In campaign news that surprised no one, Mitt Romney won the New Hampshire Primary yesterday. A win is a win, to be sure, but as the analysis begins to crystallize after the event, it doesn't appear to be the decisive win the Romney Campaign was surely looking for.
He got about 39% of the vote, which is not bad. Like I said, a win is a win, right? Well, let's talk about context, and then you can decide. First of all, the man has been campaigning in New Hampshire since 2007, when he was running against John McCain. Second, he owns a house there. I realize there are a lot of folks in the field, but you might expect a little better from a guy who practically lives in the Granite State. Finally, consider that his nearest competitor (Ron Paul, of all people) got around 23%. When you add that to what the other contenders got (including Rick Perry's 0.7%... snicker, snicker), you get more than 60% of the vote.
60% of New Hampshire's primary voters want someone other than Mitt Romney to be the Republican nominee.
Romney only got seven of the twelve delegates up for grabs. Paul got 3 and Jon Huntsman got 2.
A win is a win, sure, but it's a win with a split decision. In other words, this thing ain't over. The man has been in front of New Hampshire voters -- lived among them, even! -- for five years, and the best he can do is take a little more than half the delegates, leaving the other half to split between Crazy Racist Man and the candidate who, to date, is best known for his corny, largely unhelpful daughters?
To add further context to this, let's remember that no other non-incumbent candidate has won both Iowa and New Hampshire and gone on to win the nomination. However, if you're buying that concept that Romney is on an unstoppable train to the nomination, then you have to take a couple of things along with you on that journey, short-term and long-term.
Short-term, we see that South Carolina is up next on the primary docket (January 21). Romney appears to be in the lead as we look at polling, but it's tightening, and that has got to be the last thing they want. In other words, not a New Hampshire repeat.
Long-term, you have to think that just about the worst thing that could happen to Romney would be a "win" in state after state, with just enough of a split in those that aren't winner-take-all to keep this agonizing process going on for as long as possible. The reason that's bad for Romney is he can't really afford to have his opponents on the right keep attacking him.
If I'm working for the Obama Campaign, I'm doing nothing but collecting file footage for use in political ads this summer and fall. (That, and fund-raise, of course.).
Romney is not handling the pressure of a protracted campaign very well. He's not a very good campaigner, anyway. I don't see him as much of a people person. He doesn't get people. If you look at recent past presidents, they almost all have a quality that humanizes them to other people. And they seem to genuinely like people. Bill Clinton is probably at the top of the list. Reagan, certainly. George W. Bush, I think you'd have to say. Obama, though the other side works awfully hard to paint him as an out-of-touch elitist, an attack that's probably not going to work very well. The exception is George H. W. Bush, who you could argue lost in large part because he was so out of touch with the average American.
Anyway, his opponents smell blood in the water. My guess is none of them will let up any time too soon.
And speaking of context, we have to keep context in mind with respect to his "gaffe," such as it was, about how he "likes" to fire people. Look, I get it: dumb thing for a candidate to verbalize. Not a smart choice of words.
But as I asked you to consider larger contexts in the discussion above, you have to consider the context here. Mr. Fallows at The Atlantic, linked in the paragraph above:
He was making a reasonable point about the need for choice and competition -- just as John Kerry was making a reasonable point about the different stages of the legislative process when he said "I actually voted for the $87 billion, before I voted against it." It was completely "unfair" to use that line against Kerry, because if you stopped to listen to his reasoning, the phrase was merely one clumsy out-of-context portion of a larger "sensible" statement about how Congressional politics works. Exactly as with Romney and "firing."
Yes, context is key, and in fairness, the larger point Romney was making made (mostly) some sense.
Of course, I seem to remember an endless loop of Kerry saying "I actually voted for the $87 billion, before I voted against it." I mean, it was the political ad that that wrote itself.
Hope you guys had the record button on over the campaign H.Q., Team Obama. Because everybody knows that in a campaign context isn't king, because hey, a win is a win.
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