that seems to have never sunk in for Donald Trump’s GOP rivals (or at least until they were either sitting back at home on the couch reflecting on why they were beaten so badly or else talking sheepishly to reporters on Capitol Hill about their plans to retire from politics after being trounced in their home state) is that he feeds off of controversy and publicity. The more you talk about him - good or bad - the larger he looms in voters’ minds.