Jon Huntsman recently said that Iowa picks corn, not Presidents.\u00a0 It was a dumb thing to say.\u00a0 However, since he was already running last in Iowa, it probably doesn\u2019t matter.\u00a0 He is right in that Iowa doesn\u2019t necessarily decide who will be President, but Iowa often does decide who will not.\u00a0 As Dick Morris said recently, Iowa is the biggest political graveyard in the world.\u00a0 No one may really win in Iowa, but someone is almost certain to lose.<\/p>\n
Most polls show Romney at or near the top. \u00a0The most significant change has been with Gingrich, who is falling like a stone.\u00a0 I wouldn\u2019t be surprised to see Gingrich drop down to fifth.\u00a0 That would be a disastrous result for him.\u00a0 If he stays in the top three, or even a strong fourth, he can continue for at least a while, but if he finishes below both Perry and Santorum he will be in serious trouble.<\/p>\n
(Note:\u00a0 today Gingrich cried while discussing his deceased mother, and then floated the idea of Sarah Palin as VP.\u00a0 This looks pretty desperate to me.)<\/p>\n
Ron Paul is also dropping in the polls.\u00a0 For a long time it looked like he might even win Iowa.\u00a0 He still might do very well, because his support is rock solid, but he is finished as a candidate for the Republican nomination.\u00a0 His isolationist views on Iran are even to the left of Obama.\u00a0 When you get schooled on manhood, by Michelle Bachmann, you\u2019ve got a problem.<\/p>\n
Michelle Bachmann appears to be fading away.\u00a0 Unless something changes she is going to finish fifth or sixth, barely edging out Huntsman.\u00a0 Since she won the straw poll last fall and since she has invested all of her time and effort in Iowa, she has to do very well there to continue.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think that is very likely.<\/p>\n
That leaves Perry and Santorum who are both surging in the polls, at the expense of Gingrich, Paul and Bachmann.\u00a0 This is likely to be an interesting result.\u00a0 They say there are three tickets out of Iowa:\u00a0 first class, coach and standby.\u00a0 This year that may change.\u00a0 Romney will probably get\u00a0the first class ticket.\u00a0 But Ron Paul, who is likely to come in first or second, won\u2019t benefit much even if he wins.\u00a0 It really doesn\u2019t matter what happens in Iowa, because Ron Paul is a fatally flawed candidate.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That means Santorum and Perry will probably finish third and fourth, without much margin between them.\u00a0 Santorum needs this more than Perry, primarily because he has zero money.\u00a0 Perry doesn\u2019t need to win; he just needs to show a pulse.\u00a0 But if they finish third and fourth, it will really be viewed as finishing second and third, because Paul doesn\u2019t matter anymore.\u00a0 I think both would get a coach ticket out of Iowa.<\/p>\n
At that point it could become a two man race for the non-Romney position.\u00a0 In such a race, Perry would have an enormous advantage.\u00a0 The reason is that Perry has already taken the hits and he is still somewhat upright, but everyone has ignored Santorum.\u00a0 \u00a0Santorum was hammered with negatives during his 2006 re-election campaign, which is why he lost.\u00a0 If he has a strong showing in Iowa, the first impact will be a major assault by opponents in both parties. \u00a0\u00a0It won\u2019t be pretty.<\/p>\n
Perry, on the other hand, has already been tested.\u00a0 The Republican Establishment tried to take him on in Texas by running Kaye Bailey Hutchison against him in the Republican Primary for governor.\u00a0 \u00a0Then the Texas Democrats tried to take him on during the general election.\u00a0 Please keep in mind that George W. Bush was the first Governor in the history of Texas to be elected to two consecutive four year terms.\u00a0 Rick Perry was the second.\u00a0 He has now been elected to three consecutive four year terms.\u00a0 Opponents have been trying to dig up dirt, unsuccessfully, on Perry for years.<\/p>\n
The Republican establishment is afraid of Rick Perry, because he is not part of the cultured elite.\u00a0 They don\u2019t fear another George Bush as much as they fear another Goldwater.\u00a0 What they fail to realize is that no other Republican would have done any better against Johnson in 1964.\u00a0 Lyndon Johnson took over from Kennedy in November of 1963, when Kennedy was assassinated.\u00a0 He was still in the \u201choneymoon\u201d period during the 1964 election.\u00a0 In addition, we had the \u201cGulf of Tonkin\u201d incidents on August 2 and August 4, 1964.\u00a0 On August 7, 1964, Johnson asked congress to pass the Tonkin Gulf Resolution which unleashed the Vietnam War.\u00a0 At a minimum this was awfully convenient for Johnson who was being hammered by Goldwater as being too soft on national security.\u00a0 Once congress passed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which Goldwater had to support, Johnson coasted to election.<\/p>\n
The Republican establishment firmly believes that a candidate running for election with strong conservative principles is doomed to a Goldwater like defeat.\u00a0 Reagan proved them wrong, but just like the Global Warming Alarmists, true believers are seldom distracted by inconvenient facts.\u00a0 They actually believe Reagan won in spite of his conservative positions.\u00a0 They are wrong.\u00a0 He won because of his conservative principles.<\/p>\n
I think both the Obama administration and the Republican establishment are terrified of Rick Perry.\u00a0 He is a real threat to the establishment in both political parties.\u00a0 This year I believe the American people are fed up with both parties.\u00a0 Usually, when a candidate says he or she is not part of the political establishment, they are lying.\u00a0 In Rick Perry\u2019s case he is definitely part of the Texas political establishment, but he is not part of the Washington establishment.<\/p>\n
Ron Paul is doing well because he is playing the role of an angry man promising real change.\u00a0 Paul cannot win this election, but the country is still desperate for an angry man who looks ready, willing and able to really change things.\u00a0 I have a dream of Rick Perry going around the country saying:\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m mad as hell at all of them and I\u2019m not going to take it anymore.\u201d<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0 If that happens, he just might run the political table.\u00a0 A lot of pundits view Perry as a weak candidate with little chance of winning.\u00a0 I disagree.\u00a0 I think Perry just may turn out to be a Super Star.\u00a0 The question is whether or not we will get the chance to find out.\u00a0 We may be less than 100 hours from getting that question answered.<\/p>\n TDM<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Jon Huntsman recently said that Iowa picks corn, not Presidents.\u00a0 It was a dumb thing to say.\u00a0 However, since he was already running last in Iowa, it probably doesn\u2019t matter.\u00a0 He is right in that Iowa doesn\u2019t necessarily decide who … Continue reading