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GOP in Michigan: Every Man Has His Surge

romney-wins-michigan.jpg Michigan made Mitt comfortable. First of all, he knew the state (he was born there) and the state knew him (his father was governor from 1963 to 1969). Second, the state has ridden the flagging auto industry to the highest unemployment in the country, and is badly in need of an economic miracle-maker of the type Romney was when he was turning companies around as the head of Bain.

And so, for once, Mitt Romney was the perfect fit. The evangelicals of Iowa could have Mike Huckabee and the independents of New Hampshire could have John McCain. The economically depressed voters of Michigan wanted their favorite son.

Romney did his part. He retooled his campaign, dropping much of the social conservative pabulum that hadn't been resonating with voters and ran as a businessman hell-bent on delivering results. And the voters responded, according to exit polling. Fifty-five percent of exit poll respondents identified the economy as the most important issue. Those economically minded voters chose the native son by a wide margin: 42% for Romney, 29% for McCain, and 14% for Huckabee. Those who prioritized immigration also went heavily for Romney. Those who prioritized Iraq went heavily for McCain.

Just over 40 percent of voters said that Romney's personal connection to Michigan was "somewhat important" or "very important" to them. Those voters selected Romney by massive margins.

It helped that the other candidates' voting blocks weren't reliable. Independents were just 25 percent of the voters in the Republican primary last night, down from 35 percent in 2000 (when McCain won the state). Romney beat Huckabee badly amongst exit poll respondents who said they attend church "occasionally" and even edged him out amongst respondents who answered "weekly." Among self-identified evangelicals (40 percent of the total Republican vote), Romney beat Huckabee by five percent, a sign that Huckabee's evangelical support may not be rock solid in upcoming South Carolina.

"It's a victory of optimism over Washington-style pessimism," Romney said in his victory speech, sounding a bit like Barack Obama. "The people of Michigan said they believe in someone who is going to fight for them," he added, sounding a bit like John Edwards.

Where does Romney's victory leave the Republican field? Nowhere, really. Huckabee, McCain, and Romney can all point to a victory, meaning that there is no frontrunner. No candidate can take real momentum into the South Carolina primary in four days, meaning that contest will likely be another close one. Conventional wisdom suggests that's good news for Rudy Giuliani—the lack of a frontrunner means that no one will be biting into his leads in the massive February 5th states. His lack of effort in all the early states, it may turn out, won't hurt him.

But watch out for Romney. Willard Mitt Romney is like a Monet painting: he looks better from far away. He is better in debates and on television, where he looks presidential, than he is in person, where he appears robotic and phony. Combine that fact with his treasure trove of campaign funds and you've got a candidate custom-built for February 5th's nationwide field. And besides, as long as Romney can stick around and not make any mistakes, he might just end up being the default choice in a field of bad candidates.

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Posted by Jonathan Stein on 01/15/08 at 9:17 PM | E-mail | Print | Digg | de.licio.us | Reddit | Newsvine | Yahoo! MyWeb | StumbleUpon | Netscape | Google |



Comments

Uh... Mitt Romney can claim TWO victories (remember Wyoming?). If having won the most delegates, the most states, the most popular vote, the widest margin, the most recent momentum, doesn't count as frontrunner... what does?

Posted by: CoachNY on 01/16/08 at 2:58 AM  Respond

Mitt will not win very many states.

Giuliani may have had the right idea bypassing the early states -- except for the fact that his campaign is on fundraising fumes right now BECAUSE (in part) he did not play in the early states at all. He's lost his luster in Florida, and unless he scores a half dozen "Ron Paul" fundraising days between now and Feb. 5 he won't have the ammo to play everywhere he could be strong on Super Tuesday. Romney vs. McCain in the end? Plus Paul likely accepting the Libertarian Party nomination? No wonder so many GOP Senators are retiring.

Posted by: Egalitare on 01/16/08 at 6:29 AM  Respond

Looks like I am going for McCain after all (after Obama). I was sickened to hear Mitt lick the boots of those pricks in De-twat, I say “No Way”. For a “businessman”, the guy is a tool when it comes to the auto industry.

FACT – Detroit is in it’s position for no other reason than themselves. They have historically built inefficient cars, that SUCK and are significantly less reliable than Japanese and European designed cars.
FACT – The unions are a significant part of the problem. I have been to Ford, Viseon, Delphi and Harley plants. Without a doubt, these people are the poorest educated laziest bunch of pricks I have ever worked with. My old company has a machines at Harley whose screen would flake once a week (hardware issue). The machine kept running and there were no safety problems. The operator even acknowledged that. But every time it happened, he would shut down the machine and call maintenance. After 30 minutes, the maintenance guy would show up, reboot the machine and they would be back on their way – but Harley lost 15 parts during that time. At least the operator was able to catch up on the hillarious antics of Garfield.
I’ve seen operators asleep at Visteon plants – on numerous occasions.
We have proposed significant efficiency improvements to Harley that the Union rejected. We would reduce direct labor and make sure that the machines ran at 100%. Total union veto.
FACT – No one cried for the stable owner or the blacksmith when Model-T’s started ending up in everyone’s garage. Those folks went to work at the Ford plant, became accountants, engineers... So why should I cry about those laze asses in Michigan??? Retrain and move on. Those jobs aren’t coming back and neither is the blacksmith gig. Get over it.

McCain went to Michigan and said “Move on”. Huckabee prayed for the jobs to return and Mitt said, “We’ll give ya’ cash”.

I say 100% tax credit for ANYONE getting further education. And if you are unemployed, Uncle Sam should pay for it and you pay him back without interest. From there on, good luck!

Posted by: kirkbrew on 01/16/08 at 8:01 AM  Respond

kirkbrew,
RIGHT ON THE FRIGGIN' MONEY.
Candidates 'll say anything to get elected (maybe they should be ejected, erected and dissected...)

Posted by: Christopher Flynn on 01/16/08 at 2:18 PM  Respond

Well, we've got to elect a president in November.
(E) None of the above
is not a choice.
So, where does that leave us?

Posted by: PB on 01/16/08 at 2:29 PM  Respond

Huckabee claims Jesus walked on water.
Romney will restore Michigan to its glorious past.
Guess Huckabee is more credible.

Posted by: Gordon Leonard on 01/16/08 at 2:51 PM  Respond

McCain is a war criminal for bombing civilians in Vietnam and a traitor for violating the UCMJ, Uniform Code of Military Justice. Hucksterbee told students at Falwell[Liberty]University that his god himself has ordain ed him to be president. Also, after taking an oath to protect the Constitution the Huckster declared that his mission is to get rid of the Constitution and replace it with the 10 commandments. Mitt, well this country has had it with business types running the country, like Bush 2 for instance.All these Republicans and some Democrats are campaigning on a platform to continue the Bush presidency. Absurd, no one talk about issues but "I'm more churchianity than thou".

Posted by: bogi666 on 01/16/08 at 3:12 PM  Respond

I would much rather have Mitt Romney as the Republican's nominee than Rudy Guiliani. Guiliani is like a "smart" George W. and THAT is a truly scary thought!

Posted by: JDGal on 01/16/08 at 4:27 PM  Respond

We are in trouble in this country. Big Trouble. We need to stay home and work on changing the way we elect our president and our congress. The money has to go and only those who want to serve the public should be allowed to hold office. We must get rid of all these "professional" politicians. Robotic and phony fits most of the candidates and Millionaires and beyond fits all of them. Not good for the working folks in this country.

Posted by: Ann on 01/16/08 at 9:14 PM  Respond

DR. Frankenroves down in the lab creating the 2008 GOP DREAM candidate....JOHN MC CAIN...with MITT ROMNEYS HAIR
...FRED THOMPSONS ACTING RESUME...MIKE HUCKABEES Appeal to the RELIGIOUS RIGHT...and RON PAULS ECONOMICS!

Posted by: Bobby Decker on 01/17/08 at 8:47 AM  Respond

If the GOP REALLY likes and supports Ron Paul's 'Real Money' economics, why didn't they pursue them when they held the presidency and both houses of Congress in recent years, instead of running up huge deficits and inflating the currency?

Posted by: AlternateRealityCheck on 01/17/08 at 9:45 AM  Respond

Wait a minute! Just a week ago, there was a concerted campaign going on to get disaffected Michigan Democrats to crossover and vote for Romney just to roil the GOP in a little extra chaos. Yet, there is no mention of it above or in any of the other myriad media "analyses" of Tuesday's results.

Posted by: Jim on 01/17/08 at 2:38 PM  Respond

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