politics to go: jeff dunetz

GOP fat lady isn’t singing for Trump

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As the saying goes, “it ain’t over till the fat lady sings.” That’s the traditional refrain for those who want to point out the campaign isn’t settled. Well, valkyrie Brünnhilde, the character played by a very large lady with horned helmet, spear and round shield, hasn’t begun the 20-minute aria which ends Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, but she is getting ready to put on her costume.

“The Donald” won the South Carolina primary with one third of the votes on Saturday, albeit by a smaller margin than predicted, but that doesn’t really matter. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz finished second and third in South Carolina (22.5 vs. 22.3 percent), much better than anticipated, but that doesn’t really matter either. Neither does it matter that Jeb Bush dropped out.

None of it really matters, because unless John Kasich and Ben Carson drop out and make this an official three-way race, Donald Trump will probably run out the string and become the Republican nominee for president.

On the Democratic Party side, the aria has begun. With his loss in Nevada, Bernie Sanders campaign is dead, he just hasn’t realized that he should fall over yet. Hillary Clinton leads in almost every state and has regained the momentum with her Nevada caucus win. And don’t forget about the “super delegates” —almost one out of six delegates at the Democratic convention. The unelected super delegates, comprised of party faithful and elected officials, are mostly pledged to Clinton no matter how she does in their states’ primaries. Therefore, as of now, unless she gets arrested during the middle of the campaign (a possibility), Clinton will be the Democratic nominee.

Since Saturday, GOP pundits and candidates’ spokespeople have claimed that Rubio won last night. They’re wrong. Marco did better than expected but he placed second in votes and received zero delegates, which simply makes him the Number One loser.

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