Is Ted Cruz the Candidate Who Can Beat Donald Trump?

I think Cillizza nails it. And those of us in the media have no one to blame but ourselves.

A recent Quinnipiac University poll shows Trump leading in Iowa, with Cruz overtaking Ben Carson for second place. They are right to worry, but Trump is a problem of their own creation. In the aftermath of that tragedy, I was astounded to hear endless Washington-New York talking heads suggest that in light of the increasing threat of ISIS and growing worldwide tension, GOP voters would now turn to presidential candidates “with more experience” than Trump; prima facie evidence that these analysts are totally out of touch with the rest of the nation.

“You might not care if Donald Trump says Muslims must register with their government because you’re not one”, Moe says in the clip. Marco Rubio of Florida will win the nomination.

But in case those critiques didn’t get the point across, some politicians and pundits are now making a more direct connection between Trump’s views and Nazism. These voters account for nearly 75 percent of Trump’s support.

A few hours later, Trump re-tweeted a graphic with invented statistics showing, falsely, that black people are responsible for most killings of white people. If they say no to waterboarding, they’re undermining their hawkish cred to Trump’s benefit. He also has talked about shutting down mosques linked to extremists, called for stronger surveillance of such institutions and seemed to indicate he’d be open to registering all Muslims in a database before recently clarifying that he only wants a database for Syrian refugees. But after the Washington Post’s fact-checker gave Trump’s claim four Pinnochios, he found a small measure of vindication in a 2001article in that very paper that said: “Law enforcement authorities detained and questioned a number of people who were allegedly seen celebrating the attacks and holding tailgate-style parties on rooftops while they watched the devastation on the other side of the river”. Perhaps, even more surprising is the outpouring of support Donald Trump’s views have engendered in the American public.

In the meantime, Trump has “crossed the line for a general election electorate, and made himself all but unelectable in a general election”, said Matthew Dowd, who was chief strategist for former President George W. Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign.

Cruz has a very well-organized operation; he has 100,000 volunteers nationwide and he’s raised more money than any candidates except Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton.

Ted Cruz maintained that Hispanic unemployment and teen unemployment has gone up under President Barack Obama, even though FactCheck. Republican leaders look away. Nate Silver, for instance, published a piece arguing that analysts extrapolating forward from Trump’s current (and impressively durable) poll lead are likely to be disappointed.

Andy Martin, a Manchester man and a candidate in the Republican primary, filed a complaint challenging Sanders’ eligibility based on Sanders being elected to the U.S. Senate in Vermont as an Independent. “I think that’s the real concern”. But that didn’t continue. But Donald Trump has, so far, set the terms of the primary debate and dragged other candidates in the direction of ethnic and religious exclusion. Instead, some rivals are imitating Trump’s positions.

Donald Trump holds a rally in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

Republicans may yet come to their senses and allow a more credible candidate to emerge. Voting begins in Iowa on February 1, and, a month later, 16 states will have voted. By a 25-to-20 percent margin, Republicans were more likely than Democrats to cite the economy as their top issue.