Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Deep South

Rick Santorum wins Alabama and Mississippi. What does it mean?

  • It should mean that Newt Gingrich is out. He's enough of an egotist that he might want to stick in there for a while longer, but there is no way he can win and I assume he realizes that.
  • Mitt Romney hasn't clinched the deal yet by any means. Some people argue that a Mormon can't win in the South, but not that long ago many of the same people argued that a Catholic can't win in the South, either. In my experience, southerners are a little more (ahem) nuanced in their thinking than they get credit for, especially among northerners. We all have our biases; some biases are more socially acceptable at cocktail parties. Northerners, especially northern liberals, prefer to ignore their biases, but that doesn't mean the biases aren't present. All other things being equal, a southern conservative might prefer a Catholic candidate to a Mormon candidate, but in this instance I think the difference is that Santorum is a lot closer to social conservative issues than Romney is. And if Romney eventually wins the nomination, the notion that conservative southerners would not vote for him is ludicrous, especially given the alternative.
  • Since the general election is going to turn on economic issues, Romney still has a better chance of winning the GOP nomination, and the election, than Santorum does. Although I would say this -- if this gets to be essentially a two-man race, Romney could be in trouble.
  • Santorum has turned out to be a much better candidate than I ever thought was possible. About my only exposure to him in the past was occasionally hearing him as a guest host on Bill Bennett's morning radio show. He was terrible at it, so I assumed he wouldn't be able to connect with voters out on the hustings. That has not turned out to be the case.
  • Ron Paul will keep plugging along, because it's about all he has to do at this point. He'll keep collecting delegates here and there and will eventually extract something from the nominee. To my mind, that's a good thing, because the issues he raises need to be part of the conversation.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mark,
you can say there is no Mormon "Bradley" effect, but then you have to tell me why polling of Evangelicals just prior to voting has consistently overstated Romney's strength? Results last night in MS and AL, and prior results in North Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and S. Caroliba all raise the question of whether evangelical voters are lying to pollsters about their willingness to vote for a Mormon. Call it what you want, but there seems to be something to it. It's not a huge block of votes, but it's there. And it exists on my side of the aisl too. There was definitely a Bradley effect at play in Obama/Clinton 4 years ago.

Regards,
Rich

Gino said...

the Bradley Effect is not what the media claims it was in the first place.

Mr. D said...

you can say there is no Mormon "Bradley" effect, but then you have to tell me why polling of Evangelicals just prior to voting has consistently overstated Romney's strength? Results last night in MS and AL, and prior results in North Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and S. Caroliba all raise the question of whether evangelical voters are lying to pollsters about their willingness to vote for a Mormon.

For your theory to be correct, there would need to be two things at play:

A) Romney would need to be equally conservative on social issues as his competitor on the social issues that evangelicals care about. He’s not, of course.
B) One would then assume that Romney’s Mormonism is so abhorrent to evangelicals that they would not vote for him over any opponent. When the opponent is Rick Santorum, that might be the case. If the opponent turns out to be Barack Obama, I wouldn’t count on it.

Brian said...

My opinion of southern evangelicals is rooted in being one for the first 18 years of my life. It is at least 50% the Mormon thing. Possibly more.
If Romney gets the nomination, a significant number of very serious evangelicals will be forced to choose between two men that they do not believe are Christians. Those people will stay home.

Mr. D said...

If Romney gets the nomination, a significant number of very serious evangelicals will be forced to choose between two men that they do not believe are Christians. Those people will stay home.

Guess we'll find out. Here's the question that matters -- are there enough of them to tip the vote to Obama in those states?

Anonymous said...

"One would then assume that Romney’s Mormonism is so abhorrent to evangelicals that they would not vote for him over any opponent. When the opponent is Rick Santorum, that might be the case. If the opponent turns out to be Barack Obama, I wouldn’t count on it."

Romney has 3 opponents right now, so it's difficult to say how it will play out in this situation. But, to your point, I saw an exit poll yestderday that said 52% of GOP voters in both states thought Romney the best candidate to take on Obama in the Fall, yet he only pulled less than 30% in both states. It is a subtle thing, but my guess is that there will be people sitting on the sidelines or voting for the other side (or a 3rd Party)in the Fall. And, as previously noted, it happens on both sides of the aisle. There will be registered Dems doing the same.

Here's the question that matters -- are there enough of them to tip the vote to Obama in those states?

If "those states" are any states in the deep south...of course not. But GOTV matters A LOT in Presidential general elections. And if turnout in the primaries is any indication of the level of enthusiasm being generated by Moe, Larry, Curly and Shemp right now. I would be concerned if I were a Conservative. 4 years ago, Obama/Clinton was generating record primary turnout. These guys are too, but in the opposite direction.

Regrds,
Rich

Mr. D said...

But GOTV matters A LOT in Presidential general elections. And if turnout in the primaries is any indication of the level of enthusiasm being generated by Moe, Larry, Curly and Shemp right now. I would be concerned if I were a Conservative. 4 years ago, Obama/Clinton was generating record primary turnout. These guys are too, but in the opposite direction.

Right. Two questions, then.

1) Is the primary turnout historically low, or just low in comparison to 2008? In Minnesota, our caucuses had less people than 2008, but significantly more than in 2004, 2000, 1996. . . .

2) Is there great evidence of enthusiasm for Obama? I haven't seen that, either. The caucuses on the DFL side were abysmal. Yes, the vote didn't much matter, but usually the party regulars are there to get things organized and from what I know about it, there was/is zero excitement for the DFL in this cycle.

I have a feeling when we have some more distance from the event, we will see that 2008 was an anomaly in many ways.

Gino said...

obama generated excitement on the level that many who never voted before decided to.

all that only gave him a 3% popular edge on election day.
will they be there this time? this is the question.

mccain sucked so hard even the GOP didnt like him. and again, all that suckage resulted in a 3% differential.

if i were a democrat, i'd be feeling insecure this year.