The 2012 GOP primary race; Illinois today

2012 GOP primary race–today, Illinois

 

Romney in Chicago

Today, the Illinois primary. Puerto Rico went as expected for Mitt Romney, or better—since he won all the delegates there—and Missouri results are held in a murk, not to be clarified until April. The prevalent question surrounding the Illinois primary is how well Romney will do. Illinois has abundant metropolitan and suburban areas, with enough population to allow some division among Romney, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul without putting Rick Santorum over the top in the state. As to campaign tactics, the primary will reflect whether the Romney team has drafted an appeal sufficient to cut into Santorum’s predictable success among down-staters and non-suburbanites.

Santorum

Actually, Illinois delegates are supposed to be allocated according to a mixed formula, too, so Missouri may not be the last question mark leading to the GOP convention in Tampa.

 

Report on PACs 2012

Reminder from the previous post–this ruling by the U.S. District Court in Northern Illinois last week allows more room to spend for some PACs. The court ruled March 13 that two provisions of the Campaign Disclosure Act do not apply to PACs formed for the sole purpose of making independent contributions.

Recapping, from the Illinois State Board of Elections:

“This ruling has no effect on any political committee other than one formed SOLELY for making independent expenditures.
Contribution limits are still in effect for Candidate Political Committees, Political Party Committees, and Political Action Committees which make coordinated expenditures or direct contributions to candidates or committees. The ruling allows an entity formed for the purpose of making independent expenditures ONLY, to create a Political Action Committee that is not bound by contribution limits . . .”

This ruling allows an entity to have more than one Political Action Committee, provided the second committee is an Independent-Expenditure-Only PAC created only to make independent expenditures . . . The committee created to make independent expenditures only, is not subject to contribution limits . . .”

Disclosure of substantial contributions is still required, but within 30 days. Since that 30 days (since the ruling) have not elapsed, the public does not know at election time which candidates if any have benefited from PAC contributions since the recent ruling.

 

*Run-down of contests by metro-versus-rural metric, re-posted

  • Missouri March 17 Santorum, 52 delegates
  • Puerto Rico March 18 Romney, 23 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • Illinois March 20 Romney, 69 delegates
  • Louisiana March 24 Close three-way race, one of Santorum’s better hopes, 46 delegates Proportional
  • DC April 3 Romney, 19 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • Maryland April 3 Romney, 37 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Wisconsin April 3 Maybe Santorum, 42 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Connecticut April 24 Romney, 28 delegates Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Delaware April 24 Romney, 17 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • New York April 24 Romney, 95 delegates Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Pennsylvania April 24 Romney, 72 delegates
  • Rhode Island April 24 Romney, 19 delegates Proportional
  • Indiana May 8 Santorum, 46 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • North Carolina May 8 Close three-way, something for Santorum, 55 delegates Proportional
  • West Virginia May 8 Santorum, 31 delegates Proportional
  • Nebraska May 15 Santorum, 35 delegates
  • Oregon May 15 Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates Proportional
  • Arkansas May 22 Santorum, 36 delegates Proportional/mixed
  • Kentucky May 22 Santorum, 45 delegates Proportional
  • Texas May 29 Romney/Gingrich, 155 delegates Proportional
  • California June 5 Romney, 172 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Montana June 5 Maybe Santorum, 26 delegates
  • New Jersey June 5 Romney, 50 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • New Mexico June 5 Romney, 23 delegates Proportional
  • South Dakota June 5 Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates Proportional
  • Utah June 26 Romney, 40 delegates Winner-take-all statewide

 

more later

Update primary election night:

It was looking awfully good for Mitt Romney for an hour and a half after polls closed in Illinois at 8:00 ET. Romney had a two-to-one lead over Rick Santorum for a while; Fox News called the state for Romney by 8:37. Other networks and channels followed suit soon after. Wisely, Romney came out and gave his victory speech rather early. Good thing for him he did; when he signed off with a farewell wave and another hug to his wife at 9:31, he was down to 50 percent.

The question now is how much below 50 percent Romney will sag in Illinois, as down-state results favoring Santorum continue to come in. At 9:36 he was down to 49 percent.  Santorum entered to begin his speech soon after, in Pennsylvania, where he is campaigning instead of in Louisiana, Newt Gingrich’s current venue.

Another question, of course, is exactly how Illinois’s delegates will be apportioned.

Weekend further shaping the 2012 primaries

2012, and how the GOP primary race has been shaped

The weekend has brought its partial results. With the vote from Puerto Rico in Sunday, Romney gets the delegates there.* Missouri held caucuses on Saturday, reportedly to a mix of amusement and anger, but results will not be announced until April. The New York Daily News reported Rick Santorum ahead. Ron Paul supporters, au contraire, are claiming that Paul won 48 of 53 delegates at stake.

 

Santorum at podium

Apparently the Show-Me State is not to be shown, at least not if the state GOP maintains its hold over procedure. By all accounts, Paul’s people and Romney’s people shared the field, both having spent serious time and effort organizing rather than on campaigning. What happens to Santorum’s earlier victory in the non-binding primary remains to be seen. (Paul said at the time that it was meaningless.)

 

Ron Paul

The weekend also brought some clarity in the national political press, now not claiming with one voice that the GOP primary race is between a ‘moderate’ and a ‘conservative’. More sensibly, GOP primary voters are defined according to a contest of greater population density versus less. As previously written, the GOP primaries have divided Romney-Santorum-Gingrich-Paul voters so far according to rural appeal versus metropolitan/suburban appeal. Santorum has taken most of the less populated counties, and he has taken states where rural and small-town counties and congressional districts outweigh metropolitan areas and suburbs. In this metric, as said, Santorum has been facing a divided field, because he has the left-overs all to himself. Romney, Gingrich and Paul have been dividing the more populated areas.

 

Illinois countryside

Up next: Illinois.

 

Illinois has its wide-open stretches, but former Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell has pointed out that Santorum has a track record (this year) of almost winning the large industrial states—Ohio, Michigan. If Santorum maintains the same pattern in Illinois, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, he will continue to pick up delegates but not states won. Tomorrow’s primary will show whether Romney has begun to cut into Santorum’s predictable success among the non-suburbanites in Illinois, whether Santorum is able to generate enough outrage is get out the Romney/Gingrich vote, whether Santorum can convey enough despair to convert more GOPers to Dems, etc.

 

A few of the Illinois suburbs

It is theoretically possible that Santorum might get about a third of Illinois’s 69 delegates. That gets a little harder to see, following this ruling by the U.S. District Court there last week, which helpfully allows more leverage than ever for some PACs. On March 13, the court ruled that two provisions of the Campaign Disclosure Act do not apply to PACs formed for the sole purpose of making independent contributions.

 

I like that word ‘independent’.

From the Illinois State Board of Elections:

“This ruling has no effect on any political committee other than one formed SOLELY for making independent expenditures.

Contribution limits are still in effect for Candidate Political Committees, Political Party Committees, and Political Action Committees which make coordinated expenditures or direct contributions to candidates or committees. The ruling allows an entity formed for the purpose of making independent expenditures ONLY, to create a Political Action Committee that is not bound by contribution limits. That Political Action Committee, which will be designated as an Independent-Expenditure-Only PAC, must still register with the SBE and must file all required disclosure documents when it reaches the $3000 filing threshold. It must report all receipts and expenditures and itemize those in excess of $150 on its quarterly reports. It must file a Schedule A-1 within 5 or 2 business days, (depending on when the contribution is received) whenever it receives a contribution of $1000 or more. It must also file a Schedule B-1 within 5 business days when it makes an aggregate of $1000 in independent expenditures within the 30 days prior to an election.”

This ruling allows an entity to have more than one Political Action Committee, provided the second committee is an Independent-Expenditure-Only PAC created only to make independent expenditures. Such committee may NOT make direct contributions or coordinated expenditures. The committee created to make independent expenditures only, is not subject to contribution limits; the Political Action Committee making direct contributions IS STILL subject to contribution limits. A Political Action Committee making direct contributions may also make independent expenditures without forming a second PAC, but it must still abide by the contribution limits.”

 

So if your political purpose, or strategy, is only to spend money on behalf of [whatever], you are free of two more modest limitations.

Not yet known how many candidates RomneyRomneyRomney have benefited from PACs formed since this ruling, which happens to come just one week before the Illinois primary.

 

Onward

 

Up March 24: Louisiana.

The Louisiana primary will be interesting. We’ll see Saturday whether Romney, Gingrich and Paul have made enough inroads around New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Bossier City, etc., to offset Santorum’s advantage in the places where newspapers don’t get. Santorum’s policies would be devastating to small towns, rural areas and the Gulf Coast in general. But Santorum–whose lobbying clients have not spared those regions—is on the campaign trail blaming everything bad on lack of development, euphemized as ‘jobs’, and on President Obama. It’s dismal to see, but it works, especially in combination with the factor of race.

 

My next post on Louisiana will be from there.

 

 

*Run-down of the remaining contests by metro-versus-rural metric, re-posted

  • Missouri March 17 Santorum, 52 delegates
  • Puerto Rico March 18 Romney, 23 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • Illinois March 20 Romney, 69 delegates
  • Louisiana March 24 Close three-way race, one of Santorum’s better hopes, 46 delegates Proportional
  • DC April 3 Romney, 19 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • Maryland April 3 Romney, 37 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Wisconsin April 3 Maybe Santorum, 42 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Connecticut April 24 Romney, 28 delegates Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Delaware April 24 Romney, 17 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • New York April 24 Romney, 95 delegates Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Pennsylvania April 24 Romney, 72 delegates
  • Rhode Island April 24 Romney, 19 delegates Proportional
  • Indiana May 8 Santorum, 46 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • North Carolina May 8 Close three-way, something for Santorum, 55 delegates Proportional
  • West Virginia May 8 Santorum, 31 delegates Proportional
  • Nebraska May 15 Santorum, 35 delegates
  • Oregon May 15 Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates Proportional
  • Arkansas May 22 Santorum, 36 delegates Proportional/mixed
  • Kentucky May 22 Santorum, 45 delegates Proportional
  • Texas May 29 Romney/Gingrich, 155 delegates Proportional
  • California June 5 Romney, 172 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Montana June 5 Maybe Santorum, 26 delegates
  • New Jersey June 5 Romney, 50 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • New Mexico June 5 Romney, 23 delegates Proportional
  • South Dakota June 5 Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates Proportional
  • Utah June 26 Romney, 40 delegates Winner-take-all statewide

Target demographics and the 2012 GOP race

Target demographics in 2012–How the GOP primary race has been shaped

Reluctant as I am to post on a beautiful Saturday morning in March Madness (the wearing o’ the green worked its magic a day early this year)–still, a new Gallup poll out yesterday reinforces the previous post.

So, following up–

Recapping, the argument for pushing Newt Gingrich out of the GOP primary race has been that eliminating Gingrich would set up a one-on-one, disregarding Ron Paul, between a ‘moderate’ and a ‘genuine conservative’. Some who voice this think that Rick Santorum would then beat Mitt Romney.

The first part of that rationale—that anyone could seriously represent Romney as moderate–is the more fundamental problem. Romney, Gingrich and Santorum all represent trickle-down. Some slight variation on social issues, if any, affects only their ability to represent their counter-constructive rich-get-richer economic/monetary policy. It does not affect the policy itself.

Trickle-down theory explained

But this post continues to address the second part—the idea that Santorum would beat Romney one-on-one. As previously written, with or without Gingrich, the GOP contest would still be a contest of greater population density versus less population density, for the most part. The GOP primaries have established that the dividing line for the Romney-Santorum-Gingrich-Paul foursome is rural appeal versus metropolitan/suburban appeal. Santorum has taken more of the less populated counties, and he has taken states where rural and small-town counties and congressional districts outweigh metropolitan areas and suburbs, the most prominent example being Alabama and Mississippi.

Thus in this metric it is Santorum, not Romney, who has been contending against a divided field. Romney, Gingrich and Paul have been dividing the more populated areas.

The candidates

Sure enough—and I consider my view vindicated, here—a new Gallup poll of Gingrich voters released Friday shows that Santorum would not get a majority of them. If the poll is accurate, he would not get even a plurality. The poll, reported here and here and here and here among other places, is pretty definitive. In fact, most of the reporting thus far softens the result a bit. If Gingrich left the race, according to this snapshot, a hefty majority of his supporters would not go to Santorum: Santorum 39 percent, anyone else or no opinion 61 percent. Among named candidates, Romney would get according to the same poll 40 percent.  In other words, Santorum would get a minority of Gingrich voters.

Why would anyone be surprised at this?

GOP candidates explained

Back to the primary campaign

As previously written, there are more people in areas of greater population density than in areas of less population density. The race is not equal, and not only because of Romney’s vast financing and organization.

 

Romney's position on the auto industry bailout explained

Here is my previous thumbnail of the remaining contests, re-posted, with top finisher using the metric of population, and delegate allocation:

  • Missouri March 17 Santorum, 52 delegates
  • Puerto Rico March 18 Romney, 23 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • Illinois March 20 Romney, 69 delegates
  • Louisiana March 24 Close three-way race, one of Santorum’s better hopes, 46 delegates Proportional
  • DC April 3 Romney, 19 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • Maryland April 3 Romney, 37 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Wisconsin April 3 Maybe Santorum, 42 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Connecticut April 24 Romney, 28 delegates Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Delaware April 24 Romney, 17 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • New York April 24 Romney, 95 delegates Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Pennsylvania April 24 Romney, 72 delegates
  • Rhode Island April 24 Romney, 19 delegates Proportional
  • Indiana May 8 Santorum, 46 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • North Carolina May 8 Close three-way, something for Santorum, 55 delegates Proportional
  • West Virginia May 8 Santorum, 31 delegates Proportional
  • Nebraska May 15 Santorum, 35 delegates
  • Oregon May 15 Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates Proportional
  • Arkansas May 22 Santorum, 36 delegates Proportional/mixed
  • Kentucky May 22 Santorum, 45 delegates Proportional
  • Texas May 29 Romney/Gingrich, 155 delegates Proportional
  • California June 5 Romney, 172 delegates Winner-take-all combined
  • Montana June 5 Maybe Santorum, 26 delegates
  • New Jersey June 5 Romney, 50 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • New Mexico June 5 Romney, 23 delegates Proportional
  •  South Dakota June 5 Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates Proportional
  • Utah June 26 Romney, 40 delegates Winner-take-all statewide

 

In my view, Santorum’s best shot for the rest of the season comes in today’s Missouri caucuses. Much of Missouri is his kind of population, and Santorum won the non-binding primary there. It remains to be seen whether the organization of the caucuses will produce an outcome different from that of the primary, and if so by how much. His next best shot comes in Louisiana March 24. He is not doing well in Puerto Rico, where he traveled but immediately made English-first comments. The comments may set him up well for a good lobbying/circuit-speaking job after the campaign, in the K Street sector that sees a business opportunity in English-only resentments.

 

Santorum also has a chance, by the metric above, in other states including Indiana, West Virginia, Kentucky and maybe Wisconsin. But those states come later, the pattern dividing the GOP voting population will be more than apparent to the Romney campaign, and there is always some chance that the Romney people could adapt to it. They could try to reach the most scattered and isolated areas more effectively—Santorum’s policies would be at least as devastating to small towns, farms and rural areas as Romney’s, and his lobbying clients have not served those populations. Or they could more effectively turn out people who were going to vote for Romney/Gingrich anyway.

However, barring the unforeseen, at this point it still looks impossible for any candidate to win a majority of Republican delegates—1144—before the GOP national convention, even by effectively adapting to demographics. With proportional representation, all the candidates can pick up more delegates.

 

Note:

The foregoing aims only to assess outcomes, partially, by metrics. It should not be construed as supporting the aim of getting people to vote against their own interest, the basic drive of the GOP ticket in a national election. I oppose policies that harm this country and the world.

That said, I’m only human. It is impossible not to gawk at primaries devolving into a contest between man-on-dog and dog-on-van.

The 2012 GOP primaries–Delegate math and stupid ridicule

Math wins, numbers of voters still count in elections–open convention coming?

 

GOP candidates 2012

Another cluster of primaries, a new current argument about the GOP primary season. Now the question hovering over the political reporting is whether Newt Gingrich can be pummeled into getting out of the race. His sister suggests not. Candace Gingrich-Jones, in an excellent performance of The Accidental Activist, by Rebecca Gingrich-Jones, suggested that Gingrich is likely to stay in as long as he likes, which would be until Tampa. Q&A following the play did nothing to dispel the suggestion. Gingrich himself repeated yesterday, following the Mississippi and Alabama primaries, that he will stay in until the convention—“trying to make sure we have an open convention.” Gingrich Super PAC advisor Rick Tyler, reprising an appearance on MSNBC’s The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, backed him up. “We’ll just have it out at the convention.”

Candace Gingrich-Jones

Nonetheless, at the moment pushing Newt out of the race seems to be a first objective among the chattering classes, and they make no bones about overt displays of intent. The rationale remains oddly vague. The clearest version of an argument yet presented for muscling Gingrich out by commentary—or by ignoring him, which isn’t happening yet–seems to be that eliminating Gingrich would set up a one-on-one race (Ron Paul disregarded) between a more ‘moderate’ candidate and a ‘genuine conservative’. This line of thought is voiced explicitly by some arch-rightwing strategists on air and in print—who seem to think it follows as the night the day that Santorum will then beat Romney.

 

Santorum, family

There is something nasty about bullying and gang-ridiculing (even) Newt Gingrich, because he came in a close second in two southern states. The same gut response sets up when the same nominally intelligent people ridicule Mitt Romney for coming in a close third after trying out the local food and the local dialect in the South. Ridicule should be used against tyranny, against the powerful—not at the moment when you think you have the upper hand. Furthermore, you should ridicule as an individual, exercising skepticism as part of independent judgment. Lemmings don’t ridicule effectively. Neither do weathervanes. Furthermore again, ridicule should be used as a weapon on behalf of the defenseless. Ridicule candidates when they go along with torture and talk tough about bombing campaigns, not for superficialities.

Speaking of talking tough, does anyone ever ask Santorum about his military service?

But back to that Gingrich question, i.e. whether he can be pushed out of the primary contest by collective pressure from on-air and print commentators and political strategists—

 

And back to that rationale—

First, anyone who calls Romney a moderate, now, must be ignoring everything the candidate has said in the entire 2012 election cycle.* A contest between Romney and Santorum would not be a contest of moderate versus conservative.

With or without Gingrich, the GOP contest would still be a contest of greater population density versus less population density, for the most part. Vermont was an exception, and Utah is likely to be another; this is not an all-or-nothing picture. But the GOP primaries have established that the dividing line for the Romney-Santorum-Gingrich-Paul foursome is rural appeal versus metropolitan/suburban appeal.

As previously written, Santorum has had the less populated counties almost to himself, in most states, while the other candidates have been battling it out for more populated areas. Again, if the pattern holds, then Santorum should have an edge in states where sparsely populated congressional districts outweigh metropolitan districts.

That doesn’t mean an equal race. The number of votes is key in elections, even in these cynical times. Population is key, and—follow me closely here—population is greater in areas of greater population density than in areas of less population density. Let me repeat that, for the benefit of commentators and others (including Santorum) currently ridiculing the word “math”: there are more people in areas of greater population density than in areas of less population density. That comparison knocks out Texas, California and New York for Santorum, while possibly leaving in Missouri, Indiana and Nebraska. Doesn’t seem like an equal race.

Side note:

Why on earth doesn’t the Romney campaign just run a television ad with that clip of Santorum inveighing against birth control? Voice-over: “You really think this guy can beat President Obama?”

 

But back to the remaining 2012 primary season. Admittedly, the comparison of more populous regions to less is softened by proportional representation—which was intended partly to give rural counties and districts more of a say, as in the senate side of our bicameral legislature. In a number of the remaining contests, delegates are awarded according to proportions drawn up by the states. But several of the remaining states where Romney can be expected to win are winner-take-all, including California, New Mexico and New Jersey. Almost all of the states where Santorum can realistically hope to finish ahead are proportional-representation, Indiana being an exception and Wisconsin possibly. Even the New York primary is only modified proportional, though it is hard to see how any anti-birth-control candidate could do well there.

Here again is a run-down of the remaining contests, picking the top finisher using the metric of population, with their delegate allocation defined where feasible:

  • Missouri March 17  Santorum, 52 delegates
  • Puerto Rico March 18  Romney, 23 delegates  Winner-take-all statewide
  • Illinois March 20  Romney, 69 delegates
  • Louisiana March 24  Close three-way race, one of Santorum’s better hopes, 46 delegates  Proportional
  • DC April 3  Romney, 19 delegates  Winner-take-all statewide
  • Maryland April 3  Romney, 37 delegates  Winner-take-all combined
  • Wisconsin April 3  Maybe Santorum, 42 delegates  Winner-take-all combined
  • Connecticut April 24  Romney, 28 delegates  Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Delaware April 24  Romney, 17 delegates  Winner-take-all statewide
  • New York April 24  Romney, 95 delegates  Winner-take-all at 50%+
  • Pennsylvania April 24  Romney, 72 delegates
  • Rhode Island April 24  Romney, 19 delegates  Proportional
  • Indiana May 8  Santorum, 46 delegates  Winner-take-all combined
  • North Carolina May 8  Close three-way, something for Santorum, 55 delegates  Proportional
  • West Virginia May 8  Santorum, 31 delegates  Proportional
  • Nebraska May 15  Santorum, 35 delegates
  • Oregon May 15  Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates  Proportional
  • Arkansas May 22  Santorum, 36 delegates  Proportional/mixed
  • Kentucky May 22  Santorum, 45 delegates  Proportional
  • Texas May 29  Romney/Gingrich, 155 delegates  Proportional
  • California June 5  Romney, 172 delegates  Winner-take-all combined
  • Montana June 5  Maybe Santorum, 26 delegates
  • New Jersey June 5  Romney, 50 delegates Winner-take-all statewide
  • New Mexico June 5  Romney, 23 delegates  Proportional
  • South Dakota June  5  Maybe Santorum, 28 delegates Proportional
  • Utah June 26  Romney, 40 delegates Winner-take-all statewide

A lucid and simple statement: “It is virtually impossible for a candidate to win a majority of the Republican delegates before June 2012.”

 

Once again: Santorum has shown an advantage in rural areas, Romney/Gingrich in metro areas. Anyone who hypothesizes that Santorum could pick up another 800 to 900 delegates in the remaining states, with Gingrich out, is welcome to demonstrate how.

 

Sometimes it is difficult to understand how any analyst more concerned with ‘narrative’ than with accuracy got on television in the first place. On the other hand, maybe that’s how.

 

But even on their own terms, the narrative guys are being more than a tad inconsistent. There could be few more compelling stories in the GOP primary season than an open convention coming in Tampa—and that’s the one they choose to omit? By ridiculing ‘math’ and ‘delegate count’? What’s next—ridiculing spelling and grammar?

 

Former GOP Chairman Michael Steele, by the way, is  now talking openly about a “contested convention.”

 

 

 

* These are the same people who also assert that Romney will ‘tack to the middle’ in a general election campaign, if he gets the nomination, and that the American people will not listen until then anyway, and that he might well get away with it if he does, etc. They have a vested interest in a ‘close’ election, however contrary to the best interests of the public another close election would be. They tend to have the same vested interest every election. That’s why, throughout the eighties and nineties, we seldom got substantive issues raised in presidential election campaigns—and when they did get raised, the discussion typically conduced to an outcome at variance with the public interest.

The 2012 primaries have finally defined Santorum territory and Romney territory

The 2012 southern primaries yesterday marked a clear dividing line–finally

Santorum

If the GOP primaries have established a consistent pattern, it is that the dividing line for the Romney-Santorum-Gingrich threesome is rural appeal versus metropolitan/suburban appeal. Santorum has the less populated counties almost all to himself, in most states; Romney and Gingrich battle it out for the more populated areas. This pattern has been partly defined on the helpful late-election-night maps projected on CNN’s wall: in state after state, wide swaths of rural counties have gone to Santorum, often ultimately outnumbered by Romney’s pull in the suburbs of big cities. Mississippi and Alabama went Santorum’s way last night, less because they are ultra-conservative—after all, South Carolina and Georgia are the same–than because they lack the large populous areas that offset the less densely populated districts.

 

Gingrich

If the pattern holds for the upcoming primaries, then Santorum should have an edge in those states where the sparsely populated congressional districts outweigh metropolitan areas.

That knocks out Texas, California and New York.

 

Missouri countryside

But let’s try a quick run-down to guess the remaining 2012 primary season.

  • Missouri March 17. Next comes Missouri, where miles of beautiful green fields line the highways that get you through the state, the cities are not megalopoli, and caucuses take place Saturday. Missouri is Santorum terrain even aside from the fact that Santorum won the non-binding ‘beauty contest’ primary there. (52 delegates)
  • Puerto Rico March 18. The Puerto Rico primary involves large, bustling urban areas. Santorum announced that he is going there, but it still looks Romney. (23 delegates)
  • Illinois March 20. The state has its rural regions, but Chicago is huge, has expansive suburbs, and is not the only sizable city in the state. Illinois, using this thumb-nail look exclusively, should be for Romney. (69 delegates)
  • Louisiana March 24. The state has New Orleans, Shreveport, Bossier City and Baton Rouge, with three out of those four going to Romney or Gingrich, with some for Ron Paul. Bossier City is working hard to revitalize, partly through gaming revenues from casinos on the Red River; Shreveport is Santorum-type territory. Louisiana, another close three-way race, is one of Santorum’s better hopes. (46 delegates)
  • DC, Maryland, Wisconsin April 3. DC (19), Maryland (37), Wisconsin (42). The first two for Romney; the third a good shot for Santorum, but tight, since Wisconsin does have large cities and suburbs. (56 for the mid-Atlantic, 42 possible for Santorum)
  • Connecticut, Delaware, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island April 24. A total 231 delegates—another Super Tuesday, except that traditionally they don’t use that term about April primaries—and the only state that looks conceivable for Santorum is Pennsylvania, where he served as a senator until booted out. Nor does it look likely that Gingrich will tie Romney in any of these.
  • Indiana, North Carolina, West Virginia May 8. Total delegates 132, with a shot for Santorum in Indiana and West Virginia (using the rural-versus-urban metric), and a tight three-way race in North Carolina.
  • Nebraska, Oregon primaries May 15. Both conceivable for Santorum, with their wide swaths of radio-listening counties. (63 delegates)
  • Arkansas, Kentucky May 22. Ditto, and you can add impoverished school systems and some lack of newspapers. (81 delegates)
  • Texas May 29. The Sunbelt cities of Texas are overpowering. If Gingrich and Romney make any good effort there at all, Santorum should be a very poor third at best. Dallas is the exceptional big city that might be Santorum-friendly, but the counties of East Texas are dwindling relative to the metropolitan part of the state. (155)
  • California, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico and South Dakota June 5. With a whopping 299 delegates, yet another Super Tuesday. They’re going to have to start using Roman numerals for these supers. Of the five, Santorum has a theoretical chance in two—Montana and South Dakota—though his chances might be undercut by his continuing insistence on talking about people’s private lives. The other three states add up to 268 delegates.
  • Utah June 26. Maybe Santorum can get some of Utah’s 40 delegates, but the state tends to be as well organized, politically speaking, as one big suburb.

 

To clarify: The foregoing run-down is done on one basis and one only—the preponderance state by state of rural areas versus metro areas. Santorum has an advantage in rural areas, Romney or Gingrich in metro areas. This rural-metro division is deeper, more consistent and more fundamental (in these primaries) than divisions by region, income, or education—with which it substantially overlaps.

The national political press’s obsession with “The South” and with the ‘narrative’ of the weakened front-runner, etc., apparently prevents its taking these demographics into account.

Setting the horse race aside, the more important point about the 2012 GOP primary contest of Romney, Gingrich and Santorum is that it was never moderate versus conservative. The characterization is false. Romney is not a moderate. On grounds of conscience, a moderate would not be able to bring himself to run as what is now being called ‘conservative’:

—opposed to abortion even in cases of rape, incest and mortality for the mother

–opposed to any regulation whatsoever of the giant financial sector, even after the mortgage-derivatives meltdown, and even to prevent fraud

–opposed to any progressive taxation whatever of Big Oil, even just removing the gratuitous tax subsidies, or of large corporations, even of multinationals.

 

As to what this pattern entails, more later

The 2012 GOP primaries in the South–two today

2012 southern primaries today

Gingrich in Alabama

The big political ticket today is two southern primaries, in Alabama and Mississippi—Hawaii and American Samoa have caucuses today, too, but that’s a different story, and anyway, the delegates from beautiful places at remote distances are mainly being commandeered by Mitt Romney.

A competent run-down on the probabilities here

 

All the discussion serves as a reminder of how many kinds of political analysis there are, even in the respectable spectrum of public discourse, and even aside from political differences among the analysts.

Questions on several levels:

The open-scandal question in Alabama and Mississippi is how well Newt Gingrich’s race-baiting, politely referred to as ‘dog whistle’ or code, will work for him—will it be enough to pull him ahead of Romney?

The more conventional question is simply who will win in each state primary, and by how much, leading to the delegates question.

The less plumbed question of delegate math is the big one–whether Gingrich and Rick Santorum will pull away enough votes from Romney to siphon off the delegate count significantly. Since each state has its own version of this cycle’s super delegates, softening the proportionality of proportional representation, that question is less easy to figure—even after the results. But the question bears on the GOP convention in Tampa. Any figure less than 1144, as we know, means that Romney will go to the convention without the nomination sewn up, theoretically. It’s a little hard at this point to imagine anyone else the nominee, especially if Romney goes in with around or near 1100 delegates beforehand, but on paper the nomination would still remain to be determined at the national convention.

Nice billboard for Tampa, when the time comes:

Romney in an earlier campaign

That would make it one of the more interesting GOP conventions in decades, since the 1968 Republican National Convention in Miami—written up by Norman Mailer among others—or since the decades when Mississippi Republicans routinely sent two rival delegations to the national convention. The Lily Whites—that was their name for themselves, as was the Black and Tans for the rival delegates—always won.

 

Side note:

I continue to think that Romney is being put through the wringer way too hard over his harmless comments about grits. The commentators are making him look good by comparison, as do Gingrich and Santorum. These are ethical matters. It is ethically flawed to ignore an ethical problem, wrongdoing, when it occurs, such as the fact that the date of Jose Padilla’s arrest in Chicago is still classified information. Our U.S. Marshals could have told the public a lot about torture under the previous administration, if the GOP in Congress had not prevented it. After all, it’s the Marshals who transport prisoners, inmates and ‘detainees’ and who thus have occasion to observe their condition.

Conversely, though, it is also ethically flawed to elevate some little thing into an accusation of wrongdoing when it isn’t one. Eating the local food and saying nice things about it does not qualify as something to rake a candidate over the coals for.

It would be much more substantive to try to get the GOPers to address Wall Street bonuses and other executive compensation after the mortgage-derivatives debacle, or vote suppression, or speculating on oil futures, or the effect of fear-mongering and saber-rattling on the price of oil, or the fact that insurance premiums (rates) go up every year, etc., etc.

more later

[update]

Speaking of GOP Deep-South primaries and other Limbaugh fans–

Think Progress reports that at least 140 sponsors have pulled out of Limbaugh’s show. This from the corporate horse’s mouth itself.

[update]

It’s twilight on a beautiful spring day in the mid-Atlantic. Polls in Alabama and Mississippi will close in less than an hour. That Romney, Gingrich and Santorum have been polling close to each other messes up the narratives. Anyone who wants to talk in terms of ‘narrative’ has to offer a smorgasbord.

A few interesting items gleaned from the coverage, although not necessarily new:

  • Chris Matthews is claiming, as ever, that Mitt Romney is “a moderate”
  • Dan Balz of the Washington Post is intent, as ever, on the thesis that the November general election will be a nail-biter–Balz characterized the 2008 election as “almost ideal conditions” for Obama
  • CBS News is declaring flatly that Alabama and Mississippi are make-or-break for Newt Gingrich. CBS declares that Gingrich has to win there, or he will face immense pressure to drop out; no word about delegates awarded proportionately
  • little word on the major networks about vote suppression efforts
  • the phrase “brokered convention,” re Tampa, has been replaced, possibly temporarily, with the phrase “open convention”

Time will tell.

Polls closed–8:16 p.m.

According to CNN’s exit polls, Romney looks to win in Mississippi–he should, with all the ads–and Santorum in Alabama, where the Republican guv weighed in thoughtfully mentioning that Romney’s Mormonism might be a “subtle” factor there and elsewhere. CNN exit polls also give Romney the edge among large groups such as married women.

Much emphasis also on the president’s apparent drop in opinion polls among women, in the past month. Bound to happen with the cable channels and others touting birth control as a ‘woman’ issue. Birth control is not a women’s issue. It is a population issue, thus a matter of economy as well as of choice.

Back to the results–at least as suggested in exit polls–CNN and MSNBC are joining CBS in talking up big how Newt Gingrich should drop out if he doesn’t win tonight. So there’s your heavy pressure, right there. Presumably Fox News feels the same way. No mention of proportional delegates, mainly, in this context.

One would like to hope that it’s because Gingrich’s ‘southern strategy’ has embarrassed the media outlets. One would like to, but one can’t.

8:49 p.m.

Earliest exit polls trimmed back slightly, at least as regards Romney’s lead.

Could a virtual three-way tie be shaping up? Or will Newt Gingrich please a growing chorus of commentators and come in decisively third in both these Deep South states? No one is talking about Gingrich in Louisiana and Texas, right now.

9:32 p.m.

At the moment, things not going according to plan. With voices on all the channels speculating about how soon Newt Gingrich will/should drop out, Mitt Romney is the man stubbornly clinging to third place in both Mississippi and Alabama. It’s early days yet, and the three-way race in each state is by far too close to call, or even to make an educated guess about. But with 37 percent of the vote back in Mississippi and 6 percent in Alabama, which is moving returns much slower, Romney remains behind both Santorum and Gingrich.

Meanwhile, on CNN panelist Ari Fleischer, aka Mouth of Sauron–who helped us into the Iraq war as GWBush’s press secretary–is insisting that Newt Gingrich will in all probability drop out of the race in two days. That is, if Gingrich does not win tonight. Fleischer sets the bar pretty high for Gingrich. According to him, Gingrich has to carry both states to declare this evening a win, and anything else–he’s out. “You have to win.”

10:04 p.m.

The lineup the same in both Mississippi and Alabama, with 79 percent and 34 percent of the vote in, respectively–Santorum first, Gingrich second, Romney third. NBC has already called Alabama for Santorum, who leads by four or five percent rather than by one or two as in Mississippi. Mississippi is still designated too close to call.

Another guest on MSNBC joins the chorus of voices encouraging Gingrich to get out–former John McCain strategist Steve Schmidt, now extra well known after the HBO movie Game Change. With Gingrich clearly ahead of Romney (the front-runner) in both states, obviously the argument has changed. That is, the rationale for urging Gingrich to get out can no longer be that that’s the only way Romney can be beat.

So, as one might surmise, all those media voices urging other candidates to ‘coalesce’ around an anti-Romney candidate were never about finding the most genuine conservative.

Q.E.D.

10:57 p.m.

Santorum, speaking from Louisiana, blames Louisiana’s difficulties on Obama and on environmentalism. Typical faux populism, targeting rural voters again. Nothing from him about the dredging and drilling that have frayed the Gulf Coast, opening the way for devastation by hurricanes by removing every protection from nature. Nothing about the enormous tax give-aways for Big Oil, just another claim that environmental regulation–like keeping the Gulf of Mexico from becoming one big oil pool–is destroying jobs and raising gas prices. Nothing about speculation on oil futures, of course.

By such means, combined with record low turnout, he did win Mississippi as well as Alabama. Gingrich second in both, Romney third in both.

The contest was not between one moderate and two conservatives, with the two latter splitting the field.

The contest in Mississippi and Alabama was between the rural-area vote and the metro-area vote, with Gingrich and Romney splitting the latter. The latter is disproportionately small in both states.

No wonder Santorum is talking from Louisiana, about heading to Missouri. No wonder the most prominent media figures are feverishly boosting the GOP establishment tonight, calling on Gingrich to step aside before all the precincts are in. The vague argument seems to be that that gives Santorum a clear shot at Romney. I doubt it. As things look now, Santorum would get buried in a one-on-one progression even if he picked up Louisiana and Missouri. Our population centers contain most of our population. A pretty sad prospect of a race, looking to be even uglier without Gingrich than with him. But disappointingly, too many of the journalists, even, seem eager to forestall an open convention in Tampa.

Meanwhile, the three candidates still pretty much split the MS and AL delegates three ways, of course, with Romney to sew up some more in the island caucuses.

The 2012 southern strategy and a GOP pincer movement on Afghanistan

2012 southern strategy and the giant pincer movement on Afghanistan

 

In Afghanistan

 

The political equation of winning-and-losing is far from the most important point about Afghanistan. The shooting spree by a U.S. soldier who apparently had a nervous breakdown and shot Afghan civilians, including women and children, is only the most recent dreadful event.

Not one Afghani was on those planes on September 11, 2001. Not one. The only connection between Afghanistan and the paired, parallel attacks of 9/11 was Osama bin Laden, encamped with his wealth in the ruling regime over the hapless Afghanis.

There was also not one political reporter in the national political press in Washington, D.C., who pointed out this fact in the heyday of George W. Bush’s popularity after 9/11.

The Afghan people—much as they undoubtedly hated foreigners on Islamic territory—had about as much say in regard to bin Laden’s presence as television viewers in the U.S. today have in regard to the number of commercials on cable television. Or less, since theoretically our elected officials could brace up the FCC and control paid commercials on air time that subscribers have already paid for.

 

Ron Paul

On the campaign trail, the only Republican candidate who comes close to persuasive sanity on the Middle East is still Ron Paul, whose views have been consistent throughout his years in Congress.

 

Gingrich

A new development looms, however, politically speaking. On yesterday morning’s talk shows, Newt Gingrich began making little noises about pulling out of Afghanistan. Not a clarion call, still a deviation from the usual bellicosity. Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, as always, continue to call for more bloodshed, and even the concept of an end in sight—some day—continues to be disparaged or ridiculed. So on one side of the argument, as the GOP presidential campaign swings through the South, you have Paul and to some extent Gingrich; on the other you have Romney and Santorum.

 

Santorum

In narrowly political terms, it’s a lose-lose for the president, as always with these guys, in a situation not of Obama’s making. If Obama succeeds in getting us out of Afghanistan—as most decent people hope—it will be too soon for Romney, Santorum and the professional saber rattlers, no matter when it is. If we remain mired in Afghanistan, there will be hints from the Gingrich types that more could be done to get out.

There is always an underlying tension between GOP voters who are primarily evangelicals, on one hand, and GOPers who are primarily fans of militarism. There is also a tension between extreme militarists and genuine fiscal conservatives. Wars cost treasure as well as blood. The uneasy overlap among the three big ‘wings’ of the party—rightwing Christians, rightwing monetarists, and rightwing militarists—also goes largely unreported in a press contingent eager to play up divisions among Latinos or other Democratic voters.

It will be interesting to see whether Gingrich’s most recent comments on Afghanistan affect his results in tomorrow’s southern primaries in Alabama and Mississippi, for better or worse. He has sagged somewhat in polls over the past couple of days.

 

The word was

Meanwhile, in the South, the campaigns are working hard. Voters (including Democratic voters) across the Mississippi Delta are being inundated with robo-calls from the Romney campaign. One asks the householder to stay on the line for a telephone ‘town meeting’ with Rick Santorum, who is heard saying (2008) that Romney is the only choice. Another offers a recorded conversation between Newt Gingrich and Nancy Pelosi, agreeing on something. Another brings the recorded voice of former NBC news anchor Tom Brokaw, announcing that Gingrich has been censured by Congress on ethics charges.

Speaking of the FCC.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, Romney is being castigated for the wrong things. Far too many commentators are harpooning his harmless “grits” comments–about liking grits, about eating the local food while in the South. Far too few are taking him to task for being in favor of apparently every war, everywhere, regardless of the cost to other Americans and to other human beings.

 

But the establishment GOP has been given a free pass on that for years.

The 2012 GOP Southern Strategy–a Brokered Convention?

2012 Gingrich’s Southern strategy and delegate count–GOP primaries

 

Gingriches in Alabama

The campaign to darken history continues, as the GOP primary season scrolls on to further proving grounds for Newt Gingrich’s (infamous) southern strategy. Alabama and Mississippi come March 13 and Louisiana March 24. The March calendar also includes March 10 caucuses in Kansas and the islands, the Missouri caucuses with 52 delegates at stake and the Illinois primary with 69, but Gingrich is not considered a threat (to other candidates) in those. The three old Deep South states offer 136 delegates, and Gingrich supporters give every sign of expecting to get at least some of them, counterbalancing the 240 or so on which Gingrich has no southern claim. Farther down the road come North Carolina on May 8 (55 delegates), Arkansas on May 22 (36), and the granddaddy of them all, Texas on May 29 (155).

Gingrich supporter Rick Tyler


In this context a Gingrich supporter, Rick Tyler, gave a thought-provoking elucidation last night on cable. Tyler, billed as a Gingrich attack dog, resigned from the Gingrich campaign when it imploded after the Gingriches’ Greek cruise and Tiffany bills in 2011, but is now senior adviser to the pro-Gingrich super PAC ‘Winning Our Future’. Tyler’s own views on race in the public discourse leave something to be desired, to put it nicely; he’s one of those So-are-you types at best. Most recently, with 40 or so advertisers pulling out of Rush Limbaugh’s show, Tyler has come out front and center with a big ad buy. At that, it might be a good buy. Few Gingrich voters are liable to be perturbed by Limbaugh’s comments. The price might even be down right about now; Limbaugh’s not saying.

But in spite of his peculiar views and the eccentricities of the Gingrich campaign—again putting it nicely–Tyler gave the clearest explanation yet of why Gingrich should stay in the race. Lawrence O’Donnell on The Last Word challenged Tyler with the assertion that Romney needs Gingrich to stay in the race, to keep Romney from being defeated by Rick Santorum one-on-one. Tyler countered, and this is where it gets interesting, that Santorum, rather than Romney, needs Gingrich to stay in.

From the transcript:

O’Donnell:

“And Super Tuesday failed to do what it usually does–convince at least one candidate to drop out of the race. Santorum needs Gingrich to drop out. Gingrich needs Santorum to drop out. Well, we`re going to have a Gingrich/Santorum showdown tonight in the spotlight.”

Introducing Tyler and Santorum supporter Eric Metaxas, O’Donnell opens with everyone’s question:

“Eric, the–Santorum is beating Gingrich consistently in these things. All you have to do is add Gingrich`s total to Santorum`s larger number and you have a wipe out of Mitt Romney in all these campaigns. What does Rick Santorum have to do to convince not Newt Gingrich, but other Republicans to rise up and say, come on, let’s narrow this race?”

Metaxas argues that Santorum is the one the Obama administration is really afraid of, and electable.

O’Donnell moves on to Tyler, again with everyone’s question:

“Well, Rick Tyler, the national polls don`t show that Mitt Romney has any particular advantage over Rick Santorum running against President Obama. And your guy is just falling behind, further and further behind. Why? Why, Rick?

Why prolong this? . . . You heard Steve Schmidt say that a vote for Gingrich is a vote for Romney. How can you let that happen?”

Tyler answers smartly, “Well, Steve Schmidt managed the John McCain campaign. So I`ll just leave it at that.”

Going on,

“But look, we put a lot of effort into Georgia because we felt like we had to win Georgia. We probably over-invested in Georgia, spent too much time and money there.

But it was OK. We had a decisive win. I`m out here in Mississippi and Alabama. That`s the next step. Let me–we heard a lot about calculations today. The calculation has actually changed somewhat. The calculation is that–put out by the Romney campaign, who has no ability to beat Barack Obama–in fact, David Axelrod did a conference call today laying out why he couldn`t beat Barack Obama, because Mitt Romney has used up his last half life, and he has just wiped out his support for the middle class and independent voters.

So he has just destroyed his ability to beat Barack Obama. And you pointed out in the first segment that more people showed up for Barack Obama than showed up for the Republicans. That`s because of the negative campaigning that`s been going on.”

Interesting observation from a Gingrich man. But moving on—

“But let me just put this calculation on the table. The hurdle for Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum to catch up with Mitt Romney is only equaled by the hurdle of Mitt Romney to actually arrive at the convention with the proper number of delegates. The calculation has changed in this way, Rick–it is not in Rick Santorum`s interest for Newt Gingrich to drop out of this race.

It is in Rick Santorum`s interests, believe it or not, for Newt to stay in the race and to collect as many delegates, as Rick should do, to keep Mitt Romney from getting the requisite number of delegates to arrive in Tampa. And in that–doing that, after the first ballot, which Mitt Romney will fail to win, then Rick Santorum would have a genuine chance at winning an open floor fight. [emphasis added]

But he doesn`t have a chance otherwise, because he has no ability to beat Mitt Romney and his organization and his money.

O`DONNELL: Rick, I just have to follow up with that. Of course he has the ability to beat him. You look at Michigan. You look at Ohio. Romney bombed Santorum with money in Ohio. And if Newt Gingrich wasn`t in the race, Santorum would have beaten him decisively.

TYLER: Explain that theory to me in California. Explain that theory to me in New Jersey. Explain that theory to me in New York. That theory doesn`t hold up. Those are big states. And Mitt Romney will decisively beat Rick Santorum in those states, because he`s going to out-spend him.

He out-spent him in Ohio by almost four to one. The calculation is if you can keep Mitt Romney from out-spending you by three to one, you might win. But if he out-spends you by four to one, then you`re going to lose. And that was–that is what would happen to Rick Santorum.”

O`Donnell turns back to Metaxas:

“ . . . Eric, what Rick is essentially saying is OK, hey, everybody, let`s just keep playing. It seems pretty clear to us that even Romney isn`t going to get the delegates he needs in the election process to go into the convention with the nomination.

So we will all show up in Florida with our delegates, and then we can talk. And if Rick–and if Rick Santorum`s way ahead of Newt Gingrich, then maybe there`s some kind of deal to be made. Let`s just wait until Florida.

What`s wrong with that?”

Metaxas responds with the inevitable POV on Gingrich:

“Listen, I think they really believe that. So it`s hard for me to tell them not to do that. I don`t believe that. I think that–listen, a lot of the votes for Romney are very pragmatic votes. A lot of people don`t love Romney, but they would vote for him. I`m certainly one of them.

However, people love Santorum. . .

If I thought Gingrich could win, that`s one thing. But at this point, I don`t think he can. I guess the question is, when will he see that? The point is, it really doesn`t matter what we think. Gingrich has to believe that he can`t win. For some reason, he still believes.

I mean, he`s come back from the dead twice. I think he still believes he can do it. I simply don`t. I think Santorum is going to go a lot further.

The question is when will Gingrich see what everybody else is seeing? And I don`t know that he ever does that.”

O’Donnell goes back to Tyler:

“Rick Tyler, you seem to be saying that it isn`t about winning, that the Gingrich world has given up the idea that he can actually win the nomination through the election process. And you`re just in the business of getting delegates out of this proportional outcomes that you can get in various states, and just seeing how many you end up with when you go to Florida?”

Tyler:

“No, the key to winning is getting the most delegates to vote for you at the convention. That still remains operative. Look, Newt Gingrich is behind–60 delegates behind Rick Santorum. He could wipe out that difference in Mississippi and Alabama alone. There`s 150 delegates—”

“O`DONNELL: OK. But what if he doesn`t? Let`s just go to Mississippi, where you are right now, OK? And it`s Gingrich`s neighborhood. If Rick Santorum goes in to those southern states and beats Newt Gingrich, is there any message Newt Gingrich can get from that to say, you know what, I really am in the way; I should get out of the way so this can be the conservative against the moderate flip-flopper Romney?”

TYLER: Well, that would be up to Speaker Gingrich. As you know, I would support Speaker Gingrich if he wants to go to the convention. I would support whatever he wants to do. I believe we will win Alabama and Mississippi, and we`ll have a new ball game.

I also believe this is what Newt Gingrich has said from the very beginning, if, in fact, he believed that Romney or Rick Santorum could actually beat Obama and change Washington, which neither of their records reflect that they would be able to do that–they would both accommodate Washington–then he would step aside.”

“He doesn`t see that in either of those candidates. And so why not give the people in Rankin County, Mississippi, the chance to vote for–vote for another conservative?”

O`DONNELL: Well, according to that formulation then, he`ll never step aside, because every poll shows President Obama beating every one of these guys. Rick, come on. Come on. You can`t keep things going like this.”

TYLER: Polls change.”

 

Thus the 622 delegates from Old South states where Gingrich can theoretically win a majority, especially since he has openly staked a claim on the territory, could actually make a difference. Gingrich and Santorum, the argument goes, can siphon away enough delegates from Romney to prevent Romney’s reaching the magic number of 1144.

Craig Crawford with Helen Thomas

And then the GOP would be heading to a brokered convention—which is what well-regarded analyst Craig Crawford has been suggesting could happen.

And then, gentlemen and ladies, we would be finished with all this nonsense of a more open, more democratized process for the GOP, with the Republican nominee for president chosen directly by the voters, or at least by voters motivated enough to get out and vote. The trajectory from state conventions with their back-room deals to state primaries either too little or too much controlled by party insiders would finish with a national convention with, presumably, back-room deals. In that scenario, btw, Ron Paul delegates could make a difference.

It is fascinating to consider what kind of job offer, if any, might induce either Gingrich or Santorum to reconsider their 2012 strategy.

 

Side note, and it shouldn’t be a side note:

Looking at these numbers, one wonders whether there is any slightest chance that either Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum will speak against racial bigotry at any point in the 2012 primary season. Given the tepid response to Rush Limbaugh’s slanderous and defamatory comments about a young female law student, it seems unlikely at the moment. But there is always a moment for conscience to surface.

The big story in Super Tuesday 2012–turnout depressed, along with GOP

2012 primary turnout heading lower

Turnout for most GOP primaries and caucuses hits new lows

Santorum, Romney

There can be little doubt that turnout in the GOP primaries is reflecting some kind of political margin of diminishing returns. In almost every state holding a GOP primary or caucus on ‘Super Tuesday’, turnout was down from 2008. Regardless of whether the state is big or small, suspenseful or predictable; regardless of geographical region and almost regardless of demographics, turnout went mostly down. The partial exceptions were Ohio, Vermont and North Dakota, the latter two heavily organized by Ron Paul supporters.

Ron Paul

 

Short overview

Massachusetts gave Mitt Romney a huge margin—Romney won with over 70 percent of the vote–but showed little life otherwise. Ask the six voters who turned up at one precinct in Springfield. Anecdotal evidence abounds from around the state, corroborated by unofficial tallies showing total turnout at 355,454 votes cast. The official figure given for the GOP primary in 2008 is 1,108,854. That’s a two-thirds drop in turnout in a hotly contested GOP primary season.

Obviously, predictability is a factor. In a state viewed as Romney’s home, where Romney was governor, there was little perceived suspense. Furthermore, Romney-alternative Rick Santorum recently declared that John F. Kennedy’s speech on religious tolerance and the separation of church and state in America made him want to throw up. His words. Scant wonder Santorum failed to pick up even one delegate in Massachusetts.

Turnout was depressed for ample reason in Virginia, too, with only Romney and Ron Paul on the ballot. Romney won Virginia with 60 percent of the vote, but with Paul his only opponent, the outcome was not considered seriously in doubt. Unofficial tallies put the vote total at 265,520. Local reporting on the ground confirms the low turnout, predicted to be low in Virginia. Danville and the Danville area, Hampton Roads, the Valley, Lynchburg, etc., etc.—the story was the same across the state, generally attributed to the fact that most of the GOP candidates were not on the ballot. However, the remarkably poor turnout contrasts heavily with Virginia’s Democratic primary in 2008—which had been narrowed to a two-person contest, although by less doofy processes than in Virginia 2012. Democrats did not get de-energized in a two-person race in 2008; maybe the number of people on the ballot matters less than who the candidates are. The 2008 Democratic primary, furthermore, was hit by a massive ice storm affecting the entire mid-Atlantic. People drove through the storm, or took mass transit through the storm, that Feb. 12 to vote for the candidate of their choice—Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton–in the ‘Chesapeake primary’. Some of them drove or traveled for hours to do so after a full work day.

Or for simpler comparison, contrast the 265K number above to the Republican presidential primary in Virginia in 2008: Less enthusiastic than the Dems’, it still totaled 489,252. That’s a drop by almost half in 2012.

 

Predictability cannot be the whole story

For a less predictable state, take Ohio, where the outcome was in serious doubt until late into the night March 6, and where Romney finally won by twelve thousand votes. In arguably the most hotly contested of the day’s primaries, with millions in advertising, billed by media outlets as the one to watch, turnout was nonetheless low. Official results are not yet posted, but by all accounts turnout stayed less than 25 percent. The unofficial total is 1,181,074 votes cast. The total reported for the GOP presidential primary in 2008 is 1,095,917. A slightly higher turnout in numbers this time, but an increase of only 85,000 statewide, in the most ballyhooed primary in the nation. It would be interesting to know how many of the 85,000 were crossover Democrats.*

Ohio also had a GOP primary for the Senate, with Republicans hoping to take back the seat held by Sen. Sherrod Brown, who won his primary. One of the livelier spots in Ohio 2012 was Cuyahoga County, where Reps. Marcy Kaptur and Dennis Kucinich had been redistricted against each other. Turnout reached 25 percent there largely because of the Democratic race.

Tennessee

Or take a look at Tennessee, another of the less predictable states. The unofficial total, again for a state where the outcome was in some suspense, is 540,791 votes cast. In the GOP presidential primary in February 2008, the total was 553,815 votes cast. The 2008 primary had a high-interest field of nine persons, including winner Mike Huckabee. But then, as mentioned, this year’s contest in Tennessee was regarded as holding some interest too.

If a safe primary does not generate large turnout, and a suspenseful primary does not generate large turnout, what does that leave?

 

Gingrich

Quick run-down, primaries:

Georgia: total votes unofficially reported 872,888. The Secretary of State’s office puts the total somewhat higher, at 900,129. The Georgia State Board of Elections also has a commendably user-friendly web site, with historical comparisons accessible. In 2008, the GOP presidential primary had 963,541 votes cast. Be it noted that the drop in Georgia is at least less than the drop some other places. Newt Gingrich himself has pointed out that turnout this year tends to be higher in places where he wins than in places where he loses. Down.

Oklahoma: vote total reported unofficially as 283,308. The total for the GOP presidential primary in 2008 was 335,054. Down.

Vermont: vote total this year 54,949. Same vote (GOP presidential primary) in 2008 is reported unofficially as 39,843. There was even less enthusiasm for Rick Santorum’s candidacy in Vermont than in neighboring Massachusetts. For quick comparison to the general elections in Vermont over the years, go here. Up.

 

Quick run-down, caucuses:

Alaska caucuses: Total this year 12,926. Total in 2008 13,703. Down.

Idaho caucuses: Total this year 44,655. Total in 2008 125,056. Way down.

North Dakota caucuses: Total this year 11,349. Total in 2008 9,743. Up. An exception.

 

There is more than one way to look at this decline in turnout. Argument is different from statistics. While there is no question about the decline, there is some question about what it means, or how much it means. Lack of enthusiasm, yes. Lack of drive to vote, yes. Why? Open to question.

As previously written, the committed Obama-haters do not need a reason to vote. They hardly need a candidate.

Also as previously written, much of the Republican electorate gives every sign of wanting to know as little about its candidates as possible. They want somebody else? They like seeing someone new? They suddenly jump onto a new and intriguing bandwagon, and just as abruptly jump off it? They get turned off by candidate after candidate, after learning more about the candidate? They remain uncommitted to Mitt Romney because they know so much about him? Romney’s unfavorable rating goes up the longer he stays in the race? The common denominator underlying these trends is the same throughout: This is lack of knowledge, and a lack of knowledge enthusiastically embraced, lack of knowledge rewarding the candidate, lack of knowledge about the candidate perceived as a plus.

The GOP is struggling mightily: It has opened up, mixed up, broadened, varied, adjusted and otherwise democratized its primary process, to choose a candidate who will uphold anti-democratizing policies. This can hardly be done.

*Note: CNN reports that its exit polls show 5 percent of GOP voters were Democrats this time. If accurate, that would be 59,000 Dems, or equivalent to most of the increase in turnout from 2008. These numbers on party ID are not watertight, but CNN was the first network to report–accurately–that Romney was actually leading in the close Ohio race. CNN had the advantage of the on-site work done by Dana Bash, at the county level, to provide more solid numbers, faster, than other networks. The reporting was swiftly picked up by John King and Wolf Blitzer, and swiftly conveyed. Arithmetic trumps preconceived story lines, actual voting trumps preliminary opinion polls.

Dana Bash

Note:  This post is corroborated by the run-down posted by Daily Kos, just a few hours after the above. East Coast met by West, once West Coast gets up.

 

2012 and the shrinking Super Tuesday

Republican primaries in rapidly shriveling interest

Tuesday, March 6, 2012–‘Super Tuesday’ GOP primaries and caucuses are here, along with a lot of media coverage. Most of the remaining Republicans running for the White House are trying mightily to switch the conversation from birth control and vaginal probes to bombing Iran. As usual, the single honorable exception is Ron Paul. Paul’s comments on our nuclear age, on the Cold War of the 20th century, and on diplomacy today rank as the most sane in almost his entire party, at least among candidates for office.

 

Santorum, Romney, Gingrich

In more local focus, eleven states have delegates at stake on Tuesday. From a political perspective, they fall loosely into a few categories.

  • Georgia is the stand-out with 76 delegates, although not winner-take-all. Good thing for Mitt Romney, since Georgia is also the only state where the most current polls show Newt Gingrich out ahead of everybody else by double digits. Rasmussen, done last night, gives Gingrich 10 points over Romney. Rasmussen is a GOP-oriented poll, protective of the establishment front-runner; other recent polls put Gingrich farther ahead. It will be interesting to see whether Rasmussen is confirmed. Georgia, of course, is considered Gingrich’s home state, and Gingrich has spoken frankly about needing to win there. It is also the most fertile ground in the Union, aside from South Carolina, for winning by out-uglying everybody else.
  • Tennessee is another of the three states in which Gingrich has placed some stock, i.e. attempting to woo it like Georgia with a shades-of-Nixon southern strategy. Santorum leads in Tennessee, as the Nashville paper reports, but the race is tight. If Romney’s well-funded attack ads against Santorum have an impact, between their direct effect and the boomerang effect Gingrich could be extruded upward up into a statistical tie in the outcome.
  • Virginia should have been a natural for Gingrich to make a big play. But alas, what with one thing and another—fraud, presumptuousness and disorganization—Gingrich did not make it onto the ballot in the Old Dominion, where he was leading in opinion polls before the ballot debacle, and where he has lived for years in the DC suburbs of northern Virginia. The Commonwealth has 46 delegates, but not statewide winner-take-all. So Ron Paul’s people might hold Romney to less than the total.

Those are the three southern-strategy states.

Then there are the caucus states—Alaska, Idaho and North Dakota. They have a combined 87 delegates but also combine geographic remoteness and distance from the radar screen of the national political press. The main question is how many of the delegates Paul receives, after extensive organizing with emphasis on caucus states.

Massachusetts and Vermont, the two New England states, are both considered Romney’s. They have 41 and 17 delegates respectively, offer little toehold for other candidates to reach a percentage threshold that would allocate any share of the total to anyone but Romney, and have no swing-state appeal to draw media attention. Thus even if Romney wins all the delegates, the win is liable to be regarded as just another nail in the coffin for reasoned interest in the GOP primaries.

 

Romney

Oklahoma is something of a stand-out for Rick Santorum. Santorum leads by a hefty margin in the most updated polls, and furthermore, Gingrich comes in second. Romney is a distant third, in spite of winning the endorsement of Sen. Tom Coburn. Thus Oklahoma is sui generis, unless you lump it with Ohio.

Ohio, of course, has received the most media emphasis. The big news, horse-race-wise, is that Santorum led in the polls and may still lead, but Romney has been moving up. With 66 delegates at stake and Santorum planning to watch the election returns from there, the standard media line is mostly about Ohio being to Santorum what Georgia is to Gingrich.

more to come