For Democrats, this is a normal primary season. It appears Hillary is almost certain to get the nomination, nudged a bit further to the left by Bernie during the primaries, and likely to run more toward the center during the general. No major surprises here.

For Republicans there are basically three options:

1) Rally around Trump, try to get him a more moderate running-mate, hope for the best, and likely face a crushing defeat in November as everyone to the left of Mussolini votes for Hillary (including a lot of Republicans). This is the most probable scenario, and the one I predict will occur.

2) Stage a “brokered” convention to nominate someone else, and offer Trump something “yuge” to get him to endorse that candidate. This will royally tick off the base, and likely face a crushing defeat in November as the Tea Party crowd react to their “betrayal” by staying home in large numbers. This is a less probable scenario.

3) Let Trump have the Republican nomination, and then Establishment Republicans run an independent candidate who they can claim is a “centrist” between Trump and Hillary. This would cause much damage to the GOP. There’s a reasonable chance that a three-way race could end up getting thrown to the House, and however it comes out, the resulting President would be seen by 2/3 of the voters as illegitimate. But this is the least-probable scenario because it could spell the end of the GOP as such.

It was widely believed that John Warner, Virginia’s other (Republican) Senator convinced Coleman to run in order to deny Oliver North the victory. Coleman’s 12% showing did allow Chuck Rob to win. At any rate, Warnet campaigned for Colman and against North.

This put John Warner on the outs with the Virginia Republican Party, but he used a quirk in the Virginia law to avoid a convention (in which he would have lost) but instead face a primary, which he won by large numbers of Democrats crossing over (VIrginia allows anyone to vote in a primary; registration is not by party) to thank him for his role in defeating North.

The problem is that the kinds of money that are being talked about are enough for people to kill and be killed over. If Trump gets assassinated, that is who did it.

Without (essentially) buying the media and blocking Trump from getting coverage or ad time, I don’t see how a “conservative” can get ahead of him in votes. Maybe the recent shift in MSNBC coverage (Melissa Harris-Perry) is a sign of this starting.

I think there are only two “successful” paths to a non-Trump conservative winning if Trump gets the GOP nomination; assassination of Trump, or giving Trump an “offer he can’t refuse” so that he quits. The price of Trump quitting is likely more than a billion. Cheap compared to what the GOP Donor class will lose in higher taxes and forgone government subsidies for the military industrial complex.

Assassinating Trump would be a very high stakes gamble. The GOP base would very likely believe it was a conspiracy. It would be very difficult to keep all of the details quiet. With Obama still president, the NSA, CIA and FBI (and foreign intelligence agencies) can’t be relied on to keep quiet about it. That sort of thing happening could really undo a GOP House and Senate.

That kind of interference in elections could compel the kind of voting rights reform that would make the kinds of gerrymandering, voter ID, voter registration barriers that Red states are implementing impossible

Basically true, to the extent that Trump’s current trumpeting is taken as what he represents.

He is making it all up, of course.

Dan: Women’s rights. Health care. Abortion. Civil rights. Immigration. Science. Religion in schools. Foreign aid. Foreign policy. Governing style. Yeah, no difference.

If the Democrats aren’t actively trying to destroy Sanders, perhaps it is because there is a big difference in that Sanders isn’t winning. Or perhaps it is because the Democrats’ system of super-delegates means the Democratic leadership is confident it can control the outcome of the primaries to get the result it wants regardless of how Sanders does.

Or maybe, just maybe, Trump is a special case, someone so repugnant that the Republican leadership is willing to take steps it normally would not to keep him from being the voice of their party.

One thing is certain, though, it isn’t because of any great difference between the parties, since there isn’t one. Trump was a declared Democrat a decade or two ago, remember; how would the Democratic party have reacted to his gargantuan, orange-stained hat being thrown into their ring?

Trump does not represent Republican ideals.

The Republican establishment are telling themselves this, and maybe they even believe it. But the base voters disagree. Denial, as they say, isn’t just a river in Africa.

On most issues, the difference between Trump on the one hand, and Cruz or Rubio on the other, is that Trump isn’t hiding behind coded language. It reminds me of the Looney Tunes short in which Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam are running for some political office. During a debate Bugs quotes Teddy Roosevelt’s line about speaking softly and carrying a big stick. Yosemite Sam, whom Trump often seems to be channeling, replies: “OH YEAH? Well I speak LOUDLY and I carry a BIGGER stick, and I use it too [hitting Bugs on the head as he says the last]” The Republican candidates’ discussion of immigration policy feels particularly like this–Rubio and Cruz are saying essentially the same things Trump is, but the former two are using dog-whistle code speech while Trump is saying it openly. But there are other issues where the Republican debate has this sort of feel.

This is really quite well documented, i.e., this was not really an organic inside-GOP thing, and neither Kochs nor Big Tobacco have much muse for the Federal government. so making it not work is almost as good as controlling it…