The non-athletic version of March Madness happened on Tuesday, March 1, when five Republicans and two Democrats faced off in 11 states for the right to carry their parties’ flag into the general election. If, as anticipated, Donald Trump swamps the opposition, it will be increasingly difficult to stop his train, which keeps gaining momentum.
The two with the most riding on this Republican primary election are first, Ted Cruz and second, Trump. Strange as it may sound, Trump needs Cruz to win in Texas because if he does, Cruz will stay in the race and split the opposition between himself and Marco Rubio. Together, Cruz and Rubio have about 45 percent of the Republican vote. If Cruz loses Texas — his home state — he probably will have to quit the race and many of those voters may swing over to Rubio. So you have this very strange situation in Texas where Trump wins by losing. All Rubio has to do is stay close enough to be credible and wait.
The Democratic side is somewhat more iffy: Hillary Clinton is expected to cruise to victory, which in a campaign is always scary, because if you come in lower than expectations, people begin to view you as a loser even if you win. Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, has some momentum going, but it could be running out of gas. His supporters feel very strongly about him — probably more so than Clinton’s supporters about her — but Sanders still has to prove he can get beyond his current base if he’s to be a serious candidate.Â
The major states to watch are Texas, Georgia and Virginia on the Republican side and Texas, Massachusetts and Virginia on the Democratic side.
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The thing that seems most puzzling about the state of America today is that most everyone appears to be unhappy and thinks we are headed in the wrong direction. In many ways, we are more angst-filled and negative than we were in the midst of the recession. In the last eight years or so, the U.S. economy has improved and currently looks solid, certainly better than most of the industrial democracies of the world. The dollar is sound and inflation very low. Unemployment is down and real estate values are up.
I don’t want to sound Pollyannaish because there are a lot of people that don’t share in these improved times and inequality is rampant. Still, even the people I know who are doing very well — and that includes many in Malibu — are filled with pessimism and convinced that disaster is just around the corner. If you go to the website realclearpolitics.com and check the poll results, you’ll see that about two thirds of the country thinks we are headed in the wrong direction. Strangely, that number hasn’t changed much in years. It is like that under Obama; it was like that under Bush, (probably both father and son), and if you went back far enough, I suspect people thought about the same under Adams and Jefferson.
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Perhaps people are pessimistic because their workplaces are changing and they are uneasy. When I was growing up, people had jobs, worked 9 to 5, spent 30 or 40 years with the same company, had their medical covered by their employer and had a pension. All together it gave them a sense of security. Today that’s the exception, not the rule. Lots of employees are now independent contractors who take care of their own medical and pensions, work long but irregular hours, and no longer need an office because their office is their computer and their cell phone. I like my own space but I’m terribly old fashioned. My son, Tony, is a political communications consultant and rents a desk in one of those shared space arrangements where you get desk space, conference rooms when you need them and a business center with equipment, which you rent when you need it. We are transitioning to a shared rental economy. Why own two cars when Uber can be your second car? Rather than a hotel, check out Airbnb. Why drive downtown in your own car when soon you’ll be able to hire a driverless car to take you to work and another to pick you up from work, and you won’t need to own a car that sits unused in an expensive parking place eight hours per day?
But all this new technology (even if you understand it) is still very unsettling, which may be why people are so pessimistic. One thing is for sure: You just can’t have your old world back.