While I am sure there are similar examples in every state, I would like to take you back to two elections in my native state of Vermont that I believe shed some light on likely outcomes in the presidential election, depending on the Republican nominee.
I assure you that we do not want our nation to go the way of Vermont, where businesses, youth and young families have vacated and finally after six years of trying to help redirect Vermont though the political arena, we finally left and moved our family and my engineering business to my wife’s native state of Virginia.
In 2006 Rich Tarrant, a multi-millionaire businessman who had likely created more good jobs in Vermont than anyone in Vermont’s history, challenged Bernie Sanders in the race for the open U.S. Senate seat. It turned out that Tarrant’s business success fit right into Sanders socialist campaign against the productive and Tarrant was clobbered by Sanders who won with a 33% margin of victory! Tarrant had all the positives Trump has, without all the negatives.
Trump’s long history of supporting liberals and liberal causes truly makes him no more acceptable than to millions of conservatives than Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders. The number of conservatives that will not cast a vote for Trump will surely surpass that of the past two elections when MaCain and Romney both lost to Obama. Furthermore, if those conservative voters stay home on Election Day, Republican Congressional races will also take a huge hit. So if you are thinking of voting for Trump, think about what America will look like with either Democrat winning the presidency and a Democrat majority in Congress, because that is a very likely outcome.
Marco Rubio, who seemed like a promising option early in the race, now looks like a replay of the 2010 race for Vermont governor. Rubio is spending far too much energy playing the “Trump†card of disparaging those who challenge his record or ideas, rather than simply defending his record and ideas.
In that 2010 race, the Republican had served four terms as Lt. Governor and was a well-spoken, attractive father of four and clearly pro-life and embraced marriage as defined in the beginning. He also had the support of the four-term current governor. By contrast the Democrat had been voted the most ethically challenged member of the Vermont senate by his own Democrat colleagues. So on paper Republican Brian Dubie had a clear advantage over Democrat Peter Shumlin.
However in 2010 Brian shifted his campaign to a duck and hit style campaign as he came out of the gate ducking two core conservative issues by stating that “the issues of life and marriage were settled.†Too bad the left never sees laws as settled. Then his campaign aimed at Shumlin’s ethical shortcomings in every way possible, and with Shumlin there were lots of options. Yet on Election Day, Dubie’s attack campaign on Shumlin’s character did not win the day.
Perhaps Rubio is getting his political advice from the same people that wrongly advised Brian. Brian Dubie is a better person than his campaign showed and I would like to think Marco Rubio is also. But it is up to Marco to stand up and prove that.
Running a campaign that champions sound ideas and having a record to match is a much stronger recipe and that is why I believe Ted Cruz is best positioned to win a general election and truly bring the change that both Trump and Rubio supporters are looking for.
To paraphrase philosopher George Santayana, “If we do not learn from history, we are destined to repeat it.”
© Mark Shepard
3 comments
Sorry, I’m having trouble understanding the point of this article. Was some of the text omitted by accident?
It is like all this guy’s articles, full of hot air for Ted Cruz.
I am supporting Cruz. I make no apologies for that and I have laid out my reasons in three columns. I believe he is best positioned to both win the general and to deliver what conservatives supporting Trump and Rubio are after.
The first column was about how power breeds corruption and Ted Cruz has laid out very specific plans to push power away from its concentration in Washington and back to the states and the people. He also has not embraced a super-powerful executive model, like Sanders, Clinton and Trump. You can read that at http://www.markshepard.us. The second demonstrated that Ted Cruz shows more honesty and understanding about the process and the struggle that will be ahead even if a Republican is elected. In this column I am simply pointing to past campaigns that have similarities to the campaigns of Trump and Rubio and yet lost the general election. We can learn a lot from history, if we are willing to look at it.
Any reader certainly has the freedom to feel differently and should feel welcomed to present their case for their candidate of choice. Meaningless “hot air†type comments with no substance add nothing. Sailblazer , I hope my comments above have helped you understand my point.
I understand not liking challenges to a candidate we put our hope in, but it is much better to take a hard look before the primary than have to deal with a loss, like in the four examples I gave in this piece.
Lastly, my perspective has certainly been influenced by my own experience running for state senate in a very liberal region. I ran a campaign along the model Cruz is running with a strong grassroots focus and then solid, respectful and yet unapologetic conservative set of ideas. I also was opposed by the party powers who claimed I was unelectable. I won three elections and in the five elections since I stopped running no Republican has won that senate district. So in my experience I have seen how standing respectfully strong for sound ideas is much more likely to turn into a general election victory than the malleable candidates that followed my time in the senate.