Predictions: Who will be the GOP Candidate?

[Clinton Huxley]

Obama must have done something you approve of, CES.....

[Ian]

Of the remaining candidates, I honestly think Newt would make the best President.

I agree. Gingrich has the best understanding of both economics and international relations of any of the five candidates. The only reason he isn't getting a lot more support is because many people, like myself, don't think he's sufficiently organized to run a winning general election campaign.

I think many, perhaps most, Gingrich supporters would switch to Romney rather than to Santorum.

If Gingrich can sweep the south, where Romney is frankly weak, he'd have a very good case for being on the ticket.

Polling indicates otherwise:
http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.co ... more-28001

[Coito ergo sum]

It doesn't matter - Romney has solid leads in all of the states that are winner take all. The rest are not winner take all, which means that even where Romney loses, he still picks up delegates. Unless Santorum can start winning at a 65% clip, he literally has no chance.

[Ian]

Agreed. Romney will eventually be the nominee. The questions remaining include: When will his opponents finally drop out? Will they endorse Romney when they do? How negative will the campaigning be until the primaries are genuinely over? When will Romney start ignoring the primaries for the sake of focusing all his attention on the general election?

[Coito ergo sum]

Agreed. Romney will eventually be the nominee. The questions remaining include: When will his opponents finally drop out? Will they endorse Romney when they do? How negative will the campaigning be until the primaries are genuinely over? When will Romney start ignoring the primaries for the sake of focusing all his attention on the general election?

I bet Gingrich is waiting for a job offer.

Romney is probably figuring that Gingrich in the race takes votes from Santorum. So, the likelihood is that a conversation was had that has Gingrich staying in the race passively until Romney sticks a fork in the race, and then Gingrich gets on the short list for Secretary of State or some other cabinet position.

After Romney sews it up completely, then Santorum will be offered something to get him to fall in line behind Romney.

Then they'll all make speeches about how "the people have spoken" and now it's time for us all to put our differences aside and unite behind Romney against the common enemy.

[Warren Dew]

I think many, perhaps most, Gingrich supporters would switch to Romney rather than to Santorum.

If Gingrich can sweep the south, where Romney is frankly weak, he'd have a very good case for being on the ticket.

Polling indicates otherwise:
http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.co ... more-28001

Even that out of touch leftist source confirms my statement that many Gingrich supporters would switch to Romney.

[Tyrannical]

I still don't think Mittens can pull a delegate majority at the convention, and generally after the first vote the delegates can vote for whomever they want. They are no longer bound to a candidate and don't automatically vote for whomever their first choice endorses.

[JimC]

I still don't think Mittens can pull a delegate majority at the convention, and generally after the first vote the delegates can vote for whomever they want. They are no longer bound to a candidate and don't automatically vote for whomever their first choice endorses.

Excellent!

The Republican Party could go into the next election with a raving looney as candidate!

[apophenia]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that the GOP candidate will not be a black man.

[Ian]

I think many, perhaps most, Gingrich supporters would switch to Romney rather than to Santorum.

If Gingrich can sweep the south, where Romney is frankly weak, he'd have a very good case for being on the ticket.

Polling indicates otherwise:
http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.co ... more-28001

Even that out of touch leftist source confirms my statement that many Gingrich supporters would switch to Romney.

If by "many" you mean under half as many as Santorum would pick up, then sure.

The PPP is an out of touch leftist source, eh? What paranoia. When you write stuff like this it makes you come across like a charicature of a partisan Republican: if you don't like the information you hear, you assume the source must secretly have a leftist bias. Says more about you than it does about the PPP.

[Coito ergo sum]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that the GOP candidate will not be a black man.

Good point.

And, the Democrat candidate will neither be hispanic, nor female. :snap:

[Tyrannical]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that the GOP candidate will not be a black man.

Good point.

And, the Democrat candidate will neither be hispanic, nor female. :snap:

Still a small chance that Hillary could run for VP instead of Biden. Not sure that Biden cares much for Obama relatively speaking and might not be interested in running again. Hillary would increase Obama's chances I guess, but I don't think they like each other very much either.

[Warren Dew]

The PPP is an out of touch leftist source, eh? What paranoia. When you write stuff like this it makes you come across like a charicature of a partisan Republican: if you don't like the information you hear, you assume the source must secretly have a leftist bias. Says more about you than it does about the PPP.

If you actually read the article you linked to, it's an article in the New York Times, not the PPP. The problematic part isn't so much the PPP polling, but with the New York Times writer's extrapolations.

[Warren Dew]

I still don't think Mittens can pull a delegate majority at the convention, and generally after the first vote the delegates can vote for whomever they want. They are no longer bound to a candidate and don't automatically vote for whomever their first choice endorses.

Rumor has it that they'll all vote for Ron Paul in the second round.

Of course, Gingrich could push Romney over the top in the first round if he were willing to trade his delegates for, say, the VP slot.

[Ian]

The PPP is an out of touch leftist source, eh? What paranoia. When you write stuff like this it makes you come across like a charicature of a partisan Republican: if you don't like the information you hear, you assume the source must secretly have a leftist bias. Says more about you than it does about the PPP.

If you actually read the article you linked to, it's an article in the New York Times, not the PPP. The problematic part isn't so much the PPP polling, but with the New York Times writer's extrapolations.

More to the point, it's FiveThirtyEight.com, Nate Silver's blog, which is now carried on the NYT website.

538 is not leftist, and "out of touch" is the absolute last thing I'd ever say about his work. They guy understands polling and electioneering better than anybody around.