Don Roach: Newt Fights Back in South Carolina

Monday, January 23, 2012

Don Roach, GoLocalProv MINDSETTER™

 

The iconic LL Cool J song, Mama Said Knock You Out, begins with, “Don’t call it a comeback!” but that’s exactly what transpired in South Carolina over the weekend. Down double digits a few days ago, Newt Gingrich pulled out a primary victory of Mitt Romney and other Republican hopefuls that is as surprising as Baltimore Ravens’ kicker, Billy Cundiff, missing a 32 yard field yard field goal against the Patriots yesterday. While the Patriots fly off to the Super Bowl in Indianapolis, the Republicans head down to Florida to wage another primary battle.

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Right after the New Hampshire primary I wrote, “the fact remains that if Romney wins South Carolina, this will/should force out a candidate or two. It will also make it more difficult for the other candidates to overtake him with three successive victories in three different parts of the country.” Since my comment, it turns out Romney didn’t actually win Iowa and Rick Perry dropped out of the race (giving a nod to Gingrich) right before the South Carolina primary. The Iowa ‘loss’ doesn’t hurt Romney as much as how different the mood within the race is today compared to approximately ten days ago.

Coming off New Hampshire, Romney looked like a runaway freight train with a lead in a southern state, wins in the first two primaries, outspending all of his opponents, and looking as though he might actually get conservatives to open up to him. On the other end of the spectrum, it appeared as though Gingrich’s moment in the spotlight was over and that Perry, Santorum, & Gingrich were going to split the conservative vote giving Romney an easy path to victory. But it’s not going to be that simple.

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We’re learning that this race is going to go through many twists and turns before all is said and done. After three primaries nothing is settled with three different winners. Conservative Republicans seem unwilling to support Romney at this point, but there seems to be no consensus alternative. Romney’s team has done a good job of bringing down whichever candidate pops up as his primary rival not allowing them to gain any traction. They’ll need to continue this trend in Florida and hope both Santorum and Gingrich stay in the race.

Florida is critical

The bolded text above states the obvious. The latest Gallup poll shows Romney at 30 percent, Gingrich at 25, and no one else above 13 percent nine days before the Florida primary. If South Carolina is any indication, who knows what will happen. I’ll take a stab since this is what I do.

Looking at how Romney performed in 2008 won’t give us any clues as to how 2012 will turn out. It’s a different race. Romney ran against McCain who was a very well liked and well known commodity amongst Republicans. He too, was a moderate like Romney so differentiating himself wasn’t easy. Add in Giuliani and the field, from a moderate Republican standpoint was crowded. Back then Romney received 31 percent of the vote and the latest poll gives him 30 percent even though he and his Super PAC have already spent approximately $4.8 million in the state.

In 2012, Romney is the moderate choice with Santorum & Gingrich trying to court the conservatives. What’s interesting though, Gingrich has very powerful moderate bona fides and in my opinion, if Gingrich makes Florida about immigration he’s got a very good chance to win. Gingrich can make a left hand turn on this issue in Florida and stay right-ish on the other issues without any fall out. The other remaining major candidates won’t be able to do that effectively based on where they stand on the issue. That gives Gingrich a good chance to win the primary and the opportunity to win the critical swing state in the fall.

Does Gingrich run the risk of losing more hard-line conservatives by going left on immigration? Yes, but Romney would not be the beneficiary as those same hard-line conservatives probably don’t want Romney to win so I expect them to back either Santorum or Gingrich whoever looks stronger at the moment.

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Any way you slice it, whoever comes out of Florida is the most electable candidate. Florida isn’t Iowa, New Hampshire, or South Carolina. There’s a good mix of conservatives and moderates with a number of issues important to the electorate. In my opinion, the winner here sends the message that he is the candidate that is able to marshal the Republican forces. The next week and a half is going to be a battle and will also show us if Gingrich can use his momentum unlike Santorum & Romney before him.

Gingrich shows grit, Romney not so much

One last item. On my Facebook page, people have been killing Gingrich because of his personal mistakes thinking he’s unfit to be the standard bearer for morality. All I can do is sigh because when will we learn that Americans are forgiving when it comes to personal issues like this. America forgave a President for having ‘sexual relations’ with an intern they’ll surely forgive a man who has been married three times. Gingrich showed his grit when faced with questions about his second marriage at a debate last week. And that’s one aspect he has over Romney, hit Gingrich he’s hitting back.

Romney was asked about revealing his tax returns and he fumbled his response. Much more important to Americans than marriage fidelity is the ability of the man (or woman) to handle difficult situations. Romney was put on the spot and couldn’t answer his critics and his opponents rightly called him out on it. Romney is being characterized as the rich out of touch candidate and his response to his tax returns did nothing to shoot down that image. Unlike Gingrich who took rebutted his issue with strength Romney showed weakness on what would seem to be a trivial matter. Voters think if he can’t combat an issue like this how will he fare facing more difficult issues? It’s a legitimate question and in this writer’s opinion one that Romney is not best suited to answer.

We’ll see if Florida residents agree.

Don Roach is a member of the Rhode Island Young Republicans. He can be reached at [email protected].
 

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