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you nailed it with this comment

Way too late. Anyone serious about preventing Trump from getting the GOP nomination only has one realistic option at this point, and that's Nikki Haley. It's time for both Christie and Scott to get out and endorse Haley; otherwise Trump will win the nomination and the presidency.

Look, I'm the one who posted this, and I like Hurd. But the fact is he has NOT proved to be an impressive candidate. Since he started his campaign, he's fallen under water in his favorable/unfavorable ratio and has not qualified for either of the first two debates. At this point, I think the best thing he could do would be to withdraw and endorse a more viable not-Trump candidate. There's only one candidate who seems to have both a reasonable shot at defeating Trump for the nomination AND will lead in a more moderate direction than Trump, and that's Nikki Haley.

@@chriggsiii As an Independent voter in an open primary state, I have every right to vote for Hurd knowing full well he isn't going to win. Haley is just another Tr*mp @55 kisser .The primary should be aspirational:Who do I actually like. The general election is reality: Who is the lesser of two weasels

That is an entirely rational reaction. However it can't happen, because Christie's negatives in the Republican base are far too high for him to have a realistic shot at the nomination. And his positions on too many issues are far too conservative for him to fit into the Democratic party. And a run at the No Labels nomination will simply be a spoiler for one of the other candidates. Realistically, about the only goal and hope we have in this presidential cycle is simply to prevent Trump from being re-elected. Joe Biden cannot do that, since America won't vote for an 82-year-old president. Instead, Trump must be prevented from getting the GOP nomination to begin with. Obviously, Christie wants to prevent that from happening. Unfortunately, and equally obviously, he is in no position to do that, for the reasons I gave above. Instead, we need to find someone who will clearly lead the Republican party in a different direction from Trump, who would be a less bad president than Trump -- not good; just less bad -- and, crucially, someone who has a realistic shot at toppling Trump and winning the nomination. Because MAGA constitutes roughly 30 to 40% of the party, there is no way anyone can win the nomination without some buy-in from them. This means that whoever defeats Trump must soft-pedal their criticism of him to some extent; some criticism is essential, of course, to set that person up as a plausibly superior alternative to Trump; but it has to be carefully calibrated. So we're looking for a candidate with reasonable favorables in the Republican base, who has taken care to differentiate themselves from Trump without unduly offending MAGA and who seems to have a realistic shot at the nomination. Based on their performance in the first debate, as well as subsequent polling, particularly in New Hampshire, I believe it has become obvious that Nikki Haley is that candidate. No, she's not a paragon of morality, of steadfast principle or political courage. But she is savvy, smart and SANE. Very few of the other GOP candidates can claim that. Which means she is almost certainly the best bet we have at the moment to prevent another Trump presidency. Which means that the three other GOP candidates who are making the most sense in this race, Christie, Hurd and Hutchinson, probably need to withdraw to give Haley the space to consolidate her support. It would be ideal if they were to then endorse Haley, but that's probably a pipe-dream.

It would never work. He's way too hawkish, both on foreign policy and on immigration. In fact, Christie is a Reagan Republican, pro-trade, pro-intervention, etc. etc. Diametrically opposed to MAGA, of course, but NOT to the classic pre-Trump Republican, with whom he is right in line.

Well, by those standards, there are actually three: Christie, Hurd and Hutchinson. The fact, however, is that none of them has a chance: their negative ratings are far too high among Republicans to have any shot at the nomination. To move the party away from Trump/MAGA, you need someone who clearly leads the party in a different direction but who hasn't gone out of their way to alienate them. And there is only one such candidate: Nikki Haley.

One of them; not the only one. Hurd and Hutchinson are not bad. I also am intrigued by Haley. No, she's not as forthright in her criticism of Trump as the other three. But she's managed to hold on to higher favorables among Republicans than the other candidates while still managing to criticize Trump ("most disliked politician in America," "spent worse than the Democrats," "negativity," etc. etc.), although not as pungently as the other three, of course. And she's also got a sensible position on abortion, and has refused to promise a national abortion ban, unlike most of the others.

Yes, but that won't necessarily defeat Trump for the nomination. Since Biden is almost sure to lose (regretfully, since he's been a good president), our next president will be a Republican. If it's Trump, that's a disaster. So the name of the game is to find someone who can defeat Trump for the nomination. Unfortunately, that candidate is not Chris Christie. His negatives among Republicans are sky-high, which means he's not a viable choice. Therefore it has to be someone else who's also, at the very least, better than Trump as a president and also who is someone who can actually defeat Trump. At the moment, it looks like Nikki Haley may fit that bill; she's the candidate I'm watching most closely at the moment.

I agree; Scarborough is horrible. No couth, no civilization, nothing. What an a*****e. Why bother having a guest if all Scarborough does is talk???? I almost cut it down but that would have been intrusive.

True, but I'll say the same thing to you I said to francoisemartel6347. While Christie is the smartest, I think we need someone who's almost as smart but has a better chance of defeating Trump and winning the nomination. Christie has sky-high negatives with the Republican base. The only Republican candidate who's been critical of Trump but has managed to stay afloat with decent favorables is Nikki Haley. I would characterize her as the Goldilocks candidate, in that sense: not too fawning of Trump but not too critical either. I think she has a better chance at the nomination than Christie. Ideally, I'd like all three of the anti-Trump candidates, Christie, Hurd and Hutchinson, to drop out and endorse her. The big picture: Until the anti-Trump forces unite behind a candidate, Trump cannot be defeated for the nomination.

I agree that he'd make a better president than Donald Trump. However, unfortunately, he has sky-high negatives among Republican voters and cannot win the nomination. While he makes a lot of sense, he is actually making it harder for some non-Trump candidate with higher Republican favorables to win the nomination instead. For example, Nikki Haley is also critical of Trump and is also a grown-up. However she is above water with Republicans in her favorables and probably stands a much better chance of defeating Trump for the nomination than does Christie. Ideally, I think Christie should step aside and endorse her.

@charlesriggs2482 That was a long response and not illogical, so I will reply to it. Just as Hillary lost to Trump in 2016, for one reason or another, it could be challenging for Nikki Haley in 2024. America may well be too male-oriented for a woman to win. But Haley is a formidable candidate. Personally, I'm not sure how reliable the polling is at this time, which you cited.

True; but his stance of opposition to Trump is not going over well with the voters who will make the difference in GOP primaries and caucuses. He currently has a very high unfavorable rating with them, so bad that he will almost certainly not be able to win the nomination. (On the other hand, candidates like DeSantis, Ramaswamy and Scott have much higher favorable/unfavorable ratios and appear far more likely to win the nomination because of that. Unfortunately DeSantis and Ramaswamy, and, to a lesser extent, Tim Scott, appear ready to lead Republicans in a direction that follows in Trump's footsteps; they are Trump Lite, if you will.) More effective, as an anti-Trump stance, appears to be the approach taken by Nikki Haley. She has called Trump the "most disliked" politician in American, in urging her party not to nominate him. Moreover she has blamed him more than Democrats for our current accumulated long-term debt and current deficit. This approach is finding a far more willing audience among Republicans; she currently enjoys a strong favorable/unfavorable ratio in most surveys among those Republicans with an opinion, averaging around a 65/35 tilt in her favor. In other words, if we're looking for a strong horse capable of toppling Trump from the GOP nomination, and who will lead the party in a very different direction from Trump, it would appear Haley fits that bill a lot better than Christie.

​@@erichottel7783 I will confess that I am not too concerned over how well Haley will do against Biden. My only goal is to prevent Trump from getting the nomination, since I believe that he was a very poor president in his first term and would be even worse in his second. While I believe Biden has largely been a good president, I do not believe he can be re-elected due to concerns over his age. Which means our next president will probably be a Republican. That being the case, it's in my interest that the Republicans nominate someone who will be a better president than Trump. So if Haley should end up losing to Biden because of male (and female) sexism, that doesn't concern me too much since I still prefer Biden. My sole concern is that Haley defeat Trump for the Republican nod. Once she's done that, I am OK if she goes on to lose to Biden. However I believe she would defeat Biden, as I said above, due to Biden's age problem. She is a fundamentally different candidate from Hillary. Hillary had sky-high negatives, as bad as Trump. She had big problems with her own base, largely because of her very hawkish positions over the years. She fell short of Obama's vote totals in several key states, states which would have won her the election if she had equalled Obama's total. She was a fundamentally flawed and vulnerable candidate, with problems which Haley does not share. I would add that Hillary's problems were not typical of those from which female candidates traditionally suffer. There are several faults of which women politicians are typically accused: too emotional, too inexperienced, etc. etc. Hillary suffered from none of those. Instead, she was viewed as unprincipled and/or corrupt. Those are traits far more often associated with male politicians than female politicians. I will contend to my dying day that the reasons why Hillary lost were not primarily due to traditional sexism -- at all. At the moment Haley doesn't suffer from any vulnerabilities similar to those of Hillary. She is a fresh face, and does not have a significant national record stretching back years which weighs her down. So, while I am certainly ready to concede that it's possible she could lose against Biden (although I think that's doubtful, primarily because of Biden's weaknesses), I think the reasons for any such loss would be quite different than the reasons that led to Hillary's defeat.

@@chriggsiii-What Haley said about tRUMP and the debt is true. He added $6TRILLION DOLLARS. Unfortunately, for me Haley strikes me as a Hillary junior clone. She has a chip on her shoulder the size of Utah. I also feel she can be unnecessarily hard and ruthless.

@chriggsiii Well, you're proving yourself to be terribly inconsistent. You'd like to see Haley beat Trump, but then you don't care if she beats Biden? And you believe Biden has been a "good" President? Americans sure like that word, "good." Do you mean Biden has been an ethical President, or an above-average one?

You're welcome!

Not not@@user-om1rb2ig8z

Would be nice, but there's a problem. Special Counsel Jack Smith specifically REFRAINED from indicting Trump for insurrection or seditious conspiracy. I don't think that dog will hunt.

Well, one can admire Chris Christie for his blunt truth-telling while recognizing that he's not a serious choice for the GOP nomination. His negatives are far too high with the Republican base to have a realistic shot at the nomination. So what to do? Trump is a hopeless authoritarian, who was a disaster in his first term, and would probably be worse in a second term. And Joe Biden, even though he's been largely a good president, will probably not win re-election due to widespread concerns about his age. Which means that our next president will almost certainly be a Republican. Which means it makes a huge difference whom the GOP nominates. So we need to find a GOP candidate who doesn't engender strong negative feelings but who has demonstrated an ability, at times, to speak the truth. Put another way, we need to find someone who occasionally shows political courage but who has also shown a willingness to occasionally pander and demagogue to pacify the Koolaid-drinking MAGA crowd. Last Wednesday's debate, I submit, revealed who that person might be: Nikki Haley. She has demonstrated the necessary combination of occasional truth-telling and Trump ass-kissing that might hit the sweet spot in terms of winning the nomination and neutralizing the MAGA movement. At least, that's what I'm hoping.

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