Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Super Tuesday - About Last Night... (notes)


by Rick Hill

Tonight is a huge night for the Republican Presidential candidates.  The results could mean a potential pulling-away for Mitt Romney, a key closing of the gap for Rick Santorum, or a last-ditch effort for Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich to remain relevant in the race.  As most of Super Tuesday comes to a close, I took the liberty to comment on a few pieces of Fox News’ coverage of the ten primaries at stake:
·         Like two weeks ago, I started putting comments together way too late.  It’s currently 10:30, and it appears that most of the states are wrapped up.  A majority of the cases are no-brainers (Romney in Massachusetts, Vermont and Virginia, Santorum in Oklahoma and Tennessee, Gingrich in Georgia), but what’s striking are some of the margins of victory:  Santorum took Tennessee by far more than I expected, and Gingrich wasn’t even close in that key Southern state.  Gingrich needs to hang it up.  Paul should have hung it up a while ago.
·         They should never allow two Fox News talking heads to use whiteboards at the same time.  The numbers and makeshift charts are way too confusing between Rove and the Gingrich advisor.  It’s like a really bad episode of Around the Horn.
·         As of 10:40, they still can’t call Ohio.  Santorum appears to be up by 1%, and with only 80% reporting, it’s still too close to call.  In all seriousness, that race was the real toss-up for the night:  older reports gave the state to Santorum, but Romney has been surging as of late.  I wish I could look more closely at the precincts with extra sets of eyes, but I sadly do not have a working knowledge of voting behavior in Ohio.  All I know about the state politically is its knack for predicting Presidents:

·         Ohio’s counties are messy like Pennsylvania’s, like a fun jigsaw puzzle for those 8 and up… a great deal uglier than the neat make-up of Iowa counties, for sure.
·         Exit polling:  So you’re going to ask Ohio Republicans whether they think we should choose a background in business or in government?    Gee whiz… anyways, Santorum’s appeal to voters under 30 is interesting.  Romney’s low polling numbers among the same group is a far cry from our chapter’s feelings on the race thus far.  In other numbers, Santorum also wins the populist battle once again, winning the question of who understands the problems of average Americans better.  Even this guy, however, finds that a question bizarrely framed:  what exactly is an “average” American (let alone an Ohio Republican’s perception of that)?  In addition, how do you properly encapsulate the problems they face?
·         85% reporting - RAZOR THIN!  Santorum by roughly 2,000.  Seeing as some of the bigger counties (Franklin, for example) are under 75% reporting, there’s a very good chance Romney could leapfrog here in the next ten minutes.
·         One of the big things that the talking heads continue to juggle is Romney’s inability to lock up specific kinds of voters with whom Santorum does very well. These groups include blue-collar workers and evangelicals.  As the front-runner in 2012, Romney has got to figure these groups out, and I must admit these groups’ stubbornness against the former governor concerns me.  I think he’s the best choice to beat the President, but he has to find a way to make other voters feel that way.  It’s his best case against candidates who align more to the right of him.
·         Santorum chose Steubenville for his Ohio campaign HQ.  Shocker.

·         And Romney just took the lead as of 11:06pm.  Most of the punditry suggested since polls closed that Romney would close the large early gap Santorum created, with rural counties calculating their results more quickly.   I suggest Romney probably has Ohio, and he’ll claim five out of the ten contests.  Though he will claim three or four, the situation for Santorum is dire:  if he wants to win anything in the near future, he’s got to kick Gingrich out of the race as the primaries move to Mississippi and Alabama.  Even though the South and the Midwest are not the entire country, they make up an important psychological base for an anti-Romney effort.  Santorum’s biggest draw is that he presents himself as a true right-of-right alternative to the more moderate, more businesslike Romney.
·         Romney’s opened up a 5,000+ voter lead as of 11:15.  Shouldn’t be long until this one gets called…
·         John Bolton is one of my favorites in contemporary politics.  As a foreign policy nut myself, I couldn’t agree more that views and approaches to foreign policy often serve as important surrogates to quality of leadership.  I’m not entirely sold on his denunciation of the President’s comments today related to Obama’s reaction to what GOP candidates have been saying about Iran, Israel and the like:  in all honesty, only the President has the advantage of sitting behind the Commander-in-Chief’s desk and truly understanding our strategic place in the world.  I may not agree with the President, but I respect his perspective.  Nevertheless, I think Bolton is spot-on with his evaluation of the implications of Iran’s potentiality of gaining a nuclear weapon.
·         It’s 11:40, and this thing still isn’t over.  Even if Romney took just five of the states, another positive point for the campaign is that he finished second in all of the others (except North Dakota, in which Ron Paul is still technically in second).  That confidence is important for Romney:  as long as the final numbers stay close, it means that he still has strong appeal in the states he didn’t win.  Those results are the key to a good base for the general election.
·         Right before midnight, and I’m really confused as to why Fox just cut to a brief excerpt from a Kucinich speech (apparently he’s losing something in the first week of March?).  Then again, this is certainly not the first time I find myself bewildered by Dennis Kucinich’s attempts to string together a complete thought…
·         I find it mind-numbing that Fox anchors have to introduce Sarah Palin as the former Governor of Alaska and former Vice Presidential candidate.  Her time on Fox News since the 2008 election suggests to me that most people who religiously follow Fox have a rough idea of who she is.  I still close my eyes and imagine Kitty from That 70’s Show is speaking... wow, she struggles with complex sentences.

And so I went to bed last night not posting any more.  But in the end, as we all know, Romney pulled it out. Before I turned off the television, I told myself I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case, and now it seems that each side is claiming victory for various pieces of the race.  As the story develops more, the Pitt CR's will be sure to offer commentary, especially as the race advances and heads south.  Hope you enjoyed the notes!

      (By the way, if the memes are not as appealing as I perceive them to be, please just let me know.  I'll curb my behavior.)

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