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Salon: How rough it’s gotten for Mitt ("not completely melting down" is not "good news")
Monday, Feb 13, 2012 4:53 AM Pacific Standard Time
How rough it’s gotten for Mitt
When not completely melting down is considered good news, you’ve got a problem
By Steve Kornacki
http://www.salon.com/2012/02/13/how_rough_it%E2%80%99s_gotten_for_mitt/singleton/
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaks at a caucus, Saturday, Feb. 11, 2012, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty) (Credit: AP)
The fact that Mitt Romney scored two straw poll victories over the weekend is not, by itself, bad news for his campaign. But the fact that the entire political world knows he did is.
If things were going the way Romney and his campaign wanted them to be going (and the way they believed they were going until about a week ago), the straw votes at CPAC and in Maine on Saturday would have been campaign footnotes, two more lay-ups for a candidate well on his way to uniting the Republican Party. Instead, they made for headline news, two desperately needed and somewhat surprising victories for a feeble front-runner.
When February started, the assumption was that Romney would win every primary and caucus scheduled for the month, a streak that would lift his standing in national polls to new and previously unimaginable heights and cement his image as the GOP’s inevitable nominee. Romney would then be positioned to finish off Newt Gingrich once and for all on Super Tuesday in early March, at which point it would finally be safe to pivot to the general election.
As expected, the first domino fell in Nevada two Saturdays ago, with Romney posting a lopsided victory, Gingrich barely staving off Ron Paul for second place, and Rick Santorum showing no hint of life. But then, out of nowhere, came Santorum’s stunning sweep last Tuesday – wins with 55 percent in Missouri, 45 percent in Minnesota and 40 percent in Colorado. And just like that, Romney had lost three of the first four February contests and gained a new and potentially more formidable chief rival in Santorum.
How rough it’s gotten for Mitt
When not completely melting down is considered good news, you’ve got a problem
By Steve Kornacki
http://www.salon.com/2012/02/13/how_rough_it%E2%80%99s_gotten_for_mitt/singleton/
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaks at a caucus, Saturday, Feb. 11, 2012, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty) (Credit: AP)
The fact that Mitt Romney scored two straw poll victories over the weekend is not, by itself, bad news for his campaign. But the fact that the entire political world knows he did is.
If things were going the way Romney and his campaign wanted them to be going (and the way they believed they were going until about a week ago), the straw votes at CPAC and in Maine on Saturday would have been campaign footnotes, two more lay-ups for a candidate well on his way to uniting the Republican Party. Instead, they made for headline news, two desperately needed and somewhat surprising victories for a feeble front-runner.
When February started, the assumption was that Romney would win every primary and caucus scheduled for the month, a streak that would lift his standing in national polls to new and previously unimaginable heights and cement his image as the GOP’s inevitable nominee. Romney would then be positioned to finish off Newt Gingrich once and for all on Super Tuesday in early March, at which point it would finally be safe to pivot to the general election.
As expected, the first domino fell in Nevada two Saturdays ago, with Romney posting a lopsided victory, Gingrich barely staving off Ron Paul for second place, and Rick Santorum showing no hint of life. But then, out of nowhere, came Santorum’s stunning sweep last Tuesday – wins with 55 percent in Missouri, 45 percent in Minnesota and 40 percent in Colorado. And just like that, Romney had lost three of the first four February contests and gained a new and potentially more formidable chief rival in Santorum.
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