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Politics!
I have one of the single most dull Ontario elections coming up, and as a result, have turned my thoughts to the US nominations, which I have been watching very very closely.
BTW: Ontario? McGinity with a razor thin minority government, the NDP only picking up two seats, and the Conservatives cracking three pickups in the 905, prompting near panic. I'm voting Green myself.
As of last week, average polling for Republicans
Guiliani 28%
Thompson 21.6%
McCain 14.2%
Romney 8.6%
Huckabee 4%
The Republican candidates are all over the map in this extremely protean race. What has seriously changed the dynamics is the erosion of support for Guiliani, as he gives away votes to Thompson and Romney. McCain's campaign still looks alive on paper, but the reality is that he's four weeks from running out of money, and has been trending down in every major area for the last two months.
Mitt Romney's 8% is a little deceptive, especially this far out. While Thompson or Guiliani are the presumptive candidates, the unwinnable former Governor is leading in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada by dominant margins of 10% or higher. Now, he's concentrated on those states to try and draw some momentum, but he's been slowly trending up across the board in many states, ostensibly the single biggest benefactor of McCain's collapse.
Interestingly, Guiliani's support has been extremely volatile in these early states. In both New Hampshire and Nevada, he's dropped like a rock and rebounded somewhat. His trend has been slowly dropping across the boards, and he doesn't have a chance to win until South Carolina, in which he remains neck and neck with Thompson.
As for Thompson, his reason for waiting is now obvious; this man is not prepared to run a nomination campaign. For all the splash, I doubt he'll last much past the first round of primaries.
What this looks like is that the anti-Rudy candidate could very well be Romnay, and if he starts collecting early states at a strong clip, a collapse of McCain or Thompson's campaign, especially with an endorsement could see him bulking up enough support to do the unthinkable, and snatch California's delegates away from Guiliani. Guiliani's strategy looks very much like a Democratic race; tie up the coasts and the independent vote in the Midwest, hope to hell you can snake out something like Florida and Virginia. The problem is that Romnay is competing strongly in the Northeast, which Guiliani should have had locked up months ago.
Now, Romnay's weakness is that he's not really running a national campaign yet, focusing on early pickups to fuel him. Still, he's run a relatively tight campaign, especially in comparison to Guiliani's or McCain's. Oddly, the most innovative campaign is Huckabee's; a strong, disciplined team who unfortunately needed to start trending up a lot earlier than they have.
And for Democrats
Clinton 39.2%
Obama 21.8%
Edwards 13.6%
Richardson 3%
The Democratic party race is a lot more along the lines of what people expected. Clinton is dominating the field, with a national presence and the most professional campaign. The experience has kept her mostly gaffe free, while Obama, Edwards, and with alarming regularity, Richardson has put their foot in it. Obama's money advantage has not translated into support, and it doesn't look like his support has grown much past the initial numbers.
Edwards maintains a strong lead in Iowa, but it has been slowly chipped away by Clinton. He needs a strong blow out win here to stay in the field legitimately. He's been showing recent signs of growth in some of the early stages, usually twined with a slumping Obama, but still sits third on most of the board. In South Carolina, his trend downward is steep and sudden.
Likewise, Obama is suffering in Nevada, but has seemed to be able to slow many of his sudden declines, likely due to some time since his most recent misstep on the campaign. Strangely, this doesn't seem to be helping Clinton much. Even with Edwards and Obama declines, she's not drawing a lot of additional support yet, and the Undecided are very high in most polls.
By all polling, Clinton remains the most likely candidate, especially since the Republican candidates are already rebutting her as the presumptive choice. To have any chance, either Edwards or Obama need to fold early. Edward's organization behind Obama's money or vice versa could very easily push Clinton back on her heels, but as long as this remains a three way race, it's really just a one person race.
BTW: Ontario? McGinity with a razor thin minority government, the NDP only picking up two seats, and the Conservatives cracking three pickups in the 905, prompting near panic. I'm voting Green myself.
As of last week, average polling for Republicans
Guiliani 28%
Thompson 21.6%
McCain 14.2%
Romney 8.6%
Huckabee 4%
The Republican candidates are all over the map in this extremely protean race. What has seriously changed the dynamics is the erosion of support for Guiliani, as he gives away votes to Thompson and Romney. McCain's campaign still looks alive on paper, but the reality is that he's four weeks from running out of money, and has been trending down in every major area for the last two months.
Mitt Romney's 8% is a little deceptive, especially this far out. While Thompson or Guiliani are the presumptive candidates, the unwinnable former Governor is leading in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada by dominant margins of 10% or higher. Now, he's concentrated on those states to try and draw some momentum, but he's been slowly trending up across the board in many states, ostensibly the single biggest benefactor of McCain's collapse.
Interestingly, Guiliani's support has been extremely volatile in these early states. In both New Hampshire and Nevada, he's dropped like a rock and rebounded somewhat. His trend has been slowly dropping across the boards, and he doesn't have a chance to win until South Carolina, in which he remains neck and neck with Thompson.
As for Thompson, his reason for waiting is now obvious; this man is not prepared to run a nomination campaign. For all the splash, I doubt he'll last much past the first round of primaries.
What this looks like is that the anti-Rudy candidate could very well be Romnay, and if he starts collecting early states at a strong clip, a collapse of McCain or Thompson's campaign, especially with an endorsement could see him bulking up enough support to do the unthinkable, and snatch California's delegates away from Guiliani. Guiliani's strategy looks very much like a Democratic race; tie up the coasts and the independent vote in the Midwest, hope to hell you can snake out something like Florida and Virginia. The problem is that Romnay is competing strongly in the Northeast, which Guiliani should have had locked up months ago.
Now, Romnay's weakness is that he's not really running a national campaign yet, focusing on early pickups to fuel him. Still, he's run a relatively tight campaign, especially in comparison to Guiliani's or McCain's. Oddly, the most innovative campaign is Huckabee's; a strong, disciplined team who unfortunately needed to start trending up a lot earlier than they have.
And for Democrats
Clinton 39.2%
Obama 21.8%
Edwards 13.6%
Richardson 3%
The Democratic party race is a lot more along the lines of what people expected. Clinton is dominating the field, with a national presence and the most professional campaign. The experience has kept her mostly gaffe free, while Obama, Edwards, and with alarming regularity, Richardson has put their foot in it. Obama's money advantage has not translated into support, and it doesn't look like his support has grown much past the initial numbers.
Edwards maintains a strong lead in Iowa, but it has been slowly chipped away by Clinton. He needs a strong blow out win here to stay in the field legitimately. He's been showing recent signs of growth in some of the early stages, usually twined with a slumping Obama, but still sits third on most of the board. In South Carolina, his trend downward is steep and sudden.
Likewise, Obama is suffering in Nevada, but has seemed to be able to slow many of his sudden declines, likely due to some time since his most recent misstep on the campaign. Strangely, this doesn't seem to be helping Clinton much. Even with Edwards and Obama declines, she's not drawing a lot of additional support yet, and the Undecided are very high in most polls.
By all polling, Clinton remains the most likely candidate, especially since the Republican candidates are already rebutting her as the presumptive choice. To have any chance, either Edwards or Obama need to fold early. Edward's organization behind Obama's money or vice versa could very easily push Clinton back on her heels, but as long as this remains a three way race, it's really just a one person race.
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Obama has made too many gaffes as you say. And Edwards? I think he's unrecoverable. He's doing poorly in the South, the one region that he could and should carry... not that it matters. The south has become completely red... though I wonder how Guilani or Romney would do in the south in the presidential election. Good thing they're white and male, eh?
Oh, it's nice to live in a blue state for once. Don't have to worry about getting my car keyed for sporting a Hillary bumper sticker.
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Romney's advantage in early states - well, basically I agree with a lot of what you said. So far he is the only real candidate competing there. He's drowned NH and IA with money, if anything he should have much greater advantage over the rest of the field than he does. My impression is that Guiliani is tailoring his campaign to a new primary schedule, placing less empphasis on the eary states.
As for the Dem race - at this point the debate should really be about who is going to be Hillary's VP, IMO. Obama pretty much shattered under the campaign pressure like a glass vase - as I've said, he's simply not ready for the prime time. And Edwards is inelectable, for all his smarm.
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Romney's strategy is pretty simple; run up wins early, and try to use the momentum to cut some of the fundraising advantage. If he can hang tight once some of the other nominees pull out, you could see a shift there. Also, Guiliani's campaign has been crap thus far.
And yeah, I don't see anything changing with Clinton. But I disagree with the Southerner. I think she needs a Southwesterner. Too bad Richardson's been such a yahoo on the nomination, because he'd have been perfect.
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Hillary can't win in the south... unless of course Strom Thurmond rose from the grave, became a democrat and was her running mate. Outside of the major metropolitan areas, Clinton's name is on the same par as "Satan" (I'm not embellishing). Running against her, all you have to be is not her. But except for Florida, the electoral count isn't the nail in anyone's coffin or the feather in anyone's cap. This race will probably be decided by the midwest.
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Meanwhile GOP's likely candidate is pro-choice, pro-gay, and pro gun control New Yorker.
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I also don't believe the VP influences as much as people think. In Hillary's case, winning any of the Southern states is unlikely at best, no matter who's on the ticket, so why spend the capital in order to influence a percentage point or two where it doesn't help? Where as a midwestern candidate shifting a couple of percentage points there locks up areas like Wisconsin, Minnisota, and puts Iowa in play. A southwestern opens up New Mexico and Nevada. Most importantly, assuming the Democrats hold Kerry's wins from 2004 (and all of them are trending that way), all you need to do is flip Ohio and your candidate is President. Just looking through the South, where Bush won most by 10% or more, I don't see anyone short of Jesus Christ on the ticket impacting that.
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