“Without a true evangelical in the race, Ben Carson is getting those people”.
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I like and admire Dr. Carson. Why would anybody tell us not to?’ They want to! But what was different Tuesday was it was Trump’s first Iowa event in more than three months when he wasn’t sitting atop the polls in the state.
The Republican presidential campaign is entering a decidedly more combative phase as candidates prepare to take the debate stage on Wednesday night. At one point, he descended from the stage to join the audience so that he could speak directly to Todd Landen, a US Army veteran seriously wounded by a roadside bomb in Iraq.
Trump acted decisively. He told Todd and his wife to put their information on a card and give it to him so he could champion their cause.
7% Fiorina and Kasich were tied at that level among Republicans in the October. 15-18 Bloomberg Politics/Des Moines Register Poll. His favorability ratings are consistently the highest of all the Republican candidates.
Not everyone is sold on Carson, of course.
It might be insane, but so far in this primary it is proving intoxicating to a certain type of angry right wing voter. “Those outsider voters are now flipping back and forth”.
Carson opposes abortion under any circumstance, including rape and incest.
Meanwhile, the Bush campaign has begun focusing its fire not on Trump but on the candidate who has surged ahead in the positive lane: Rubio, the 44-year-old senator from Florida. “He grew up in poverty and he became a multimillionaire, so he’s lived in every class and he can relate to every class. And doing so, he’s a role model for those living in poverty”.
The idea of Carson as a unifier was echoed by others.
This turnaround by such a wide margin of Republicans says that Trump, in his own way, has won over the die hard and done so using the oldest of tactics, yet rarely used.
Carson has posited himself as an outsider, distancing himself as someone who did not make up his mind on positions by sticking his finger into the wind. “I think Carson can bring that all together”.
This line, late in his speech, was as tough as Trump got at this rally: “Ben Carson said yesterday or the other day he wants to abolish Medicare. OK”.
“It requires them to no longer just glide by on attributes like being new and bold”, said Madden, a former top aide to 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney.
“It’s a shot across the bow to candidates who embrace Trump and who embrace those proposals that you should be anxious, because we’re going to call you out”, Aguilar said. Cruz has staying power with all the groups that now favor the leaders (everyone minus the establishment, that is) and seems poised to pick up supporters in droves if and when people waver on the concept of choosing a relatively unknown quantity in the non-politician candidates.
But while Carson’s journey is definitely impressive, the insistence that he did it without help is farcical.
Shonda Sonnefield, a middle-aged homemaker, says Carson is her first choice because he’s “transparent” and “personable”. The other polls, as you know, in other states are extraordinary, actually. And he criticized Carson’s successful fundraising operation as too costly and inefficient. So while Carson might be leading the GOP field for now, he’s still got a lot of work to do to explain to America who he is. “We’re going to take care of the VA”.
Not everyone dismissed governing experience. Starting with Wednesday night’s debate, his campaign is promising a sharper, more nimble and aggressive candidate and is looking to history for encouragement.
“[President] Johnson knew how to twist arms to get things done”, said Mr. Albrecht. “Thousands of people dying, waiting for a doctor”, he said.
Sen. Rand Paul tried to volley against Trump in September’s debate by calling his rhetoric “sophomoric”, noting his “careless language”.
A few Iowa Republicans worry about picking someone so politically green. “Carson is more like Jimmy Carter than like Obama”, said Popkin. She’s backing New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. Lindsay Graham, former Pennsylvania Sen.
And then on Tuesday, the day before the debate, Bush spokesman Tim Miller took the argument to national television.
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To achieve that, Bush will have to contend with another key rival: former Florida senator Marco Rubio, a longtime friend and former ally who outshone Bush in the first two presidential debates. “His talk about the balancing of budgets and Obamacare does interest me”.
