PHOENIX, February 28, 2012—It’s the morning of the very crucial and nail-biting Michigan Republican Primary.
A state that was thought to have been a landslide win for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, has now turned into an all out battle between the former governor and former Pennsylvania Senator, Rick Santorum.
A poll released by Public Policy Polling, just hours ago, shows Rick Santorum leading the field in Michigan, 38% to Romney’s 37%.
Political analysts, such as Nate Silver at the New York Times, are already forecasting it to be a very close race.
Silver bets that Romney will garner 38.7% of the vote and Santorum will receive 38% of the vote.
Though this race won’t be called until late tonight, it displays another key aspect to this bumpy and unpredictable Republican primary: Mitt Romney is not the inevitable and most electable candidate.
Michigan is the state where Romney was raised and his father was a popular governor. Romney has received the backing of current Republican Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder and spent millions in ad campaigns there.
Yet he still isn’t leading by a wide margin against Santorum.
It was just back in November of last year, that Romney was leading the field in Michigan by a whopping 14 points. Even in the beginning of this month he was leading by 15 points over the rest of the field.
Even if Romney does pull of a victory in Michigan, it won’t be by a large margin. It will be very similar to the Iowa Caucus, which Romney lost by only a couple of votes.
Even though Santorum’s momentum has faded since his tri-state win a few weeks ago, the fact that he is giving Romney a run for his money underlines the decision of Republican primary voters to cast their ballots on the basis of their conservative principles, rather than on electability.
Rick Santorum is a strongly social conservative candidate, but he also understands the needs and means for economic stability and rehabilitation. In Michigan, the unemployment rate sits at 9.3%, one full point above the national 8.3%. A candidate like Rick Santorum displays a persona that better understands the middle-class and how to put blue collar Americans back to work than Romney does.
It should be no surprise to hear talk of a brokered convention in August when the not-so-inevitable candidate is losing primaries left and right. Republicans want to win and they want to defeat Barack Obama. Unfortunately, they haven’t come to a consensus on who can both restore America to economic greatness and beat the president in November.
Michigan, like with South Carolina and Iowa, may surprise you today.
In a race full of unpredictability, we may see these candidates slug it out until the convention this summer, or we may see a nominee on Super Tuesday.
If Santorum does lose Michigan, he might lose some of the momentum he’s built in Super Tuesday states. However, if he wins today, he will have proved that he is the final anti-Romney candidate and that he is a viable general election candidate.
Email Henry D’Andrea at tips@politicons.net and follow him on Twitter (@TheHenry)
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