Chaos in Cleveland is the only way to stop Trump

Is it too late to stop Republican front-runner Donald Trump? Don’t count on rival candidates Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas) or Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.). It’s a long way from last summer when Trump announced his candidacy for president and reportedly had to pay strangers to attend his very first political event. He is now the undisputed favorite. One thing is sure: If Cruz loses the Texas primary on March 1 and Rubio loses Florida on March 15, the race for the GOP nomination surely appears over.

{mosads}But not so fast! I’ve got an alternative strategy. The Republicans have to first believe that if this Silvio-Berlusconi-comes-to-America candidate becomes their nominee, they will lose the Senate and the House will be in play. (Let’s even forget their distaste for his style and that he will embarrass the party by his appalling lack of substance and smarts.)

Old-fashioned self-interest has to kick in. There has to be a consensus in the GOP that this guy is political suicide. Trump at the top of the ticket will not only elect Hillary Clinton as president, but the 1964 drubbing of Republican nominee Barry Goldwater will pale in comparison.

I remember 1964. (I was a child prodigy at the time.) The Party of Lincoln waited almost to the eve of their convention at the Cow Palace in San Francisco. The likeable moderate Gov. Bill Scranton of Pennsylvania thrust himself forward and sought to be the chosen one (knowing that the last — and only — Republican president from the Keystone State was the hapless “doughface” James Buchanan).

That was a time when there was a “moderate” wing of the Republican Party. People like Jacob Javits (N.Y.), Clifford Case (N.J.), Leverett Saltonstall (Mass.) and Hugh Scott (Pa.) populated the U.S. Senate. They were most often called “Rockefeller Republicans.” They didn’t mind the label; in fact, they wore it proudly. But Scranton went nowhere in 1964; it was too late.

You have to have a modus operandi way before the convention to stop Trump. Here’s mine.

A few weeks back, I wrote a column advocating that some of the quality Republican candidates who have dropped out stay all the way to Cleveland and continue to make their case. Upon further reflection, I have come to the conclusion that that was naive and unrealistic. So this is what should now happen. (Sorry for the dated reference, but what I’m proposing is the “let-a-thousand-flowers-bloom strategy.”)

What I mean is that a new batch of aspirants have to get in the race. Allow me to throw out some respectable names. How about, from the Senate, South Dakota’s John Thune, chair of the Republican Conference? He surely looks the part and is calm, reasonable and steady — the stylistic antidote to Trump. Or Jerry Moran of Kansas, senator from the home state of Ike? No one knows him, but maybe that’s a plus: He’d be the compromise candidate, with no visible sins. Susan Collins of Maine. Nice and knowledgeable. A screaming moderate who does not scream; the intellectual opposite of 2008 vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — independent and tough. Again, the polar opposite of Palin in every regard.

Since all the governor candidates have departed, here is a new batch.

Mike Pence of Indiana: well-spoken, white-haired and Midwestern. Charley Baker of Massachusetts, who got elected in the most liberal state in the nation. He must have done something right. Nikki Haley of South Carolina, who took down the Confederate flag. She’s gutsy and principled and still gets conservative support.

Let’s not forget the House, either. There are some intriguing possibilities. Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania, a charming centrist. Walter Jones of North Carolina, courageous son of the South who is adamantly noninterventionist when it comes to our military misadventures. Or there could be two very rich guys, Darrell Issa of California and Michael McCaul of Texas. They could easily self-fund, a la Trump, their late-blooming candidacies.

Or my personal favorite, Eddie Baza Calvo. You don’t know him? Shame on you. The governor is a household name in Guam (“where America’s day begins”). To go back home, this aspirant has to travel 9,000 miles away from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. But that’s why we have Air Force One.

And here is one final name: Samuel Alito. As president, he could preserve the much-revered legacy of the late Justice Antonin Scalia philosophically and ethnically by appointing justices similar to Scalia — and himself.

This entire theory and this odd profusion of mentionables rests on the foundation that the Republican regulars see an impending disaster coming with Trump and act in advance to remedy the situation. None of these individuals alone will be able to stop Trump, but if they all got in, that would create a new dynamic. Basically, each and every one would go to his or her own state delegation and ask them to adopt them. The convention would then be anything but predictable.

I would call this effort the “favorite son, favorite daughter” play run amuck. Look (as Ohio Gov. John Kasich would say): Let them try this — otherwise, it’s Trump. The only way to not let Trump happen is to have chaos in Cleveland.

Plotkin is a political analyst, a contributor to the BBC on American politics and a columnist for The Georgetowner.