Let’s Be Serious About Ted Cruz From The Start: He’s Too Extreme And Too Disliked To Win

[mia]

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s newly minted presidential campaign is the media equivalent of a juicy rib-eye that robbers use to distract a guard dog during a heist. He’ll get a ton of media attention, and he’ll get to spread his message — which may be all that Cruz is after — but Cruz almost certainly has no shot of winning the nomination, according to every indicator that predicts success in presidential primaries.

First, Cruz doesn’t have enough support from party bigwigs. To win the Republican or Democratic nomination, you need the backing of at least some of the party apparatus. At a minimum, your fellow party members shouldn’t hate you. Otherwise, you end up getting the Newt Gingrich 2012 treatment. That is, you get pounced on the moment you’re seen as a threat to win the nomination....

Second, Cruz has an electability problem. You can see this on two fronts: ideology and polling.

Cruz is likely far too extreme ideologically to win the nomination. The Republican party has a habit of nominating relatively moderate candidates (see John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012). That’s especially the case when the party has been out of the White House for more than one term. A Cruz nomination wouldn’t just break this streak; it would throw it off a 100-floor balcony and drop a piano on it....

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/lets-be-serious-about-ted-cruz-from-the-start-hes-too-extreme-and-too-disliked-to-win/

[niyad]

1. problem is, everything in that article assumes an honest political and electoral system.

[Kalidurga]

2. The biggest problem with Cruz is that he makes all others look sane...

He makes Mitt Romney look more human and that is something I thought would be impossible.