Allegedly, Senator Lindsey Graham is still running for President. I say "allegedly" because no one - no one anywhere - believes he ever had a shot at winning. This, I'm 100% sure, includes Lindsey Graham. So, whatever he's really doing, it isn't "running for President."
Maybe he thinks a presidential bid will boost his eventual speaking fee. Maybe he thinks it will increase his stature in the Senate. Maybe he just views it as a wacky piece of performance art. Whatever it is, I simply refuse to believe he's dumb enough to believe he can grab the brass ring. Why? Because nobody is that dumb. ...Nobody.
Should you be one of the two or three people who believe he seriously thinks he can win, ask yourself: "why would a candidate attack the very voters he so desperately needs?"
Have you ever seen a candidate who hates his own base as much as Graham hate his? That's doubtful, and Graham has decided his constituents are a bunch of racists who harbor an irrational hatred of Obama.
“Well there’s about 40% of the Republican primary voter who believes that Obama was born in Kenya and is a Muslim,” Graham said on Boston Herald Radio on Friday. “There’s just a dislike for President Obama that is visceral. It’s almost irrational.”
“I could promise you this, he’s not gonna win 270 electoral votes,” Graham said, citing Trump’s inability to grow the vote with the Hispanic community.
“I can promise you that Hillary Clinton will clean his clock,” he added.
Now, I'm not going to argue against Graham's point that Hillary will beat Trump. All the polls agree and I’ve never been convinced that Trump's cult of personality is large enough to overcome the Clinton machine.
What I will say is this:
Lindsey Graham has, from day one, acted as an election year spoiler put in place by the establishment. He was never there to win. He was there to split the vote as best he could and bend the primaries toward the will of the GOP elites who wanted Jeb to be the 2016 nominee. Nothing more, nothing less.
As that scenario looks increasingly unlikely, Graham becomes increasingly irrelevant and increasingly unhinged. The attacks against his own party have become more pronounced and he's made virtually no argument about the merits of his own candidacy. He's only there to levy attacks against whoever poses a threat to the GOPe's preferred candidates.
He's a party stooge, and a failing one at that.
Still, you may be interested in hearing what Graham thinks of the voters he's allegedly courting. That audio appears below.