Trump Colorado Outrage Was Planned All Along

As countless people have pointed out in the last week or so, the Colorado primary/caucus system was set up a loooong time ago, and Donald Trump’s campaign would have to be pretty stupid (not that this is outside the realm of possibilities, given some of the astonishingly ignorant statements to come out of the mouth of said candidate, just sayin’) to not know what would be required of them to secure delegates from that state.

So why, then, even if Trump and his people disagreed with Colorado’s caucus system (which would be perfectly understandable), why did they not seek to right what they now claim is so wrong ahead of time, before the caucus calendar rolled around?  Or failing that, why would they not still try to work within the rules established by the Republicans of that state and compete for Colorado’s delegates?  You know, the way Ted Cruz always runs his ground game?

It really doesn’t make sense, does it?

Well, not unless it was something Rush Limbaugh floated to explain it during Friday’s show:

There was never going to be an election, a primary election in Colorado and this op-ed gives the impression that Colorado was gonna have a vote. There was gonna be a primary and people are gonna vote like they have in other states and at the last-minute changed their mind.  There never was a plan to vote.  There was never a plan to vote that was canceled in Colorado.  Colorado was always, from last August, going to be what it was:  a series of conventions where delegates would be chosen to the convention by Republican attendance at these various county conventions and at the big state convention, but there was never gonna be a vote.

And this op-ed — you know, I asked a question two days ago, and I asked it again yesterday.  And that question was, why didn’t Trump call attention to Colorado not having an election beforehand?  Why did he wait until Colorado’s process was complete to lodge a complaint about it?  And this op-ed gives us the answer.  You know what we have here?  Trump and Colorado is a classic lesson in winning by losing.  How to win by losing.

It is apparent to me now that the Trump campaign was fully aware that they were gonna lose Colorado this way and had found and discovered a way to turn that to their advantage by claiming that Colorado had cheated, by claiming that Colorado was disenfranchising people, by claiming that Colorado was gonna have a vote and then changed their mind.  But their never was a plan to vote.  So I’ve answered my question.  Trump waited ’til after Colorado to exploit the fact that there was not an election there, and it helped his point if he lost.

So for those of you devising campaign strategies in the future, file this one under the category of winning by losing.  And even in the next page of the op-ed he refers to it again.  He said: “No one forced anyone to cancel the vote in Colorado. Political insiders made a choice to cancel it. And it was the wrong choice.”  There was no vote ever intended to happen.  So there was never in this cycle a cancellation of an election.  But Trump’s op-ed makes it look like there was a scheduled vote and a last minute cancellation to disenfranchise people because they didn’t want Trump to win.

And Trump supporters are more than happy to embrace that.  I mean, every supporter loves it when their guy is the victim of some cheating or some dirty trick.  So I’ve answered my question.  Why didn’t Trump call attention to this before they caucused in Colorado?  Because he was counting on losing and then exploiting it, which he’s done brilliantly, and here you have this op-ed in the Wall Street Journal which carries the theme forward.

Keep in mind that Rush Limbaugh has been exceedingly generous and soft on Trump as a “Republican” candidate who has promoted liberalism and liberal politicians for decades, so it isn’t like Limbaugh has been on the warpath against Trump.

While Donald Trump certainly is not the most capable tool in the box, even he isn’t stupid enough to totally miss out by accident on a serious fight for Colorado’s delegates.  Therefore, the only thing that makes sense is that he deliberately sought to use it as a vehicle to garner sympathy for himself among the masses that are already (rightfully) furious at the Republican Party fat-cats who have betrayed us all. It wouldn’t be the first time an opportunist piggy-backed on legitimate anger to further their own ends.

So what does that mean if Trump counted on losing so he could exploit it and play the victim?  That means he was intentionally deceptive and is promoting a falsehood.  He’s intentionally trying to deceive people about the truth of the matter.

In other words, he’s lyin’ about “Lyin’ Ted” like he has been all along.  And this isn’t just something that a pro-Trump PAC has done, or one of his campaign staff has done. This has been deliberate deception right from the horse’s mouth.

Do we really want a president who deliberately attempts to deceive the American people?

If we do, then politicians aren’t our only corruption problem.  We the people are corrupt.

And what did the founders of this great nation say about a corrupt people?

It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters. – Edmund Burke

Vice destroys freedom, that arbitrary power is founded on public immorality, and that misconduct in those who rule a Republic, the necessary consequence of general licentiousness, so disgusts and degrades that, dead to generous sentiment, they become willing slaves. – Gouverneur Morris

When people are universally ignorant, and debauchd in their Manners, they will sink under their own weight without the Aid of foreign Invaders. – Samuel Adams

A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience, is incompatible with freedom. – Patrick Henry

To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea. – James Madison

Civil liberty cannot be long preserved without virtue. – John Witherspoon

Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become more corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.

This election season–even independent of the anti-American poison being spewed by the Democrats–is on the verge of making it impossible for me to escape a very unpleasant conclusion: We the American people are now too stupid and corrupt to deserve to be free.

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Bob Ellis has been the owner of media company Dakota Voice, LLC since 2005. He is a 10-year U.S. Air Force veteran, a political reporter and commentator for the past decade, and has been involved in numerous election and public policy campaigns for over 20 years. He was a founding member and board member of the Tea Party groups Citizens for Liberty and the South Dakota Tea Party Alliance. He lives in Rapid City, South Dakota with his wife and two children.

Bob Ellis

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