By late Tuesday night all the candidates were visibly tired, and justifiably so. It had been a long two weeks, most especially for Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum who had spent the majority of that fortnight bludgeoning each other with lead pipes and brass knuckles.
In Carrolton, Georgia, Newt Gingrich gave a soft-spoken speech in which he described, while as a young professor in Georgia, helping other college-instructor neighbors cut down an old oak tree--a comically doomed project with the predictable punch-line that advanced degrees do not equal common sense. Ron Paul gave his usual high-energy stinging harangues of a failed monetary system, a government unable to control its spending, and a misguided foreign policy predisposed toward undeclared wars.
Santorum, his voice raw from campaigning, conceded gracefully to Romney and then outlined the reasons for his continued idealistic quest, invoking, among other things, the words and legacy of George Washington and other founding fathers. Romney, also hoarse and a bit frayed as he spoke to a large crowd in Novi, Michigan, acknowledged the narrowness of his victory, and seemed palpably relieved to be grasping the victory trophy--any victory--on his own turf.
"We didn't win by a lot but we won by enough," Romney said, "and that's what counts." Then, after thanking friends and supporters in Michigan and Arizona, including John McCain, Romney once again tried to turn the argument toward President Obama and an election in the fall.
It had been a dangerous ten days for the former Massachusetts governor: had he lost in Michigan, even by a few votes, questions about the viability of Romney's candidacy would have become the overwhelming political theme and the non-stop chatter of the 24-hour a day news machine--and, the savants of GOP brokerage would have surely begun in earnest the urgent and vaguely sci-fi business of floating alternate names.
The lost dark art of angling and maneuvering at an open convention! Ahh...the smell of cigar smoke (is that allowed these days?), the sounds of men and women shouting to be heard above the clamor, the shakiness of the hand-held TV cameras in the midst of the throng on the floor; the pushing, the shoving, the name-calling. The Cow Palace, San Francisco, July 14, 1964. Had it really come close to this for Republicans?
Well, no. No closer, at least, than it had for Democrats four years ago when Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama fought with meat cleavers and chainsaws all the way to June.
Of course it is far from over for Republicans. Super Tuesday may yet prove to be a mixed bag for all four GOP candidates. Romney, newly re-energized, can now again assert himself as the nominee-to-be and front-runner. But Santorum may still have a better-than-average shot at seizing vast tracts of socially conservative real estate across multiple states this Tuesday. Gingrich, meanwhile, pins his hopes on Georgia and a Hail Mary pass in Ohio.
In the meantime, Romney's wins in Arizona and Michigan were not without their problems. Santorum, as it turns out, may get to walk away with the same number of Wolverine State delegates as Romney due to Michigan's Congressional District method of delegate allocation. Romney wins the moral victory and gets to claim the momentum, but Santorum may be able to put just as many delegates in the bank.
The good news for Romney is that he gets to keep all of Arizona's 29 delegates thanks to the Grand Canyon State's winner-take-all allocation. Romney swept every county comfortably. His take could have been much greater had the Republican National Committee not penalized the Arizona GOP for moving their primary date outside of the designated time frame, which was to be later in March, but still, Romney gets to walk away with a healthy numerical sweep.
In the most densely populated areas, Romney won by substantial margins. Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix and Mesa, gave 50% of their votes to Romney, as opposed to 27% for Santorum and only 16% and 8% respectively for Gingrich and Paul. Pima County (Tucson) was only slightly better for Santorum, where he pulled in 30% to Romney's 44%. Only Cochise County was close, with Romney grabbing 38% to Santorum's 34%.
Michigan was more problematic for all candidates, but especially for the two top-tier contenders. Michigan had been widely watched because of its make-or-break importance to the viability of Romney--a native son with a, iconic and well-loved Michigan governor as a father. It had been repeated a thousand times by reporters and analysts: if Romney can't win here, where will he win in the later primaries? And if he fails to close the deal in Michigan, then surely his candidacy is in grave danger.
Win, he did, but in what remained a breathtakingly close race almost to the end. The earliest totals began to flow in within minutes of the polls closing. The major networks, wisely avoiding a Florida-like fiasco by calling things too early in a razor-close race, held off on calls or projections until voters in both the Eastern and Central time zones had voted. Several counties (and parts of counties) near Wisconsin on the Upper Peninsula are in the Central Time Zone.
But as the partial totals finally started coming in, it was clear that Santorum and Romney would be in a neck-and-neck race. Santorum led early in the evening, but as the votes began to tumble in from the more populated areas, Romney took the lead. At times there were only 120 votes separating the two candidates even as thousands of votes were totaled on the tickers. Finally, late into the evening, Romney began to open up a tentative lead, which, as the votes rolled in, opened up comfortably enough for Romney to declare victory and take a deep breath.
Santorum, as expected, swept many parts of rural and small town Michigan, rolling up lopsided totals in the heavily conservative areas where evangelical and fundamentalist social attitudes carry the day. In the conservative band of southern counties which border Indiana, Santorum racked up wins in the mid to upper 40s, leading Romney by as much as 10%. Much the same pattern held in the state's mid-section and in the Thumb. Santorum also carried the lion's share of the Upper Peninsula, though his lopsided wins there meant little in the context of sparse population density.
Conversely, Romney won big where it counted the most--in the cities and suburbs. Romney won by comfortable margins in some heavily populated counties (Kalamazoo, Ingham, Saginaw) and by whopping margins in still others, such as Wayne County (Detroit), Macomb County (Warren and Sterling Heights), Oakland County (Pontiac and Royal Oak) and Washtenaw County (Ann Arbor). Santorum squeaked out wins in Genesee County, which includes the cities of Flint and Flushing, and also in Grand Rapids.
The bad news for both candidates is that, like Arizona, Michigan has also been punished by the national GOP for unauthorized fiddling with its primary date: both Santorum and Romney might have walked away with twice as many delegates had it not been for the changes instituted by Michigan Republicans.
Still, coupled with Romney's expected win in the state of Washington this weekend, his victories in Michigan and Arizona keep him in play as the front runner. Rick Santorum may put this notion of pre-eminence and inevitability to the test again very soon, when voters in ten states and territories go to the polls on Tuesday, but for now Romney gets to celebrate.
Romney's joy at winning two states on the same night proved somewhat short-lived. In a pattern that has held him back several times already this primary and caucus season, he faced an immediate set-back of his own making. In Ohio, after a confusing question from a reporter on the issue of contraception and legislation affecting religious organizations, Romney stumbled, seemingly stating a position opposite of his convictions and contrary to a current GOP plan (referred to this week as Blunt-Rubio) being debated in the Senate. The misfire drew more attention back to questions of Romney's convictions, this during a time of particularly emotional arguments about birth control and religious freedom. Democrats piled on, calling Romney a flip-flopper and a panderer. Romney staffers and supporters sought to control the damage, and later the same day he explained that the question was posed vaguely and in confusing language. True enough, perhaps.
But Romney was once again drawing incoming fire from two directions--his adversaries on Team Obama and the Democrats, and the combatants within his own party. After his comments about his wife's two gas-guzzler Cadillac SUVs (approximate retail price each: $40,000) and his admission that, though he knew little about auto racing, he felt a kinship with the Daytona 500 since he had friends who owned NASCAR teams, Romney was once again having to explain his disconnection from Main Street USA while at the same time struggling to free himself from entrapment in the quicksand of contraception and birth control.
Santorum, too, was also being repeatedly asked this week to explain himself on social issues. A recent brouhaha over Santorum's disdain for the words of John F. Kennedy in a famous 1960 speech about religion, tolerance and church influence on presidential decision-making had turned into a storm for Santorum. The former Pennsylvania senator had defended his criticism of a fellow Catholic by explaining the full context--that Santorum believes that the notion of a "separation of church and state" (words not found in the U.S. Constitution) is a distortion of what the original framers of the founding documents had in mind: a system of tolerance that allowed, not prohibited, people of differing religious beliefs to share space in the public square.
Santorum and Romney each found themselves last week struggling on a variety of fronts to keep the Culture War blood spatter off of their faces.
The media will not likely give them a pass, either, for several reasons. Political reporters and hungry analysts in the continuous cycle of election news require constant feeding. The more contentious and controversial the hubbub, the better it works to keep ratings high--so red meat works best. Additionally, the White House and the Democratic Party have joined the food fight, and with good results so far. What started as an apparent foul-up on contraception by someone in the Obama administration has, after the first 48 hours, gone swimmingly ever since for the Democrats--the party with the most to lose if voters decide to punish someone for a bad economy.
Political news that had previously been dominated by GOP candidates and Herman Cain's ex-girlfriends and Romney's ten thousand dollar wager and endless debate performances, has now been unseated by the arrival of the Second Culture War. A circular and self-sustaining process that serves both the news media and Democratic liberals is now in full motion, with predictable results for the hapless Republicans.
Whether it is GOP candidates being asked to defend or condemn the loutish words of Rush Limbaugh (warning to candidates: do not take the bait on this one; walk away and let Limbaugh answer for himself) or conservative responses in California to a federal court's decision to strike down Proposition 8, contestants Romney, Santorum, Gingrich and Paul are at risk of watching independent voters, women voters and younger voters walk away.
The difficulty for Republicans is obvious. By allowing themselves to become ensnared in the bitter entanglement of social issues--especially sex, contraception, birth control, and by direct extension women's health--it will be the Democrats, not the GOP, using the so-called wedge issues of culture and religion to their advantage. A month ago the most formidable three issues were jobs, jobs, and jobs.
Now, even if Romney is able to peacefully secure the Republican nomination while also unifying the warring factions within--traditionalist, reality-based conservatism versus social conservatives and idealistic evangelicals--Romney himself may be forced to carry this heavy baggage at his side all the way to November 6.
If you think two weeks in Michigan makes you tired, trying lugging that much weight for nine months.
Copyright 2012, Thursday Review
Road Show is published each week by Thursday Review publications, copyright 2008, 2012
