Trump tells FoxNews why he won't debate Harris

Agreed. The false equivalence of "he backed out of an agreed upon debate" and "she hasn't responded to the invitation yet" is obvious.

 

This is completely wrong.

The candidate in any primary most likely to win the primary more often than not is not the candidate in the primary most likely to win the general election.

There was a sense that this was especially the case with 2016 Trump, even though he ultimately won.

 

Please substantiate such a obviously quantifiable issue with data. Thank you in advance.

 

Plurality winners in primaries hurt parties, new paper finds - FairVote

Satisfied?

What am I saying? Of course not. You have no interest in being persuaded, you’re just playing gotcha games.

 

I disagree, but this is a good point.

It certainly goes both ways with Trump. But that can be said about every issue. The question is if it’s a net positive. And that’s a judgment call, but I think the muted mics are a net negative for Trump.

 

Muted mics aren’t necessary if the participants adhere to the rules. Trump does not so muted mics are necessary.

Getting substantially more speaking time than your opponent via rule violation is a decided advantage.

 

You said: "The candidate in any primary most likely to win the primary more often than not is not the candidate in the primary most likely to win the general election."

The article you reference is a study on plurality winners, not "most likely to win" winners. The topic sentence of your source:

"New research finds that when candidates win primary elections with less than 50% of votes, they perform worse in general elections than candidates who win their primaries with a majority"

Maybe I'm missing something but that sure seems like apples to oranges to me. Gotcha!?

 

I'm not really sure what you're trying to say or if you're even really disagreeing. The party leadership definitely didn't think Trump could win (who did?), they reluctantly backed him once he won the primary because what else were they going to do? He'd won a contested primary at that point, if they forced him out in favor of Ted Cruz they would definitely lost the election. In 2020, there was no challenge to Trump because he'd already won, and they cleared the field. The main difference between Trump and Biden is that Democratic voters never loved Biden, there motivation was to beat Trump.

 

Apparently “pick your preferred option” is a viable choice as seen with this election.

 

Was Trump a plurality winner in 2016?

 

You think that "Was Trump a plurality winner in 2016?" proves your general assertion? One data point? Really!? At the very least I expect primary election results, general election outcomes, pre-primary and pre-general election polling data, longitudinal data over multiple election cycles, etc...

Regardless, consider your statement:

The candidate in any primary most likely to win the primary more often than not is not the candidate in the primary most likely to win the general election.

For this to be true, the candidate 'most likely to win the general election', as measured by head-to-head polling and/or electoral count projections, would have to lose their primary "more often than not". Has the prohibitive favorite for a general election ever fail to get his/her party's nomination?

Why would a party support a process that results in the most likely general election winner not being nominated? The primary process is premised upon doing the exact opposite.

 

So Im still trying to keep score here. Did we want Trump to debate or not? Seems like some people can't make up their mind. Their energy changes depending on who they talk to. Must be exhausting to not be able to say what you mean and give your actual opinion all the time. So much virtue signaling, goalpost moving and opinion changing. Sheesh, its amazing any of you have enough time in your lives to get stuff done.

 

“Muted mics” are literally a Trump thang. He’s the only one since mics that won’t stop the Gish Gallop.

 

Harris Accepts Only One Debate, Refuses To Commit To More Against Trump (dailywire.com)

A campaign official said Harris would not agree to the September 4 presidential debate on Fox News that was floated by Trump, ABC News correspondent Selina Wang shared in a post to X.


Wang further reported, citing the same official, that Harris views future debates as being “contingent” on Trump showing up to the ABC News debate that has been set for September 10.

 

Who cannot make up their mind about trump debating on ABC?

 

No, but it proves that Trump likely was not the candidate most likely to win the 2016 general election… yet the Republican Party stood with him because he won the primary.

Interesting.

Can Democrats say the same with respect to Joe Biden?

 

Considering that he received 44.9 % of the vote in the Republican primaries it's accurate to describe him as a plurality winner.
2016 Republican Party presidential primaries - Wikipedia

 

Wait . . . the dems somehow erred by dumping Biden; meanwhile, the pubs were noble/did the right thing by keeping an idiotic, non-experienced, lying, cheating, douchebag as their nominee? What is this, bizarro world?

 

Because the money was drying up. He saw the writing on the wall and did it for the country. Admirable

 

This didn't age well