And the Nomination Race Begins!

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Most actually do on the more important issues, at least according to polls. A good majority want increased taxes on the rich and corporations, don't want to touch medicare or social security, think income inequality is a problem, and most think that all of Congress deserve to lose their jobs. Granted, not everybody takes polls, but I think that says something about the opinions of the public versus their so-called "representatives".

 

There's something I'm curious about - with his past, affairs and all, I'm surprised other candidates haven't eaten him alive by now. It's supposed to be the values party - isn't that considered a big problem? If he does make it to the presidency, I doubt it will be his biggest problem - personally, I think he may have some ego issues that may interfere with his job, from what little I know of him.

Paul is interesting, but an outlier in a lot issues. While I agree with some of them, on others his position strikes me as quite extreme and harmful. There's a reason political science doesn't have lab classes - unlike with mice, experiments with countries tend to cause a lot of problems. Call me biased, but imo the best candidate of the crop is (or rather, was) Huntsman. Business experience, political experience, doesn't spew complete BS... I don't agree with a lot of his positions (i.e. border fence - I think it's all a big smokescreen/pet project for contributors), but IMO he is the most likely one of the bunch to remember he's supposed to be the president of the entire USA, not just some bits of it.

 

It's also the party of Evangelical Christians, and you see the problem is that Romney needs to be saved. I saw more than one person in the exit polling interviews (they all seemed to talk exactly like Foghorn Leghorn from the Looney Tunes), that the candidates religious affiliation matter to them, and those who said it did voted overwhelmingly for Gingrich.

(Perhaps there is more substance to LKD's assertion that the Republicans would not vote for a Mormon than I originally gave it credit.)

There's two things I'm sure of at this point. 1) This is a two candidate race. Santorum and Paul are probably in it for a while yet - Paul maybe for the long run as he runs a low-cost campaign. But the only two conceivable nominees are Romney and Gingrich. 2) This is going to be a long nomination process now. Gingrich is riding high right now, and he could well win Florida too. But after that, the primaries swing to Nevada, Arizona, and Michigan, and Romney should clean up there. This isn't being resolved before Super Tuesday.

 

I agree. The dynamics of the race have changed significantly. Newt is doing better now than I think anyone expected, and seemingly out of nowhere. The wind is at his back so much that I now give Romney and Gingrich even odds at winning the nom. I'd even go as far as to say its now Gingrich's to lose. But we'll see what happens. The South Carolina debate changed everything, with Newt's fiery performance and Santorum's retroactive Iowa victory earlier that day. Anything could happen now, but I'd say it's either Newt or Mitt, and Mitt is making too many mistakes now to recover much momentum, in my view.

A situation that I would imagine brings no end of delight to the Obama campaign.

 

This may also mark a shift in internal SC politics.

A show looking at the GOP in SC used to describe it as being dominated by country club (think wealthy if you don't get the reference) republicans.

The Evangelical and Tea Party wings of the SC GOP have both been growing in strength.

The latter in particular Gingrich may have been able to appeal to by his angry stance. It seems lot of Tea Partiers are the non-weathly whites who listen to conservative talk radio (which is often out there attacking stuff and proving its manhood with a highly political slant).

Even if talk radio hosts attack Gingrich (perhaps at the behest of national party leaders or Country Club republicans who still control a decent about of financing within the GOP), Gingrich himself may still be able to adapt that pattern of behavior and speaking so that they still rally for him.

Also there are serious questions may who are conservatives have about Romney-thus for ideological reasons they want someone else.

Many of these candidates may have flip-flopped a great deal but Romney appears to have done it the most. And the most blatantly as if he is simply trying to get votes. So a true believer in conservative ideologies has reason to question Romney.

Also there is a lot that can be said about the hypocrisy may conservatives already have when dealing with gay people already. And many places in the South have high divorce rates and so on.

Now it isn't like people don't get divorced elsewhere but perhaps there is a certain level of internal excuse making/ignoring anyway.

Some may say this goes to both parties as many Democrats didn't approve of Bill Clinton cheating on Hillary but ignored it anyway.

 

So.... looks like the options are two guys named "Mitt" and "Newt". What wonderful choices the Reupublican Party is giving the public... I mean Newt???? Really? Our next President might be named Newt? I can't help it but hearing that name makes me think Monty Python, I'll never be able to take that clown seriously.... I got five fun tickets at 20 to 1 that says Obama is our next Prez, any takers?

 

If Newt wins the nod it won't even be close. If Romney wins ... and chooses a good running mate ... and it's not an Obama/Clinton ticket ... there may be a chance Obama will not get re-elected.

Newt will not take the moderate vote, but Romney might (provided he stops saying such stupid, demeaning stuff to the middle class).

 

That's not even the worst of it. Look at that Evangelical vote the Republicans rely so heavily on - it's a choice between a heathen (in their view) or an adulterer. Many Evangelicals will find their choices - to put it nicely - suboptimal.

I mean, what are they thinking though? If there was ever a year in which to nominate a moderate, this is it. You got a still sluggish economy with an incumbent who is still a bit below 50% in approval rating. There is opportunity here if they play it right.

You think there's only a 5% chance Obama is our next president?

 

I'm voting for Ross Anderson.

 

95%. The takers would be betting against me....

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But I can't see how it won't be an Obama/Hilary wedding. After all the Republican blunders we are seeing, Obama would have to be an absolute idiot not to take Hilary as his running-mate.

 

Nice to hear you say that. The more I look at the way the Republican Party is devouring itself, the more I think that no one has a prayer against Obama come November. The one feature that the Republicans have always had is that they stuck together no matter what. They have not fractured themselves as badly as the Dems or other political parties in other countries. But now? With the Tea Partiers, the Evangelicals, and the Moderates all pulling in different directions, it's really sad. I like Romney, but he's obviously a second stringer, politically speaking, and many swing voters will not vote for someone whose own party is lukewarm about nominating. Newt is even worse, and I can't imagine any swing voters EVER voting for such a tool. I like a lot of Paul's positions, but that's because I'm an extremist, and I recognize that swing voters will not go there any more than they will for Newt. Santorum is faceless to me, but the stats tell me he has no hope of getting the nomination.

So settle in for another term of Obama (which despite the slagging he's got, I really don't think he's that bad.) In a second term, he might pull out the stops and play more hardball with Congress.

 

I also think it's a smart move for the party as a whole. Hillary is 64, so theoretically, four years from now she could run for president herself. It would be her last realistic shot of doing so. 2008 was very unusual in that there is nearly always an incumbent president seeking re-election, or the incumbent's VP running for a first term if the incumbent can't run again.

So it is highly likely that if Obama wins in 2012, that whomever his VP is will be the Democratic nomination for 2016. Joe Biden is not a great choice for that, as Biden will turn 70 this year. That means he'll be 74 in 2016, and given how much was brought up concerning John McCain's age last election when he was 72, I can't imagine they'll want to pursue that path. (Although some of it with McCain was health-related as much as age. Biden doesn't have a list a mile long of health concerns like McCain - he wasn't a POW, and he isn't a cancer survivor as far as I'm aware.) Still, I think most people view Hillary as the stronger presidential candidate. And hell, it's hard to argue her qualifications - she been First Lady, Senator, Secretary of State, and potentially the future Vice President.

But what I haven't seen is a reason why Republicans don't like Romney. Most seem incapable of articulating any reason. It's not like in 2008 when Clinton was an acceptable candidate to most Democrats, but it turned out that people liked Obama better. It wasn't so much a rejection of Clinton as much as it was an endorsement for Obama. But people really seem to not like Romney. And it's not like his opponent in Gingrich was like Obama in terms of his popularity. It's inexplicable to me.

That said, I'm not totally convinced that most of the Republican base will still not go out and support their candidate, regardless of who he may be. I agree with you that Romney has a better chance of capturing the moderate and independent vote, and is thereby the better candidate for the general election, and I cannot believe Republicans can't do this simple bit of political calculus.

The only reason I know much about Santorum is that he was one of Pennsylvania's senators, where I lived for the first 26 years of my life. He is extremely conservative - the most conservative on the ballot - and I include Perry in that list.

Historically, it is the second term where presidents tend to accomplish more. They don't have another term to think about, and so are more likely to push an agenda that is a bit more ambitious, simply because they don't have to answer for it at the polls again.

The problem with that theory is I think that Gingrich's increase in popularity is largely due to other people already dropping out, or other people's support decreasing. I don't know how many more votes are left in that well. Romney's numbers have been remarkably stable. He's in the high 20s in terms of people who have him as their first choice now, which is exactly where he was before Iowa voted. Gingrich's rise has not come from former Romney supporters, but from former Perry supports, and Cain supporters, and most recently Santorum supporters.

Romney's problem is that he hasn't been able to latch onto anyone's supporters except Huntsman, who was a marginal candidate without much popularity to begin with.

Also bear in mind that we shouldn't read too much into Gingrich's win in South Carolina. While it was true that it was a must-win state for him to remain competitive in the race, there are many demographic factors at work in South Carolina that played to his strengths. The view by most people was that if Gingrich couldn't win there, he couldn't win anywhere. This is much the same way that Romney had a lot of built-in strengths in New Hampshire.

Looking ahead at the primary calendar, it's more of the same. Florida is next, which is good for Gingrich. But then we have Nevada, Arizona, and Michigan after that, all of which will play to Romney's strengths. That's why I don't see us getting a good idea of what will happen until we get to Super Tuesday.

 

I read that as Hillary wants out of the State Department.

 

I really have no idea where this "Biden ditched for Hillary as VP" idea comes from. Here is the first I've ever heard of it. I for one thing it's highly unlikely. But who knows.

 

OH, NOOOoooo. Not the "L" word....

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/29/10265036-gingrich-labels-romney-a-liberal

 

Well, in the world of someone for whom Obama is a socialist, should we be surprised Romney is at least a liberal ?

Edit: as I understand, Romney has won the Florida primaries. It is quite early to judge, but I imagine that doesn't sound too good for his opponents.

 

Well, there isn't going to be another interesting primary until Super Tuesday - March 6 for those keeping track. Nevada, Arizona, and Michigan are all still on the calendar for February, but none of those three races are competitive. Romney is a huge favorite in all of them. The next primary/caucus where Gingrich holds a lead is Ohio - one of the Super Tuesday states - and it is a very small lead, that can certainly change over the course of the next 4 weeks.

The nomination being settled following the results of Super Tuesday seems like a strong possibility. It's not that Gingrich won't win any more states - his performance in the south and specifically the southeast will be strong. (Side note: I actually made an error with Gingrich - he's from Georgia - not South Carolina.) But he will always be running from behind, and it's unlikely that he'll ever be able to compete in the advertising campaign with Romney. It might take a while for this to finish up, but Romney is now an overwhelming favorite to win the nomination.