WA Post: They are terrified that Hillary will get the nomination and win.
Or even worse, that one of their looney-tunes might succeed.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/time-for-gop-panic-establishment-worried-carson-and-trump-might-win/2015/11/12/38ea88a6-895b-11e5-be8b-1ae2e4f50f76_story.html
Less than three months before the kick-off Iowa caucuses, there is growing anxiety bordering on panic among Republican elites about the dominance and durability of Donald Trump and Ben Carson and widespread bewilderment over how to defeat them.
Party leaders and donors fear nominating either man would have negative ramifications for the GOP ticket up and down the ballot, virtually ensuring a Hillary Rodham Clinton presidency and increasing the odds that the Senate falls into Democratic hands.
The party establishment is paralyzed. Big money is still on the sidelines. No consensus alternative to the outsiders has emerged from the pack of governors and senators running, and there is disagreement about how to prosecute the case against them. Recent focus groups of Trump supporters in Iowa and New Hampshire commissioned by rival campaigns revealed no silver bullet.
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The concern among some party elites goes beyond electability, according to one Republican strategist, who was granted anonymity to speak frankly about the worries.
“We’re potentially careening down this road of nominating somebody who frankly isn’t fit to be president in terms of the basic ability and temperament to do the job,” this strategist said. “It’s not just that it could be somebody Hillary could destroy electorally, but what if Hillary hits a banana peel and this person becomes president?”
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Sounds to me like the only thing they fear more than a Hillary presidency ... is having one of their own front runners win!
You can't make this stuff up!
a former Senator and Secretary of state, as being too ambitious.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/are-we-born-racist/201010/is-hillary-clinton-pathologically-ambitious
This perception of Clinton has always bothered me. The reason is gender inequity. The last time that I checked, nobody has accused other presidential candidates or presidents (all male) of being too ambitious, despite the fact that gunning for the job of "leader of the free world" would seem to require--by any standard--some degree of extraordinary ambition.
In my experience, arguments such as "sexism plays a role here" or "race was a factor in this incident" (see, for example, Lebron James' recent claim about race factoring into reactions to "The Decision"
when dealing with specific individuals or events tend not carry much water when trying to convince people about group-level inequities. This is generally because at the individual level, it is often easy to find alternative explanations and attenuating circumstance. No question, Hillary Clinton has ambition; LeBron James' drawn-out announcement that he was "taking his talents" to Miami could have been handled better
One of the central themes of this blog, and of my career more generally, is to get beyond these difficult specific examples, which too often result in finger-pointing and accusations of overreaction (see, e.g., responses to my last blog) and to examine the systematic ways in which cognitive processes are actively at work in the maintenance of racial and gender inequalities.
Why would Hillary Clinton in particular be vulnerable to perceptions that are-- I suspect unconsciously-- sexist? The answer lies in the fact that Hillary Clinton was forging into a territory that is overwhelmingly associated in people's minds with men -- the presidency in particular, and leadership roles more generally. As noted in the New York Times recently, women continue to lag behind men in appointments to position in leadership. And here is why these kinds of strong mental associations matter for the perpetuation of inequities.
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if they had anything...they would have used it years ago...
(and "recent" flash in the pan... )
Their front runners are two flawed individuals with zero political experience who would be terrible at governing. They also know that Hillary would eat them alive in a debate. If nothing else, the interminable Benghazi hearing proved her mettle.
