Tom DeLay's Admitted Anti-Trump Bias Led to Wishful Thinking
Trump will win over more voters than his two Republican rivals, who are young and ambitious first-term Senators with ties to the Bushes now running to be the first Hispanic President of the United States.
Former House Republican whip Tom DeLay of Texas is not a fan of "New York values," which he uses as an epithet, or Donald Trump, whom he attacks by suggesting that Trump personifies "New York values" (as though New Yorkers are all of one mind).
"Cruz did a great service to everybody when he talked about New York values," DeLay told "The Steve Malzberg Show" in an interview. "It was 78 percent of the people that voted last night didn't vote for Donald Trump."
The final numbers show that less than 76 percent didn't vote for Trump and more than 72 percent didn't vote for Cruz, which DeLay neglected to mention.
That doesn't make either of them unelectable.
More importantly,Cruz invested much more time and money than Trump in the state Ronald Reagan lost on the way to becoming a two-term President.
Neither Cruz's Iowa win nor Hillary Clinton's Iowa victory is worth boasting about. All they mean is that Cruz and Clinton are still running.
In a state that previously rewarded Mike Huckabee in 2008 and Rick Santorum in 2012 for devoting themselves to personal campaigning across Iowa, it should not be shocking that Cruz came in first by a few points.
As for the delegates, Cruz won 8, Trump won 7 and Marco Rubio, who came in third, won 7 delegates.
If Cruz had not won, perhaps Trump would have run the table.
But running the table is not required to win the Republican presidential nomination and Trump's showing in a caucus state that fits Cruz so well is not cause to expect Cruz to win the first presidential primary in New Hampshire next Tuesday and run the table.
The Iowa caucuses may be the high point of the Cruz campaign.
In that recent interview, DeLay acknowledged: "Of course, I'm a little biased. I'm for anybody but Trump."
Delay's other remarks during the interview show more than a little bias.
Newsmax's Todd Beamon summarized those remarks as follows (www.newsmax.com/Newsmax-Tv/tom-delay-iowa-caucus-force/2016/02/02/id/712449/#ixzz3z6z5b7uX):
"Trump's concession speech was 'all a façade': 'It was a very short, straight-forward speech that he looked like he had to do and he didn't want to do.' His ending with "I'm going to come back and buy a farm in Iowa" was just pandering to the Iowans. He was boiling inside.'
"The developer's Iowa showing has forced him to 'run a race' for the nomination: 'There's a lot more forest ahead of us and certainly Trump can be part of that. But 'he's got a race on his hands — and the biggest thing is that he can't stand there and say, "I'm leading in the polls so I'm going to win."
"The contest now is between Cruz, Rubio and Trump: 'Unless [Ben] Carson can do something or Jeb Bush can do something to elevate his numbers.'
"Conservatives are not going to vote for Trump after other candidates drop out: 'They're not going to go to Trump. They've already exhibited that they're not going to vote for Trump.
"Cruz is far better suited to win many of the state primaries over Trump, particularly in the South: 'Texas is a major state with a lot of delegates, along with Florida and others, and I just don't think they're going to vote for somebody with New York values.'"
DeLay's bias blinded him to the truth.
Trump's concession speech was notable for its graciousness and brevity, and those are good things.
Ted Cruz's victory speech was notable for its great length.
As for Trump being in a race, that's hardly news.
He was last in a big field at the start and has been first for many months.
As for the polls, Trump's still up by about 20 points in New Hampshire and leading nationwide by a wide margin.
Yes, the Republican presidential nominee will be Trump, Cruz or Rubio, but that's not news either. The trajectory of the Carson came has been downward for months and Jeb is still a Bush and has not recovered from Trump's deft dismissal of him as "low energy."
More importantly, conservatives want to win and will vote for Trump, because he can win.
Trump will win over more voters than his two Republican rivals, who are young and ambitious first-term Senators with ties to the Bushes now running to be the first Hispanic President of the United States.
Remember when Hillary Clinton ran for the Senate in New York against Republican Rick Lazio?
Lazio was dismissed as "Little Ricky" and not viewed as a viable alternative.
Team Clinton will be able to combat Cruz or Rubio much more effectively than Trump.
Whether the Democrats nominate Hillary, or socialist Bernie Sanders, or Vice President Joe Biden, Trump will do better than either Cruz, the natural-born Canadian, or Rubio, the ambitious young man who won his Senate seat with Tea Party support by promising never to reward illegal immigration and then joined the Gang of Eight to reward it.
Michael J. Gaynor has been practicing law in New York since 1973. A former partner at Fulton, Duncombe & Rowe and Gaynor & Bass, he is a solo practitioner admitted to practice in New York state and federal courts and an Association of the Bar of the City of New York member.
Gaynor graduated magna cum laude, with Honors in Social Science, from Hofstra University's New College, and received his J.D. degree from St. John's Law School, where he won the American Jurisprudence Award in Evidence and served as an editor of the Law Review and the St. Thomas More Institute for Legal Research. He wrote on the Pentagon Papers case for the Review and obscenity law for The Catholic Lawyer and edited the Law Review's commentary on significant developments in New York law.
The day after graduating, Gaynor joined the Fulton firm, where he focused on litigation and corporate law. In 1997 Gaynor and Emily Bass formed Gaynor & Bass and then conducted a general legal practice, emphasizing litigation, and represented corporations, individuals and a New York City labor union. Notably, Gaynor & Bass prevailed in the Second Circuit in a seminal copyright infringement case, Tasini v. New York Times, against newspaper and magazine publishers and Lexis-Nexis. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed, 7 to 2, holding that the copyrights of freelance writers had been infringed when their work was put online without permission or compensation.
Gaynor currently contributes regularly to www.MichNews.com, www.RenewAmerica.com, www.WebCommentary.com, www.PostChronicle.com and www.therealitycheck.org and has contributed to many other websites. He has written extensively on political and religious issues, notably the Terry Schiavo case, the Duke "no rape" case, ACORN and canon law, and appeared as a guest on television and radio. He was acknowledged in Until Proven Innocent, by Stuart Taylor and KC Johnson, and Culture of Corruption, by Michelle Malkin. He appeared on "Your World With Cavuto" to promote an eBay boycott that he initiated and "The World Over With Raymond Arroyo" (EWTN) to discuss the legal implications of the Schiavo case. On October 22, 2008, Gaynor was the first to report that The New York Times had killed an Obama/ACORN expose on which a Times reporter had been working with ACORN whistleblower Anita MonCrief.