A glimpse into the dark side

[yonder]

An interview with republican consultant Mike Murphy by CNN's Chris Cillizza. Normally, I wouldn't post something like this except for some interesting angles brought up by Mr. Murphy.

"Can the Republican Party survive Donald Trump?"
Analysis by Chris Cillizza, CNN Editor-at-large
Updated 10:22 AM ET, Tue August 21, 2018

...Cillizza: Let's say Trump loses in 2020. What -- if any -- is the lasting damage the Republican Party will have sustained from his presidency and the way the party reacted to it? Does that change if he is a two-term president?

Murphy: I think the bigger question is what happens if we lose the House -- and more -- in the 2018 midterms. If it does happen, such a meltdown will shake the party badly -- no political party endures a major loss without repercussions -- and Trump, the supreme magical winner of 2016, will become an epic party-killing loser. (My guess is Trump will compound this by attacking the party for its loss, since nothing can ever be his fault.) At that point the idea of running in 2020 under Trump will look like a march to the guillotine, particularly for the GOP Senate majority. That's when Trump will find himself on the sharp end of the same kind of cynical self-preservation thinking that he's benefited from to date. Nobody in the family stands up to Tony Soprano until they stop making money and start going to prison. Then it's time for change. Tony is the last to know.

Still, if we hang on to the House by two votes, it'll read in the expectations bazaar as a big Trump comeback win and he'll probably be the nominee. Then we'll be near-certain to lose big 2020. It'll be our McGovern '72 and out of that rubble the 2023-4 GOP primary race will redefine the party, hopefully back to opportunity conservatism.

(One crazy prediction: if Trump does hang on, I predict he'll start talking about dumping Mike Pence as VP. Such a story would create irresistible drama for the reality show producer POTUS. Next year, after the media gives over-implied but loud credit to female voters for any Democratic gains in 2020, White House press leaks will start to appear indicating that while Trump likes good old Pence, he wants to shake things up and after a flurry of hysterical who's next drama in the media with various names bouncing around, Trump will eventually float the name of Nikki Haley. The media will buy it hook, line and sinker: "A clever Trump master-stroke to get back female and minority voters, blah, blah, blah." That move will also allow Trump to plunge a satisfying Shakespearean dagger of revenge into Pence, whose own future presidential maneuverings are a bit too transparent for the insecure Trump. Team Pence really needs to read a few Stalin biographies.)...

more here: https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/21/politics/donald-trump-republican-party/index.html

[FakeNoose]

1. Rantings on the order of "What wild-ass scenarios could possibly save my job?"

I'm wondering how many vodka shots they gave him in the Green Room before he want on TV.

[yonder]

3. "if we hang on to the House by two votes"

vodka, mescal, chartreuse and wormwood, I'd say. He's in dreamland.

[brush]

2. IMO Paul's cozying up to Putin has vaulted him past Pence and Haley...

for the 2020 VP slot. Putin's orders.