First South Carolina Debate: Can Romney Be Stopped?
Tonight is the first and best chance for Mitt Romney’s rivals to slow his momentum before Saturday’s South Carolina primary. He has an average lead of 7.7 points in the state with Newt Gingrich not far behind him. It’s tempting to declare that Romney has the nomination in the bag, but if he trips up tonight and suffers from a week of negative media coverage, that could be enough for him to lose the primary and keep this race going.
The biggest advantage Romney has is that he doesn’t need to knock it out of the park tonight. Had Gingrich, Santorum, or Perry dropped out, then he’d have to worry. Instead, the anti-Romney vote is divided. His rivals have two choices: pounce on him or squabble amongst themselves. If they take the first option, then Romney must have prepared answers that show his electability. This first option benefits Romney because none of his opponents leave with injuries, and so the field against him remains divided. With the second option, Romney has to worry about a coalescing of the anti-Romney vote, but can enjoy the time he doesn’t have a target on his back.
Newt Gingrich has been very clear about the fact that he must win South Carolina. He’s gone so far as to call it “Armageddon.” The problem facing him is that the areas where he has been clashing with Romney don’t work to his favor. His attacks on Romney’s tenure at Bain Capital have backfired, and I highly doubt anyone is going to base their vote on the issue of Super PACs. Gingrich must shift his argument in a way that undermines Romney’s greatest strength — electability — and exploits his biggest vulnerability — authenticity as a conservative.
Gingrich appears to recognize this. His new ad in South Carolina attacks Romney for flip-flopping on abortion and accuses him of having “government-mandated health care with taxpayer-funded abortions” as governor. The ad also says that he appointed a pro-choice judge and had Planned Parenthood on the state medical board. That could do serious damage among social conservatives in South Carolina, and Gingrich will probably make that his main talking point against Romney tonight.
Gingrich’s second lines of attack are electability and questioning Romney’s credentials as a job creator. He called on Romney to release records to prove that he created 100,000 jobs while at Bain: “If he can’t stand up today and defend his claim today, how is he going to stand up to Obama in the fall?” he asks. If Gingrich can make Romney flustered, he will be able to make voters question whether Romney can withstand the onslaught that the Democratic Party will hit him with.
Rick Santorum has adopted Gingrich’s term of “Massachusetts moderate” to describe Romney. He is focusing on Romney’s changing political stripes, and called him “bland and boring.” The problem Santorum faces is that the first line of attack has already been used as much as it can be. Every voter knows about it. The second criticism probably can’t be said in an artful way on the debate stage, and isn’t a very convincing talking point.
Good grief!
How many *more* of the mindless Romney premature-Coronation propaganda ads will we be forced to endure?! *I* vote in Florida – and will vote for GINGRICH – so thankfully I can tune out the noise after that.
Huntsman’s ad against Romney sums it up pretty well why he’s a loser:
http://electad.com/videos/jon-huntsman-mittstant-replay/
And McCarthy at NRO states quite well why Romney makes the GOP a loser:
“The issues in the election are Obamacare and debt. Focusing on them massively favors the GOP … except that Romneycare is the building block for Obamacare and, far from admitting error, Mitt has doubled down. As readers will see, I believe his federalism defense of Romneycare is fatuous. The Massachusetts program is indefensible. By nominating someone who vigorously defends it, I am very worried that we are giving away our best rationale for deposing the president and dispiriting the base whose enthusiasm is vital.”
GINGRICH IN 2012!!!
Santorum and Gingrcih need to cut a deal, or another RINO is going to be coronated in the GOP primaries, because the Conservative vote was split.
Huntsman was siphoning off votes from Romney, but no longer.
My entire point system for scoring the debates goes to whomever best soundbites the current administration and inserts into the MSM the narrative that upends this radical leftist agenda. Negative points are scored for circular firing squad, and forfeiture for self inflicting quotes.
Romney is not Reagan, but like Reagan, he will bring to the voting both the moderate and conservative democrats that will no longer support Obama and his very left agenga policies. Romney, may be moderate, but so is this country. History, when the RNC won the Congress, Clinton moved to the middle and won re-election.
Yes, Romney will be stopped by obama in the general.
He’s a terrible candidate to an incumbent who will pull all the stops and run circles around Romney…and I hate obama. You can’t win an election as “not obama”, didn’t we learn this with Kerry trying “not Bush”?
It is what it is. NO MORE RINO candidates. We need new House and Senate leadership. We need to win the Senate and increase numbers in the House. Then we can check obama’s Constitutional line-stepping.
It would be helpful to defeat Romney if you could prove he is a RINO. This article by Peter Ferrera (American Spectator) at http://spectator.org/archives/2012/01/11/rino-romney-is-the-least-elect