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WHY A VOTE FOR CARSON IS A VOTE FOR RUBIO



By Dr. Ed Berry, PhD, Physics
November 21, 2015
NewsWithViews.com

This article is pro Republican. I write not to tell you who to vote for but to help conservatives understand how they must vote to win. For fair disclosure, I am a hat-wearing supporter of Donald Trump.

For the first time since Reagan, Republicans have a chance to nominate a conservative presidential candidate who can win the final election. That candidate is Donald Trump.

Whether conservatives accomplish this goal depends upon how collectively smart they are. If they are smart, they will come together to achieve their common goal.

First, the facts

Following the November 11 debate, the Republican presidential race is down to 4 candidates.

A pre-debate CNN/ORC poll shows Trump, Carson, Rubio and Cruz polling 25, 23, 13 and 11 percent, respectively. All other candidates have less than 6 percent.

A newer and more accurate pre-debate YouGov.com poll shows Trump, Carson, Rubio, and Cruz polling 32, 18, 11, and 8 percent, respectively. Bush also got 8 percent but he cannot catch Rubio who is his major competitor. All other candidates got less than 5 percent.

In his after debate comments, Dick Morris said he is even more certain that one of the above four candidates will win the nomination.

To understand the polls, we must quantify the votes in candidate categories.

If we add the poll percentages separately for candidates whom we might loosely define in voter perspective as conservative – Trump, Carson, Cruz, Paul, Huckabee - and moderate – Rubio, Bush, Fiorina, Kasich, Christy, Jindal - we find the conservative candidates get about 2/3 of the votes and the moderates about 1/3.

But this cannot be. Conservatives do not outnumber moderates by 2 to 1. So what’s up?

The answer is Donald Trump. Trump, uniquely among the candidates, draws uniform support from moderates, somewhat conservatives, and very conservatives. Trump draws strong support from Latino and black voters, independents and conservative Democrats.

No other candidate does this and no presidential candidate has done this since Ronald Reagan.

In summary, the poll data show Trump draws 1/3, moderates draw 1/3, and conservatives draw 1/3. Donald Trump is an island unto himself.

The conclusion that conservatives should back Donald Trump if they want to win is obvious, but let’s go further to see why this is critical.

David Wasserman’s “The GOPs Primary Rules might doom Carson, Cruz and Trump” confirms this conclusion. His footnote says “Trump’s support is relatively evenly distributed among moderate, somewhat conservative and very conservative Republicans.”

In politics, the side with the smartest strategic voters wins. In 2016, conservatives have a unique opportunity to elect a conservative president.

Here’s some stuff we need to know

Wasserman shows why the GOP always nominates a more moderate president than the Republicans it sends to Congress. The system is rigged. The GOP’s distribution of presidential delegates gives more weight to voters in the blue states than to voters in the red states.

Under RNC’s delegate geography, an average vote in a blue state gets twice as many delegates as an average vote in a red state. In the extreme, a GOP vote cast in the bluest part of the Bronx is worth 43 times as many delegates as the reddest part of Alabama.

As you would expect, GOP voters in blue states vote for more moderate presidential candidates while GOP voters in red states vote for more conservative presidential candidates.

Since blue state votes get twice as many delegates per vote as the red state votes, the GOP bias favors moderate candidates over conservative candidates by 2 to 1.

Rubio will very likely get the moderate 1/3 of GOP votes. Carson and Cruz will compete for the conservative 1/3 of GOP votes. It does not matter whether Cruz or Carson wins these votes. The total of their votes will not be more than the total votes for Rubio. The GOP 2 to 1 delegate bias will nominate Rubio over either Cruz or Carson.

Bottom line: Neither Cruz nor Carson can beat Rubio

The only candidate who can beat Rubio is Trump because Trump draws support from Rubio’s moderate base as well as from independents and conservative Democrats.

To understand this, we must understand the demographics of the Republican Party.

The well-known four faces of the Republican Party and their approximate compositions are Somewhat Conservative (40 percent), Moderate to Liberal (30 percent), Very Conservative but Secular (10 percent), and Very Conservative Evangelical (20 percent).

Evangelical voters are found in all four faces of the Republican Party. The Very Conservative Evangelicals are the more extreme evangelicals who dominate the tea party.

The 10 percent Very Conservative but Secular voters always support the Republican nominee. The 20 percent Very Conservative Evangelical voters do not. This is the source of the well-known “split” in the Republican Party.

On the flip side, the other 80 percent of the Republican Party do not vote for overly evangelical candidates. The 80 percent will vote for either Trump or Rubio but not for Carson or Cruz. Sorry, that is reality.

No matter how many times the 20 percent Very Conservative Evangelicals (VCE) may call other Republicans “RINO’s,” the simple fact is their VCE “marketing niche” is too small to elect one of their own.

Carson’s support comes from the VCE face of the Republican Party. Every Carson bumper sticker I have seen has a “Ten Commandments” bumper sticker beside it. Not to criticize the Ten Commandments but this tells us who supports Carson.

Carson’s supporters make a big mistake. Ben Carson’s evangelical supporters think he is a conservative because they assume every Bible-thumping candidate is a conservative. But Carson is not the conservative they think he is.

Therefore, as they learn more about Carson, they may change to another candidate. Polls show Carson’s support is “soft” and his supporters may change their minds.

Arkansas Times columnist Gene Lyons wrote “Ben Carson’s screwball candidacy doomed to fail,”

Every four years, rural Iowa Republicans fall raptly in love with a Bible-brandishing savior who vows to purge the nation of sin. Soon after the New Hampshire primary, the holy candidate fades fast.

Carson’s fans have been slow to grasp that their party’s presidential nominee will need the votes of millions of “blue state” Republicans historically resistant to religious zealotry.

While Carson’s supporters would prefer Trump over Rubio, they are unaware their support of Carson will only help Rubio. That’s not smart voting.

Kevin “Coach” Collins wrote about the liberal media,

They would all love to see Carson as the Republican nominee because they know he would lose massively to their favorite felon Hillary Clinton.

A dispassionate review of what Carson brings to the table, his lack of substantive ideas at best, bad ideas and crazy beliefs at worst, makes him the best hope the media has of electing their favorite felon.

Unless Carson supporters wakeup and support Trump, conservatives may lose their greatest opportunity to elect a conservative president since Ronald Reagan.

Carson supports Obama’s Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) which will kill American jobs and flood America with more foreign workers. This should be a wakeup call to his supporters who believe Carson is a conservative. Trump is very much against TPP.

I argued that Carson’s statements on climate make him susceptible to irrational measures to “address” climate change in the name of saving the environment. By contrast, Trump is very clear about how he thinks the Democrat’s climate claims are a hoax that harms our economy.

Dick Morris said his biggest fear is Carson may block Trump from winning the nomination.

Morris hopes Carson’s credibility will fall apart before the Iowa caucus. Morris hopes Carson’s whoppers will wake up his supporters. Carson said Egyptians built the pyramids to store grain. He said rather than sending troops to Afghanistan after 9-11, he would have focused on energy independence instead. He said the holocaust would not have happened if the Jews had guns.

Forget what some polls say, Carson cannot beat Hillary. These polls are meaningless because the average voter has no idea about who can beat Hillary. Dick Morris says Hillary would eat Carson alive.

Good news is tea party activist and former congressional candidate Katrina Pierson has joined the Trump train. Pierson will act as the national spokeswoman for Donald Trump. This is a good move by the Trump team to counter the Carson threat.

Trump or Rubio?

The race is now down to either Trump or Rubio. The differences in these two candidates is vast. When voters understand the differences, they can chose the candidate they prefer.

Rubio is “gang of eight” open borders candidate. Trump is not.

Rubio backs Obama’s amnesty and Trans Pacific Partnership. Trump does not.

Chris Hedges wrote about the TPP,

Wages will decline. Working conditions will deteriorate. Unemployment will rise. Our few remaining rights will be revoked. The assault on the ecosystem will be accelerated. Banks and global speculation will be beyond oversight or control. Food safety standards and regulations will be jettisoned. Public services ranging from Medicare and Medicaid to the post office and public education will be abolished or dramatically slashed and taken over by for-profit corporations.

Rubio’s tax plan provides social welfare to families with children. Trump’s tax plan will create new business and jobs in America.

NumbersUSA.com grades candidates on “Worker-Protection Immigration.” Trump scores “A minus,” Cruz “B minus,” Carson “C” and Rubio “D minus.” All Democrats score “F.”

Michelle Malkin wrote about Trump’s immigration plan,

“I’m endorsing his immigration platform, which is airtight, which agrees with so many of the fundamental principles we talk about in our book.”

Rubio, Jindal, and Cruz are the youngest candidates at 44. Trump is the oldest Republican candidate at 69.

Rubio is the poorest candidate while Trump is the wealthiest.

Rubio must answer to his major donor, hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer. Singer was pivotal in the Republican cave-in on same-sex marriage. Trump answers only to himself.

Conclusions

World class competitive sailors adapt to the water, weather, and competition to win races. No one strategy will win in all conditions.

Voters in the 2016 Republican presidential nomination also must adapt. They have only two options to win:

1. If you like Rubio or Bush or Fiorina, vote for Rubio to win.
2. If you like Trump, Carson, or Cruz, vote for Trump to win.

Every other option will lose. Only Rubio or Trump can win the nomination. Adapt to it.

Voter demographics of the four faces of the Republican Party combined with the biased GOP distribution of delegates make it impossible for Carson or Cruz to beat Rubio.

Donald Trump is the only Republican who can beat Rubio because only Trump brings to the table his own 1/3 of GOP voters.

For Trump to overcome GOP’s delegate bias, many conservatives who now support Carson or Cruz must vote for Trump. If nominated, Trump will win the general election by a landslide.

Some VCEs find fault with Trump. VCEs find fault with every candidate. When VCEs refuse to vote for an “imperfect” candidate, they always lose and they take down all conservatives with them.

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To win, voters must vote for the candidate among those who can win, whom they believe will achieve the greater good for America. If they believe that candidate is Rubio then they should vote for Rubio. If Trump, then vote for Trump.

It is illogical and immoral to reject a candidate because of imperfections. It is logical, moral, and effective to choose the candidate whom you believe will achieve the greater good.

Politics is a team sport where the side that plays the smartest wins. Conservative voters can win if and only if they come together to achieve their common goal.

© 2015 Edwin X Berry, PhD – All Rights Reserved

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5 - Dr. Ben Carson Won't Get My Vote

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Dr. Ed Berry is editor and publisher of edberry.com based in Bigfork, Montana. He has a PhD in Physics, is a Certified Consulting Meteorologist, and an expert in climate change who takes the position that our carbon dioxide emissions are insignificant to climate change.

E:Mail: ed@edberry.com

Website: EdBerry.com


 

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This article is pro Republican. I write not to tell you who to vote for but to help conservatives understand how they must vote to win. For fair disclosure, I am a hat-wearing supporter of Donald Trump.