Michigan Primary Preview: A Two-Horse Race
Likewise, a Mitchell/Rosetta Stone poll released on Friday showed that Romney has a 3-point leader over Santorum in Michigan:
Fueled by a strong debate performance Wednesday night, Mitt Romney continues to lead Rick Santorum in the latest Mitchell/Rosetta Stone Poll of Michigan conducted for MIRS (Michigan Information & Research Service) the night after the CNN Debate. The two front runners are still in a statistical dead heat, although Romney (36%) has increased his lead by 1% over Rick Santorum (33%) while Ron Paul (12%) replaced Newt Gingrich (9%) in third place. Undecided voters dropped in half to 11%.
Whether Santorum will eventually go the way of Newt Gingrich remains to be seen. Gingrich came on like gangbusters, too, and then he experienced a precipitous decline. The South Carolina primary breathed new life into Gingrich’s campaign, but he plummeted again after a dismal showing in Florida. That said, if we haven’t learned anything else during the GOP primary season, we should have learned this: you should take polling data with a grain of salt. Polls tell us how voters feel about potential candidates at any given moment, but as my colleague at the University of Virginia, Larry Sabato, said,
Real votes make clear what polls cannot fully pick up. The Republican election season has been shaped by two forces, other than the obvious one to oust President Obama. First, the strongest potential candidates did not enter the fray, and the remaining contenders do not satisfy most GOP voters. At every polling opportunity, Republicans have expressed their desire for a wider choice. Put another way, Republicans would love to combine the economic acumen of Mitt Romney, the social conservatism of Rick Santorum, the debating skills of Newt Gingrich and the enthusiasm of young voters for Ron Paul into one candidate. That feat must await several generations of advances in genetic engineering.
A few days ago, PJ Media conducted a presidential poll, but instead of including only the announced candidates, they added Mitch Daniels, Paul Ryan, Chris Christie, Jeb Bush, Sarah Palin, and Condoleezza Rice to the mix. Their results showed that only Santorum and Rice would narrowly defeat Obama as of February 21-22, but Rice is an unproven political commodity. Although she has served as secretary of state and national security advisor, she has never run for public office and she has not been vetted the way that the announced candidates have. Thus, it doesn’t make sense to place too much weight on her showing in the PJ Media poll.
For that matter, Santorum is just beginning to garner attention. Following his three-state sweep, I wrote this in an American Thinker blog post:
Even though Rick Santorum had a great day last Tuesday, he has yet to undergo the kind of scrutiny that frontrunners attract. Both Rick Perry and Newt Gingrich have been where Santorum is now. Perry is back in Texas and Gingrich is fading to black. Can Santorum succeed where they failed? Maybe he can and maybe he can’t, but this much is certain: Mitt Romney has undergone intense scrutiny and even vilification for years and like a Timex watch, he’s still ticking. That should tell us something.
Judging by the poll numbers released on Friday, I was correct. Among the candidates for the GOP presidential nomination, only Mitt Romney has remained relatively steady over time despite the fact that conservative Republicans have been searching frantically for a conservative “unRomney.” To date, they have been unsuccessful. Each person they have homed in on has failed to convince voters that he is the right man to take on President Obama in the general election, but they continue their search anyway.
If Romney wins the Michigan primary, conservative Republicans should seriously consider giving up their search, getting behind him, and spending their time trying to influence his agenda. Even if Romney loses in Michigan, which appears unlikely at this point, they should still work toward persuading him to champion conservative causes because the race is far from over, and he will play an important part in shaping the Republican agenda regardless of the final outcome.
It is forbidden to vote for Romney the Mormon.
Anyone who votes for Romney the Mormon is committing a sin against God.
Whoever votes for Romney the Mormon is going straight to hell.
Whoever votes for Romney the Mormon will have to answer to God for it.
Mormonism is not Christianity.
Mormonism is a cult.
Mitt Romney is a demonic cultist.
We will expose the Mormon cult for what it is.
Mormons are not Christians.
If, God forbid, Romney the Mormon is elected President of the United States of America, God will judge America, and give us what we deserve — hell on earth, the destruction of the United States of America, and the end of our way of life.
Who is this guy?
A complete blithering idiot. I don’t like Romney, but this attack on his faith is despicable.
Last time I looked, I was pretty thoroughly involved with the TEA Party. And the last time I looked, I am an elected delegate to our County Republican Convention, and a candidate for delegate to our State House of Representative District Nominating Convention, State Senate District Nominating Convention, Judicial District Nominating Convention, and the State Convention and Assembly.
I am not Mormon, but I know an awful lot of them as friends, neighbors and co-workers. The candidate I am supporting for State House of Representatives is Mormon [and TEA Party]. I usually view someone being Mormon as a distinct plus; showing that they are honest, hardworking, and live by a code of ethics I approve of. I, and pretty much our entire local TEA Party group [we did a preference poll at our last city meeting and Romney did not get a single vote], detest Romney because he is not a conservative of any kind or a Constitutionalist. He, personally, is a big government, self-described “moderate progressive” whose claims of conservatism still have the ink wet, and who has never fought for any conservative stand in his 20 years in politics. He detests the base of the Republican Party, and that feeling is reciprocated. He is disliked in spite of being Mormon, and not because of it.
If he is the nominee, he will lose; because he depresses Republican and conservative turnout [look at the counties he has carried in the primaries so far]. Even if he did win, he will do absolutely nothing to push back against what the Left has done over the last decade from his history. Given the Vichy leadership of the Republicans in Congress, he will pander to the Democrats and tell the base once again to get stuffed.
Attacking a candidate because of his/her Judeo-Christian faith, of whatever variety; is a mark of a Democrat not the TEA Party.
Subotai Bahadur
Who is THIS guy? He is pretty sure he knows all about Mitt Romney, at least from all the predictions he makes.
Great sarcasm “Salafi”!
The anti-LDS sentiment is hardly called for.
Romney 2012 !
Concerning the ‘polls.’ First, the media treats us almost daily to the President’s numbers in the November election over against any of his possible Republican challengers. But since we don’t yet know who the Republican nominee will be, what is the point? Second, does anyone remember that in July of 1988, Michael Dukakis led George Bush by a whopping 17 points? And that was after we knew who the contenders would be! Third, as we all will recall, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton fought a very long, very protracted contest for the nomination of their party in 2008, a contest which Obama didn’t clinch until early June! Was there fervid media interest in February of that year about the possibilities of a ‘brokered’ convention, or a ‘contested’ convention’? Perhaps I missed it. Fourth, and finally, does anyone recall an election cycle where the party in the White House made such a concerted effort to damage an opposing party’s ‘presumed front runner’ long before that candidate’s nomination has even been secured? Fewer polls and greater sobriety required.
The primary in my state comes quite late in the game and I’m in blue state. But now Romney is definitely my choice. Tenacity counts for something.
1) TPS – Your tinfoil hat is on to tight, that’s why your hearing voices.
Excuse me, but the country is broke. Nattering about condoms is chasing a red herring, deliberately foisted upon us by Mr. Stephanopoulos, the White House, and the nice folks at ‘JournoList’ as bait. When Mr. Gingrich remembered to run against President Obama and the establishment press, he did very well. Forgetting who they’re running against, various candidates have since degenerated into bashing each other over religion, demonstrating their unfitness for the job. Fellows, try to keep your eye on the ball. ‘It’s the economy, Stupid!’
I hope my fellow Michiganders will take note of the story on the Romney campaign’s apparently illegal sharing of personnel with their SuperPac, and hiding of their salaries in shell companies before voting. See http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/feb/26/romney-camp-super-pac-share-high-level-aides/
The establishment and the MSM have been pushing this guy since day one. Are we going to let them pick our candidate again, as with Dole and McCain?
Romney’s whole campaign has been based on money, playing safe (after all, he’s the heir apparent), and buying victories with attack ads. Note that he can’t outspend or out attack the Obamaites.
Santorum is at least an honest man, and Gingrich has the big ideas and personality to face the Won- all Romney’s got is the urge for promotion, just like Gore, Kerry, etc.- the next logical step for a Havahd man. He’s merely safe for the big boys in Washington.
Politisite Political Projections: Michigan Primary Tuesday February 28, 2012 has the race as a tossup as well. Looks to us that Romney may pull out a slim victory.. but the numbers are right at 36.5% each. We also Have Ron Paul third and Gingrich fourth. http://wp.me/pOe4O-aac
In Arizona, a bit different story, we have Romney with a 15.7 point lead.
Unfortunately, the democrats crossing over and voting for the weaker Republican candidate is starting up again. Santorum is openly asking for their votes. I thought the Rs cleaned up this problem from last go around?
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