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What is the steelman for voting for Trump in the primaries?
He's not a true outsider anymore. He's not an unknown quantity. We know his temperament. We know his governance style. What does he provide over Desantis/Haley/Ramaswamy? He didn't build the wall the first time, why would he do it now?
I have some ideas, but they're all terrible once you think about them for ten seconds. I am willing to believe that the median voter is unable to think clearly for ten seconds before being hijacked by monkey-brain, but I'd like to make sure I'm not missing something obvious.
1. Personal Loyalty: This is close to the Richard Hanania theory. Personal loyalty would make sense if Trump was loyal in turn to his supporters, but he isn't. How many of his lawyers have gone to jail? How many orange-blooded Trump fans lost their jobs or got arrested for believing in him too hard on January 6? He could have pardoned these people, but he didn't. Orange Man good because Orange Man good.
2. Perceived Injustice: Yes, Trump has been treated unfairly by the media and the Washington establishment. Lots of people have been. I can understand why this would be seen as a necessary condition (e.g. "nobody liked by the 'elites' could ever be a good president"), but why would this be a sufficient condition? Surely electability and general competence matter more than an extra standard-deviation worth of grievances against the media.
3. Hatred: I'm not talking about "Hate™". I'm talking about a genuine desire to see one's political enemies suffer. It's not even clear to me that Trump would be better at this than other Republican candidates, but I feel I would be missing something if I didn't put it on the list.
Because he's better than the alternatives, and has the greatest odds of beating Biden? It does not have to be deeper than that.
He doesn't have the greatest odds of beating Biden (that would be Nikki Haley according to the polls), and he's worse than DeSantis on just about anything where they differ.
I doubt Haley with full exposure would win. She would get some points with independents but lose more with the base. Her unfavorables amongst republicans are getting higher and higher.
What are republicans going to do about even if they're unfavourable, let Biden win?
There are some people openly suggesting that they will never vote for Haley and would stay home instead of voting for Biden. It seems insane to me to screw the down-ballot candidates just because you can't stand the top of the ticket, but these are otherwise sensible-sounding voices, so who knows?
I’d vote down ballot but I wouldn’t vote for Haley. She is a bad joke
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Those people wouldn't say they would vote for Haley to a polster either, so that's already included in the equation.
My point is not yet — the more people know about Haley the more Never Nikki republicans will become.
Isn't Haley just a weathervane?
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