Bill Straub: Entertaining Republican presidential field gives us yet another reason to be thankful

WASHINGTON — As always there’s plenty to be grateful for on this Thanksgiving Day, even though the commercial interests have succeeded in shanghaiing a once wonderful holiday and transforming it into a simple appendage of Christmas in order to haul in a few more bucks.

But voters should be particularly thankful this season given the entertainment being provided by the 14 remaining Republican candidates for president, who continue to offer more laughs than Abbott and Costello.

Kentucky has a stake in these festivities given that a favorite son, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Bowling Green, has endeavored to make it known that he’s interested in the job although few, apparently, have noticed. He’s currently attracting the support of a splendid three percent of probable GOP primary voters, according to latest polls, and the recent troubles in Paris likely will make his erratic views on the military and foreign policy even less appetizing to the red meat Republican clientele.

Regardless, Paul’s involvement in this high-stakes political game is about the only matter of interest in the commonwealth, whose transition from yellow-dog Democrat to rock-ribbed Republican has occurred in a breathtakingly short period of time as these things go. Over the last four presidential elections Democrats have failed to crack 42 percent of the vote. President Obama, not exactly the most popular figure in the Bluegrass for a number of reasons (and let’s keep it at that for the time being) grabbed a herculean 37.8 percent of the vote in 2012.

Hence the switch from blue to red. Republicans can feel safe that, in Kentucky, at least, they can dig up their long-gone patriarch, Ronald Reagan, pain a grin on his face and be secure in that fact that he would draw better than 60 percent of the vote.

That assumes anyone bothers to show up at the polls. In an odd twist, Kentucky is becoming both Republican and apolitical simultaneously. The race for governor, particularly in the Democratic primary, used to be one of the greatest political shows on earth. The recently concluded face-off, won by Republican Matt Bevin who provided no experience in elected office, drew about 30 percent of those registered.

Paul, if he’s still around, will almost certainly win the March 5 Kentucky Republican presidential caucus he arranged, constituting the biggest fix since Jake LaMotta took a dive against Billy Fox back in November 1947.

But Kentucky’s delegates are about all that wonder boy Rand can count on. Surveying the field, it’s becoming increasingly apparent that only four of the 14 contenders – perhaps five if former Florida Gov. Jeb! Bush’s money finally kicks in – have a legitimate shot at the nomination heading into the Cleveland convention. And the possibility remains no one will hold the number of delegates required to put him or her over the top, meaning the outcome could ultimately be determined on the floor.

The four remaining serious contenders are New York businessman Donald Trump, neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-TX, and Sen. Marco Rubio, R-FL. The rest, including Paul, are just window dressing.

(Short column intermission: A personal note – Please remember that, as political correspondent for Scripps Howard News Service in 2004, I was the first to proclaim that then Sen. John Kerry, D-MA, had absolutely no, zero, nil chance of winning the Democratic presidential nomination. Whadaya say we just leave it at that, okay? Now back to our regularly scheduled programming).

Of the four, Carson appears to be the obvious first man out. His credentials consist of a speech delivered at the National Prayer Breakfast in 2013 where he criticized Obama administration policies in the president’s presence.

Yeah, that’s just about it.

Carson has parlayed that confrontation into his current second-place showing in the polls, pulling in 22 percent, according to the most recent ABC News/Washington Post survey. At one time he was considered the lead dog but some of his more recent remarks have given even the crazy wing of the Republican Party second thoughts and his grasp on foreign affairs is so tenuous that close advisors have hinted that the poor man simply doesn’t have a clue.

In normal years someone like Carson would be running eleventh or twelfth in a 14 person field, avoiding the basement only because of the sympathy vote. The fact that he’s still so highly positioned reminds one of Groucho Marx pointing to his brother Harpo and relating, “He’s the brains of the outfit – which tells you everything you need to know about the outfit.’’

Perhaps more remarkable than Carson’s positioning is Cruz and Rubio vying for what is dubiously characterized as the establishment vote. The pair, both first-term senators, earn the designation because they actually hold public office in a year when such an achievement is considered rather gauche, like performing death metal at a christening.

Right now Rubio looks to have an edge simply because Cruz is understandably despised by so many – including Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, of Louisville, who Tailgunner Ted once verbally attacked as a liar on the upper chamber floor.

But Rubio, who for all the world resembles a Hispanic Charlie Brown, consistently comes across as rather ingenuous, hoping his backstory – parents emigrating from Cuba, father working as a bartender, yada yada yada – will divert voters’ attention away from the fact that his grasp of many issues is rather shaky.

Then there’s the king of the hill, the Donald, who has managed to lie and insult his way to the lead – the exemplar of American politics in the early 21st Century.

Trump is the wet dream of a certain type of entitled white, male voter who sees power slipping through his fingers – the type that constitutes a major faction of the modern Republican Party. During the midterm elections in 2014, 64 percent of white men voted for the GOP and they’re the ones giving life to Trump’s scorched earth campaign.

Trump’s supporters mistake rudeness and brashness for strength, preferring a candidate who expresses their own distaste for issues like diversity and diplomacy through harsh rhetoric rather than offering corrective solutions that don’t necessarily involve stomping someone’s face in the ground.

The Trump campaign is based almost entirely on form over substance and it is working. The man who political observers insisted had no chance when he entered the race has led in the polls for four straight months and maintains leads in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina – the first three states to determine who gets the delegates.

The ABC News/Washington Post poll has Trump at 32 percent – 10 points ahead of the second place Carson. Reports of his political death, which come with every gaffe, slur and proven untruth, have proved, as Mark Twain famously said, an exaggeration.

And what if, say, Rand Paul were to drop out because of any number of reasons – lack of money, lack of endorsements, embarrassment. Is there any reason to believe the two or three people who still offer him their support won’t sidle up to The Donald? Don’t kid yourself.

Donald Trump, like a scar from an appendix operation, is here to stay. The question is whether the Republican establishment can rally the troops to keep him from grabbing the crown.

Washington correspondent Bill Straub served 11 years as the Frankfort Bureau chief for The Kentucky Post. He also is the former White House/political correspondent for Scripps Howard News Service. He currently resides in Silver Spring, Maryland, and writes frequently about the federal government and politics. Email him at williamgstraub@gmail.com.