Neither side expects the political chasm over the issue to significantly affect legislative business for the rest of the year. Bills to overhaul prison sentencing, combat heroin abuse, and reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration still have a chance of passage, as does a patent bill.
That’s partly because Democrats have announced they will not engage in reprisal obstruction.
That’s because both side are using the issue to rally the base. Politically, it’s a bet, and as Trump is looking to lock in the nomination, the Dems are probably liking their odds. No sense in blowing everything up if you think you have a winning hand. If you look at things from the Dem perspective, Trump will crash and burn, and the Republicans could either outright lose or be weaker in the Senate. The best they could do right now is a compromise candidate. From the Republican side, the idea that a Democratic President and possibly Democrat Senate raises the stakes in this election substantially.
It’s good news for the Second Amendment that Reid won’t try to force a replacement now. Given GOP turnout numbers in the primary vs. Dem turnout numbers, I’m comfortable with the bet.
If we lose the presidency we’ll probably get a worse candidate than Obama would be willing to “settle” on — but then if we lose the presidency it’s a sure bet that the 2nd amendment becomes a dead letter in the near future anyway. I think both sides have good reason to wait. The Dems may have the presidency and the Senate and a free path to any socialist activist judge available after the election. If the Repubs win/hold both they’ll at least get a moderately conservative judge (assuming it’s not Trumps sister I’ve heard about or he screws us on that)
If Hillary wins the nomination, as it appears that she will, the Democrats lose the votes of people under 30. That doesn’t mean that those voters will select Trump. It means that voters under 30 will stay home.
Bernie, like Obama, energized the youth vote. Obama used that to win with a vacant promise for “hope and change.” Hillary can’t pull that off, because she is seen as part of the establishment. Sure, there will be some women who will vote their gender, but I am not thinking she has a lock.
Trump’s weakness is that he doesn’t sound presidential, but that is EXACTLY why many voters love him. Will they love him enough to show up at the polls is the question that needs to be seen.
At this point, I am no longer so sure that Trump will crash and burn. Short of having him on video with Hillary acknowledging that this was all a sham from the get-go, he might actually win. Trump is exactly the kind of leader a lot of the rest of the world has as president (see e.g. Venezuela, Cuba, Russia, DPRK, and most of south america). My main concern about him is that I don’t see him being beholden to the Republican party because the base would elect him, and therefore I feel like he would freely throw normal republican constituencies (i.e. us, the gun folks) under the bus in a flash.