Where Do We Go From Here?
Written by Sam on January 9th, 2008So what’s next? Huckabee won the Hawkeye Caucii, Romney took Wyoming, and McCain made his money in New Hampshire. Romney is leading the pack with 30 delegates, Huckabee with 21, McCain 10, Thompson 6, Ron Paul 2, and Giuliani and Hunter each have 1. Conventional wisdom says that Romney should win the next primary, Michigan, because he is from there and his dad was the governor back in the 60s. However, with McCain’s resurgence he could ride in on a white horse and sweep victory off its feet. He did win the state in 2000.
South Carolina is a must win for Fred Thompson otherwise he is finished in my opinion. It’s too bad. The man really does have all the Reaganesque qualities about him, except he’s lacking Reagan’s personality which had the gravitas to pull everyone in. He is starting an 11 day bus tour throughout the state as what I would suspect is a last ditch effort. Should he prevail we will be in a really interesting situation coming up, because Florida and Super Tuesday follows.
Huckabee, Romney, McCain, and Thompson all still in the race by February 5th may very well set up a perfect storm for Rudy Giuliani. He has everything banked on making big wins in Florida and on the states on Super Tuesday when many of the larger liberal states that would go for Giuliani are voting. Giuliani will most certainly win New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Delaware by large margins, and most likely California as well. I also think he will have a good showing in Florida the week before. Since he won’t be facing just one opponent by that point the non-Rudy vote gets diluted and that could set him up very well. Granted, nobody has ever made it to the White House using this strategy but he is looking to be the first.
Regardless, I don’t think this race will be decided even on February 5th. We could easily see a scenario where these five candidates all have enough delegates accumulated to keep chuggin along down the line.
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Sam, I doubt that any of the 5 major candidates drop out before Super Tuesday. Possibly not even after that. That includes if Fred loses South Carolina. The main reason is that the delegates are SO spread out that everyone wants to be the last man standing. I don’t think anyone can develop “momentum” and that we are en route to a brokered convention.
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There’s a debate tomorrow night, Fox News sometime in the evening. I think it’s short but it should be important.
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I’ve officially switched camps. I no longer see Fred as a viable alternative. Disappointing, but I think it is time to move on.
My new candidate is Mitt Romney. I know he has the baggage of changing his abortion stance, among others, but he is the most conservative among the “big 4″ of Giuliani, Huck, Romney, and McCain.
I can’t vote for Giuliani even if he is the nominee b/c of his abortion and gay rights stands.
I don’t like McCain because he voted against the tax cuts and pandered to Ted Kennedy for the last 8 years on everything from immigration to “torture”.
Huck is a social conservative and economic liberal, despite what he says on the trail. No thanks.
Mitt Romney has the charisma and skills to make a very good President.
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If anything I see Fred as much more viable than Romney at this point, seeing as Romney plowed millions into the first two states with the intent of winning them and catapulting to the nomination. Now he’s licking his wounds, and if he loses Michigan to McCain he’s all but finished.
Thompson, on the other hand, is a strong candidate for South Carolina and the South (on Super Tuesday). He’s crisscrossing the state in his bus tour and getting a lot of attention, and Huckabee is not in as strong of a position going into S.C. as McCain is going into Michigan. Since Michigan is before South Carolina, I think it’s likely that should Romney lose Michigan, many of his supporters in South Carolina will go to Sen. Thompson, not the other way around as you see it.
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Also, I can’t see how Giuliani is in your “top 4″ yet Thompson isn’t, given as Thompson has garnered delegates from two states (Iowa and Wyoming) and Giuliani has yet to pick up any. Not saying that Giuliani’s Florida-then-Super-Tuesday plan can’t or won’t work, just pointing out that the logic behind your assessment is flawed.
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Don’t get me wrong: Fred was my first choice. I don’t see him as more viable than Romney when Romney has placed second in the first two states and noone is even talking about Fred. His poll numbers are in the single digits, and Romney is still within a few points of the national lead in the latest Rasmussen poll, coming in a close second. Romney is tied for the lead in Michigan, but Fred is a distant fourth in South Carolina. Fred is not going anywhere, I’m sorry to say.
Giuliani is a top tier candidate because he leads in Florida and California, states with huge delegate counts.
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The national Gallup poll released yesterday had Fred at 12% and Mitt at 9%, actually…
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Well, I guess we can cherry pick our polls to suit our candidate, but neither is where I want them to be. If I thought Fred would take off, I’d be for him. I was for him, and lobbied family and friends for him. In the next few states, though, Romney is polling first or second (except for 3rd in SC, but still ahead of Fred). I’ll give you this: I want ONE OF THE TWO to win the nomination, but just in my opinion Romney has the better shot.
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I love listening to Thompson when he talks about policy, but I doubt he can catch fire. Sometimes I think Thompson should have ran for the Senate in 2006 when he could have taken over for Frist.
I do not think Romney has much of a chance at this point purely because he is slowly but surely getting the loser label.
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Romney has come in first (Wyoming), second (Iowa), and second (NH). Hardly a loser.
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yes but he spent all his time and all his money there!
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Bush lost both Iowa and New Hampshire before beating McCain in So Carolina. Right now it is anybody’s game, but Romney has to start winning some primaries, or he’s done. Same can be said for all of them, though. Whoever wins the next few races will have a very good shot at being the nominee.
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Michael… Bush won Iowa.
I think the huge question mark is what will be the impact of the February 5 primaries. In theory, someone like Giuliani could lose all the pre-February 5 primaries and be leading after February 5 by winning New Jersey, New York, California, etc… McCain could be very viable in these states too if Rudy continues to disappear. We are just in unknown territory so your guess is just as good as mine.
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Mitt Romney? That greasy-haired used car salesman would be God’s gift to Democrats.
If your strategy is going to be get every piece of evangelical vermin to crawl out from under their trailers to vote for him, someone who isn’t on video saying that he’s more pro-gay than Ted Kennedy might be a better bet.
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The funny thing about this–a person could come in second all the time and win the nomination!!
These guys are going to stay in because it dilute the delegate base–throwing selection powers to the leadership.
I guess hoping that the election would give a shock to the party to reform is now down the tubes.
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The Dems have a bigger weapon against Romney than his shifting stance!
I have met libs that prefer Huckabee or McCain over Hillary–but not one that like Romney over Rep Jefferson!!
And that is awful….
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Romney is not electable
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About those polls…
If I recall the Dem side of the NH primaries, polls are not good indicators of exactly where your candidates are.
The delegate count is alot more important than numbers the RNC convention will not use. Also, you are counting on Fred picking up significantly more delgates than McCain, Romney and Huckabee in the South. That is unlikely–it should be finely split mainly between tthree of these four.
South Carolina is a toss up according to Rasmussen, with McCain first, Huckabee 2nd and
Drum roll please–ROMNEY 3rd!
(associated press numbers
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jm_py0hn1T2W1dh_WSn7MDkdRFMQD8U3788O1 )
The days maybe numbered for that red pickup!
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Let me ask, shouldn’t we all be closer to on the same team?
I dream at night of a Thompson Hunter ticket.
I understand that grows less likely daily, but I can hope.
I will not let me preference for those men make me dislike others.
I have never liked McCain and consider Huckabee the Baptist Minister Bill Clinton. I do not want to bash them, I just do not want them to win.
At this point a McCain Huckabee / McCain Romney ticket looks very likely and well isn’t that better than Clinton Richardson or Obama Edwards?
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Let’s see…
Both McCain and Huckabee have bought into the global warming hysteria and are in favor of economically-damaging measures to “correct” the problem.
McCain is right about Iraq and the War on Terror… and that’s about it.
McCain voted against the Bush tax cuts. Now he claims it was because they weren’t coupled with spending cuts. At the time, however, he spewed class warfare rhetoric much like the Democrats in his opposition.
Huckabee is a well-documented Big Government guy who is averse to free market economics. He raised taxes in Arkansas a net half-million dollars and ballooned state spending.
Huckabee claims that our foreign policy is “arrogant” and is against keeping suspected terrorists in Guantanamo.
McCain’s Gang of 14 allowed for several good nominees for circuit courts to be derailed indefinitely.
Huckabee exploits his religion up the wazoo and will reference the Bible in government policy before the Constitution. (It’s not the government’s job to institutionalize specific religious beliefs, only to protect those beliefs from being persecuted.)
I haven’t said anything about Romney, because he’s the only one of the three who’s even close to being acceptable. I say that because, miraculously, he has reversed much of his prior positions and said exactly what I (and other conservatives) want to hear during the primary season. Yes, I’m being snarky, because I’m suspicious and find his conversions to be entirely too convenient for my comfortability level.