It’s hard to overstate just how badly Mitt Romney did in South Carolina. He was supposed to win, and win pretty easily. Instead, he got clobbered – Gingrich outperformed even the most optimistic (for him) polls and won by 12%.
To get a sense of how extraordinary Romney’s collapse was, take a look at this summary of all the polling in South Carolina since the beginning of the year:
Up until about five days ago, Romney was still ahead, even though his lead was slowly shrinking. And then, rather suddenly, the wheels came off: Romney kept botching questions about his tax returns, Gingrich turned in a couple of solid debate performances, and bam – Romney’s stock sank like a stone.
So now, on to Florida. Romney still has way more money, and Florida is a big, expensive state. But Gingrich can expect to see a lot of money pour in after tonight’s results, and, perhaps more importantly, he is motivated in a way that he wasn’t earlier in the cycle: after what Romney did to him in Iowa, Gingrich wants nothing more than to destroy Mitt Romney’s political career.
Pass the popcorn.
Al says
to do the dirty fighting for him. He’s fighting against an opponent who relishes the dirty, down in the trenches battles, and is good at it. Mitt, when he has to get involved himself, stammers when trying to be aggressive. It doesn’t play well. If you want the job, you have to fight for it yourself. You can’t pay others to do this dirty work for you.
jconway says
Remember though, before he ran for office he loved paying others to do the dirt work for him.
Mark L. Bail says
President on the Republican ticket is you have to be nominated by Republican voters. And they’re freakin’ nuts!
I have no idea what will happen. There are 2286 delegates up for grabs. A candidate needs to get 1,144 to win the party nomination. Mitt can win the states with sane voters (i.e., the Northeast), I think. He can probably win California and a good chunk of the Midwest.
It will be interesting to see what happens to the Glove in the big states like Texas which has about 140 delegates up for grabs or 155, depending on your source. If he loses Florida, he’s in trouble. I think we can look forward to an interesting GOP convention for a change. Newt doesn’t like to lose and Mitt never had to (his ill-fated senate race was a political victory).
sabutai says
Something that stands out is that Florida is winner-take-all in delegates. It is also a closed primary. Paul is skipping the state, but Santorum remains Romney’s best friend.
jbxx says
It’s great to see the ol’ Hindenberg again…I missed it.
lynne says
I knew it would make an appearance soon! Thanks for satisfying my craving!
lynne says
I think the biggest thing is the narrowing of the choices that has happened. Of course, most of the narrowing came with the self-immolation of most of the rest of the candidates…but the not-Romney field used to be huge, and now it’s only medium-sized.
Yeah, sure, there’s still votes divided up between the three legs of the non-establishment conservatives – libertarian, religious, and looneytunes – but there used to be 6 or so competing for those. In a race where Romney can’t seem to get above a 25-30% ceiling on support, you can still divide the vote a bit and see someone else win.
I am dying laughing at the complete turnaround in the media narrative…a 180 from “inevitable” to “imploding.” I mean, this is Mittsy’s last stand here, and he wants it so badly, and has for so long, and poof! he might lose his best chance. (Of course, he’s losing his chance at being the sacrificial lamb that has to go up against Obama under a damaged Republican brand, but still.)
Weird to me is that the normal pattern, where the religeo/paleocon/libertarian (take your pick) supahstah outsider looks about to rise far enough to take the nomination by storm, to be crushed by the Republican establishment whose “turn it is” (Bush over McCain in 2000, McCain over Huckabee et al in 2008, etc)…that pattern seems to have lost its power. I mean, Republican primaries were utterly predictable prior to this. Now, it’s probably still going to be Romney…a limping, bleeding Romney…but we’re really not so sure. If he keeps flubbing up his responses to the nonscripted things coming at him (tax returns, being in the 1%, Bain history)…if he can’t get his shit together…well. It’s anyone’s guess then.
The Republican party is reaping what it sowed when it took the House in 2010 and totally empowered the crazy wing of the party. Now they think they’re entitled to actually win stuff! And the rest of America goes, WTF? These people don’t represent what I believe in! All the moderates run far, far away.
Just when I think the Republicans can go no further right, or get any more cartoony, they push it further. I can’t help thinking, is there going to BE a moment where they examine the situation and pull back for the sake of elect-ability? Of course, by now (given where they stand on the issues and how far off the path of what most Americans want they really are, despite the claim they make that they represent the majority) I would have thought they’d start losing on a regular basis. As long as lunatic strategy gets them a few wins, they’ll keep at it. Once they start losing…will they still cling to it? How far will it go?? (People like us hopes it goes as far as the Republican party in MA, which cannot even undo the Dem supermajority in the state house, and which has been dealt so many blows on statewide offices, too, due to lack of a bench.)