New at Reason

December 17, 2007

Jesse Walker breaks down the increasingly competitive race for the GOP presidential nomination.

Comments

Bingo|12.17.07 @ 1:10PM|#

Wow, great article. The line about how, in a Giuliani-Huckabee race, Republicans are choosing to jettison either social or economic values was damn insightful.

Forwarding this one to a few people!

VM|12.17.07 @ 1:10PM|#

Excellent work, Jesse!

I'll be joining Bingo in sending this on!

|12.17.07 @ 1:17PM|#

Good summation of the typical GOP lineup. The lack of traditional conservatives in this race is striking. Paul is the closest to a real conservative, in so much as he is the only one talking about small government. Thompson puts even himself to sleep. Guiliani has even fewer morals than a drunken Clinton, but with none of the class. If Huckabee were a Congregationalist instead of Baptist, the media would be portraying him to the left of Edwards. And I continue to assert that Romney is an artificial replicant. The other candidates are either one note wonders or have refused to do any actual campaigning.

|12.17.07 @ 1:22PM|#

Did anyone see Meet the Russert yesterday?

Mitt kicked some serious ass, sanding off the roughest corners of his "I'm a theo-con, too!" speech and aquitting himself plausibly on the abortion question.

Like him or not, he reall helped himself yesterday.

|12.17.07 @ 1:25PM|#

What about Duncan Hunter? Just because he's the spitting image of the grinch doesn't mean he intends to steal christmas. Actually, while I don't like his main theme, bashing immigration, he sticks pretty well to the party line.

Fluffy|12.17.07 @ 1:30PM|#

Funniest thing of the primary season so far:

After 2/5, it's entirely possible that the only guy still standing who can be the "Stop Huckabee" candidate will be...Paul. He'll be the only guy not broke or discredited.

So I guess we're going to see which of these two guys the Bill Kristol style establishment hates more.

|12.17.07 @ 1:30PM|#

Duncan Hunter is this year's Bob Graham.

It seems like every four years there is a candidate with a very good resume who the press just decides to marginalize for no discernable reason.

In 1996, it was Dick Lugar.

|12.17.07 @ 1:31PM|#

What has doomed the GOP - aside from the "vision thing" - is the failure to replace Cheney ("stepping down due to health concerns")
before the surge. His replacement (let's say Colin Powell) could have been running essentially as an incumbent and, if the surge is successful, as an architect of the strategy.
Just like with football teams, the GOP has to go through rebuilding - last place, get some new blood, kick out the old coach and his strategies, etc. If they can contend in 2012, it would depend on how badly the Dems screw up things. But it could be another long stretch out of power.

|12.17.07 @ 1:33PM|#

@joe

Mitt kicked some serious ass, sanding off the roughest corners of his "I'm a theo-con, too!" speech and aquitting himself plausibly on the abortion question.

Like him or not, he reall helped himself yesterday.

Actually, after Paul he'd probably be my first choice based on his track record, rather than anything he says - a bland but capable executive who could clean up Bush's mess while not doing anything that would particularly mess with the lives of the citizenry...

robc|12.17.07 @ 1:33PM|#

joe,

I think the factor tying those all together is "blandness".

|12.17.07 @ 1:39PM|#

What has doomed the GOP - aside from the "vision thing" - is the failure to replace Cheney ("stepping down due to health concerns")
before the surge. His replacement (let's say Colin Powell) could have been running essentially as an incumbent and, if the surge is successful, as an architect of the strategy.

I really don't understand why they didn't do this. I was convinced this was the plan from the beginning of the 2004 campaign.

Perhaps the GOP establishment realized that being associated with GWB is tantamount to a set of concrete slippers right now...

Rhywun|12.17.07 @ 1:40PM|#

What about Duncan Hunter?

I can't be the only person who still doesn't know who that is.

|12.17.07 @ 1:40PM|#

Pig Mannix,

I gotta hand it to, Romney is a very capable excecutive.

robc,

I think you're right. They wouldn't make good subjects for a "Behind the Music" episode, so the press blows them off.

highnumber|12.17.07 @ 1:42PM|#

Rhywun,

I even watched one of the debates he was in, and I still have no idea who he is. Every time the camera cut to him, I said "why is one of the moderators on the stage?"

TLB|12.17.07 @ 1:42PM|#

For the love of Gaia!

Would it be possible for Reason to concentrate on policy matters - even if they're wrong - rather than providing the same old horserace as the MSM sites?

Once again, if Reason would like to differentiate themselves from the other sites and would like to get a lot of good publicity and would like to get Ron Paul's ideas out there, let me suggest putting on some low-budget debates about real issues.

And, even when doing horserace, they can't bring themselves to mention the issue that will, sooner or later, drive Huck out of the race.

Kolohe|12.17.07 @ 1:44PM|#

It isn't just the nomination that's available. The GOP's political vision is up for grabs.

Best sentence I have read in the past few weeks.

Tacos mmm...|12.17.07 @ 1:51PM|#

I really don't understand why they didn't do this. I was convinced this was the plan from the beginning of the 2004 campaign.

Because Cheney will give up the keys to power when they pry them from his cold, mechanical hands.
Powell actually had a political future before he crossed Cheney's path. If you think he's going to do this administration, or the Republican party, any more favors, you're nuts.

Kolohe|12.17.07 @ 2:01PM|#

The two men who began the campaign as Rudy's biggest rivals, Arizona Sen. John McCain and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, have been assiduously courting the Christian right. But they have a history of statements and stances that put social conservatives on edge.

I totally understand the reluctance to embrace Romney with his necessary history as a yankee governor. But McCain I never understood.
What exactly did McCain do to piss in the social conservatives' corn flakes? It can't be CFR. And nobody anymore remembers the Keating Five.

|12.17.07 @ 2:04PM|#

John McCain can never be forgiven for breaking partisan ranks and arguing, in 2003-2006, that we were NOT turning the corner in Iraq, we did NOT have the right strategy, and we did NOT have a strategy that would result in victory.

Even though Republican primary voters now overwhelmingly agree that he was right, they seem to have decided that they care more about winning domestic political fights over the war than winning the war itself.

Brandybuck|12.17.07 @ 2:04PM|#

Duncan Hunter is one of those "other" candidates who appears unwilling to do any actual campaigning. He had the resume and policies to be a front runner (if he would have toned down his anti-brown-people rhetoric), but his campaigning seems to be non-existant. He could have appealed to pro-war neo-cons, socially conservative theo-cons and fiscally conservative econ-cons. But instead he made the mistake of thinking that debate attendance was sufficient to get him polling numbers.

|12.17.07 @ 2:15PM|#

I heard Alan Keyes on Sean Hannity's radio program last Friday. He made the comment that Ron Paul is a "blame America first" type. Ron Paul is not blaming America, he's blaming our government for its meddling foreign policy that puts American citizens in danger of acts of terrorism.

Bingo|12.17.07 @ 2:15PM|#

they seem to have decided that they care more about winning domestic political fights over the war than winning the war itself.

Ouch, so true it hurts.

|12.17.07 @ 2:22PM|#

Just like with football teams, the GOP has to go through rebuilding - last place, get some new blood, kick out the old coach and his strategies, etc.

I like the analogy, but I would be remiss if I didn't point out that William Clay Ford has been doing this with the Detroit Lions since 1964. In that time (43 years) the pussycats have won one, yes one, playoff game. Total. Republicans, you have been warned.

ed|12.17.07 @ 2:23PM|#

I predict the next election cycle will begin before the current one ends.

Thomas Paine\'s Goiter|12.17.07 @ 2:25PM|#

Jesse, great article.

dugg!

http://digg.com/2008_us_elections/The_Grand_Old_Party_Is_Up_for_Grabs_2

Kolohe|12.17.07 @ 2:25PM|#

John McCain can never be forgiven for breaking partisan ranks and arguing, in 2003-2006.

Arguing against the Iraq war with a critique of its leadership competence, rather than its desirability, is a postion I agree with, but I don't think has permeated the consiousness of the average voter, or even primary voter. The meme seems to be strictly a choice between "stay the course" and "let's get the heck out"; more subtle options do not seem to be in consideration by most voters.

In either case, McCain's antagonist realationship with evangelical social conservative republicans definitely pre-dates nineelebum. I can't figure out why.

|12.17.07 @ 2:27PM|#

I think McCain's problem with christians started when he slighted Bob Jones University. He also campaigned in New Hampshire as the non-bible thumper.

|12.17.07 @ 2:33PM|#

Not to mention buddying up to the godless media didn't help. And CFR did alienate right to lifers, whose political activism was squelched by the issue ad regulations.

|12.17.07 @ 2:40PM|#

John McCain can never be forgiven for breaking partisan ranks and arguing, in 2003-2006,

Nah. Rank and file Republicans and conservatives had had it up to here with McCain long before that. He was always just a little too willing to carry water for Democrats and too eager to get "strange new respect" from the librul media, is my recollection. I'm a little foggy on specifics, because I've always despised him as an authoritarian a-hole.

|12.17.07 @ 3:22PM|#

Not to mention buddying up to the godless media didn't help. And CFR did alienate right to lifers, whose political activism was squelched by the issue ad regulations.

Rush Limbaugh can't stand McCain (for the reasons mentioned above and by R C Dean) and I think that prevented a lot of the base from seriously considering
him. Frankly, after Ron Paul, I'd have to choose McCain as my candidate of choice and I have no idea why the other candidates are polling so much higher.

I think the Democrats have this election locked no matter who they choose. I just hope the GOP can at least keep a filibusterable minority in the Senate.

iowan|12.17.07 @ 3:52PM|#

Thread jack of sorts . . .

The RonPaul2008 site has links to the 30 minute paid political advertisement they plan to broadcast this weekend in Iowa.

I was mostly impressed with the content. Looks like a mashup of several independent politcal ads with some crammed together video from a campaign appearance with intermingled quickly recorded extended messages. The mashup ads look pretty polished. I hadn't seen any of them yet (I think they were being run in NH, but not IA). The rest of the stuff is pretty rough in places.

Overall, there is 15 to 20 minutes of brilliant stuff and the remainder is chaff. It could use some serious editing, but then they wouldn't fill the half-hour slot. No where does he look like a nut.

I guess that $6M is going to have a big impact on the campaign in IA which has been relatively low key so far.

|12.17.07 @ 4:25PM|#

Ron Paul's problem is that some of the states where he has the strongest support (the green states here are likely to default to the "home state" advantage of his rivals: McCain should take Arizona, Romney should take the two most Mormon states, Utah and Idaho.

But, if Ron Paul can pick off some of the green states, plus have some unfaithful electors in other states go to him, it might get him enough primary delegates to hold the balance of power.

Big Nanny|12.17.07 @ 4:49PM|#

"In either case, McCain's antagonist realationship with evangelical social conservative republicans definitely pre-dates nineelebum. I can't figure out why."

It might have something to do with that fact that in a speetch in the 2000 campaign season he compaired Jerry Falwell and the religous right with Louis Farakahn and the black Muslum movement.

LarryA|12.17.07 @ 5:21PM|#

The GOP's political vision is up for grabs.

They have to find it first.

I heard Alan Keyes on Sean Hannity's radio program last Friday. He made the comment that Ron Paul is a "blame America first" type. Ron Paul is not blaming America, he's blaming our government...

For Alan, U.S. government=America.

Bingo|12.17.07 @ 5:50PM|#

prolefeed:

Ron Paul has Arizona tagged and bagged. I've seen one McCain bumper sticker in the past 4 months. One. 2 Rudy stickers. I didn't even know Mitt had stickers until 3 days ago.

I drive past a dozen Ron Paul signs on the way to work, theres stickers on the bumpers of snowbirds in the land yachts, college kids on mopeds, rednecks in pickup trucks, and rich bastards in their damn Lexus SUVs. I saw some black kid that probably wasn't even old enough to vote get thrown out of a Walmart for passing out Ron Paul merchandise.

The Goldwater legacy is alive and strong in Phoenix.

Yet somehow we end up with Arpaio as our Sheriff, go figure.

|12.17.07 @ 6:12PM|#

¡Para el amor de Gaia!

¿Sería posible por razón de concentrarse en materias de la política - incluso si son incorrectos - más bien que proporcionando el mismo viejo horserace que los sitios de MSM?

De nuevo, si la razón quisiera distinguirse de los otros sitios y quisiera conseguir muchos de buena publicidad y quisiera conseguir las ideas de Ron Paul hacia fuera, me dejó sugiere poner en algunos discusiones del bajo-presupuesto sobre ediciones verdaderas.

Y, iguale cuando hace el horserace, no pueden traerse para mencionar la edición que, más pronto o más adelante, Huck de la impulsión fuera de la raza.

Civics Teacher|12.17.07 @ 6:55PM|#

But, if Ron Paul can pick off some of the green states, plus have some unfaithful electors in other states go to him, it might get him enough primary delegates to hold the balance of power.

Prolefeed,

No "electors" in a primary

F

|12.17.07 @ 7:34PM|#

Wouldn't any "unfaithful" electors be drawn to Rudy, anyhow? Birds of a feather, y'know.

|12.17.07 @ 8:10PM|#

Bingo -- Much as I would like to believe the anecdotal evidence you cited showing Ron Paul pwning Arizona, how do you explain this polling data?

|12.17.07 @ 8:13PM|#

Civics Teacher

You're right, but you may have noticed that hastily typed and checked posts here are not generally held to the same level of scrutiny as articles published in peer-reviewed journals? If people understand your point, good enough.

SIV|12.17.07 @ 9:02PM|#

I'm too lazy to look it up right now but are delegates bound to vote for their candidate?

If so, is that only on the first ballot?
Not that we have had open conventions any time recently but one can always hope for the future.

Robert|12.17.07 @ 10:42PM|#

As to why McCain has alienated certain groups, that's easy: McCain just makes a lot of enemies, period! The guy is notorious for his antagonism to those he works with or alongside, and that's got to filter down from the top. He will underperform his polls because few will GOTV for him.

ww|12.18.07 @ 8:38PM|#

除尘器
化工机械
电加热器