Some of you may be “shocked” that Ted Cruz and John Kasich have decided to “tank” certain states in advance of today’s primaries so that one or the other does better against Donald Trump in the effort to keep him from getting the majority of delegates needed to secure the GOP nomination. Some may wonder why you wouldn’t actively try to convince as many people as possible to voter for you–instead of hoping people will just vote against the other guy. Some wonder why the two didn’t come to this agreement sooner–saving them both a lot of money and effort in a number of other states.
The Trumpster is of course railing against this strategy–calling it an “unprecedented effort” to target just him. Well, if The Donald knew his US history and politics, he would know this isn’t the first time such a deal has been struck. In fact, he’s missing out on using the great title given to one such agreement in the past: “The Corrupt Bargain”.
The Presidential election of 1824 saw John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay and Andrew Jackson split the Electoral College Vote in such a way that none of them were able to secure the majority of votes needed to win the Presidency. That sent the election into the House of Representatives–where Clay was the Speaker of the House. Despite that position, Clay didn’t have enough support to win in the House, so he convinced his fellow members to vote for Adams–who then turned around and named Clay his Secretary of State (which apparently was a more prestigious position back in those days than it is now). That left Jackson and his supporters howling–and Old Hickory to coin the phrase “The Corrupt Bargain”. (It should be noted that Jackson crushed Adams in the 1828 elections–as voters bought into Jackson’s view of the previous election).
And so we are left to wonder what deal has been struck behind the scenes at the Cruz and Kasich campaign headquarters? Cruz has far more delegates and cash than Kasich–so is he the one setting the terms? Kasich is still in the race for only two reasons: He thinks he can win a brokered convention in his home state of Ohio–or he thinks he can still be some kind of “kingmaker” at the convention and can leverage a Vice-Presidential nomination out of the deal. For Cruz, his only hope is that Kasich assigns his delegates to him if Trump is not nominated on the first ballot.
But let’s get the Trumpkins going on using “The Corrupt Bargain II” in their tweets and Facebook posts–if for no other reason than to make it look like they know a little something about politics and history.
