By Hal Brown

Nov. 9, 2023: This was on HuffPost this morning:

UGH: Donald Trump Flirts With Tucker Carlson As Running Mate

The former president said he liked the conspiracy theorist Twitter personality for one reason.

Excerpt:

This is a portion of what Trump said on “The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show” when asked if he’d consider Tucker Carlson to be his VP running mate.

“I like Tucker a lot, I guess I would. I think I’d say I would because he’s got great common sense. You know, when they say that you guys are conservative, or I’m conservative, it’s not that we’re conservative, we have common sense. We want to have safe borders. We want to have a wall because walls work. The only two things in centuries to have not become obsolete” are wheels and walls.

Here’s another artilce about this:

Excerpt:

Someone finally straight-up asked it, and Donald Trump gave a straight answer: Yes, the former president and current GOP front-runner would, in fact, consider Tucker Carlson as his running mate for 2024.

Trump appeared Wednesday on “The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show,” the syndicated-radio heir apparent to the godfather of conservative talk, Rush Limbaugh.

“Would you consider Tucker Carlson on your VP list?” co-host Travis asked point-blank.

“Oh wow,” Trump immediately responded, as if this might be the first time he’d given any thought to bringing the former Fox News host onto the stage at which he’s been chucking rotten fruit for decades now. Before he got to the core of his answer, Trump launched into a lengthy reminder about how he and Carlson staged an interview on X the same August night as the first GOP debate, which he elected to skip:

“First of all, I did my first, you could call it counter-programming, but I won’t call it that — but Tucker wanted to do an interview during the first debate,” Trump said. “And I think you know … we broke every record in history. I think it hit over 300 million people. But it was for that evening over 207 million, then got to 275 million within a day or two.”

I speculated about the possibility that Trump might want Calrson to share the ticket with him as his vice persidential choice back in February. This is what I wrote:

Tucker Carlson might be Trump’s best pick to run with him for VP

Anyone who says the following might be the best pick for Trump to ordain as his running mate:

From The Washington Post:

How a small-town train derailment erupted into a culture battle

The East Palestine train accident is one of hundreds each year, but it’s become a significant political flashpoint

Fox News host Tucker Carlson used his show to bring race into the discussion, decrying an alleged lack of urgency by the government for a blue-collar community with few people of color. “Is it because these are not their voters?” he asked Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), who agreed with the premise.

This is small potatoes compared to Tucker Carlson’s latest coup enabled by Kevin McCarthy. Whether or not other media are able to get all the J6 videos of the Capitol attack his getting first dibs will score big time points with Trump.

What puzzles me is, even though the word is in quotes, why Carlson refers to this as “insurrection day” instead rebranding it with a term that most people peacefully entered the Capitol and were there to make sure the election wasn’t stolen. 

With the speculation as to whether Trump would prevail in the GOP primary leaning heavily towards it being the former president there has also been chatter in the punditry about who is angling to be his vice presidential pick. There’s no similar discussion about who might be currying favor with Ron DeSantis to persuade him they would be his best running mate choice.

Look at this web search:

First, what would be in it for Tucker Carlson? 

While he’s the top banana at Fox News, being second banana to a president of the United States who might die in office would make him president, and assuming Trump lived it would position him to run for president in 2028. The answer for him in one word is “power”. He’d have to be patient and should Trump win he knows he’d be hand maiden to a megalomaniac but time would be on his side. In addition, what would he have to lose since if Trump was defeated he could simply go back to his former Fox News gig.

(Update: Of course this has changed and he’s no longer working at Fox News.)

The second and more important question is what would be in it for Trump. What would Carlson bring to the ticket that nobody else would, and what are the drawbacks of having his as a running mate?

The only drawback I can think of is that Tucker is another crowd pleasing performer, an actual star. It’s possible he could upstage Trump. He’s Marjorie Taylor Greene without being certifiably insane.

The benefits include Carlson’s star power. Trump could make sure Carlson never upstages him when they are literally appearing on the same stage by warning him about this. Carlson is smart enough never to do this. 

The only possible better lead-in act for a Trump rally than Tucker Carlson is Marjorie Taylor Greene, but does Trump really want a screaming manic introducing him? Besides, he can include her as a member of his rally show cast and she can appear before Carlson. Greene, Carlson, Trump: now that would be a MAGA crowd pleaser. 

With Trump who would make the best, i.e., the most competent vice president is irrelevant. It was a fluke that he picked Mike Pence who actually had some governing experience. He picked him because he was a national unknown who wouldn’t upstage him. He believed in his grandiose self-confidence that he didn’t need anyone to help him win.

With Trump running again he may have rethought this and want to run with someone who has their own huge fan base. He may have a moment of humility and want to run with someone that may actually bring him additional votes in the primary coming from those who lean towards DeSantis because they see him as Trumpian without being Trump. 

For Trump it is always about winning. Who can forget this?

The question I have is whether the star of a long-running hit show is if he’d be willing to allow an equally talented understudy to be hired.

Addendum: 

As a reward to Marjorie Taylor Greene Trump could make her his Chief of Staff. She’s adept at sucking up and has demonstrated this with Kevin McCarthy. No puns intended here…

Click above to read snarky replies to this tweet.

Can you guess who just tweeted this?

Hubris is the delusion that causes people to mistake themselves for God. They imagine they have power, wisdom and foresight they don’t actually possess. It’s a species of mental illness. 

It is Carlson’s latest tweet:

I am sure that the graduate of Harvard and Yale Law knows the meaning of the word “hubris”. He’s obviously not referring to himself, a high priest of hubris.

Addendum:

These are some images I made yesterday:

Below: Not too many people assume Tucker is dead, more likely with his star power if he has died it is only temporary and he’ll be a zombie king leading his undead hoard to continue his attack on the living liberals.

Below: Only Tucker and perhaps a few top Fox News insiders know why Rupert Murdoch really fired him. It is possible that the reason is quite simple. Murdoch may have seen a behind the scenes video of Tucker joking about why Lesley Ann Smith said they called off their engagement.

Below, the HUFFPOST top story title and above what they really meant to say..

Above: Nov. 2023 Update.

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