No one will deny the existence in the Republican Party of “Never Trumpers,” folks like Senator Romney and many others. Why do they exist? Never Trumpers are the establishment ingrained Republicans who are the party faithful, the traditionalists who do not like President Trump because he is not an establishment cookie-cutter politician who “has paid his dues” to the national party.
Contrary to popular belief, there are Never Trumpers in the conservative media, even FOX News; I give you Chris Wallace among others. Rush Limbaugh and Laura Ingraham have commented on the lack of support for the President some at Fox News have shown during the impeachment process.
The establishment Republicans worked overtime during the Republican primaries to support anyone but candidate Trump; they failed. We are now seeing the “anyone but Bernie” movement in the leftist party; why? Senator Sanders is just too much of a wild card, in the same way candidate Trump was not a polished party person. Senator Sanders does not owe fealty to the traditional Democratic establishment, along with “the posse,” a group of uber-liberal female United States Representatives who are outside of the traditional mold. They are attempting to move the leftist party even further left, even radically left, scaring the hell out of the party establishment.
As I have stated before, the primary process empowers the most radical on the left and right; a candidate can win the nomination with 5% of the electorate. So, who are the 5%? The most dedicated, the true believers, mostly the old and young.
Democratic polling tells us that the main issue the voters want is someone who can defeat President Trump; a very believable poll, but the 5% who vote in the primary want a change, as did Republican primary voters in the last election. The AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) wing of the liberal party want a bomb thrower; not an uncle Joe (Vice President Biden), but a Senator Sanders. They want an unapologetic socialist who has advocated an income tax as much as 100% for those making over one million dollars. He is a person who has advocated per Wikipedia the nationalization of banks, corporations and medical care.
Early poling is mixed, even contradictory, on who wins a head to head match up between Senator Sanders and President Trump. My evaluation is that for a Socialist to win, the American economy must be in the tank, deeply in the tank. Every time socialism has been seriously considered in our history (Eugene Victor Debs in 1912 got nearly a million votes), the people were hurting, just coming out of a recession, unemployment, high interest rates, foreclosures, money and jobs not readily available. That may be true in a few months, but I doubt it; the economy is just too strong to tank badly in 10 months.
So, the establishment Democrats are working tirelessly once again to send Senator Sanders to the ash heap of history and send good old uncle Joe to the White House. It is a political lifetime between today and election day; anything can happen, but my worst nightmare as a Republican is Mayor Buttigieg, or anyone under 60. The main objection I have with our President is his age. Senator Sanders, Vice President Biden and Mayor Bloomberg are older than President Trump, and Senator Warren isn’t much younger. The demands placed on the President are tough for anyone, but very hard on a person my age or older.
With a strong economy and full employment, it would be a hard sell to put a socialist government in charge of our lives from womb to tomb.
