im ron paul all the way, but id put my money on romney. as ive said before, the GOP would sooner totally disband the party before handing over the reins to paul. it sure is funny watching them squirm right now though! that being said, i do believe ron paul gives the republicans the best chance to beat obama. as ive said, i think republicans would either vote for paul or just stay home (they aint voting obama), paul would win the independent vote and he would even siphon off far left democrats who are unhappy w/ obama. im not saying paul would CRUSH obama, but i do think he would put up the best fight and we would also get some of the most interesting debates we have had in a long time. romney is the republican version of john kerry - he is an empty suit being trotted out to lay down to obama in the general election.
I've been saying Romney since last year. There has been little doubt because none of the alternatives are viable. He gets it by default. Your poll is about 10 months too late.
I agree. Romney will get it. That's who the Republican hierarchy wants, and he's the only one who won't look like a total imbecile while he gets drubbed in November.
Realistically, none of these guys stand a chance against Obama. Romney will get the nod and will do better than Newt or Paul would do but it won't be good enough to become president.
Newt could win if Romney falters; and with his reputation for flip-flopping: which I'm actually fine with considering the unreasonably long and contradictory list of ideological demands on either side, all you'd need is a story with an Executive memo from his time in Mass, and some contentious exchanges with the press, just in time for a big Southern primary.
Romney seems like it by default. I really thought Newt would have a bit more staying power than he's had and wouldn't collapse until the general. But at this point, it seems like Newt, Bachmann, Santorum, and Perry are equally splitting about 60% of the vote, which just means all of them lose. Bachmann and Santorum were out from day one, and I really thought all of that vote would coalesce around Newt or Perry, but it just doesn't seem to have happened. Romney will be competitive in the general election. I think in today's partisan world, the floor for either party is around 43-44% for a Newt/Perry type. I think a Romney-Obama matchup will be more in the 52-48% range.
I have no idea how to predict the popular vote in a general election; reliably red states like Texas have Dem mayors in their big cities and the County Judges are all Repubs, and in Big Blue states like Cali and New York you get all kinds of suburban conservative animosity towards the big cities. Then you have all the Southern states, some of which I believe are blacker than the rest of the Union, so all the whites vote Republican.
55/45 would be considered a landslide, I'd guess it'll be more like 52/48. Mitts has PAC money to burn, though it will be hedged for Obama too. But it's the electoral college count that could be interesting and only the Congressional balance that would make any difference. It'll be business as usual in Washington until at least 2014.
I've stated before that I think the money behind the GOP doesn't even care about the Presidency, they have the set-up they want now, all they have to do is maintain control of the House and they can stop any Hope and Change. They may see Romney as an expendable centrist. His loss just allows the extremist room to keep up the pressure and outrage. If they won the position it would be harder to call for more tax breaks just to settle for keeping what they have.
