John Quincy Adams, our greatest secretary of state (sorry, Hillary Clinton fans), thought that Cuba would inevitably become part of the United States. It hasn't, at least not yet, but two Cuban-Americans were serious presidential contenders this year.
So Republicans now have a presumptive nominee -- one headed to a clear delegate majority without visible opposition -- sooner than the Democrats. It's another way in which this year's presidential race has defied expectations and ignored precedent.
The unexpected successes, forecast by almost no one 12 months ago, of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders in winning 40 percent and 42 percent in Republican and Democratic primaries and caucuses is widely taken as evidence of raging discontent among American voters.
Donald Trump has declared himself, after following up his New York win April 19 with victories in five other Northeastern states Tuesday, the "presumptive nominee" of the Republican Party. Is it a done deal?
Ethnicity still matters. That's one lesson I draw from the results so far of this year's Republican and Democratic primaries and caucuses.
Home-state candidates notched up impressive victories in New York's presidential primaries Tuesday. Donald Trump topped 50 percent for the first time -- and handsomely, with 60 percent of Republican votes. And Hillary Clinton won 58 percent of Democratic votes in her adopted home state.
Noo Yawk. That's the state with this week's presidential primary, in which candidates who have spent time in New York recently are currently running ahead, according to polls.
"Gestapo tactics." That's how Donald Trump's recently installed campaign manager, Paul Manafort, characterized the Ted Cruz campaign's successful effort to win all 34 of Colorado's pledged national convention delegates at the long-scheduled Republican congressional district and state conventions.
If you live any distance beyond the Capital Beltway you probably didn't notice, but an important part of government in Washington shut down on Wednesday, March 16. That's when the Metro subway system's recently installed general manager, Paul Wiedefeld, ordered a one-day shutdown of the entire 117-mile system for emergency inspection of track-based power cables.
"Donald J. Trump withstood the onslaught of the establishment yet again." That's the first sentence in a Trump campaign statement tweeted out Tuesday night by the Washington Post's Robert Costa. It's also a strange way to respond to a solid defeat, reminiscent of the Monty Python knight who insists he is winning after both his arms are hacked off.
What you hear when you listen to many fervent supporters of Donald Trump is that they are victims -- victims of globalization and trade agreements that have sent their jobs to Mexico or China. Victims of competition from illegal immigrants from Mexico willing to work for starvation wages. Victims of a Republican establishment that promised to get rid of lots of things they don't like and then failed to deliver.
On June 23, when Donald Trump will or will not have won the 1,237 delegates he needs to be nominated, voters in Britain will decide an issue as divisive as Trump's candidacy: whether the United Kingdom will remain in or leave the European Union.
How can one make sense of the electoral divisions in this year's Republican primaries and caucuses? The contours of Donald Trump's support and opposition don't fall on traditional lines.
Perhaps the most important results of the March 22 Republican primary in Arizona and caucus in Utah were numbers that didn't appear on your television screen, no matter how late you stayed up for the poll closing times. Those were the numbers of votes cast for Marco Rubio in Arizona -- 70,587 of them at this writing.
Many Donald Trump supporters think he is a slam dunk to beat Hillary Clinton in the general election. The candidate himself certainly takes this view.
Can Donald Trump be stopped from winning the Republican nomination? The answer is yes. Despite his big win over Marco Rubio in Florida and his narrow wins over Ted Cruz in Illinois, Missouri and North Carolina, he has not won a majority of delegates yet awarded -- 661 at this writing, with several more to be added when Missouri and Illinois congressional district totals are tabulated.
The likely presidential nominee of the Republican Party and the certain (barring indictments) nominee of the Democratic Party have something in common, something more than residences in New York: campaign appeals based on nostalgia.
Bad news for both parties in the primaries and caucuses in the seven days in March following Super Tuesday.
The Republican race for president last week converged, suddenly and briefly, in Detroit. In the Fox Theatre, one of the nation's great 1920s movie palaces, the four remaining presidential candidates fought it out in the Fox News debate.
The Republican race goes on after Super Tuesday. In ordinary years, Donald Trump's wins in seven of the 11 Super Tuesday contests after three out of four wins in February, together with his delegate lead, would make him the nominee. Politicians would hurry to back the apparent winner.
