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Are Republicans across the country going to awake up tomorrow thinking that their brothers and sisters in South Carolina went to the prom with the wrong guy? How much backlash is there going to be against Gingrich or will he quickly emerge as the candidate of choice for the angry, the disaffected and the tea potters?
A lot of that depends on Florida. It probably can’t give a knockout blow to Romney, but it could pack a hell of a negative punch for Gingrich ten days from now if he doesn’t win there. Before Saturday, almost no one would have questioned that the nomination was “Romney’s to lose”. That kind of thinking is not merely out the window, it is in outer space right now.
The Republican race for the nomination has been blown wide open by the distaste and apparent dissatisfaction the voters in South Carolina felt toward Romney. This might not be so much Gingrich love as a refusal to go along with the Republican establishment choice, Rome
Once someone becomes a front runner, the game changes. Now, there are two front runners, Romney and Gingrich and both are expected to show they can hold their positions and advance against the other. Gingrich should have an advantage in Florida, since it, too, is an old southern state, but Florida is also a mixed state where lots of northern transplants live. All the political pros say Romney’s organization in Florida is top notch, loaded with money and ready for war. Gingrich, in contrast, still doesn’t have a real presidential style campaign effort, one that can move quickly from state to state in an organized, military like fashion. It could be that Gingrich just got lucky in South Carolina and will have his head handed to him shortly by the voters in Florida. That’s possible, but I wouldn’t want to bet the ranch on it.
It looks like we are in for a long, long campaign season, one that will both help and hurt the Republican effort to win back the White House. The part that helps is they get to dominate the news for at least another month or so. The hurtful part is they are tearing each other to pieces and the Democrats love to watch them go at it. The Republicans, in fact, have probably been doing a better job of tearing each other down than the Obama campaign will do in the fall.
Doug Terry, 1.21.12
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