Remember when I was writing all those posts about the possibility of a brokered convention for the Republicans? The premise was that Romney would never be able to close the deal and that Republican voters would vacillate between Romney and at least two other candidates. Whenever Romney won something, the base would rebel and go running to an alternative. When that alternative proved unpalatable, they’d move to another alternative. When the second alternative proved odious, they’d go back to Romney. And the cycle would repeat long enough that no single candidate would win a majority of the delegates.
Whether or not that winds up happening, it’s clear tonight that the GOP base does not want Romney. Once they think about Santorum for a while, they won’t want him either. They didn’t want Gingrich after they had time to think about his victory in South Carolina.
What we need is for this cycle to go around for a few more cycles.
Romney will probably win the nomination but he is coming in third place tonight in Colorado and Minnesota. Rick Santorum is winning in those two contests, but he’s also winning in the beauty contest in Missouri in a landslide.
The rest of February will be spent discussing what’s wrong with Mitt Romney.
I still think Rickrolled is the better term – a short interruption in the usual programming that people will find amusing for a little while before it is relegated to its proper spot as a hilarious internet meme.
Are you sure?
I think you are cementing my case!
I just heard Rick Santorum’s speech where he says something to the crowd about Obama “thinks he’s smarter than you.” Umm – he is.
Tonight Mittens is learning that no matter how much money you spend you can’t make people “really” like you.
Wasn’t Romney supposed to kick ass in Colorado? But isn’t Colorado also home to a fair chunk of Talibangelicals? Colorado Springs and that area?
Yes, yes, and yes.
In hindsight, Romney never should have allowed Colorado to be set up as his firewall last night.
Apparently voters in Minnesota and Colorado and Missouri have zero dignity or self-respect.
At least cracker-assed South Carolinians could say they were rolling with their neo-Confederate brother-in-arms, but for tens of thousands of people to throw a collective temper tantrum and willingly vote for Rick Santorum?
Jesus. That’s not rock-bottom. That’s the center of the earth’s core.
I always figured the Republican Party would die only once independents got fed up with the insanity, and who knows when that would finally be? But now I think it’s gonna come due much, much sooner. Because their own officeholders, those who aren’t touched with fanatical madness themselves, must be terrified to death of their own voters. Crazy, crazy, desperate people.
Obama already won a higher percentage of women voters in 2008 than anybody not named Ronald Reagan in 1984. What percentage would he earn this year if the GOP is insane enough to nominate Santorum?
60%? 65%? 138%?
I’d find this all a lot funnier if the specter of right wing violence didn’t always hang over great progressive leaders of our time. I always prefer if they think they’ve got a shot in the political process instead.
I don’t know how they’re breaking delegate apportionment down this year, except that some early states are apparently using proportional representation and some later ones are still winner-take-all. But as of this moment, I wonder what the delegate count is. Santorum has now won four states, Mitt three, and Newt one. I just can’t buy into the inevitability argument for Mitt. I think the wingnuts are spoiling to take this to a floor fight, and they’ll do it.
This doesn’t include tonight’s results, since they aren’t official. Also remember that tonight’s primary in Missouri didn’t mean anything.
Delegate Tracker
why people thought Romney was a shoe in for the nomination.
The Republican rank and file simply do not want to nominate him.
The question is whether Santorum can marginalize Gingrich in Arizona and Michigan, and get to a one on one race with Romney. It should be obvious at this point that Ron Paul is helping Romney at this point.
So lets play a game: how big a bounce does Santorum get? Gingrich got a 30 point bounce of South Carolina into Florida which faded. He got a 27 point bounce in the National polling. As I wrote at Dkos in 2007, the average bounce out of New Hampshire for a non-front runner in National polling is 30 points, and Obama got a 26 point swing from his win in South Carolina.
So here is the average of the last 3 polls:
Romney 36.3, Gingrich 24.33333333, Santorum 16.66666667 Paul 12.5
If I plug in the Obama data and the data from other bounces, I get this:
Romney 31, Santorum 30, Gingrich 18, Paul 10
This might be conservative.
s the average of the last 3 national polls:
Well I didn’t either…but I figured it’d be Bachmann rather than Santorum. And I never thought Gingrich seriously wanted to win (still don’t).
than Bachman.
I do think Gingrich wanted it, though.
Santorum scares me more than Romney.
A better pol, yes, but from the outset her fundraising should have been monstrous if her House numbers were any predictor. They weren’t lol. I didn’t think Rick would raise much of anything, so I thought he’d be gone quick. He got lucky by being the last one to gain momentum at the right moment in time, really.
though I think Santorum found his voice when he went after Romneycare in the second debate.
Both Santorum and Gingrich are lucky: they are running against someone their party doesn’t want.
It’s a charade. The conventions will go for Romney. Not many Republican primaries are binding. They are just for media coverage and PR to make you think there is a horse race.
and I would note Santorum is killing Romney in a caucus state.
The convention will go for Romney, but it ain’t gonna be pretty.
wow, GOP Chair says that Santorum won the caucus in CO.
BWHAHAHAHAHAHA!
I thought caucuses were supposed to be Paul’s strong suit? Is he going to win anything?
Is he going to win anything?
Besides in AG’s dreams? No!!!!
Bet on it. Watch.
NO, NO, NO.
That’s wrong.
You should have said:
Bet on it.
Watch.
For AG, the spaces say it all. The content is always minimal, the spacing is all.
Bet on it.
Watch.
Wake!
The fuck.
Up!
For some reason, this reminded of this clip:
.
Dr. Paul won 5 counties in Minnesota vs Romney zero!
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."I think the rest of February is going to be spent making not particularly clever ass-juice jokes.
At least, that’s what I’m gonna be doing.
Don’t be such a brown stamp.
I’m waiting for the followers to toss Mitt altogether for any one of the hundreds of reasons and choose to band behind Rick all the while saying, ‘I’d rather lose to Obama with a candidate who has his conservative creds intact than a guy who compromises my principles with double talk’
It was hard last night not to hear “MONEY” playing in the halls of the DNC headquarters as they added up the millions wasted on Romney. Whether or not his run has depleted the SuperPac hoarde, this has to be playing out as a much more costly venture than they originally estimated. Team morale and all.
Good grief, the GOP nominating process so far has been like watching a bad marriage of convenience between fundamentally incompatible folks finally fall apart in public, complete with screaming fights, running to friends for support, and meltdowns into desperation and despair. Whose side will long-time friends take in the split? Or will they just walk away from the whole mess in disgust? And what will the neighbors say?
Can this marriage be saved?
HA!
And Citizens United money makes it possible for even the nuttiest relatives to takes sides VERY LOUDLY.
With luck, we are headed for a giant, messy divorce, Dodgers-style.