For the Record: Admit it

Happy Friday, For the Record friends! We were thinking today about a certain piece that published last July: "Admit it: You people want to see just how far this goes, don’t you?" Who said it? Donald Trump...except not really, because it was Trump in the Onion, our/everyone's favorite finest satirical news organization. And yet, eight months and several primary contests later, the prescience of the piece is uncanny: the references to Trump gear that we'd all get a kick out of and our delighting over the Donald's performance in the primary debates. Next up, per the Onion oracle: Trump picks his running mate, delivers a speech at the national convention and goes head-to-head with Hillary.

Seemed crazy to consider back then, when we had our pick of 17 different candidates. Not so far-fetched now.

Except that maybe people do want Kasich to be president

The thing is, as we inch closer to a Trump nomination, polls are starting to emerge that show people aren't necessarily excited about the Donald. A new poll from Monmouth University found that Hillary Clinton would beat both Trump and Cruz in the general election. However, she'd lose to John Kasich — something that also happened in that other poll we talked about yesterday. Lindsey Graham, hesitant backer of Ted Cruz, summed it up well: "John Kasich wins by 11 points against Hillary, so he's absolutely out. Nobody wants a loser like that."

We're going to try to make sense of numbers

Raise a glass to this moment: It's not even the end of March yet, and fundraising for this election has already raced past the $1 billion mark. Compare that to 2012, when the presidential fundraising monsters had $402.7 million by this point. Then there's 2008, when candidates had raised $812 million by this point. The most interesting bit about 2008: this was pre-super PAC (Citizens United v. FEC wouldn't shake everything up until 2010), so the candidates did that all by their lonesomes. Flash forward to 2016, and candidates have only raised a mere $623.8 million if you take out the super PACs. Still, as one super PAC spokesman says, "Super PACs can’t replace a good campaign. They support and enhance them."

The latest on the Trump-Cruz wife feud

The Donald retweeted on Wednesday an image that insulted the appearance of Ted Cruz's wife, Heidi. Shortly thereafter, Cruz responded: "Donald, real men don't attack women. Your wife is lovely, and Heidi is the love of my life." On Thursday, he got a bit more fierce, saying that Trump should leave Heidi "the hell alone." A Cruz spokeswoman pointed out that Trump's history of insulting women, and then one of those women, Megyn Kelly, simply questioned Trump's tweeting of the insult: "Seriously?" Is #StandWithHeidi trending yet?

More from the campaign trail

• Clinton wonders how to beat Trump, and the answer may be found in her face-off with Giuliani (Paste BN)
• We eagerly await the breakdown of what the media spend flying around with other candidates besides Bernie Sanders (Burlington Free Press)
• Because who doesn't love polls: Clinton tops Trump by 10 points in Michigan poll (Detroit Free Press)
• Supreme Court nomination fight hits the airwaves in Iowa. We're sorry (Des Moines Register)

Humor the pundits in us for a moment

Here is something we've been pondering. Let's say that the Establishment has its way and prevents Trump from getting the nomination, because magical delegate math could lead to him having the most but still not enough delegates and people are having fever dreams of a contested convention. What stops Trump from running anyway? The Trump-Me-Nots say he's not a conservative. The Donald proudly boasts (and various exit polls back up) that he appeals to people outside of the Republican base. Yes, yes, Trump has previously promised that he wouldn't run as a third-party candidate. But consider for a moment: if future Trump decides that the nomination was stolen from him, then he could kick the reality TV-ness of this election cycle up a notch or 10 and run as an independent. We're just saying. And now we'll hang up our pundit hats.