Redstate

Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
http://thehinzsightreport.com
www.theminorityreportblog.com
www.race42008.com
www.fred08.com

Huckabee is to social conservatism, what Pual is to libertarian conservatism. Both of these candidates are hurting their causes in ways they may never admit. I think people will VERY likely have a choice between Mitt and John. Neither of these two would be on my top ten if I got to pick the candidates. But the reality is, unless Fred pulls off a miracle, we are likely going to get Mitt or John. If we do get Huckaboob, it will be a slaughter.

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Molon Labe!

"Mike Huckabee's sole purpose in this race right now is to dilute Romney's access to social conservative voters so that McCain can win and choose him as VP. There, I said it."

Well, it might just help us win this election:

Polls can be misleading BUT Romney down 56-26 to Obama bodes terribly for his electability (he is down 12 to Clinton). Mac down 2 to Obama (statistical tie), up four against hillary

Spitballs?!?! / Yo No Soy Marinero, Soy Capitan

I would rather have Rice but he may have to fight off McCain/Huck at the convention.

The MSM wants McCain to win the Republican nomination because THEY KNOW HE WILL BE TROUNCED by either Billary or B.Hussein in the general election. Huckabigot would be even better, but he would be almost too good to be true (from the Dems perspective that is).

When McCain won in New Hampshire by 5.5% the MSM couldn’t stop talking about how it wasn’t as close as anyone had expected, that it was a clearly impressive win for McCain, that it was a “resounding defeat” Romney, who’s campaign was now “devastated.” Some actually suggested he should drop out after these two “stunning losses.” This, even though he had a very good showing with 25% in Iowa and 31% in New Hampshire (not to mention the whopping 67% win in Wyoming which the media refused to even cover), and was ahead in the actual delegate count by quite a margin (24 - 18 - 10)!

Never mind those pesky delegate totals. One week later, coming of these “resounding defeats,” (where he somehow managed to limp away with more delegates than anyone else) Romney then inexplicably wins Michigan, a state with three times the delegates of New Hampshire, by a whopping 9%!

But that’s not what you heard from the MSM who spun it as McCain losing a “close race” to Romney who clearly only won due to his vast wealth and family name in Michigan, and that Romney’s “struggling campaign” had managed to stay alive a while longer, but will surely be finished off in South Carolina by McCain or Huckabee who control all those Evangelicals who wouldn't think of voting for Mormon Mitt (Please do as the MSM says and ignore the fact that Mitt is tied with a Baptist preacher for the Evangelical vote and actual beat him for their vote in Michigan.)

For the MSM the big news wasn’t that Romney beat McCain by a very large margin (especially among actual Republicans!), or that he beat Huckabee among his own Evangelical base. No the big story that night was that Romney (dirty campaigner that he is) made a calculated move to bump McCain’s concession speech with his own acceptance speech. Gasp! What poor form. Oh the shame of it! blah, blah, blah.

WHY WONT THE MSM TALK ABOUT WHO IS WINNING THE DELEGATE COUNT! That is, after all, the score that actually decides the winner of this game!

Can you imagine the networks all broadcasting the NBA Playoffs without ever showing or mentioning the score?! Just imagine - "Well, Bob, with that kind of ball handling, McCain is certainly in the lead.”

“Jerry, I couldn’t agree more, dribbling around the court like that at his age is certainly impressive, but you can’t dismiss those flashy no-look passes from Huckabee. That may just be the thing that puts him on top at the end of this ball game.”

One word - LUDICROUS.

PLEASE LOOK AT THE REAL SCORE PEOPLE!

ROMNEY - 52 delegates
HUCKABEE - 22 delegates
MCCAIN - 15 delegates

It would appear that Mr. Romney, with his struggling campaign, has somehow garnered more than twice the delegates of Huckabee, and more than three times the delgates of the “front runner,” McCain. Isn’t it amazing how the actual numbers say just the opposite of what the MSM is reporting. But, as Hitler’s PR man, Joseph Goebbels said, “if you tell a lie long enough and loud enough, eventually people believe it to be true” no matter how absurd it may be.

Even if you look at how the candidates have placed in these 4 state caucuses/primaries (Iowa, Wyoming, New Hampshire, and Michigan), Romney still comes out the clear winner. Let’s look at the “medal standings.”

The MSM poster-boy, “I’m a POW so even though I’m liberal vote for me”, John the Maverick McCain has captured one gold, and one silver medal.

Theologion-in-Chief, “Vote for me because that’s what Jesus would do”, , Mike Jimmy Carter Wannabee Huckabee has claimed 1 gold, and 2 bronze medals.

But wait! Stop the presses! Mitt Romney has somehow managed to get not just one but, count them, two gold (Michigan, Wyoming), and two silver (not bronze) medals (Iowa, New Hampshire).

How could this be?! I demand a recount! Certainly Evangelicals in Michigan would never vote for one of those wacky devil-worshipping Mormons! Something is very wrong here. Didn’t that flip-flpper consider running with John Kerry on the Dem ticket just a few years ago…er…no that would be McCain. Okay, but didn’t one of those five Romney boys hang a dog or something….er…no that would be Huckabee. Shoot, well, doesn’t he have three wives…er…no that would be Rudy.

You get the picture. This is all a manipulation (spin) game for the MSM to promote the candidate they want to face of against the Dems. And it’s apparently anyone but Mitt.

The next big contest is in Nevada, but because Mitt will undoubtedly win there, it is getting almost no press, even though it has more delegates than South Carolina 34-24. But because McCain or Huckabee is likely to win in South Carolina that is being promoted by the MSM as the next big contest that will likely determine the Republican nominee.

Give me a brake.

Republicans need to stop listening to the MSM-Democrat spin machine telling them how to vote. Romney is the only candidate that is doing well in EVERY state. He is the candidate the Democrats and their MSM marketing allies fear the most.

And if Republicans are smart enough to see through the MSM distortion campaign to promote anyone but Romney, he will become our next President. And things are going to change in Washington.

I believe we are, and I believe he will.

"If politics is the art of the possible, persons of faith should make the best politicians." - me

Glad to see someone delving into the numbers a bit. I will say that MI swamped the other states in number of votes, so this may not be a great comparison. But kudos for the research.

I think the post-SC numbers will give us a better feel for evangelicals and non-evangelical voting patterns. We'll finally have a Southern state to add to the mix.

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I think it is importaint to note that, as far as the claimed problem that Huckabee has that he still does better amoung nonevangelicals than Giuliani does and still better than Thompson.

McCain reaches out to neocons. Romney to fiscal conservatives. Huckabee to social conservatives.

Thompson lost the social conservatives to Huckabee b/c they like Huckabee better. Rudy lost the neocons to McCain b/c they like him better.

There is now a 3-way divide based on the 3 parts of the GOP. The neocons, the socons, and the fiscons. McCain, Romney, and Huckabee are all atleast moderate on 3 issues. They are all more fiscon, socon, and neocon than whomever the Dems will put forward.

To the fiscons, McCain and Huckabee are viewed as having issues that make Romney better. To the socons, McCain is still problematic, as is Romney. To the neocons, McCain is viewed as electable and solid, whereas Romney and Huckabee are just not viewed as being on the same level.

In Iowa Huckabee did very well with fiscons and neocons, which allowed him to win. He also did great, as expected, with socons since Brownback dropped out.

In NH, McCain did well because of both the anti-Romney vote, as well as because of Rudy's free fall, and because he was able to win many of the independent votes. Remember McCain also had some big newspaper endorcement help.

In MI, Romney won on his home field.

SC will be a big test for all the candidates. Romeny needs to prove that he is viable in the South, and good showing would help. McCain needs to show that he can appeal to the same voters who he couldn't appeal to in 2000. It will be much easier for him as the field is split, but a strong showing could really help. In the case of Huckabee, this is his chance to put the Thompson campaign to rest. Huckabee needed Brownback to leave the race to win Iowa, likewise, it will be hard for Huckabee to win the nomination if Thompson stay in for the long haul as a viable candidate. They share the same voters.

Even though he is 'skipping' the state, Giuliani faces another test in SC. Giuliani campaigned heavily in SC early in the race. For him to lose Iowa, NH, MI, WY, and then SC badly would only continue to hurt him. If he wants any sort of momentum going into FL, it would help him to place above a real contender in SC.

Paul raised almost $20 million in the last 3 months of 2007, which is the highest of any GOP candidate. If he is able to continue that fundraising, and uses it well, he may be able to pick up a few delegates from some of the states that award delegates proportionally. His challenge, though, is that many of the states are winner-take-all or district-take-all, or have a good portion of the delegates awarded by winner or district. That makes it a harder for him to get delegates in some states. It appears that his goal is to raise issues and getting a few delegates may help with that. It is hard, however, to see a strategy for him to win the nomination.

I'd be interested to see you redo the analysis after a few more states are in. Both to see what happens once the field is winnowed and also to see if the results even out after the effect of Michigan on the process is diluted.

for him in the future is that the exit poll in Michigan also shows:

Voters to whom Romney's ties to Michigan were:

Very Important 67% voted for Mitt
Somewhat Important 52% voted for Mitt
Not Too Important 35% voted for Mitt
Not Important At All 13% voted for Mitt

In other words he only received 13% of the vote among those who didn't think his Michigan ties were important. If I were the Romney campaign, that statistic would be keeping me up at night.

If your proposition tha Huckabee is running as a foil for McCain's Veep, he needs to get in line. Also running for this coveted spot are SC's Lindsey Graham, Joe Lieberman and Fred Thompson. McCain's got a lot of kissin' to do...

I think your conclusion is incorrect. You assume that Romney would pick up a greater share of Huckabee voters than McCain based on Romney getting a larger share of "evangelical" voters than McCain thus far. The problem is that this assumes all evangelical voters are alike. In fact, evangelicals are a large and diverse group.

According to the NH exit poll, Huckabee voters had approximately a 71-29 favorable-unfavorable opinion of McCain and a 43-57 favorable-unfavorable opinion of Romney. In MI, they didn't ask the same question, but they did ask who was most likely to bring needed change (basically a surrogate for who do you like). Huckabee voters named McCain over Romney by a 5-3 margin. At least in those two states, I think it is clear that Huckabee voters would have chosen McCain over Romney. Thus, Romney benefits by Huckabee staying in the race, not McCain.

http://www.redstate.com/blogs/smokymtman/2008/jan/17/can_minority_group_...

I think the evangelicals are getting a bum rap...

as of yet for Mike but we all know that most of the evangelicals live in the south. And we all know that if you can't win the South then you don't win the Office. Also what does it say about Redstates beloved son Fred Thompson he has attracted less votes than Huckabee in both categories. Wait until after the south and then do this same Evangelical vs. Non-evangelical and see what happens.

push polling against him in SC. Found the link at hotair:

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/01/thompson-cries.html

www.fred08.com
Redneck Hippie