Bolton/Cain ’16!
Unfortunately, the predictor is Bill Kristol, so I’d set the over/under on the number of these people who actually runs at 0.5:
Who’s going to survive training camp, endure pre-season and do well enough in scrimmages to be on stage for the first post-Labor Day 2015 GOP presidential debate, moderated by Megyn Kelly? John Bolton, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, Rand Paul, Mike Pence, Joe Scarborough and Scott Walker. That will be the regular season starting nine.
I assume that citing Palin is Kristol’s way of winking at the audience, Straussianism for dummies. Anyway, you remember the 2102 Republican primaries, in which a highly vulnerable, mediocre-at-best candidate cruised to the nomination because he effectively ran unopposed? This field would appear to be a logical conundrum in which all 9 candidates are running unopposed. (Well, I guess, I’d but Walker and Jeb above the other 7.) The real Republican field will look a little better than this — but probably not a lot.