Decision ‘08

Are The Republicans Down To A Two-Man Race?

With McCain fading fast, and Romney stuck at around 10% max in almost every national poll, one can be forgiven for wondering if the Republican nomination is down to Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson. The latest batch of polls, as you can see here from the invaluable RealClearPolitics, has Thompson surging and Giuliani in a narrow, but unmistakable, declining pattern (Rasmussen has actually had Thompson leading in the last few updates, but it seems like an outlier).

It’s still hard to know what to make of the Thompson candidacy - he’s still benefiting from a bit of a honeymoon (though recent attacks on his lobbying past indicate that honeymoon is about over). Even if Thompson fades, though, Rudy doesn’t have a clear path to the nomination. Despite his lead in virtually every national poll, Romney still leads in enough early states to make this a three-man race, at this point. Indeed, in a traditional election season, one might even say Romney’s strength in the classic early matchups gives him the edge.

This is no normal season, however, with Rudy skipping the Iowa caucuses and concentrating on large states that are going to cast their primary votes much, much earlier this time around. Also of interest is Romney’s recent massaging of expectations regarding a fundraising total that will clearly be lower than his surprisingly good first quarter showing (though he has deep, deep pockets).

As if all that wasn’t enough, there’s the Bloomberg wildcard. If he runs, he has no prayer - none - of winning the presidency, but he might attract enough potential Rudy supporters to throw the election to Hillary - but that’s getting ahead of ourselves. Rudy has to still march through two challengers to make it to that scenario…we’re a long way from deciding anything yet…

16 Responses to “Are The Republicans Down To A Two-Man Race?”

1 Chris J. Breisch Says:
June 27th, 2007 at 7:32 am
I’ve already made my viewpoint known on the main point of this article. I think it’s at best a two man race. And I’m not even 100% convinced that Fred has staying power, so it may be just a one man race.

I don’t buy the “strength in early states” mantra. It’s never been enough in my lifetime, and I don’t expect it to ever be enough. Didn’t McCain win Iowa in 2000? Didn’t Dean win NH in 2004? Actually, I may have those wrong. I didn’t bother to look it up. The point is this, however. Someone always does surprisingly well in one (or even two) of the early states, then fizzles when the real season starts.

I still think it’s unclear whether Bloomberg would pull more from the Republicans or the Democrats. I don’t see him pulling a single vote from Rudy. We already have a New York mayor in the race that’s left of most Republicans on social issues. Seems like overkill.

Most people think that Bloomberg hurts the Republicans more than the Democrats for a couple reasons, a) the Democrat base percentage is higher than the Republicans (these are the people that are going to vote for Hillary or whoever no matter what), and b) Bloomberg is a Republican.

I can buy a), but I think we have to wait to see who the nominee is to be certain of that. I have problems with b), though I’m sure the MSM will be pushing that angle. Bloomberg isn’t a Republican. He’s a lifelong member of the Democrat party. He switched in 2001 to the Republican party to avoid a nasty primary battle in NY. But, if you look at his policies, they’re pretty much all left of center. I’m sure that the Republican party will emphasize that over and over should he enter the race. If they are successful at getting that point across (a big if), then Bloomberg might hurt the Democrats more than the Republicans.

I don’t know if that can really happen. My point though is that there are too many unknowns right now to even guess the impact of a Bloomberg candidacy.
2 Dan Says:
June 27th, 2007 at 8:29 am
My completely not backed up by science opinion is that if people are going to vote for a former New York mayor then they are going to going to vote for Rudy.
3 Ryan Bonneville Says:
June 27th, 2007 at 10:27 am
I think discounting Romney is remarkably foolish. For one, we’re a looooong way from primary season and these polls mean virtually nothing. At this time in 2003, the two leaders in the Democratic pack were Lieberman and Gephardt. We all know how well that worked out for them.

Also, you may think that the new primary season dramatically alters the landscape and the importance of the early states, but there’s simply no reason to conclude that as scientific fact before the primaries even start. The only two candidates in recent history who won their party’s nominations without winning either Iowa or New Hampshire were Clinton in 1992 (which was a bizarre primary season for a lot of reasons that are unlikely to matter in 2008) and McGovern in 1972. Until we know for a fact that the new season will fundamentally alter the landscape, it’s still reasonable to believe that winning both Iowa and New Hampshire earns a candidate frontrunner status.

Combing these two points, of course, we can see that Romney doesn’t necessarily deserve to be considered the frontrunner. Leading in Iowa and New Hampshire in June of 2007 does not translate into leading in those states when it actually matters. That said, that he has the lead in those two states means he can’t be counted out.

Also, to Dan, if the election comes down to Hillary vs. Rudy vs. Bloomberg, the New York mayor I would be voting for would be Bloomberg. I am obviously atypical, but I feel it’s worth pointing this out.
4 Ryan Bonneville Says:
June 27th, 2007 at 10:27 am
Uh, combing = combining.
5 Dennis Says:
June 27th, 2007 at 10:41 am
I wonder if the frontloading of primaries could actually lead to every political reporter’s dream story — no clear nominee and a brokered convention. When the primaries were more strung out, many of the big states didn’t vote until the nominee was already pretty clear. There was a natural winnowing process that made those later primaries coronations of sorts.

But when you’ve got big states like California, Florida and New Jersey all planning to vote in February, suddenly the usual early mishmash of support that sorts itself by June might instead remain frozen in place. Combine that with the fact that nobody seems to have claimed clear frontrunner status for the GOP, and maybe the eventual nominee won’t have the votes for a clear majority without doing a little horsetrading.
6 Chris J. Breisch Says:
June 27th, 2007 at 10:57 am
Ryan,
Leave Bloomberg out. Who would you vote for?

In other words, the question isn’t whether you’d vote for Bloomberg or not. The question is who lost your vote by Bloomberg entering the race.

From your previous comments, it doesn’t sound like you’d be voting for Rudy in any case.

I like Romney. I just don’t think he’s a legitimate player in this race. Unless…he starts picking up voters leaving McCain’s sinking ship. But, while I think it’s obvious that McCain’s ship is sinking, I don’t think it’s sinking fast enough.

All the so-called “experts” that I have heard think that due to the extremely long campaign season the primary season will be meaningless this time around. I often hear that we will know our Democrat and Republican nominees for 2008 with a fair amount of certainty by Labor Day 2007. I’m not willing to buy that it’s going to be that soon, but I wouldn’t be surprised by it. But, I do think we’re likely to know long before Halloween.

If these experts are right, or even if my slightly more conservative estimate is correct, Mitt needs to be polling significantly higher soon. He may find that the race is over before he really got started.

Of course, if he campaigns heavily in the fall, and does pick up, perhaps he can prove the “experts” wrong. I’d love to see that too.
7 Ryan Bonneville Says:
June 27th, 2007 at 12:53 pm
In the absolutely awful (and apparently quite likely) situation that the race comes down to Hillary vs. Rudy, I would have to call myself “undecided”. My preference at the moment is probably Hillary, but I fundamentally don’t trust her. Of course, heading into 1992 and 2000, I didn’t trust her husband and was pretty well sold on George; just goes to show that my instincts are maybe even less trustworthy than Mrs. Clinton’s. That said, Giuliani has room to maneuver in the general if he’s willing to cast of the facile strongarmishness (I just made that word up, in case you’re curious) the Republican base is clamoring for. My biggest worry about Giuliani is that I think his instincts about the so-called Global War on Terror are dead wrong; I actually pretty much like him on everything else (gun control not so much, but there isn’t a more effective advocacy group than the NRA, so no worries). If he continues to insist that torture and foreign wars are the solution to terrorism, I go Hillary. If he grows up and starts thinking about the complexities of international terrorism, Arab politics, and the schisms in the Muslim community, he can get my vote.
8 doug harger Says:
June 28th, 2007 at 10:47 am
the very idea that any thinking person can continue to try make a strong case for the election of Hillary is beyond me. Rudy is definitely preferable to me than Bloomberg, though he has been a good financial mayor of New York. Hillary is the queen of phony and always has been. She is willing to do or say anything that is convenient and is so assured of her own righteousness that it is scary. I am saying all of this trough the prism of having been in New York on 9/11 and having worked in Iraq for the past 3+ years. Believe me whether we like it or not, or whether it is comfortable for us or not, we must stay on the offensive. The enemy is real, and they really do want to kill us…talking to them nicely is not an option that is going to work for us.

Ryan is right to not to trust Hillary… and please someone explain to me why she scores so high with people on the question of experience??? How are her 6 + years in the Senate fundamentally different or more defining than the 6+ years that GWB had spent as the Governor of Texas or her own husband’s years as the governor of Arkansas? I don’t get it.
9 Chris J. Breisch Says:
June 28th, 2007 at 11:48 am
Interestingly enough, I received my weekly Evans-Novak Political Report yesterday. It also says that the Republican presidential nomination is now a two man race.

Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson.

Yes, you read that right.

The outlook for the Republican presidential nomination increasingly looks like a shoot-out between former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. The nominal front-runner, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, suffered a terrible week last week, and the previously presumed establishment candidate, Arizona Sen. John McCain, is fading badly.

Here’s the article: http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=21329

Okay, this seems like a wacko thing to say to me, but I guess time will tell.

Sign up here for their weekly e-mails if you’re interested:
http://paracom.paramountcommunication.com/ct/ct.php?t=1459203&c=1382337451&m=m&type=1&h=ACE0715F7D5A7E40F2B16EC2993A4AA5
10 Ryan Bonneville Says:
June 28th, 2007 at 1:13 pm
The Corner is also pushing the Romney-Thompson line. It’s wholly implausible.
11 Sean P Says:
June 29th, 2007 at 12:07 pm
Romney has the same problem McCain does — too many Primary voters dislike him for him to have a legitimate chance of getting to 51%. In fact, relative to name recognition, Romney’s negatives in the party are actually HIGHER than McCain’s (although McCain’s are higher in absolute terms).

And how does the race actually get to Romney/ Thompson anyway? Romney has put all his chips into winning Iowa and New Hampshire but this could prove an extremely difficult balancing act. He is winning NH at the moment because (among other factors) McCain and Rudy are diluting the moderate/ independant vote. But McCain has put all his chips into stopping Romney in Iowa. If he loses there, he will probably drop out, which will send most of his supporters to Rudy, making a NH win even more difficult.
12 Mark Says:
June 29th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
Jake, that ‘discovery’ about Giuliani’s marriage was made about 20 years ago. It’s not news, and very few care…
13 Jake Says:
June 30th, 2007 at 5:05 am
It appears I must of hit a nerve since the blog administrator felt it necessary to delete my postings on Rudy Giuliani earlier yesterday on friday June the 29th 2007.

I said that I read an article in “The New York Sun” titled “Giuliani Compares Himself To Schwarzenegger” you can read it hear if you copy and paste this link. http://www.nysun.com/article/57565

It must be known that in the last paragraph this article speaks of Rudy’s first marriage being married to his “second cousin”. What wont this man do?

This is so vile and he calls himself Republican. I say he’s running in the wrong primary. Also, I hope this time around I will be allowed to have my enty left on this site for others to read.
14 Chris J. Breisch Says:
July 2nd, 2007 at 8:32 am
FDR and Eleanor were second cousins. That was greeted by America with a collective yawn, and it was 70 years ago.

I have been known to offer Rudy his fair share of criticism, but this is not an issue.
15 Mark Says:
July 2nd, 2007 at 7:02 pm
Nobody deleted your post, Jake…it does appear to be gone, but it must be a database issue - sometimes comments do get lost.

Your sudden ‘discovery’ of the second cousin issue is quite hilarious and shows the lengths Rudy’s opponents will go to derail him.

Why don’t you bring something of substance back with you next time? You don’t have to support Rudy to comment here, God knows, but let’s leave the slime at the door, shall we?…
16 Dan Says:
July 3rd, 2007 at 10:44 am
Definately not a two man race. Its right now a three man race. Rudy Fred and Mitt. Rudy’s got the name, nobody even knows what Fred is about yet he’s just a name. Mitt is gaining recognition and lets not forget that he leads with an overwhelming majority in Iowa and N. Hampshire. We’ll see Thompson’s true colors as he gets closer to announcing his candidacy later this month, though im sure not much will change. Rudy is going to be strong and stay strong. But as of now, for Mitt, he’s doing great. Nationally he’s not well known but the presidential election is state-by-state not a national election. If he can pick off key states in the primaries (Iowa and N. Hapshire) he’s got the nomination wrapped up.