So what happens now that Santorum won three states? Is this race back up in the air? Actually did not see this coming, although I suppose I should have.
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So what happens now that Santorum won three states? Is this race back up in the air? Actually did not see this coming, although I suppose I should have.
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chowkster
Don’t feel bad. No one can see Santorum coming.
schrodinger's cat
I say that the representative of the 0.0001% still wins the nomination but he is finding out that money can’t buy him love or votes.
MattF
I think the main take-away is that nobody likes Mitt. And that includes his dog.
Lee
No one wants to see santorum.
chowkster
Romney will still get the nomination in my opinion, but he will have to choose a far right nut job as his VP. On the other hand, he can’t have the only far right nut job who is actually liked by the cons in GOP who don’t like Romney – Santorum. The tide of negative ads that is about to unload on Santorum will ensure that.
Jon O.
I guess all I’m taking from it is that GOP primary voters have not come to terms with how much they hate Mitt Romney yet. I would count on his people to bury Santorum in money right up until the next set of primaries… which Newt might then win…
When in doubt, the best lesson about these GOP primaries is “all of these candidates are odious, and the GOP electorate is struggling with pretending otherwise.”
JPL
Santorum does not have enough money to win the nomination although he can make it interesting. I still think it’s over by Super Tuesday. Romney will move further to the right though. He’ll probably suggest the death penalty for females who consider an abortion.
Mark B
Santorumentum!
Seriously, a guy who couldn’t get reelected to his Senate seat isn’t a serious threat as a candidate for the presidency. But he’s far enough to the right to do well in the primaries with the people who care only about tribalism and not electability. And nobody likes Mitt. So he’s got a chance to win the nomination. But if he does, he’s going to have a hard time getting beyond the 27% hard core anti choice crowd + 10% more stone-cold racists not already in that group.
He’ll still get 40-42% because the crazies are crazy motivated to get out and vote, but it’ll be a landslide win for Obama.
Rosalita
As I said to my mom earlier, it’s funny and it’s frightening. Funny that they have no clear leader and frightening that anyone would vote for a rabid nut like Santorum.
Betty Cracker
With any luck, the GOP will limp into the convention with no clear nominee, have a vicious floor fight and lose all 50 states in the general. That’ll never happen. But it sure would be cool if it did.
JasonF
What happens next is that at least until Super Tuesday, everyone stays in the race, unless Adelson gets fed up with Newt and pulls his support. But at some point, someone (most likely Romney, but you never know) needs to start winning solid majorities. If not — well, I’m not sure the Flying Spaghetti Monster likes me enough to have the Republicans go into their convention without a candidate having enough delegates to secure the nomination, but we may be moving in the direction of a brokered convention.
Rosalita
@Betty Cracker: Heh, that would be awesome.
Villago Delenda Est
There were what, something like 70 delegates at stake last night?
All this is about is media momentum, nothing more. However, the Romneytron campaign is redoubtably doing some soul searching today to figure out just what the fuck is going on that their “inevitable” candidate is so embarrassed by the frothy mixture.
Serious delegate numbers start to get distributed on Super Tuesday, but what happened last night was OvenMitt’s ability to multitask, that is, run campaigns in multiple states at the same time, was sorely tested. This does not bode well for Super Tuesday, where the battle is truly joined.
gbear
Hopefully we get to watch Mitt throw a rod in the next week or so.
Ira-NY
Pierce had a great line today:
“…Rick Santorum, the hardest working Catholic in politics since Torquemada…”
Mark B
If Romney wins the nom, my best guess for his VP would be Rick Perry. Yeah, the guy’s a laughingstock, but he’s the only one of the right wing candidates who has been openly friendly and helpful to Romney. It helps that he got knocked out early.
Mary G
I was just talking to an 80-year-old wingnut I volunteer with – a devout Catholic and proud member of “Right to Life” and abortion-clinic picketeer, who was happy her “Santy” won last night…
then said she was considering voting for Obama! I kid you not! She hasn’t decided yet! Hell is freezing over.
jwest
Most Catholics are democrats. Obama received 54% of the Catholic vote.
scav
aaaaaaaaahhh-hhh, somehow I’m just thinking a lot more of the same. Saturation nasty PAC ads, pontifications of the punditry from on high (with solemn gestures of blessing and absolution in multiple directions), the diligent interpretations of the entrails of polls and lots and lots of arguing about whether that thunder was heard from on the right or the left. Muffled guffaws and giggles from certain members of the audience.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Jon O.:
This is the Kubler-Ross-MittRomney GOP primary:
1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance
6. Trying to get that Kenyanislamomarxist out of the WH
7. Crushing sense of existential despair when stage 6 fails.
8. Violent codemnation of America as having failed them, and God.
9. We must be MOAR conservative!
Depending on which GOP subgroup we’re talking about, they are currently anywhere from stages 1 thru 4. Stage 5 has yet to make an appearance.
Tsukune
No actual delegates were at stake yesterday. Four years ago, Romney “won” the Minn. caucus and by the time the delegates were actually assigned, McCain ended up with them. So far, only NH, SC, and FL have actually awarded delegates officially, and all three states have been penalized 50% (for the time being) for starting early.
All the caucus states will re-assign delegates to the “correct” candidate when they have their statewide conventions (which will happen after Romney has been crowned as the winner).
Cat Lady
Newt won’t be able to stay in, but I see him teaming with Frothy to dog Romney all the way to Tampa. Mittens is going to end up paying cash money for every delegate he needs, which is what this race was always ultimately about for Newt and Frothy.
General Stuck
The base is rebelling against the Romney poseur, which shouldn’t be a surprise. They seem to have hastily pinned their attention for anyone but Romney onto the insane Rick Santorum, for now. Newt has turned into such a prickly little shit to his own party, they spit him out, for now.
They have no where else to turn, and are spiraling into dejection as the vaunted GOP enthusiasm gap goes down the shitter. A few more solid jobs report, and if Israel doesn’t start WW3, we could book the GOP on the Muppet Show, and let Kermit and Miss Piggy stomp their stupid asses.
Hal
Romney’s win might be inevitable in the end, but his constant need to redouble his efforts continuously points to his inherent weakness as a candidate. There are simply a certain number of Republicans who do not like Romney. Will they vote in the end? Probably, but that doesn’t bode well for him winning in the end. He has to fight hard just to get people who will vote for him no matter what.
dmsilev
1. Romney, or the totally-not-coordinating-with-Romney SuperPAC issues a retargeting order on the deluge of negative ads.
2. The SantorumSurge is buried underneath said deluge.
3. Romney says multiple things that reinforce the point that he’s an out-of-touch gazillionaire.
4. Romney probably wins the eventual nomination, but carries absolutely zero enthusiasm with him, even against the Kenyan Soshalist Usurper.
Yevgraf
Despite the best efforts of the polygamist and the Mormon, Santorum came from behind.
Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
Worst House Speaker Ever, leader of the Least Popular Congress Ever, declares: “Why, yes, we would like to die on that particular hill“.
I’m still puzzled as to how they think this topic’s a winner for them.
Mark B
One thing that’s interesting is that the Texas primaries are going to be very late this year because of the redistricting screw-ups. In fact, nobody knows when they are going to be yet, because there’s no agreement to what districts to use, and no timetable for the courts to rule.
It was thought that this was going to make the Texas primaries irrelevant, since the nomination was going to be decided by early spring. Now that the Texas primaries may be sometime in the summer, they are suddenly looking important. Are we ready for Rick Perry, kingmaker?
Yevgraf
@Mark B:
I think of him as a white Alan Keyes.
Tom Q
Every time Romney wins, the press will try to hustle him back onto the Inevitability Track, because their sources are mostly the GOP establishment, which devoutly wishes for that to be the case. (Sanely, I might add, as they’re correct all the other options are suicidal) But, as in the Sen./Gov. primaries of 2010, the base voters will resist. From here on out, it’s uncharted territory — will the irresistible force of the voters be able to overwhelm the immovable object of the establshment, or vice versa?
If right-wing voters decide to vote regionally — going with the more likely Gingrich in the South and Southwest, sticking with Santorum in the midwest and mountain region — we could actually get into the seemingly mythical brokered convention scenario. British voters did something similar in the Blair landslide of ’97 — Labour sympathizers went with Lib Dem candidates in constituencies where they were the more likely winners, Lib Dems went for Labour in Labour-leaning areas. It’s a question of how tactical voters are able to be.
Either way, I think it’s gold for Obama, who’s already ascending thanks to improving economic figures. If Santorum or Gingrich miraculously get the nod, we’ll have McGovern of the right. But if Romney holds on, he’ll be in Mondale territory.
Jay C
Probably no more than it ever has been. The big “winner” from yesterday’s polling seems to have been “Anybody But Romney” with Rick Santorum just ABR’s latest stand-in. When ABR starts to get any serious (or really, ANY) number of pledged delegates, then the game is changed.
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
You forgot to include
10. Secession
on your list (somewhere)…
Mark B
It is kind of funny to watch the Romney superpacs play whack-a-mole with his opponents. As soon as one of them pops up his head, they get hammered with negative ads. Sooner or later, he’s gonna get them all.
wrb
Mitt is helped by the result, as it assures that the notmitts will remain divided.
He’s hurt by the blow to his appearance of inevitability.
Don’t know which will prove more important.
The remaining Krispy Kreme states are bunched from March 6th to 17th. Newt’s gotta scarf them to have a hope.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor: They watch MSNBC. Alex Wagner just said she’s having Lawrence O’Donnell and Mike Barnicle on tomorrow, the mushroom cloud of sanctimony caused by professional micks getting all self-righteous about the Holy Mother Tribe may just blow out your cable connection.
Hal
A conservative former co-worker of mine whom I’m friend with on Facebook seems ecstatic, and declared that people don’t like “media elites” telling them who they’re candidate will be.
Which of course is total bullshit. Yes, the media is playing a roll in the mittmentum, but so is Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and every major Republican in Washington. Still, I think it’s hill-harry-ho-us that anyone thinks Santorum can win.
Villago Delenda Est
@Mark B:
Are you thinking “favorite son” (bleech!) Texas delegation to the RNC?
redshirt
Of all R-Money’s flaws – and there are many – I don’t see regionalism discussed much, yet. Regardless of where he’s actually from, he’s tagged as a Masshole – surely, on top of the Mormonism and the Richy Richness, your typical southern Fundy is not gonna get fired up voting for a Carpetbagger. Right? Aren’t Republicans required to run someone from the South/West, as per the dictate of Saint Ronnie of California?
I mean, heck! The Bushes employed some pretty powerful foresight in getting the whole “We’re from Texas” bit established well before the sons hit the market.
Conclusion: Romney needs to buy a ranch and do some brush clearing.
Villago Delenda Est
@Hal:
The “media elites” do not include Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, or Glenn Beck.
At least as the 27% define “media elites”.
Bubblegum Tate
The Santorum bubble is already bursting (I know: eeeewwwwwww!). This probably qualifies as nutpicking, but one wingnut who is all about finding the best not-Romney has made the most damning accusation a wingnut can make: Santorum is like Obama!
beltane
@Mary G: That really doesn’t surprise me. My extremely conservative, somewhat racist, Catholic mother-in-law wouldn’t say who she voted for in 2008 but she did go from saying she hoped Obama would win to expressing happiness that he did win. Even the most rabidly anti-choice Catholics I know, particularly the women, are quite humane when it comes to the treatment of those who are less fortunate than themselves. The utter viciousness of the Republican Party’s attacks on the poor, the sick, and the helpless will not play well with these people.
eyelessgame
@Tom Q:
Um.. I’m having a hard time differentiating between those. Which one is worse for them?
Dreaming big, either way. :) I’d almost agree with you if it weren’t for CU. CU means we fight like we’re ten points down – because we’re going to have to.
Jay C
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor:
Desperation. The GOP has so few issues going for them these days, ginning up outrage against Those Evil Godless Liberal Secularists daring to “insult” the Holy Mother Church and trample on their “freedom of religion” must look like a good stand to take. If it becomes a debate over birth control per se, they’ll lose: but if they can lie loudly enough to push the “government telling churches what to do” talking-point, it might get them some political traction. Which given the Fail Circus the Republicans have made of themselves lately, they sorely need.
Comrade Mary
@Cat Lady:
If I didn’t have such a vivid and painful image in my mind right now, I’d call what you did there very subtle.
jwest
Unless there is some game changing event, it’s hard to see how any of the republican candidates gets enough delegates for the nomination. Unlike democrats who have superdelegates that can overrule any popular vote, the primary votes on the right actually matter. Also, there are well funded groups who are strategically looking for a brokered convention.
None of the factions will back down by the time it gets to Tampa, so the only outcome will be somebody fresh like Rubio.
kay
I think we should conclude that Romney can’t win the “white working class vote.”
Which is 1. hysterical, considering and 2. great.
That’s what I plan on repeating, constantly, anyway. That’s how I see it! In my view….
ceece
but my extremely conservative somewhat racist Catholic mother-in-law is the opposite. She’s not interested in being humane, she only wants to WIN!!! or be a sanctimonious victim, which is even better.
oh well, maybe our mother-in-law votes will cancel out.
Suffern ACE
Tomorrow, Romney will again shores up his right wing credentials by stating that he plans to offer the justice department to someone like Joe Arpaio and promises that Roy Moore will be his first pick for the Supreme Court. And he’ll get fewer votes. Santorum is authentic crazy. If Romney really wanted to win that crazy, he should have started earlier.
Cluttered Mind
What happens now is we get to see firsthand whether or not unlimited money is really capable of buying an election even when the candidate the money is backing is completely loathed by the base (and pretty much everyone else too). If Santorum can keep surging and flow past Romney for the nomination, I would actually see that as a good sign for our democracy, because it would mean that there are still some things that money can’t buy. I’m not optimistic that this will happen, but it would still be nice.
That said, the bar for feeling good about our democracy must have been lowered quite a bit if I’m actually considering feeling good about our democracy because the 27% are batshit crazy and cannot be controlled by anyone.
Jay C
@jwest:
Well, “fresh” – in this case – might also mean “not ripe yet”. I can’t see the Republicans – however desperate they might be – putting up a relative tyro like Rubio for President when they have a stable of announced and voted-on candidates in the running.
I can see Marco getting on the short-list for VP, though: even if in a losing cause; it’s amazing free publicity (ask one Ms. Palin, S.) and, in a pinch, might somewhat mitigate an electoral disaster. Maybe.
Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
@Jay C:
It’s just odd, since these are issues that I thought were settled decades ago. The only Catholics old and/or crazy enough to be swayed by this weren’t going to vote for Obama anyway.
I do hope a decent, reasoned leftie counter-narrative comes out: Nobody’s forcing anyone to use contraception. Nobody’s telling them they can’t preach against contraception (ie Rick Warren’s out-of-context quote of Acts 5:29). Nobody’s forcing them to take government funds at those schools or hospitals, either.
So what’s the “religious liberty” issue? The only “liberty” I see being violated is their imagined right to force the rest of us to adjust ourselves to their peculiar set of superstitions. They have no such right.
I’m just pissed at the fact that these a-holes refuse to stay on their side of the First-Amendment fence. I don’t go to church to heckle the sermon, and I don’t show up at Sunday School with a briefcase full of dinosaur bones for the kids.
So please, give the rest of us the same respect. A good neighbor stays on their side of the fence, dammit.
danimal
I’ll repeat myself:
GOP 2012: Dated ’em all, married Mitt.
The GOP base is just getting as much hot and heavy action as they can before they settle for boring missionary-style relations that have been pre-ordained for them.
General Stuck
I haven’t seen any data on the GOP primary voting that breaks down the GOP faction that is showing up at the polls more. But the fact that overall, the voting numbers are down from 2008, could be a sign that a major block of goopers are staying home, for no candidate they can support.
It could be that the evangelicals are taking up the slack and voting in bigger numbers as well, due to Santorum being one of them. If true, this could be good news for Mr. Mammal Fucker, and bad news for Mitt. Something to watch, anyways.
jibeaux
@kay: I accept your marching orders and await further instruction.
Mark B
@Villago Delenda Est: Not formally, I don’t even know if Perry is even going to be on the ballot, but he’s going to put his considerable influence with Texas voters on the line and campaign with the candidate of his choice. Perry is a national laughingstock but Texas Republican voters love ’em.
I don’t see this as a likely scenario, but Texas could end up being the state which either locks it up for Romney or throws it all into limbo by leaving nobody with enough delegates, since it’ll be the last big state to have a primary. It’s going to be interesting.
mdblanche
My mother has her dog trained pretty well to come up and take his medicine without trying to resist swallowing it. Maybe she could offer the GOP establishment some advice.
curiousleo
I wanted the GOP primary essentially done before the NC primary. Why? Because our worthless GOP state legislature put an anti-same sex marriage state constitutional marriage amendment up for vote. When did they decide to hold this “let the majority vote on the minority” election? During the general election so that everyone might be more likely to show up? Of course not. It is scheduled for the same day as the primaries. Where there is no primary for pres. for the dems.
Of course, there will now be a primary for dem. gov. candidates so maybe that’ll help dem turnout.
LGRooney
@chowkster: Food Fight!!!
Yes, you’ve heard it before. THEY will fall into line. Romney will be the nominee. Some true wack job will be the Veep on the ticket since everyone knows Romney is faking the social wacko shit and he needs cover. Romney is the nominee and the teatards will fall in line. However, if we can run around stating exactly this loudly enough among each other that teatards and Chachis of Freedom hear, they may make it a point of acting like the cool kids they are and sit on their hands come election day pouting about Dagny or being railroaded or something about trains.
It may be Santorum. Never mind the nastiness of the campaign. From what I remember, things got pretty damned nasty between Obama and Clinton during 4 years ago with cries of racism and sexism and lack of liberal fealty and criminality and charges of Noobism and been-there-done-that in between. Look where they are now.
The nastiness of political campaigns is bread and circuses. At the end of the day, they will all lie down on the same doggybed to which their money masters direct them.
chopper
@Hal:
exactly. from an electability standpoint (i.e. ignoring all of his personal flaws), his biggest problem is that he just can’t fucking seal the deal. even with UNLIMITED CORPORATE CASH.
terraformer
Soon, the nebulous entities inhabiting the smoky back rooms will have their minions step forward and not-too-politely ask both Santorum and Gingrich to circle the wagons.
They can’t have this go on much longer. In the end, the wingnuts will coalesce around the preferred candidate. They always, always do.
amk
4 more for 44. what else ?
The Moar You Know
@jwest: Yeah, that’s not happening. Romney will “win”, but he’s going to be so crippled by the non-stop assaults and his own inability to act human that I think we’re looking at a 1984-level blowout here.
I feel bad for you guys, I do, but it’s nice to see the shoe on the other foot for once.
trollhattan
@danimal:
Pretty much this. Dragging the nomination process along for a longer period damages Brand Mittens(tm) and forces him to swat at the Republican flies at least part time, rather than taking all his shots at Obama.
You’d think at some point, the superPAC donors will have to dig into their hookers & blow funds if Mittens has to keep buying anti-Newt and Rick ads.
handsmile
The financial elite of the Republican Party supports Willard because he is one of their own. They know full well what he will do on the issues most vital to them, while dismissing both his mutability on social issues and his compulsive gaffes as inconsequential or mere irritants for the hol polloi.
That hoi polloi, aka the GOP primary base, however, has been demonstrating throughout the primary campaign and its prelude that their allegiance is to Anyone-But-Mitt. Only such “passionate intensity” (the worst are full of it, pace Yeats) can explain their lurching, desperate support for such charlatans and grifters as Bachmann, Cain, Gingrich, now Santorum. Not one of whom had/has the remotest chance of becoming the 2012 GOP presidential candidate. And yet MIttens’ unpopularity only deepens as the race lengthens.
Now I understand that the authoritarian nature of the present-day Republican Party should dictate that the faithful will rally around one designated leader. But the primer on political wisdom has been ripped apart during this primary season. I fail to comprehend how these candidates and the warring factions within the GOP will form a kumbaya circle in the coming weeks. Money and media narratives may triumph as the smart money would predict, but the odds of a new entry at the Tampa Bay track are getting shorter.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@The Moar You Know:
Not gonna happen. The big blowouts from 1932 thru 1984 happened because the partisan divide between Dems and GOP cut across the cultural divide between the Confederate states and the rest of the country. So whoever could win the Old South + their own partisan base in the rest of the country + moderates in the rest of the country, that was enough for a blowout win.
But neither Obama nor any other Dem capable of winning a Democrat primary contest can carry the Old South these days. Thanks to a solid South, the GOP nominee has a floor of about 45% in the general election regardless of how badly they get mauled in the other sections of the country. McCain in 2008 was about 2 points above rock-bottom for the GOP.
Now the electoral college, that is another story. The electoral college map is grim reading for the GOP because of the states they’d need to pick up to win.
Cris (without an H)
Was the 2008 Puma/Obot divide as schadenfreuntastic to the Republicans as this one is to us?
redshirt
@Cris (without an H): They thought so. Hence the Starbursts.
As with most things – all things? – they were wrong.
eric k
Regional polarization has changed a lot since ’84. If you look at the popular vote Reagan got 58% but it was so consistent across the states that he won the EC 49-1. Obama could get 58% and probably still only win a couple more states than he did last time.
Mark S.
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
They have virtually no margin of error. They have to win Ohio and Florida or they can’t get to 270.
This year and 2016 are really their last chances unless they modernize a lot.
Brachiator
Media and pundits will gnash their teeth all the way until Super Tuesday.
I have no idea what it all means. I’m content to enjoy the GOP confusion and conflict. At some point, though, it will all settle down. And the GOP will hold their noses and vote for whoever emerges from the froth.
lonesomerobot
Truth is, Santorum’s won more states than all other candidates right now (Santorum: IA, MN, MO & CO; Romney: NH, FL, NV; Gingrich: SC). So shouldn’t he be the front-runner?
NCSteve
Man, ya gotta hate it when santorum gets back up in the air.
celticdragonchick
@Lee:
I predict santorum will be on the lips of every Republican.
billiecat
@Villago Delenda Est:
Does not compute. Romneytron has no soul.
jwest
@Mark S.:
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Now the electoral college, that is another story. The electoral college map is grim reading for the GOP because of the states they’d need to pick up to win.
You should pass your information along to Gallop. They seem to think that Obama is in big trouble on a state by state basis.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/152372/Obama-Approval-Above-States-2011.aspx?utm_source=alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=syndication&utm_content=morelink&utm_term=Politics%20-%20Presidential%20Job%20Approval
Here is how those number look on a map:
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/gallup-state-numbers-predict-huge-obama-loss/352881
Samara Morgan
i TOLD you.
that colorado would fuck Mitt up.
us coloradoans hates teh polygs.
Chyron HR
@jwest:
So are you illiterate, or are you just too stupid to tell the difference between an approval rating poll and an election poll?
Samara Morgan
America is just not ready for a mormon president.
Mormonism is too weird.
jwest
@Chyron HR:
Are you familiar with the reelect rate for incumbents who have an approval number below 50%?
Apparently not.
Mark B
@Chyron HR: The notion that Obama has to be over 50% approval in a state to win it is kind of laughable. He’s not running against the generic disapproval numbers, he’s going to be running against a specific Republican candidate. One that’s guaranteed to have higher negatives than him almost everywhere.
That’s the real story of this election. Obama would be vulnerable if he wasn’t running against some of the worst looking opposition since Ali fought Wepner.
Mark B
Another thing to note is that Obama’s approval numbers are trending upwards, and he hasn’t even begun to campaign yet. I suspect he’s going to be well over 50% by November.
jwest
The idea that Obama has any chance at reelection is so naïve that it’s breathtaking.
toujoursdan
@Mark B:
That, and we don’t even know who Obama’s running against. Romney’s negatives are pretty high and if he picks an uber-Christianist VP to bring in that wing of the party, the negatives will probably go higher. If Santorum or Gingrich lead the pack, it will be a shoo-in.
rikryah
I think it’s hilarious. they simply don’t like Willard. Every chance they get, they keep on telling the GOP that they don’t like him.
BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Tom Q
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: For the record, McCain’s final percentage in ’08 was 45.60%, so he was pretty close to hugging the floor you posit. And he was a candidiate who, at least at one point, was seen as having cross-party credentials, so he may have out-performed the party metrics. Four years’ worth of demographic shift — all favoring Dems — should lower the base further. I wouldn’t assume anything higher than 43-44% as a GOP baseline for this election. (And Santorum or Gingrich could push that further, as McGovern pushed the Dems way below their assumed base in ’72)
I do agree the Electoral College is different than it was for FDR/LBJ/Nixon/Reagan. The upside for Dems is, they have the clear edge thanks to NY/IL/CA — the GOP needs to thread the needle, picking up FL/OH/some of the Southwest states to narrowly prevail (as Bush did). The downside is, 15 3-5 point states in the mountains and prairies, as well as the Goldwater/Wallace Southern states, will go Republican barring Satan himself as the candidate.
I’d say Teddy Roosevelt’s 1904 re-election is the model for Dem landslides today. He won by nearly 20%, but lost Southern states in massive landslides.
Gex
@Cluttered Mind: I’d be cautious about being happy to see that waves of Christian fascists can defeat a money candidate. Not sure I see that as a good thing.
Catsy
@Chyron HR:
Yeah, this. For an approval poll to have any kind of predictive value, you have to break it down to the level of knowing why someone disapproves–otherwise you end up including a lot of people who are upset because Obama isn’t liberal enough, or for some other reason that nevertheless means they’re more likely than not to vote for him anyway.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Tom Q:
Agreed. The electoral map today would be very familiar territory for TR, just with the labels switched around. That isn’t the only parallel between Obama and TR. The approach TR took to working with Congress during his 1st administration bears a close resemblence to what Obama has done so far.
You are correct on the percentages, revise my predicted 45% floor to 43%.
Oh, and just a reminder: DNFTT.
Gex
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: Sucks to be king of the red states, home to wide open tracts of land which as of yet, don’t add delegates to a state.
Eric S.
@General Stuck:
While I think this is true I don’t think that directly translates into goopers staying home in November. They hate Obama for dozens of reasons that have been laid out here and elsewhere for a long time now. As much as a good portion of GOP voters are going to hate the eventual nominee they are going to come out and vote for him to rid the U.S. of Obama.
McJulie
@Hal: He has to fight hard just to get people who will vote for him no matter what.
Furthering my impression that Romney is the Republican John Kerry — I felt like so much of his campaign was spent winning over people who were going to vote for him anyway. And he, too, was touted for his supposed “electability” more than for any other quality.
Which probably makes Gingrich the Republican Howard Dean. Dear FSM.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Catsy:
Yup. Along with good old fashioned random noise, an approval poll is mixing together three signals: (1) where does the political figure who is the subject of the poll sit on the policy/ideological spectrum relative to the electorate, (2) what personal charisma do they have (or lack) which appeals to folks regardless of ideology, and lastly how polarized is the electorate. We are used to assuming that the 3rd factor (polarization) is a constant and hence variation in the results of approval polls conducted from year to year and from administration to administration measure some combination of (1) and (2) only. I contend that whatever merit that interpretive assumption might have had a generation or more ago, it is no longer valid. The last two decades in US politics have been highly polarizing for a variety of reasons, e.g. under the impact of events and personalities, as a result of the rise of a conflict-driven news media, and as a consequence of the GOP’s Southern Strategy going to its logical end-point. As result of this heightened polarization I suspect that the old rules of thumb are less reliable than they were before, because of it. We do not yet know how a more polarized electorate will react to the re-election bid of a committed policy centrist like President Obama. That is one thing which we are going to find out this year.
colby
@jwest: When did we change the word “naive” to mean “backed up by solid reasoning, historical examples, and statistical data”?
Paul in KY
@Yevgraf: Excellent comparision. Maybe Satanum is a little better than Keyes at keeping the crazy under wraps. Also being white doesn’t hurt him either.
ksmiami
@handsmile: Not to mention that the more people see and hear Mittens, the more they loathe him. Maybe that uncanny valley thing is real… but I will have to ask Sully first
General Stuck
@Eric S.:
The base will show up to vote NO to Obama, which is okay, cause a Santorum nom would fire up our base even more, and send about all swing voters to Obama as well. Santorum is more toxic than even Gingrich, to the indies, and most all center left minded peeps. The guy lost by 18 points for his Senate reelection in PA. I watched several of his debates with Senator Casey and the guy is simply nuts. That loss was the greatest in history for an incumbent senator.
SRW1
Romney’s SuperPac is going to deluge little Ricky until he snaps for air.
Good thing to come out of that episode is that it will do wonders for the popularity of Citizen United among Teapublicans.
pseudonymous in nc
jwest: keeping the stupid going on the internets since 2000.
I’m going to predict a pyrrhic victory for Mittens, partly because of the amount of shit he has to rain down on states in order to win primaries, partly because ABR voters in states he loses won’t be best pleased when they find out that their state GOP decides to back Romney regardless of their votes.
Gus
Romney has boatloads of money and the support of the “establishment.” Losing a few caucus states where delegates aren’t even picked doesn’t mean much. So no, this doesn’t mean much.
Bruce S
Santorum is the new Bla..aahhh…ghh
The Dangerman
I’m beginning to wonder if Mitt will throw a Hail Mary (see Palin, Sarah) with the VP (as he’s still going to be the nominee). I mean WAY outside the box…
…so could Ron Paul actually be his pick?
The Paulites are fucking nuts, but they are committed nuts. Any and all bases of nuts might prove useful in this election.
priscianusjr
@JPL:
priscianusjr
@Betty Cracker:
priscianusjr
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor:
baldheadeddork
@jwest:
Not as big trouble as you or the Koch suckers at the Washington Examiner think. Yes, President Obama only had net positive approval in ten states for 2011. But those states punch way above their weight in electoral votes – 159 to be exact. That’s 30% of the total for the entire country and 60% of what you need to win the White House.
(That’s also more electoral votes than in the twenty states where Obama finished 2011 below 40%. The ten states where Obama is least popular have just 51 EV’s.)
It doesn’t get better for Republicans from there. Minnesota, Rhode Island, Washington and Oregon are safe for Democrats unless it’s a blowout. That takes it to 192. Then there is Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Maine, Ohio and Florida. The first four are solid blue (none have gone R since 1988) and the last are genuine swing states. But all six have wildly unpopular Republican governors thanks to the 2010 elections. The best of them (Corbitt in PA) is around 45%. Walker, Scott, Kasich and Snyder are looking up at 35%. That’s especially unhelpful for the Republicans because all of the GOP presidential candidates are promising to do for the country what these governors have done for their states. Tying the Republican nominee – whoever he is – to the governors in these states is going to be like tying McCain to Bush in 2008.
If Obama just carries those seven states like he did in 2008, it’s over. He will have only won 21 states so the map will be mostly red, overwhelmingly red by area, but it won’t matter.
And we haven’t gotten into the other states that are going to be in play, like Nevada, Colorado, and New Mexico (have fun with the Hispanic vote there) and states like Iowa and New Hampshire that have a clear pattern of leaning blue. Obama probably won’t win them all like he did in 2008, but he doesn’t have to. In an electoral vote map the R’s are still at a major disadvantage and will be until they can compete in the northeast, upper midwest and the west coast.
@jwest:
Looks pretty good to me. Since Eisenhower, four incumbent presidents running for re-election have had a <50% approval rating in Gallup for most (at least three quarters) of their third year. Three (Nixon, Reagan and Clinton) won re-election. The only one who didn't come back to win was Carter, and his approval numbers were far below Obama's.
Incumbent presidents usually see their lowest first term poll numbers during their third year. Disappointment over campaign promises not kept reach their peak, the opposition is beginning to attack in earnest, and everyone begins talking about the next election. It takes something exceptional to break that trend, like the Iranian hostage crisis in Carter's term and the recession that hit George HW Bush in 1992.
But if those extraordinary events don't happen, the incumbent always gets significantly stronger in the election year. Part of this is leveraging the advantage of incumbency in the campaign, but a bigger part is getting a defined opponent. It's easy for voters in the third year to tell a pollster they'd prefer a generic R or D over the guy they have now, but when you make it a specific opponent and put them through a bruising primary, it usually benefits the incumbent.
You can see this in the Gallup numbers. Nixon, Reagan and Clinton all saw their approval ratings climb between 7-10 percentage points in their re-election year. Two of those three who were below 50% for most of the year before went on to win historic blowouts, and even Clinton beat Dole by 220 EV's.