GOP Race: On to New Hampshire

04 January 2012 |permalink | email article

Several takeaways from the Iowa caucuses: 1. Mitt Romney managed to win by eight votes, a single decimal point, over Rick Santorum; 2. He eliminated his major foe, the other Rick, Texas Gov. Perry, who’s suspended his campaign and is history; 3. Michelle Bachmann, like Perry, will not go to South Carolina and is toast; 4. Santorum will try to consolidate anti-Romney conservatives who regard him with suspicion even though hapless John McCain was the first to climb aboard Mitt’s less than stunning performance; 5. Newt Gingrich, basically destroyed by millions of dollars from Romney PAC groups, is bent on revenge and will go all out to support Santorum; 6. Even if Romney loses in South Carolina he can rebound in Florida, or if not in caucus states in February, or Super Tuesday in March because he has the Republican establishment’s funding; 7. This weekend in New Hampshire will be a debate Donnybrook, with Mitt under savage attack by Santorum, Ron Paul and Gingrich Saturday on ABC , and “NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday. Update: Rick Perry, who finished a poor fifth, with 10 percent of the Iowa vote, now says he’s back in the race, will debate and go to South Carolina. 

Romney versus Obama

It’s long been clear that Romney is resting his case to on defeating Barack Obama on two core claims, Greg Sargent reported on the Washington Post’s Plum Line.
The first: At Bain Capital, Romney created over 100,000 jobs, which supposedly proves he has the processional experience to turn the economy around. The second: Under the Obama presidency, the country has actually lost jobs, which proves his record is a failure. Both claims are crucial to Romney’s central rational for running for president. Sargent raises this question: is it too much to expect reporters and the news outlets to scrutinize them or ask him to substantiate them? The Romney campaign is circulating a quote he gave to Fox News on Tuesday. Defending criticism of his Bain years, Romney replied in part: “This is a president who lost more jobs during any president than Hoover. That is 2 million jobs that he lost as President.” The media’s role is to determine the accuracy of Romney’s claims.

L.A. Politic

Michael Dukakis, the former Massachusetts governor and 1998 Democratic nominee for president, is backing Rep. Brad Sherman, in a fierce battle for the newly drawn San Fernando Valley congressional district seat as fellow Democratic Rep. Howard Berman. Odds favor Berman.

What They Said

“The only candidate with genuine big vision.”—Media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who controls Fox News Channel and the Wall Street Journal, supporting Rick Santorum on Twitter—an assessment which will impact on both conservative media outlets.

“The country doesn’t want an election that is Harvard Law versus Harvard Law”.—Columnist David Brooks, in the New York Times, who trashed a President Obama/Mitt Romney face-off. 

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