A New List

On Friday, the Washington Post's Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blake published a new list of their rankings of the Republican politician most likely to be the 2016 nominee:

1. Rand Paul
2. Chris Christie
3. Jeb Bush
4. Marco Rubio
5. Scott Walker
6. John Kasich
7. Bobby Jindal
8. Ted Cruz
9. Mike Huckabee
10. Paul Ryan

Jonathan Bernstein pushes back against their number one pick: I remain highly skeptical and will have to see some explicit support from important party actors outside of the Paul orbit (and outside of Kentucky, where he and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell have developed a working relationship). We know that Paul will have some important opponents within the party, especially on national security. He’s going to need some serious supporters to overcome that. And given the large, strong group of contenders, I just can’t imagine why any (non-libertarian) group of party actors would take on that battle.

[T]he opposition to Paul, and the policy differences between Paul and most of the party, are far deeper than was the case with Romney in 2012.  

Show me evidence Paul is attracting support from mainstream conservatives, and I’ll start believing he’s a viable nominee. Until then, he's an implausible longshot. 

Read Cillizza and Blake here, and Bernstein here.

Days until election day: 702