Experts Expound: Can Trump be stopped?

“No.  Trump will be in the general.  A brokered convention would delegitimize the primary system and only give strength to a Trump bid as an independent.  Hillary has it won.  Bernie has conceded that his run is about a movement, not just the presidency.   That’s the end of the real campaign on the Democratic side.”

“Trump is like a hurricane that newscasters originally dismissed as a tropical storm. Now he’s Category 5, barreling down on the GOP establishment and threatening catastrophic damage on voters.”

“While I’m not sure he can be stopped I expect we will continue to see some high profile Republicans, like Romney, Nebraska Senator Sasse and Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker, speaking out and saying they won’t vote for Trump. As a result, I also expect that there will be a one-time GOP alternative candidate who runs as an Independent — could be Romney. Of course, splitting the GOP vote would likely hand Hillary the win. She is still unpopular and flawed but she’ll be the nominee.”

“Trump should be stopped. He is not reflective of who the Republican party is.  Will he be stopped? Very difficult absent a major screw up – which while he has had some, which his voters are ignoring.  Note that nearly 2/3 of Republicans voters are rejecting him. On a brokered convention – that needs to be dealt with now – it would be hard to go forward with 5 different camps and potentially a yet-to-be-named compromise candidate. Hillary will win the democratic primaries but faces a very tough general election.”

“While a brokered convention seems possible, it is nearly impossible to imagine delegates pledged to Trump, Cruz and Rubio agreeing on much of anything, much less a nominee.”

“Anyone that tells you they know how this is going to work out in November is a big fat liar.”

“Trump cannot be stopped as the eventual nominee, it’s too late. Cruz has too narrow a support base, and Rubio can’t win by finishing second and third everywhere. I know it’s considered bad form and bad luck in campaigns to bring up the Nazis, but Trump’s inexorable rise, and the nationalist and even white supremacist nature of some of his followers (David Duke, anyone?), reminds me of Hitler capitalizing on the disaffection and anger of many Germans in the ’30s to fuel his rise to power. Trump is channeling a lot of ugly and vicious strains in the GOP base that cannot be halted by appeals based on whether he is sufficiently conservative (Cruz) or whether he is electable (Rubio). The Republican chickens are coming home to roost. Cluck, cluck, cluck.”

“His Hairness is unstoppable for the Republican nomination and will attempt a makeover of epic proportions to “clean up” his odious tone and behavior.  With Trump’s inevitability, the Republican Establishment dummies who created the groundswell for him will fear a loss of influence and grudgingly fall into line.  Meanwhile, Hillary will continue making remote control users reflexively mute the TV to avoid hearing her. We all will be wondering how we’re in this situation.”

“Maybe John Oliver can stop him. He blocked the two-tier internet, didn’t he?

“No. The options are all lose-lose. If Republicans are willing to lose the general election in order to save the party, they can draft a candidate at the convention — Paul Ryan? — and run him, get behind him with money and unified support, and then likely lose the race against Hillary, or even Bernie. Or they can get behind Trump and, probably, still lose the general election, but at least give the party some semblance of unity behind a deeply flawed candidate. If they don’t get behind Trump, he’ll run as an independent. Either way, the Republicans get split into pieces and will be trying to recover while Hillary is  being sworn in.”

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