P. J. O'Rourke was more right about John Kasich than he knows

According to careful vote counting by FiveThirtyEight, "Kasich could lay off winner-take-all states where only Cruz has a chance to beat Trump: Wisconsin, Indiana, Nebraska, Montana and South Dakota" in a last ditch strategy with Cruz to divide and conquer Donald Trump's march to 1,237. "Kasich and Cruz’s choice is simple: wage war on Trump on two separate fronts, or lose."

But Kasich is having none of it, in keeping with his previous refusal to work with Marco Rubio in Rubio's quest to keep Florida out of Donald Trump's column. John Kasich is "all in" to the convention, convinced he's the party's savior from the so-called outsiders Trump and Cruz. Kasich already has four events planned in Wisconsin between now and April 1 leading up to the primary there on April 5.

The reason? He is convinced he's a better candidate everywhere than is Cruz, but especially in the Midwest, insisting he wants the presidency and is not interested in "a parlor game of who gets this or who gets that". And as Rush Limbaugh has observed, John Kasich takes himself way too seriously. The man is delusional.

"We don't want to work with those people [Democrats]. We want to defeat them politically, and here comes Kasich! It's all about him. That whole thing, saying that he would be way open to choosing a Democrat? Kasich is taking the occasion here to try to sell himself as something unique and special."

Of course Kasich's not unique and special. The party's problem is that it's given us such Republicans too many times before, candidates whose vision of politics is nothing more than white flag bipartisanship. John McCain was infamous for it in 2008, and his lackey Lindsey Graham also puked out that line this time around, before ignominiously crashing and burning.

It's conventional wisdom out there that Donald Trump is destroying the Republican Party as we know it. But the truth is closer to what P. J. observed last fall, that it has simply killed itself.

John Kasich is just the Republicans' two word suicide note.

The John Kasich vote is the Rorshach for the "Obamacon" vote, owns about 14% of the GOP primary vote so far

"I ought to be running in a Democrat primary", he said in New Hampshire.

"Just because someone happens to be a Democrat doesn't mean they're disqualified", he said about his possible choice of a vice presidential running mate.

"Well, you know, he received you know overwhelming support, I think even from Senator Hatch, so of course we'd think about it," he said about possibly naming Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court himself, Obama's current pick to replace Scalia.

Trump's low favorables today match Reagan's exactly in March 1980

2016 candidates' current favorables averages, according to Real Clear Politics:

Sanders: 48.7

Kasich 43.2

Clinton: 40.7

Cruz: 33.4

Trump: 30.4

John Kasich voted for the assault weapons ban in 1994

The Roll Call is here.

click to expand

John Kasich, Supreme Court squish, would consider Obama's nominee Garland

Quoted here:

"As someone who's talked about unity, would you take a look at Mr. Garland...if you were elected president?" host John Dickerson asked Kasich.

"Well, you know, he received you know overwhelming support, I think even from Senator Hatch, so of course we'd think about it," Kasich replied.

In other words, expect more liberals on the court from President John Kasich.

Ranking the candidates by credit scores of supporters: Kasich's have the best credit, Sanders' the worst

Nearly 60% of Kasich's support comes from people with excellent credit (FICO 720-850).

Half or more of supporters for all candidates have excellent credit, including supporters of Trump (who brings up the rear at 49.8%).

Compiled from the story here.

Combined percentages of supporters with excellent and good credit scores / combined percentages of supporters with fair and bad credit scores:

Kasich 86 / 14

Rubio 69 / 31

Trump 69 / 31

Cruz 68 / 32

Clinton 67 / 33

Sanders 66 / 34.

Rubio's in second because of the difference between 68.65% of support coming from from the good side for himself and 68.6% for Trump. Before rounding Cruz trails Trump in each category by 0.5 points.

Trump's net favorable rating surges 340% from 5 to 22 since February 29th, Cruz up 62% from 13 to 21, Kasich up just 12%

Gallup, here.

The combined popular vote for Trump & Cruz is beating Rubio & Kasich by 2.1 to 1

Let me translate this Ted Cruz statement for you

Cruz: Every Day Kasich Stays In The Race, It Benefits Donald Trump

Translation: Every day Kasich stays in the race hurts me.

Kasich isn't too smart: Neither Trump nor Cruz can win a general election

Here:

“Neither of those guys can win a general election,” he told reporters after a town hall-style event outside Philadelphia.

Oh yeah?

Ohio results from Tuesday:

Trump: 727,585

Clinton: 679,266

Missouri results from Tuesday:

Cruz: 380,367

Clinton: 310,602

Marco Rubio drops primary ballot challenge to John Kasich in Pennsylvania: Kasich short of the needed 2,000

So it wasn't a matter of principle at work to Rubio, just self-interest while he was still a candidate. Dropping the challenge now that he's out ensures that Rubio's spoiler strategy continues in the person of John Kasich. Denying Trump delegates is still the mission.

Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity keep misrepresenting Marco Rubio as a conservative. Little Marco's actions even now prove otherwise.

From the story here:

The Kasich campaign's lawyer had agreed that Kasich's paperwork was eight valid signatures short of the 2,000 required, but he maintained that the challenge was invalid because it was filed after the deadline.

Told you so: Trump needs only to maintain his current level of support to win, not increase it

The New York Times, here:

If Mr. Trump maintains his current level of support in the remaining races, he would almost certainly secure the nomination.

With delegate allocation still incomplete at Real Clear Politics after yesterday's primaries, Donald Trump needs to garner less than 53% of the remaining delegates to win, a level consistent with his actual performance at the beginning of March (see here).

Trump has consistently needed between 50% and 54% of outstanding delegates to win throughout the period to date since February contests ended.

With his wins yesterday the percentage needed is moving back toward 50%, indicating his momentum is increasing.

John Boehner voted for Kasich yesterday, calls Cruz "lucifer" and wants Paul Ryan if no one wins the primaries

Here:

"If we don't have a nominee who can win on the first ballot, I'm for none of the above," Boehner said at the Futures Industry Association conference here. "They all had a chance to win. None of them won. So I'm for none of the above. I'm for Paul Ryan to be our nominee."

Trump crushes previous nominees' performance yesterday and Limbaugh talks John Kasich, Marco Rubio and a shooting story

A speech last night by Marco Rubio suspending his campaign proves to Limbaugh that Marco is the real deal while his one accomplishment in an otherwise feckless Senate career proves otherwise, that's what you should be thinking about.

Maybe Rush is waiting for the drugs to kick in. 

In Ohio it looks like independents came out big for John Kasich yesterday

Democrat primary turnout in 2008 in Ohio was 2.2 million (in 2012 0.5 million for the incumbent Obama), but in the 2016 contest last night it struggled to round off at 1.2 million.

On the Republican side, turnout yesterday in Ohio was 2 million in contrast to 2008 and 2012 when turnout was 1.1 million and 1.2 million respectively.

Since Republicans and independents only could vote in the Republican primary in Ohio, not Democrats, it looks like independent support for the Ohio governor carried the day for John Kasich yesterday.

Kasich and Clinton declared winners in Ohio

New Hampshire taught us that nothing John Kasich says can be taken seriously

December 28th:  “If I get buried in New Hampshire, it’s over.”

February 9th: Trump 35.3% over Kasich 15.8% in New Hampshire (2.2:1)

March 14th: "This is the craziest election that we've had in decades. And I'm taking things one day at a time."

John Kasich would legalize all illegals within the first 100 days of his presidency, which would open the floodgates to millions more

Noted here in a list of all Kasich's extreme positions on illegal immigration:

In last Thursday’s CNN debate, Kasich told voters that he would enact the largest amnesty in U.S. history within his first 100 days in office. “For the 11 and a half million who are here, then in my view if they have not committed a crime since they’ve been here, they get a path to legalization. Not to citizenship. I believe that program can pass the Congress in the first 100 days,” Kasich said.

John Kasich spotted supporting Trump

OK, maybe it's his twin brother.

Here.

Like Benedict Arnold John Kasich learned nothing by being present at the founding

David Horowitz, here.