2012 Presidential Elections
August 12, 2012 - With Paul Ryan, Romney finally has a plan
Yesterday Gov. Mitt Romney, the soon to be presidential nominee for the Republican Party, selected Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as his running mate for the 2012 presidential race. In doing so, it probably shifted the debate in the race more to the issues than ever before. This was a critical move for the Romney campaign, because up until this point the majority of the debate in race has been about a lackluster job growth cycle and the past history of Romney ... Read more »
August 11, 2012 - The Paul Ryan game change
As probably many have already seen Gov. Mitt Romney will select Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as his nominee for vice president, what many are viewing as a politically risky move for Romney, but not risky in the sense of McCain’s pick of former Gov. Sarah Palin. The pick of Paul Ryan forces the Romney campaign into an area it might not have wanted to go, especially with regards to the Ryan Budget. It will create conflicts with several groups of voters, ... Read more »
January 30, 2012 - The Butterfly Effect of the GOP presidential race
Amazing how in politics some things somewhat unrelated can have an effect on other things. Kind of a “butterfly effect” in a political sort of way. In this case, it appears the tight race to select a Republican presidential nominee may be pushing parties in the Texas redistricting case to come to a swift agreement. According to Michael Li, a Dallas attorney who has been closely following the process, we could see a settlement between both the ... Read more »
January 29, 2012 - Left to his own devices
“Once again, what a difference a week makes” was the way I started a Facebook status after seeing the latest Real Clear Politics summary graph of the Florida polls. That was before the release of the NBC/Marist, PPP, and Rasmussen polls were entered but even after those polls factored into the mix, the result was still the same – Romney leads Gingrich by double digits going into primary week in Florida. What’s more striking is that if you ... Read more »
January 17, 2012 - Is there a path to victory for Gingrich?
Today Newt Gingrich urged the other two conservative candidates, Rick Santorum and Rick Perry, to drop out of the race so conservative voters can rally around a single “anti-Romney” candidate. Of course, you can just imagine how much support he got from the other candidates on that suggestion. "It's an enormous amount of hubris for someone who lost their first two races, who thinks enough of themselves –- because a couple of polls have him at ... Read more »
January 12, 2012 - Republicans are sure having a hard time picking a nominee
So it’s looking more and more like Mitt Romney will be the Republican nominee for the presidential race. He won, for all intents and purposes, Iowa and handily defeated Ron Paul in New Hampshire. He’s leading the in the polls in South Carolina, although the latest poll shows him only two points ahead of Newt Gingrich. Florida has him with a double digit lead ahead of Gingrich, something that will only increase if he wins South Carolina. But is ... Read more »
January 8, 2012 - Forget New Hampshire, South Carolina is the state to watch
Coming off a sprint of debates, one last night hosted by ABC News/Yahoo/WMUR and one this morning hosted by NBC News/Facebook, the Republican candidates had a chance to make their case for the New Hampshire voters before the primary on Tuesday. While the debate might shake up the lower tier of candidates, Mitt Romney will still win the state with a sizable margin and Ron Paul will come in second with his own sizable margin over the rest of the field. ... Read more »
January 4, 2012 - The Good, Bad, and Ugly of Iowa
For all the flack Iowa is taking about not being a representative selection process for a presidential nominee, it created some interesting outcomes that the Republican Party will be dealing with in the weeks or months to come. As I said yesterday, Iowa is not about picking winners. It’s about culling the crop of the bottom tier of candidates. But the dynamics of the Iowa campaign may have created some outcomes the Party wasn’t expecting or planning ... Read more »
January 3, 2012 - Live blogging Iowa
The Iowa Caucus day is finally here. The big question is who will survive and who will have to ask the hard questions about continuing forward. Current poll averages show Romney a little over a point ahead of Paul. Santorum has been surging lately, rising almost daily so he could be a surprise tonight. Regardless of what the polls say, it all boils down to who shows up at the caucus sites at 7 p.m. Unlike primary elections you can't just stop in and ... Read more »
January 3, 2012 - The Iowa Caucus is not about picking a winner
Today’s the day many of us have been waiting for. Tonight about 100,000 Iowans will head to schools, churches, meeting halls, and living rooms to sit down and cast their choice for the Republican presidential nominee. Iowa is “first in the nation” and received prominent attention during the 70s when an obscure former GA governor and peanut farmer won the contest and went on to become president. Since then the nation focuses on this state’s ... Read more »
December 19, 2011 - Another day, another poll
Another poll was released yesterday from Public Policy Polling, a Democratic based polling firm that actually seems to bias towards Republican candidates according to Nate Silver. In the poll, Ron Paul took the lead from Newt Gingrich who actually slid pretty substantially from 27% on Dec. 5th to 14% in this latest poll. The poll was taken just after the last Republican debate in Sioux City and included Sunday after the release of the Des Moines Register ... Read more »
December 17, 2011 - Sometimes increasing voter turnout is not a good thing
Today Victor Landa wrote a good column in the Express-News as a follow-up to last Saturday’s presentation of a Citizen’s Bill of Rights and Responsibilities presented by graduate students at UTSA’s College of Public Policy. He picked up on a suggestion made by Phyllis Ingram, head of San Antonio’s League of Women Voters, that to increase voter turnout we should consolidate the elections to a single day. On the surface, that sounds like a good ... Read more »
December 15, 2011 - Iowa and beyond
Tonight is the final debate between the GOP presidential primary candidates before the Iowa Caucuses on Jan. 3rd. After that, there’s nothing between the candidates and the caucus other than a lot of open roads, corn fields and a bunch of towns full of Iowans. Just check out Gov. Perry’s 44-city, two week bus tour throughout Iowa. At least he’s taking some time off for Christmas. But he’s not alone as every single candidate will be criss-crossing ... Read more »
December 1, 2011 - The strangeness of the Iowa caucus
Today Rasmussen released their latest poll showing Gingrich in the lead with 38% trailed by Romney at 17%, Paul and Cain tied at 8%, followed by the pack around the 4% mark. That’s an interesting spread with each segment half the distance of its leader. If we held an election today, Gingrich wins this race outright with no questions. But the first contest is not an election. In fact, it’s probably one of the most bizarre forms of democracy we ... Read more »
November 15, 2011 - The GOP field–Romney and anybody but him
Yesterday some more polls came out highlighting some of the changes that have happened in the Republican primary field after two weeks of fun. Those two weeks saw two debates, a campaign in denial, and another campaign trying to get some positive air-time. But looking at the polls and the shape of the field it’s becoming apparent Republican voters are falling into two clearly distinctive camps (well, three if you count the faithful) – those who ... Read more »
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