I think both you and the media are giving Trump much too much credit for the kkk thing. I'd be inclined to believe it hit him by complete surprise, and he bumbled it. I seriously doubt he has any connection to the kkk nor harbours any secret "white supremacy" associations at all. Or cares...

Not that I'm a trump supporter, but both parties have every motivation to sensationalise this to the max. And they are.. For lack of any other killer dirt. The Republicans in particular, are flipping out.

Bret Stephens, the conservative WSJ editorialist least likely to pull any punches captures my feelings on Trump perfectly:
Staring at the Conservative Gutter - WSJ

Make no mistake, we are watching the implosion of the Republican party, an implosion that has been decades in the making. Instead of traditional social liberal, fiscal conservative policies of Republicans, the exact opposite has taken over. Over the last 15 years, the defensible, considered tenets of classic big "L" Liberalism have been overrun by a bunch of selfish, childish, fearful, economically ignorant bigots with the IQs of carrots.

Today, the WSJ hammered the message home by making it clear who's to blame here:
Trump Voters Need a Mirror - WSJ

The answer is: look in the mirror. We voted for this garbage. We expect the government to save us from our own idiocy. We want to have our cake and eat it too. We love pointing the finger at others for our own problems. We refuse to pay now that the bill's coming due. We refuse to make hard decisions. We are prepared to ride this gravy train into the dirt because dammit, the world owes us. We refuse to grow the f%^k up.

This is the nightmare of an election we deserve.

That applies to all Republican Rallies. Why should his be different?

The GOP has been race baiting with the Southern Strategy for decades. It was only a matter of time before it bit them in the arse. You could see it coming with the rise of the Tea Potters over the last few years.

(Ir)reality check.....

Yeah, they brought this on themselves. The GOP completely lost me with GW (not because he was racist, more because I disagreed with all of his policy instincts).

One thing: if we're going back to the Southern Strategy, the Democratic Party hardly has impeccable race policy credentials. They're even worse if anything.

I don't disagree, except for the fact "going back" suggests the Southern Strategy is a thing of the past. It's never gone out of style, though perhaps this clusterfck will kill it for good.

I agree with those sentiments, but perhaps what I find the most amusing is that few of the issues that the candidates are sensationalising (particularly the Republicans, including Trump) are hardly "existential Crises" as they all seem to convey. In a global context, the US is actually in pretty good shape.

Perhaps the single most important issues are healthcare and guns. And nobody's expressing those as key issues.

Nope, it's terrorism (the US has endured about the least of it in past decade), immigration (much bigger problem elsewhere in the world). And for the republicans, apparently the complete destruction of the US that Obama has imposed in his secret conspiracy to destroy the country. Yet, compared to most of the rest if the world, things really aren't all that bad.

In order to "save the country", you need something to save it from.

Odd, I agree with the sentiments.

But perhaps a bit of mis editing from a piece about the current administration?

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/03/us...smtyp=cur&_r=0

Looks like Ben Carson is on the brink of suspending his campaign, probably won't be at the next debate.

That will put an extra spring into someone's step today. Cruz?

I guess if both Kasich and Carson drop out it could make a difference, but I doubt Carson on his own doing so is going to change things much.

I haven't seen much analysis of second preference votes, but I suspect they'll go evenly to Cruz and Trump rather than Rubio.

I see the GOP are wheeling out Mittens to give a big speech tomorrow attacking Trump. I can't see it making any difference, as Mittens was never really popular with the people who are voting for Trump.