Keep this in mind when you hear Republicans pontificate about democracy and the will of the people:
Sen. Ted Cruz is out-hustling Donald Trump and looks set to ensure many Arizona delegates will defect to him in a convention floor fight. The Texas senator, who ever since Iowa has played a stealthy ground game in contrast to Trump’s chaotic populism, is taking steps to snatch the Republican presidential nomination from The Donald at the convention in July.
The New York businessman easily won last month’s Arizona primary taking 47 percent to Cruz’s 25 percent, scooping up all 58 of the state’s delegates. That’s nearly 5 percent of the 1,237 Trump needs for the nomination, and they’re tied are to him on the first ballot.
But Cruz, exploiting deep opposition to Trump among grassroots Republicans, has been far more active in Arizona than Trump, insiders say. He’s recruiting candidates for the available 55 delegate slots, that along with the other three delegate positions filled by party leaders, would be allowed to vote for him in a multi-ballot contested convention.
“Cruz, out of all the campaigns, has the most folks on the
ground and has been the most organized,” Michael Noble, a Republican
consultant in Arizona who is neutral, told the Washington Examiner on Friday. “Trump has no real organization in Arizona,” added GOP
strategist Sean Noble (no relation) in an email exchange. “Cruz will get
most/all Arizona delegates on second ballot.”
This is all according to the rules. The problem is that it is indicative of structural and institutional corruption, not that this comes as any surprise. Legality is not morality. Of course, if the Republican establishment doesn’t like the Trump wind, they really won’t enjoy reaping the nationalist whirlwind that is beginning to swirl even now.
What is alarming about this to me is the way it reveals the elite political establishment to be extraordinarily short-sighted. No wonder the Republicans have conserved nothing. Unlike the die-hard Left, they have no long-term strategy, only short-term tactics.