HONOLULU, February 29, 2011—Arizona and Michigan just held their GOP presidential primaries. While the results are clear, sometimes it is necessary to clarify the crystal clear for those unable to see the obvious.
Mitt Romney won. End of discussion. Put an exclamation point on it. Those wanting to minimize his wins to make the race more exciting are simply manipulating data. There are no moral victories. Two contests occurred, and in the real world winning means coming in first place. Dale Earnhardt Jr. came in second in the Daytona 500. The New England Patriots came in second in the Super Bowl. Yet the awards went to Matt Kenseth and the New York Giants, respectively. On this most recent primary night, Mitt Romney won.
Arizona saw Romney receive about half the vote. Rick Santorum received about a quarter of the vote. Another candidate who has won only one contest received about 15% of the vote. As for the final candidate, he came into these contests winning nothing and continued to win nothing. His supporters claimed victory as they always do, because in their world they are the popular choice despite being rejected by 91% of the people. These same people claim that the popular vote does not matter, because everything comes down to delegates. Their candidate remained in last place in the delegate count and stayed that way. Arizona was a winner take all contest, and Mitt Romney collected all 29 of the delegates.
Michigan was more competitive. Romney and Santorum gave the country a nailbiter, but Romney prevailed over Santorum by a 41 to 38% margin. Since this state was proportionally allocated, both men will receive about the same number of delegates. Some in the media felt that Romney did not win “by enough,” since that was a state he called home. That is nonsense. He won.
The media made Michigan out to be the more important of the two contests, but that analysis could not be more wrong. Arizona was far more important because it was winner-take-all. Also, Michigan has a habit of allowing insurgent candidates to win at the expense of the mainstream. The Democrats went into sheer panic in 1988 when Jesse Jackson won there. In 2000, John McCain throttled George W. Bush. Michigan has a strong union presence, which means attacking the establishment for the sake of doing so. Rick Santorum ran a strong campaign, but the fact that Romney prevailed showed that this time the establishment overcame the insurgency in Michigan. Even a small win under these circumstances is impressive, especially since Romney was down by almost double digits in the state before his most recent strong debate performance.
Since Santorum finished such a strong second in Michigan, he is absolutely still in the game. Newt Gingrich has won nothing since South Carolina, but a win in his home state of Georgia on Super Tuesday combined with another win on that day could immediately vault him back into the game. Ron Paul is banking on Virginia, since only he and Romney are on the ballot. Yet if he loses again in a two man contest by a wide margin, no number of delegates will overcome the real narrative that he cannot come in first anywhere. At some point he needs an actual win to justify his candidacy.
Conspiracy theories about Maine are irrelevant at this point, and are as interesting as Al Gore crying about Florida in 2000. Maine will not impact the final tallies, and is only a factor to those desperate for any kind of moral victory in a slew of defeats.
Before Super Tuesday, the Washington State Caucus on March 3rd provides more excitement than usual. In fact, most contests are getting more attention than usual.
March 13th is the Hawaii Caucus. The GOP has never held a caucus before in this state because it is so reliably in the hands of the Democrats. Yet all four candidates paid the $5,000 filing fee to compete in that contest.
The GOP energy has been high in Hawaii the last few days. I spoke on Tuesday to the Grassroots Institute of Hawaii at their weekly “Calabash.” The Calabash is modeled after the weekly meeting in Washington, DC, led by Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax reform. On Thursday I address the Oahu League of Republican Women. All four candidates will have spokespeople in attendance.
While there are so many states to analyze, Hawaii has been chosen because being on the ground and listening to people gives a view that cannot be gleamed from newspapers.
Romney has already made one trip to Hawaii. It was done in secret. The other candidates have not visited. Hawaii has some passionate social conservatives, with the Hawaii Focus on the Family leading them. The Hawaii Republican Assembly was very active until recently.
The Laissez-Faire Institute tends to have more libertarian leanings. Hawaii Pacific University announced that a rally for Ron Paul was being planned for Friday. He has some young and energetic devotees. Because of the colleges, it will be interesting to see how Dr. Paul does.
One possible block of support for Dr. Paul can be found on Kuhio Avenue, known for its nightclubs and women walking the streets in the world’s oldest profession (not farming, the other one). While Ron Paul probably would fare well among the call girls, and they are many, they may not be registered Republicans. This is not a question they prefer to answer at Midnight while trying to conduct business.
The nightclubs on Kuhio Avenue may not seem to be representative of America, but they do provide a diverse window into American society at large. Nashville Waikiki is a country bar, where the guys wear cowboy boots and hats. Zanzibar is more likely to have a larger black population, where many of the baseball caps are worn backwards. The Mad Dog Saloon has the most diverse population, with hits of the 1980s to today bringing in people of various ages, races, and ethnicities.
One block does not tell the story of a city, nor does that city reflect the entire state. One state does not reveal the desires of an entire nation. Yet enough blocks in enough cities and states when added together actually do.
This is why coming in first matters. Some candidates skip contests they cannot win and then claim that a defeat is meaningless because they failed to compete. Refusing to fight should not be rewarded. Candidates can claim they only have a certain amount of resources, but this is just another excuse. If they were preferred by more people they would have more money.
So while this race has taken many twists and turns, right now Mitt Romney is in a strong position. Rick Santorum is his closest competitor. Everything else is noise until proven otherwise.
Brooklyn born, Long Island raised, and now living in Los Angeles, Eric Golub is a politically conservative columnist, blogger, author, public speaker, satirist and comedian.
Eric is the author of the book trilogy “Ideological Bigotry, “Ideological Violence,” and “Ideological Idiocy.” Eric is 100% alcohol, tobacco, drug, and liberalism free. After years of dating liberals, he has finally seen the light and now only dates Republican Jewish women. His family is pleased over this. Republican, Jewish women, you may contact Eric above.
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Eric Golub is an independent writer for the Communities. Read more from Eric at his TYGRRRR EXPRESS blog.
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