John Kasich tells Stephen Colbert why the GOP debates are dumb, Obama shouldn't pick Scalia's replacement

John Kasich tells Stephen Colbert why the GOP debates are so dumb

(Image credit: Late Show)

published 18 February 2016

Gov. John Kasich (Ohio) came in second place in the New Hampshire Republican primary, and like the No. 3 finisher in Iowa, Marco Rubio, he declared victory. "How is losing winning?" Stephen Colbert asked Kasich on Wednesday's Late Show. Kasich laughed and said that now people know his name. The two men ended up having an interesting, lively, and fairly wide-ranging discussion.

"When I listen to the Republican debates, it sounds like America is, like, just a burning dumpster fire," Colbert told Kasich. "And it doesn't feel like America is a burning dumpster fire right now." Kasich didn't disagree. "Stephen, the debates are the dumbest thing going," he said. "It's soundbites. You know, how are you going to elect a president on the basis of a clever soundbite, particularly if the soundbite is designed to attack somebody else?... If I can't win by being fundamentally positive, what's the point in winning?"

Colbert noted that some of his "positive" solutions don't sound very much in step with the Republican electorate. "Look, the Republican Party is my vehicle, it is not my master, okay?" Kasich said. "It has never been." That got Kasich a big cheer from Colbert's audience, but the love didn't last. When Colbert asked if a President Kasich, with a year left in office, would punt on appointing a Supreme Court nominee, Kasich said that he wouldn't — because he would have brought the country together — but President Obama should, so the next president can appoint Antonin Scalia's replacement in "a more orderly, less political" atmosphere than today's Washington. That earned Kaisch a rare Late Show audience boo. Watch the lively discussion below. Peter Weber

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.