Day Three Of The Republican Convention Got A Little Wild

Newt Gingrich’s speech emphasized that LGBTQ Americans, among others, would be worse off in other nations. This construction of the nature of freedom in American identity, here in reference to Muslim fundamentalist governments, is reminiscent of the anti-Soviet framing during the Reagan era. Here, Gingrich is emphasizing comparative freedom versus talking about what freedom means in terms of the Republican platform for LGBTQ Americans, for example. As a side note, Gingrich lobbied hard to become Trump’s VP. He’s staked a lot on his dreams of higher office. According to Bloomberg, the FEC postponed a debt resettlement plan designed to spur Gingrich’s repayment of $4.6 million in debts from past campaigns.

https://twitter.com/jmsummers/status/755952716174745604

When Harry Enten and I spoke to Cruz campaign manager Jeff Roe today, Roe suggested that if Trump lost to Clinton, it would come to be seen as a black swan event and that the Republican Party might return to relatively familiar ground in 2020. Whereas a Trump win in November would be more transformational. One can agree or disagree with Roe’s analytical point. In our view here at FiveThirtyEight, there’s a substantial chance that the Republican Party is forever changed, whether or not Trump wins. But given that Cruz represents the Reagan-esque, movement conservative wing of the GOP, you wonder if Cruz wouldn’t prefer for the party to return to where it was before Trump descended that escalator last June.