Jeb Bush: My opinion of Jeb actually went up this year. He wasn’t a particularly interesting Governor, of course, but I was ten years old when he left office. My initial distrust of Bush softened a little when I had the opportunity to intern for a consultant involved in his campaign, and I was also highly impressed by his speech at the Sunshine State Summit where I found him to be a very high energy speaker. Bush’s main problem was that he was out of touch with the undercurrent of anger in America and the fact that his meager amount of charisma didn’t carry over on television. Of course, I would have never voted for Bush (though I’d prefer him over Hillary, I guess) but in the end, I actually felt sorry for Jeb. Goodnight, sweet prince
.
Ben Carson: I’ve always been fascinated by outsider candidates, from Paul Fisher in the 1960s to Morry Taylor to Herman Cain and so on. But Carson was just weird. His announcement was more of a Christian rap concert then an announcement. He was sleepy, he had no substance, and didn’t do much beyond getting his base of old white grandmas excited. But he seemed like a nice guy. Of course, his campaign was a giant book tour and database collection effort. It was a shameless scampaign. But what the hell, it was kinda fun. Nice guy, FF!
Chris Christie: Despite being extremely hawkish, I have to admit that I still like Christie. He really should have sat this election out in hindsight, especially with the presence of Trump in the race which kinda stole his main selling point (“I’m tough”) and he is obviously is as corrupt as Clinton is, but I like people with his personality-big, loud, brash, and colorful-so long as they remain a small minority of the political class. So my opinion hasn’t really changed.
Ted Cruz: This was the biggest disappointment of the election. When Rand Paul started to sink, I wanted to support the Cruz who I thought I knew-a somewhat libertarian leaning Senator with a relatively reasonable foreign policy (not perfect but not hawkish). Ted Cruz turned out to be nothing more than a slicker, arch-conservative version of Santorum. I ended up backing Kasich over him until I finally decided to pull the trigger for Trump. Cruz is permanently damaged in my eyes. I will never trust or support him again, and that was before I learned that the perceptions of him being an asshole doesn’t just exist from within the Senate. The dudes a dick, and I was yugely wrong about him.
Carly Fiorina: Like I said about Carson, I am fascinated by outsider candidates. But Fiorina from the start had nothing to stand on-her corporate record sucked, she lost the one campaign she ever ran by a large margin in a Republican wave. She did impress me in the early debates, especially when she neutered Trump, but I never thought she’d had a place in the campaign and I found her to be an annoying waste of space.
Jim Gilmore: Admit it, you were obsessed with this campaign. It was cool seeing how well a completely unknown rando could do. I bought a Gilmore button and wore it when I met Roger Stone, and we talked for a little bit about how hilarious his campaign was. I later pretended to be his youth outreach director at the same event, as I detailed in another post.
Lindsey Graham: This bloodthirsty old queen has always been my least favorite Republican along with Rubio. I loved how Trump doxed him, and I got personal satisfaction in watching him a speech in person to an empty room. He was even more of an asswipe then I thought he’d be, though, when I had the chance to meet him.
Mike Huckabee: He sucks, but more importantly, he’s old news. His weird combination of tired social conservatism and fake populism didn’t fool anyone, and I was glad to see that Iowa didn’t love him as much as he loves it. Like Fiorina, he was just a waste of a podium during the debates.
Bobby Jindal: Never cared for him. His record was awful, and his campaign was awful. He might have been a stronger candidate in 2012, but not this year. By the time he announced his campaign, I was getting tired of watching announcement speeches on C-SPAN and thought there wasn’t any room for him in the race left. The voters agreed, and he sank like the stone that probably is in his head.
John Kasich: I supported him briefly when I realized that Paul was doing more harm than good, but the Kasich who started the campaign (the guy who declared that he understood America’s anti-NAFTA anger and was willing to bring the party into the 21st century on social issues) quickly became this wishy washy creep who talked way to much about his mailman father, hugging that dude who was crying in New Hampshire, and his daughters Emma and Reeceypoo’s obsession with 21 Pilots. Republicans wanted an angry candidate this year, but if that angry candidate loses, and shinks hits the fan this year, a “bring us together” type candidate like Kasich could gain traction in 2020. But it probably won’t be Kasich.
George Pataki: Old news, should’ve ran in 2012 if he wanted to get 3% in New Hampshire. I literally have no opinion of him because he didn’t run a campaign. Even Jim Gilmore traveled and spoke at various events and summits, and he didn’t make any of the debates.
Rand Paul: I still like Rand Paul, but I don’t buy the answer that Papa Ron gave me when we spoke on C-SPAN last month. Rand’s problem was that he took his father’s base for granted and tried to run as a more standard Republican. But he was off message; he wasn’t explicitly anti-war like his father, he seemed obsessed over the issues of NSA spying (which, while I agreed with him, was not a major issue this year. I based my vote on immigration issues, foreign policy, and trade) which took him nowhere, and he was utterly destroyed by Trump in debate after debate. He should’ve dropped out in December and saved himself some face.
Rick Perry: Trump took him out of the race the day he entered when he made fun of his glasses and the fact that the AC broke at his announcement speech. Perry managed to run an even worse campaign then he did in 2012, and that entertained me at least. He’s a total empty suit, though.
Marco Rubio: The biggest asshole of them all. Rubio is a hypocritical, lying, ambitious jerk who would stab his own mother in the back to get what he wants. And his supporters were the WORST. Especially the Florida Young Republicans who backed him. They were all rich, lily white kids from Miami. Basically, they were
these people. Rubio is scum.
Rick Santorum: It was nice to see Santorum get pulverized in Iowa. He deserved that big time. I didn’t hate him like I did in 2012, because I barely thought of him. I often forgot that he was running.
Donald Trump: I never, ever, ever thought I’d vote for TRUMP. But I did. Trump entered the race as my least favorite candidate, and he ended up being the candidate who embodied what I have been feeling for years. Do I want my views to be put into action by an orange loudmouthed racist mascot for a shadowy real estate conglomerate? No, but I want them in the mainstream, and Trump was the cannon needed to fire paleoconservatism back into the discourse of conservative thought.
Scott Walker: No strong feelings on him either way. He didn’t impress me and he didn’t go anywhere, but I don’t dislike him as much as the others. I’ll probably end up hating him when he runs for President again, but I cannot say that just yet.
Lincoln Chafee: 'Lil Lincoln was among the better candidates overall, but I wish he didn't run. He took a political career already on life support and killed it, then cremated it, then took the ashes and spread them into a volcano. Hillary pulverized him in that debate, then Chafee did himself in with a fatal blow. I just feel sorry for at this point.
Hillary Clinton: There was once a time when I wished she was president instead of Obama because she was at least likable. Those days are gone. She's the devil. 'Nuff said.
Larry Lessig: It was funny seeing him interact with black people for the first time in his life, but other than that, he creeped me out.
Martin O'Malley: The arrogance of DWS, the holier-than-thou progressive approach to politics that paints Clinton as a corporate crony and Sanders as a radical, and a general d-bag personality rolled into one. I don't care for O'Malley at all.
Bernie Sanders: He's alright, but his supporters started to wear on me by the end. Most of the real life Bernie supporters I've met in Tallahassee are very aggressive and rude, and I saw first hand how violent they can get when they started rocking the bus I was on during the GOP debate. I hope when they're done burning down Cleveland, they turn their fire on Philadelphia.
Jim Webb: Pretty cool guy. Liked him before, like him now. The only time I thought his campaign was interesting was when he launched his website, because it was throwback to like 2003.
