Romney, Gingrich battle could drag for months
Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images
The much-hyped Iowa caucuses are just a few weeks away, but that doesn't mean you should expect the fight for the Republican presidential nomination to be over anytime soon.
Consider some simple math. Between the four states where there will be primaries and caucuses in January, only 115 delegates will be decided: 28 in Iowa (January 3), 12 in New Hampshire (January 10), 25 in South Carolina (January 21) and 50 in Florida (January 31).
There are a total of 2,285 delegates available - nearly 20 times as many delegates as will be allocated in January. In Texas alone - where the primacy is currently set for March, though it could be moved back - there are 155 delegates to be had. And there are more delegates to be had in June - 405 - than the 311 there are to be had in January and February combined.
That doesn't mean that the early states aren't important - the momentum that a candidate can earn from winning both New Hampshire and Iowa, which translates into a flood of fundraising and positive media coverage, can be enough to propel him or her the nomination. But it does mean that we should keep those contests in perspective.
There's another important factor to consider as well. New rules adopted by Republicans mandate that delegates awarded before April 1 be distributed on a proportional basis, which will make it harder for a frontrunner to deliver a knockout blow with winner-take-all victories in the early states. A candidate who wins just 15 percent of the vote in a state will be able to add to his or her delegate count.
It's a situation that has Mitt Romney settling in for a long slog to the nomination.
"I'd like to close real early but my experience is, particularly with delegates being awarded on a proportional basis, why who knows how long it could go?" he said this week. "We're prepared to go on a nice, long, successful campaign."
That followed comments in Arizona last week, where Romney predicted "[t]his will probably take longer than a week or two to sort out."
"My expectation is that this is going to be a campaign that's going to go on for a while, and I expect to win it," he added.
Romney is currently better positioned for a drawn-out fight than his main rival for the nomination, Newt Gingrich, who is struggling to close the gap on Romney when it comes to fundraising and organization. (The risks of Gingrich's last minute push were illustrated Tuesday when his new Iowa political director was forced out for suggesting evangelicals are ready to help God "expose the cult of Mormon.")
But Gingrich is currently leading in the polls, and he could easily leverage momentum from early state victories into the resources he needs to battle Romney into March and beyond. (Funding Gingrich during this period will be both direct donations to his campaign and the two SuperPACs that are supporting him, which can spend unlimited money on his behalf.) In addition, Ron Paul is poised to leverage the generosity of his passionate supporters to stay in the contest for the long haul, building up delegates and complicating the frontrunners' efforts to put each other away.
It's unclear whether a long primary battle will ultimately help or hurt the Republican nominee. President Obama's re-election team has been arguing that it will be damaging, because it will force the candidates to play to the right in a way that will alienate moderate voters. Senior Obama campaign strategist David Axelrod told reporters this week that "the longer this race goes, the more you are going to see these Republican candidates mortgage their general election campaign to win the nomination."
Yet there is a case to be made that a long fight could help the eventual nominee -- with perhaps the best piece of evidence being Mr. Obama's long battle for the 2008 Democratic nomination against Hillary Clinton.
It's certainly true a long primary fight would mean that Republican candidates spend the spring focused on each other, not Mr. Obama, potentially inflicting significant damage on each other while the president sharpens his message and campaign operation. But a long primary fight also focuses media attention on the candidates, gets primary voters engaged, and allows them to go through the difficult skirmishes that make them a better candidate in the long run. It also can translate into a significant uptick in voters registering with the party in order to cast ballots, which could pay significant dividends in a general election.
And particularly for the unpredictable Gingrich - who many Republicans fear will self-destruct on the campaign trail due to his penchant for off-the-cuff comments - a long primary fight is an opportunity to put to rest fears that he would be a disastrous general election candidate. Indeed, Republicans may well be far more comfortable with Gingrich as their nominee if he proves himself over a course of months against Romney instead of wrapping up the nomination in the early states.
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more laws that destroy the constitution (Obama just signed the NDAA)
More printing of money by the Federal reserve to pay for all their bureaucracy
More corporate bailouts to their campaign donors
More of business as usual.
The one candidate who is actually LEADING in Iowa by at least 4 percentage points at 23 percent, is RON PAUL!!!!
People, if Ron Paul wasn't a treat to the lesser of two evils, why would they black him out. think critically now, read his policies and look at hos perfect record.
Take your country back. Or keep trusting the corporate state media. Its your choice. But NEVER COMPLAIN AGAIN if you don't give Dr. Paul a thorough comparative look.
Ron Paul 2012!
We normally only consider the candidates placed right in front of us by the mainstream corporate-owned media, even though those candidates made themselves visible by taking legal bribes (campaign contributions). And then we complain about how the politicians we elect answer to the people whose money made them visible.
We should use imagination and initiative to search for alternative candidates. We don't have to wait for anyone to change the campaign finance system. Let's just refuse to vote for any candidate backed by big money. That denies power to the source of that money, bypassing the need for reform (and the lobbyists who would stop that reform because their jobs would be threatened).
It's satisfying to deny consent to the existing system by voting that way.
Voters in primary elections should insist on voting for such a candidate, if their party has one available. There are some politicians who take very little money from any sources except individuals; Texas Congressman Ron Paul allegedly is one of them, and he's the most famous current example that I know of. If you must vote within the two party system, then candidates like him are a good choice.
Maybe the media aren't ignoring Ron Paul as a conspiracy; maybe the media decision makers just assume his views are too radical and that his lack of wealthy supporters means he has no chance. He won't be doing big advertising buys from them, because he doesn't accept the influence of powerful interests!
But if no candidate like that wins the primary for either major party, my strategy would require voting for neither Democrats nor Republicans. Other parties' candidates still appear on ballots. It does not matter which candidate, because that candidate will not win the election. It's OK to vote for a goofball or weirdo.
If more people start voting for those outside party weirdos you see on ballots, it becomes more likely that sensible independent candidates will emerge in various elections. Then we can vote for those people. Also, that will pressure the two main political parties to adapt to voter preferences more than big campaign donors would like.
That 3rd party strategy has a risk of splitting the liberal vote between two candidates (as happened with Ralph Nader) or the conservative vote between two candidates (as happened with Ross Perot). The best outsider candidate would be a centrist who can steal votes equally from both parties. And that risk is another reason it would be so much better for both Democratic and Republican primary voters to select nominees who don't take any form of influence money.
Lack of change results from almost everyone voting for either Democrat or Republican mainstream candidates. Why do we just jump back and forth, voting one or the other into office? By now it's clear that that won't change anything.
Why should we forget about the past harm they've done? It's not like that harm was accidental; it was the result of both responding to lobbying and acting based on party ideology. We should assume that politicians of both parties will repeat some of their past harmful actions.
Voters should stop focusing only on candidates who are visible in debates and TV ads. Unless a candidate is extremely wealthy, to be visible he/she has to work within the two parties' systems and to take campaign contributions from powerful interests.
Enough people voted for Republicans in 2010 to give them a House majority, while we were still suffering from the economic consequences of Republican policies. We got rid of them only two years before that. What about Republicans had changed in two years, that we should trust them? Nothing. Their bad deeds merit their permanent banishment from public office, unless they are taking no special interest money. Though voting for Democrats in 2008 was questionable also, because they contributed to those same problems.
Some voters were seduced by Obama's charisma or saw his election as a chance to break down a racial barrier; they did not insist that he offer real solutions before voting for him. They were kind of like the voters who elected George W. Bush in spite of his indifference to facts and policy.
There's a saying: "In every democracy, the people get the government they deserve". We're getting abused because we choose the wrong representatives. It's our fault, and it's our responsibility to change that.
I have stopped watching, listening to and reading anything that comes out of any politicians mouth until maybe October 2012.
By that time they may have figured out that any incumbent stands very little chance of being re-elected.
From now until then they are going to continue to tell you what they think you want to hear and lie their socks off.
Don't waste your time and lower your electric bill at the same time.
Ron Paul is in a statistical tie with Newt Gingrich in the latest Iowa Poll(he is at 21 percent), with Mitt Romney at 16 percent.
Ron Paul is at third in New Hampshire, as well. Given an Iowa win(which is looking very likely at this point), his chances at taking New Hampshire increase as well.
Yet, you don't mention that. You are not a valid media source, as a media source presents the facts; something you apparently are unable to do. You are pathetic.
RON PAUL 2012
VOTE FOR AMERICA'S SURVIVAL