“Leap and the net will appear.” John Burroughs supposedly said that — but it also describes Bill Kristol’s model of punditry. His track record of making predictions is checkered. On the other hand, he gets a lot of press for teasing us. And there is rarely a price to be paid if things don’t pan out exactly as he predicted. There’s always a safety net (or a short fall); never a splat.
One example that especially sticks in my craw was this “news,” which drew huge attention in August 2008: “Bill Kristol says on Fox News that former Secretary of State Colin Powell will endorse Obama and do so at the Democratic Convention.”
Drudge exploded. Kristol got a lot of publicity. Powell, of course, never spoke at the Democratic Convention.
Did anybody notice?
I remember this incident only because the media firestorm occurred during an otherwise sleepy summer week (not unlike this past Memorial Day weekend). I was on vacation in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, but had to waste several hours of one day writing about this “story,” which, of course, was a big nothingburger that was either fabricated, or — within the realm of possibility — something that fell apart after Kristol leaked it.
Of course, there was still an element of truth in the prediction; Powell never spoke at the convention, but he did endorse Obama a couple months later.
In a sense, Kristol is a bit like Trump. Both men understand how to remain relevant for decades, garnering publicity along the way. Like Trump, some of the things Kristol says are simply meant to troll us. They are meant to be tongue in cheek. “My predictions are lighthearted,” he confessed to the Washington Post a while back. “I try to predict long shots. I don’t take it very seriously.”
“People get too attached to the conventional wisdom,” he continued. “Provoking people to think things might turn out differently, I’ve found, is generally a useful thing. . . . It’s sort of educational. I do try to be provocative.”
This, of course, brings us to Kristol’s tweet this Saturday, which read: “Just a heads up over this holiday weekend: There will be an independent candidate–an impressive one, with a strong team and a real chance.”
Should we take this at face value? Or is it like the time Kristol said Barack Obama wouldn’t win a single primary? The fact that we don’t know is part of what makes this so compelling.
At least one person was paying attention. Donald Trump responded with a few tweets of his own. One pointed out Kristol’s dubious track record, “Bill Kristol has been wrong for 2yrs-an embarrassed loser, but if the GOP can’t control their own, then they are not a party. Be tough, R’s!” — but another tweet took Kristol’s threat more seriously: “If dummy Bill Kristol actually does get a spoiler to run as an Independent, say good bye to the Supreme Court!”
There was definitely some cognitive dissonance going on there. On one hand, Trump wants us to know Kristol makes bad predictions. On the other hand, Trump is clearly worried that Kristol might actually be right this time — that a third party candidate could play spoiler.
Trump’s schizophrenia on this matches my own. Something is probably afoot, but what?
Part of the reason this is hard to game out is that the goal of a third party campaign won’t be to win, per se (it’s all ready too late to get on the ballot in some states, including delegate-rich Texas), but to deprive anybody from obtaining the 270 delegates needed to become president, thus throwing the election to the House of Representatives. It’s basically (but not exactly like) a larger version of the convention fight Republicans were hoping to have, with members of Congress playing the role of convention delegates, and with the winner ultimately emerging as the president, not just the nominee.
My guess is that Kristol, who is now combining punditry with activism, indeed knows something we don’t. Someone is going to seize this opportunity. The real question is whether it will be, as Kristol promises, “an impressive one, with a strong team and a real chance.”
This last part is the one I’m a bit skeptical of. Speculation is that possible candidates would include Mitt Romney, Sen. Ben Sasse, or former Sen. Tom Coburn. The problem? These candidates have all publicly declined third party overtures. One thing seems likely, though: No matter who runs — unless this candidate truly becomes a spoiler that inadvertently elects Hillary Clinton — Bill Kristol wins.
