Friday Open Thread [2.17.12]

Filed in Open Thread by on February 17, 2012

This column by Jonathan Chait in the New York Magazine is perhaps the greatest column written about the 2012 Republican Presidential Primary. Here is a taste:

The unpredictable Republican presidential race has taken another surprising turn as recent numbers show Mongol warlord Genghis Khan seizing the lead in national polls of likely GOP primary voters. Benefiting from widespread doubts about Mitt Romney’s authenticity and ideological commitment, Genghis has changed the shape of the race by sounding sharp populist themes that resonate with supporters of the tea party. “Mitt Romney wants to manage Washington, D.C.,” he told an enthusiastic crowd in Scottsdale, Arizona. “I want to burn it to the ground, slay its inhabitants, and stack their skulls in pyramids reaching to the sky.” […]

Genghis’s surge to the top of the polls began after a recent debate in Williamsburg, Mississippi. After moderator Brian Williams questioned if his popular campaign promise to not only defeat President Obama but to enslave his family was racially insensitive, Genghis angrily replied that he enslaves the families of all his defeated rivals, regardless of race. Then, in a dramatic touch that reminded many Republicans of Ronald Reagan’s famous I-paid-for-this-microphone moment, he charged down from the stage on horseback, decapitated Williams, and displayed his head before the roaring crowd. At a post-debate focus group led by pollster Frank Luntz, numerous attendees praised Genghis for standing up to, as one attendee put it, “the politically correct media.”

REPUBLICAN PRIMARY – PRESIDENT

NATIONAL (Gallup Tracking): Santorum 32, Romney 31, Gingrich 14, Paul 10
NATIONAL (YouGov): Santorum 29, Romney 27, Gingrich 16, Paul 14
MICHIGAN (Marketing Resource Group/Inside Michigan Politics): Santorum 43, Romney 33, Gingrich 11, Paul 8
NEW YORK (Quinnipiac): Romney 32, Santorum 20, Paul 14, Gingrich 10
NORTH CAROLINA (High Point University): Romney 30, Gingrich 19, Santorum 13, Paul 11
OHIO (Quinnipiac): Santorum 36, Romney 29, Gingrich 20, Paul 9
OHIO (Rasmussen): Santorum 42, Romney 24, Gingrich 13, Paul 10

GENERAL ELECTION – PRESIDENT

NATIONAL (Democracy Corps): Obama d. Romney (49-45)
NATIONAL (Rasmussen Tracking): Obama d. Romney (47-43); Obama d. Paul (44-39); Obama d. Santorum (47-41); Obama d. Gingrich (51-37)
NATIONAL (YouGov): Obama d. Romney (49-42); Obama d. Santorum (49-42); Obama d. Paul (49-41); Obama d. Gingrich (52-37)
NEW HAMPSHIRE (Benenson Strategy): Obama d. Romney by 8 points (no % reported)
NEW MEXICO (Rasmussen): Obama d. Santorum (55-37); Obama d. Romney (55-36)
NEW YORK (Quinnipiac): Obama d. Romney (52-35); Obama d. Santorum (53-35); Obama d. Gingrich (57-31)
OHIO (Fox News): Romney d. Obama (44-38); Santorum d. Obama (43-40); Paul d. Obama (42-41); Obama d. Gingrich (43-37)
OHIO (Quinnipiac): Obama d. Romney (46-44); Obama d. Santorum (47-41); Obama d. Gingrich (50-38)
WASHINGTON (Elway Poll): Obama d. Romney (49-38); Obama d. Romney and Paul (44-28-17)

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  1. auntie dem says:
    February 17, 2012 at 1:57 pm

    Good one DelDem.

  2. Jason330 says:
    February 17, 2012 at 2:05 pm

    “Here I am, accompanied by my one wife, consuming a sandwich consisting of cooked animal meat,” (Romney) told campaign reporters.

    Awesome. Great find.

  3. Jason330 says:
    February 17, 2012 at 9:13 pm

    Brokered baby, yeah!

    “Play around with the CNN delegate calculator and you can see that even if [Mitt] Romney were to win every contest going forward with 100 percent of the delegates (that’s called kickin’ it North Korea-style) he still wouldn’t reach 1,144 until April 3. Under a similar extreme scenario, it would take Rick Santorum until April 23. Here’s the real kicker: If Romney and Santorum were to split the delegates going forward and each were to carry five of the 10 all-or-nothing contests, neither candidate would win enough delegates to clinch the nomination.

    As kos points out, this does not factor in the immense pressure to drop that would be applied to the loser of a string of primaries, but still…. zoinks!!

  4. Jason330 says:
    February 18, 2012 at 7:26 am

    It looks like the Supreme Court might have a chance to fix the ‘Citizens United’ cluster-fuck.

  5. bamboozer says:
    February 18, 2012 at 9:24 am

    Don’t rule it out and never give up on the return of Zombie Reagan.

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