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DAY 19

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SEPTEMBER 23,  2011

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 10:45 P.M. ET:

CHRISTIE? – The big political buzz tonight is that Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey is reconsidering his decision not to run for president, at least according to some sources.  Christie is a conservative favorite because of his budget-cutting and confrontational attitude toward anyone who disagrees with him.  Frankly, I hope he doesn't run.  We'll be discussing this at Urgent Agenda if the story turns out to have legs, but I will argue that Christie, despite doing some good things in New Jersey, just isn't on a presidential level. 

PERRY'S ORDEAL – It may be unfair, but the internet has been savaging Rick Perry all day long over his debate performance last night.  This is what happens when someone enters a presidential race with such huge expectations, and then disappoints.  There are many fine things about Perry, but he doesn't seem able to bring them out, and he's now had three debate chances.  People envision him debating Barack Obama, today's version of Slick Willy, and the image isn't good.  Perry will get several more debate chances, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Mitt Romney rise in the polls, despite the general lack of enthusiasm for him.

AH, REHABILITATION – A new USA/Gallup survey reports that a majority of Americans think Obama is about the same or worse than George W. Bush as president.  Thus, the rehabilitation of Bush has begun.  Obama performed especially poorly among independents, who are a decisive vote in any presidential election.  I'd love to see a poll matching Obama with Reagan.  Now just how do you think that would turn out?

THEATER OF THE ABSURD - The Palestinians presented their case for UN recognition of Palestinian statehood, bypassing negotiations with Israel, at the General Assembly today, which whooped it up in support of the idea.  Among the whoopers were such notable democracies as Syria and Egypt, and third-world groupies like South Africa.  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the General Assembly the "theater of the absurd," and he's right.  It's a place where dictators are loved and democracies suspected.  It is dominated by Muslim states, old Communist states, goofball regimes like Venezuela and Cuba, and third-world ramshackle countries that work hard to stay third world.  Not a place for respectable people, although the food in the cafeteria is supposed to be pretty good.

September 23, 2011      Permalink

SCIENCE LESSON – AT 11:07 A.M. ET:  Readers of this daily effort know that we periodically discuss "climate change," and have expressed some skepticism about the theology of the Church of the Global Warming.  Part of our doubts revolve around the arrogance and certainty of the global warming "community" and its boosters, including the angry Al Gore and the increasingly daffy Bill Clinton.  Science is not about certainty, but about questioning.  There is no such thing as "settled science," although the Warmers tell us there is.

Now comes a remarkable science story that illustrates the difference between real scientists and trendy hangers-on.  I rarely use the term "required reading," but this is required reading, a well-reported story by Bloomberg/Businessweek:

Sept. 23 (Bloomberg) -- A neutrino beam was measured as traveling faster than the speed of light, appearing to break the limit set by Albert Einstein in 1905.

The data come as a “complete surprise” and more research is needed before the results are verified, said Sergio Bertolucci, research director at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, said in an e-mailed statement today.

Please note the immediate call for "more research."  These are scientists, not strutters. 

Neutrinos, subatomic particles fired from CERN’s Geneva base to a laboratory 730 kilometers (454 miles) away in Gran Sasso, Italy, were clocked at a velocity 20 parts per million above the speed of light, the organization said. The tests first produced unusual results last year, with scientists spending the ensuing months trying to rule out any flaw in their methods that could have skewed the numbers.

The skeptics are presented front and center:

“To me as a theoretician it screams systemic error,” Roberto Trotta, an astrophysicist at Imperial College, London, said in a telephone interview. “There is probably something in the experiment that the experimenters still don’t understand.”

And what comes next?

Now the task is to replicate CERN’s experiment, possibly in Japan where there are several neutrino detectors, the most complex piece of equipment required, Trotta said. Until then, it’s too early to draw conclusions, he said.

And...

CERN’s findings fit with those of a 2007 experiment by the University of Minnesota, Subir Sarkar, a physicist at Oxford University in the U.K. They also chime with data recorded in 1987, when Japanese observers detected neutrinos from an exploding star in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a galaxy visible from the earth’s southern hemisphere, hours before the supernova was seen by an amateur astrologer in New Zealand, he said.

“The implications are that Einstein’s special relativity is wrong and that’s earth-shattering stuff,” Trotta said.

Still, the most likely explanation is a mistake by CERN, not Einstein, Trotta said. “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof,” he said.

COMMENT:  Please read that last quote again:  "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."  They certainly do...except in the matter of "climate change." 

This is fascinating stuff.  Are we present at a great new moment in physics?  Or will these experiments be shown to be flawed?  That is what science is about, not projecting climate 75 years down the line and asserting that anyone who disagrees is the equivalent of a racist or a Holocaust denier. 

September 23, 2011     Permalink

SNIPPET OF THE DAY – AT 9:53 A.M. ET: 

From Andrew Malcolm at the L.A. Times:   "We’re the country that built the Intercontinental Railroad."  That's what the president of the United States flat-out said Thursday during what was supposed to be a photo op to sell his jobs plan next to an allegedly deteriorating highway bridge.  A railroad between continents? A railroad from, say, New York City all the way across the Atlantic to France? Now, THAT would be a bridge!  It's yet another humorous gaffe by the Harvard Law graduate, overlooked by most media for whatever reason. Like Obama saying Abraham-Come-Lately Lincoln was the founder of the Republican Party. Or Navy corpseman. Or the Austrian language. Fifty-seven states. The president of Canada. Etc.

But he's our Barack, and we must not question.  He has come to save us.  So he doesn't know the difference between intercontinental and transcontinental.  What does that have to do with Muslim outreach?  English is the oppressor's language anyway.

A STUNNING ACCUSATION – AT 9:36 A.M. ET:  Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen, who's about to retire, has come right out and said that Pakistan, our "ally," aided a recent attack on the United States embassy in Afghanistan.  From WaPo:

The Obama administration for the first time Thursday openly asserted that Pakistan was indirectly responsible for specific attacks against U.S. troops and installations in Afghanistan, calling a leading Afghan insurgent group “a veritable arm” of the Pakistani intelligence service.

Last week’s attack on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul and a Sept. 10 truck bombing that killed five Afghans and wounded 77 NATO troops were “planned and conducted” by the Pakistan-based Haqqani network “with ISI support,” said Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The ISI is the Pakistani military’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency.

“The government of Pakistan and most especially the Pakistani army and ISI” have chosen “to use violent extremism as an instrument of policy” to maintain leverage over Afghanistan’s future, Mullen testified during a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta also testified.

Mullen’s statement represented a sharp break with a long-standing administration policy of publicly playing down Pakistan’s official support for Taliban insurgents who operate from havens within its borders. U.S. officials have typically described Pakistan as a troublesome but valuable partner in the struggle against terrorism.

The testimony capped a week of increasingly critical administration statements in the wake of the recent attacks and reflected a rising conviction that a new strategy is needed.

COMMENT:  Pakistan is a nuclear power.  We worry about where its loyalties are, and how well its nuclear weapons are protected.  This is not an encouraging report from Mike Mullen. 

We're trapped on this one.  On the one hand, we need Pakistan in the fight against terror.  On the other, most Pakistanis don't care for us.  Pakistan is a Muslim counry living in, maybe, the 10th century. 

It's the nuclear weapons I worry about most.  Nothing compares to that threat.  If Pakistan tips in the wrong direction, those nukes could get loose, or the Pakistani nuclear program could be infiltrated, resulting in a theft of nuclear materials by terrorist groups.  A nuclear weapon doesn't have to sit at the top of a missile.  It could be a crude device sailed into an American harbor and set off by a suicide squad.

We don't live in a safe world, and some in Washington are talking about drastic cuts in our military budget.

September 23, 2011       Permalink

AMERICANS AND THE MEDIA – AT 9:09 A.M. ET:  A new, well-done poll by Pew Research Center has bad news for the media.  In increasing numbers, Americans don't trust journalism. 

This is an important poll.  We believe here that press bias played a substantial role in the 2008 election.  If Americans are becoming more discerning about the press, the impact of that bias might be lessened next year.  Might be.  From The Politico: 

Record numbers of Americans consider the news media to be “immoral,” “inaccurate,” and “biased,” a new poll says.

A plurality of Americans, 42 percent, said that the press was “immoral,” compared to 38 percent who viewed the news media as “moral” - a record high according to an annual Pew Research poll on the media.

Americans were evenly divided on whether the news media helps “protect democracy” or “hurts democracy,” with 42 percent for each. The number of people who thought the media hurts democracy was another record high – in the mid-1980s, about twice as many said that news organizations protect democracy.

Americans also believe that news stories are often inaccurate - with 66 percent thinking that, compared with 34 percent in 1985. Only 25 percent of those surveyed think news organizations “get the facts straight.”

And when reporters get the facts wrong, 72 percent of Americans said that they “try to cover up their mistakes” rather than admitting them, yet another record high, according to Pew. Only 18 percent said that reporters were willing to admit their mistakes.

While majorities of Americans said that the news media remained highly professional (57 percent) and care about the quality of their work (68 percent), a historically large percentage of respondents thought that reporters were “not professional (32 percent) and “don’t care about how good a job they do” (31 percent).

By a large margin, respondents said that reporters were “politically biased in their reporting,” with a record high 63 percent agreeing with this view and only 25 percent disagreeing.

And a new Gallup poll reflects the belief that the press tilts leftward:

A significant majority of Americans, 60 percent, also perceive bias in the media. 47 percent said that the media is too liberal, and 13 percent said that that it was too conservative.

Americans have perceived more liberal bias in the media than conservative bias by a large margin since at least 2002, according to Gallup.

COMMENT:  I continue to see liberal bias, although I do think many journalists are aware of the awful reporting of 2008 and are trying to get things reasonably straight.  The most influential newspaper, however, is The New York Times, which is under firm liberal management.  Its regular news stories about Rick Perry, tilted heavily against him, reflect the same tired formula The Times disgraced itself with in 2008 – go after the Republican, and leave Barack alone.

September 23, 2011       Permalink

THE DEBATE – ROMNEY OVER PERRY – AT 8:46 A.M. ET:  It's pretty clear from opinion across the intercut that Romney defeated Perry in last night's debate.  We turn to superb analyst Michael Barone, in the Washington Examiner:

Rick Perry was not considered, by himself or by just about anyone else, a potential presidential candidate. His performance in last night's Fox News/Google debate in Orlando showed why.

Perry has been leading all the other Republican candidates in every national poll taken since he announced his candidacy on Aug. 13, upstaging the Iowa straw poll that Michele Bachmann won the same day. But in the debate, he showed himself still unprepared to answer some obvious questions and unsteady in his responses to attacks from others.

And...

Perry has spent 10 years as governor of Texas, and only a few weeks preparing to be president of the United States. He still has to think about his answers, and he has seemed fatigued in the second half of all three debates he has entered.

Romney, by contrast, has been campaigning for the presidency for more than four years, and is so trained up that he can seemingly go on autopilot when answering most questions. The results is a smooth, practiced delivery that makes him seem more presidential at this point in the campaign.

COMMENT:  However, it isn't over.  Perry still leads Romney in GOP polls, although I'd want to see if anything shifted after last night's winning performance by Romney.  And Perry is a learner.

Also, I must say this:  Perry has a certain warmth that Romney, very much the executive technocrat, often lacks.  One might disagree with his defense of his program to give children of illegals tuition breaks in state universities, but he spoke from the heart in pointing out that they had, themselves, done nothing wrong, and, like all young people, deserve to be educated. 

Perry got hurt last night by giving vague, hesitant answers.  He needs rehearsal, and he must do what Sarah Palin failed to do – learn the kind of details that make Romney look in command. 

September 23, 2011     Permalink

SEPTEMBER 22,  2011

TEXT OF OUR LIVE-BLOGGING OF THE GOP DEBATE IN ORLANDO:

COMMENT:  Advantage Romney.  It wasn't a knockout, but Romney won on points.  Perry did not do what he had to do, which was to break out as a truly national candidate.  But I don't think it was enough of a Romney victory to change the polls all that much immediately.   However, those who counted Romney out when Perry jumped into the race were clearly wrong.   

10:51 P.M. ET:  The debate is winding down and getting tired.  And now it abrupty ends.

10:47 P.M. ET:  Discussion turns to who the candidates would pick as running mates.  Silly stuff. 

They're on another break.  Only 15 minutes to go.

10:40 P.M. ET:  Back to the economy.  Each candidate is given a chance to say how he, or she, would lead.  And, you know, they're all pretty good.  These are set pieces.  Gary Johnson gives the best line of the night:  "My neighbor's two dogs have created more shovel-ready jobs than this administration."  Great laugh.  Not much happening in this round.  People are looking at their watches.

They're on another commercial break.  I still think Romney is ahead, but the last segment was confusing because of all the separate questions.  Also, we're now at the 90-minute (slightly more) mark, and a debate starts to get tiresome after about 75 minutes.  I think any impressions that are going to be made tonight have already been made. 

10:24 P.M. ET:  Discussing health care.  Perry once again defends an attempt to require an anti-cancer vaccine for girls.  He's effective and sounds compassionate, which he actually is.  It's one of his strongest traits, but it doesn't come across often enough.  Romney up, defending his Massachusetts health plan.  Now Perry snaps back, and strongly attacks Romney as someone who changes his views.  Tough attack.  Romney deflects it and turns his guns on Perry, accusing him also of flip-flopping.  I'll call this a draw.

10:15 P.M. ET:  Now they're talking about church and state.  Bachmann defends a Jeffersonian view.  And now they're talking about "don't ask, don't tell."  And now, sigh, they're talking about abortion.  Once again, the format has shifted to each candidate getting a different question, so it's confusing.  The mind starts to wander. 

10:02 P.M. ET:  Foreign policy is the subject.  Romney strongly defends our alliance with Israel, and raps Obama.  Herman Cain echoes Romney.  Perry now speaking about Pakisan, and he speaks knowledgeably.  He's done homework, and that is commendable.  Santorum up.  He's very strong on foreign policy, and takes a traditional, and good, hawkish line.  It's a strange format at this point because each candidate is being asked a different question.  I'd like to hear them answer the same question. 

They're on another commercial break.  I still think Romney has the edge in this debate, and it may be more than an edge.  I repeat my earlier feeling that he's beating Perry in the "confidence" factor.

9:47 P.M. ET:  Talking immigration.  Lots of red meat here.  Romney attacks Perry's Texas plan to provide in-state college tuition rates for illegal immigrants.  Again, he has detailed figures.  Now Perry is up.  His somewhat liberal immigration policy is controversial, possibly his Achilles heel within the Republican Party.  (Is he soft on illegal immigration?)  Perry, though, gives an effective reply, defending giving those tuition breaks.  But Rick Santorum points out that the tuition breaks give an unfair advantage to the illegals.  Perry replies, but doesn't reply to the issue, saying he'll put boots on the border if he's president.  It was an okay answer, but not great.

9:37 P.M. ET:  Debate now turns to federal education policy.  Usual conservative talk, much of it good.  But now Perry claims Romney is in favor of Obama's education policy.  Romney deflects, and lays out an education program.  Again, Romney has organized his thinking in an effective manner, and he continues to defeat Perry.  Bachmann and Cain speak about education, but our minds, I think, are focused on the two frontrunners.s

9:32 P.M. ET:  Romney up again.  Strong statement on his economic philosophy.  Now Huntsman is up.  Again, there's just a lack of impact, and no personality.  Herman Cain goes.  You have to give Herman credit, he's a great entertainer.  Has some good ideas.  But he won't get the nomination. 

9:28 P.M. ET:  Perry up, asked about Social Security.  Claims he doesn't want it returned to the states.  Romney replies, challenges strongly what Perry said, quoting Perry's recent book.  Advantage, Romney.  But now Perry responds.  And he catches Romney in a contradiction.  Romney responds, again in detail.  Romney is beating Perry.  He's got a grasp of information.

They're on a commercial break.  So far, no great fireworks, but I think Romney has the edge.  He's been aggressive and detailed.  I would say, without too much analysis, that average voters could easily feel that he, more than the others, deserves their confidence.  That is only my impression thus far.

9:15 P.M. ET:  Huntsman up.  I just find him boring.  He has this image of the "responsible" candidate, but I see a kind of shallowness.  He never seems passionate about anything.  Herman Cain is up.  You can't dislike the guy.  He has an economic plan, but it seems awfully oriented to companies.  To the voters' ears, that may not click.  Romney responds to an attack by Cain, and, once again, gives specifics.  We can't examine every aspect of his plan here, but at least he speaks in specifics, and appears to know his subjects.  That, I think, is why he's approaching Perry in some polls. 

9:09 P.M. ET:  Bachmann up, says Americans should keep every cent of what they earn, but that some has to go for taxes for the services they want.  Sensible answer, but nothing special.  Santorum and Gingrich speaks.  They have some interesting ideas, but they're not going to be nominated.  The debate is cluttered/

9:06 P.M. ET:  Perry starts by talking about what he's done for jobs in Texas.  Fine, but, again, too much Texas.  He's running for president.  Romney up now.  Gives specific ideas, whether good or bad, and gives national answers.   

9:01 P.M. ET:  Bret Baier of Fox News is introducing the candidates.  There is one new guy – former Governor Gary Johnson of New Mexico.  There are nine candidates in all, too many, really, for a good debate, but we work with what we have.

WE ARE NOW STARTING OUR LIVE BLOGGING OF THE REPUBLICAN DEBATE FROM ORLANDO

September 22, 2011       Permalink

ROMNEY BOOSTED BY NEW GALLUP POLL – AT 7:55 P.M. ET:  This is being written about an hour before tonight's Republican debate from Orlando (9 P.M. ET, on Fox).  Universally, across the web and on TV, pundits are saying how important this particular debate is, because there's going to be a lot of shaking out.  It's understood that Rick Perry will come out swinging, replying to the attacks on him.

A new Gallup poll just out gives comfort to Mitt Romney and outlines the challenge that Perry faces in proving that he's an electable candidate:

PRINCETON, NJ -- More registered voters say they would definitely vote for Mitt Romney or might consider doing so (62%) than say the same about his two main rivals in the 2012 presidential election, Democrat Barack Obama (54%) and Republican Rick Perry (53%).

Though Romney currently receives the highest level of consideration among voters, more say they would "definitely vote for" Obama (33%) than say this about either Romney (21%) or Perry (20%). That may reflect the virtual certainty that Obama will be the Democratic candidate for president, while Republicans' loyalties are divided between their two leading contenders.

That dynamic is apparent in the higher percentage of Democratic registered voters who say they definitely would vote for Obama (70%) than of Republican registered voters who would definitely vote for either of the main Republican contenders (41% for Perry and 44% for Romney). Once the Republican nominee is decided, the percentage of Republicans who say they would definitely vote for that candidate should increase significantly.

COMMENT:  Voters, in my view, are looking for an economic leader, and that notion will probably grow as the economy weakens even further.  Just look at the panic in the markets today.  Romney might look better and better.  I say "might" because he can falter, or attacks on his record can take their toll.

Watch the debate.  Should be fascinating. 

And the lingering question:  Will Sarah Palin get in?  She could pull votes from Perry, enough to make Romney the frontrunner again. 

This ain't over.  It ain't even begun.

September 22, 2011       Permalink

GRIMNESS, GRIMNESS, GRIMNESS – AT 10:01 A.M. ET:  Sure, we're in an economic recovery.  Can't you see it everywhere?  From The New York Times: 

Global stock markets tumbled Thursday as investor pessimism about the outlook for the United States and European economies was deepened by weak data for the euro zone and a grim assessment from the Federal Reserve.

“Today, we really seem to be stuck in a negative spiral,” said Matthias Jasper, head of equities at WGZ Bank in Düsseldorf. “Investors just want to keep their exposure low and watch from the sidelines.”

In the opening minutes of Wall Street trading, the Dow Jones industrial average was down 301.06, or 2.7 percent, 10.823.78. The Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index lost 2.6 percent, and the Nasdaq composite was down 2.7 percent.

In afternoon trading Thursday in Europe, the benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 index, the FTSE 100 in London and the CAC-40 in Paris were all down between 4 and 5 percent.

And this, from Bloomberg:

More Americans than forecast filed first-time claims for unemployment insurance payments last week as the labor market struggled to improve.

Applications for jobless benefits decreased 9,000 in the week ended Sept. 17 to 423,000, Labor Department figures showed today. Economists forecast 420,000 claims, according to the median estimate in a Bloomberg News survey. The average number of claims in the past month rose for a fifth straight week, to the highest level since July 16.

An elevated level of dismissals raises the odds U.S. companies may put off plans to increase employment, making it difficult for joblessness to fall below 9 percent. Citing ongoing weakness in the labor market, Federal Reserve policy makers announced yesterday they would use another unconventional monetary tool to spur economic growth and job gains.

“These numbers are consistent with a job market that is essentially in suspended animation,” said Brian Jones, an economist Societe Generale in New York, who correctly forecast the level of claims. “Anything that the Fed does to help the economy should help the labor market, but it takes time. We’ve got to see job growth before we can get more demand.”

COMMENT:  It gets more and more grim.  The administration is clueless, and, frankly, I'm not sure the Republicans have any great answers.  We seem to be in uncharted territory.

All this agony will undoubtedly come up at the Republican debate tonight.  It is in the area of "business" that Romney has his advantage.  We'll see if he can exploit it.

September 22, 2011        Permalink

ROMNEY ON THE ATTACK – AT 9:25 A.M. ET:  Romney and Perry are going at each other, but Romney's attacks are more concentrated and seem better organized.  He is hitting Perry on the electability question, clearly one of Perry's major problems:

Mitt Romney is leaning into an unapologetically process-focused sales pitch ahead of Thursday night’s debate, urging Republican primary voters to consider which of their party’s candidate’s is really capable of defeating Barack Obama.

In a USA Today interview published on the morning of the debate, Romney voiced concern that Perry’s “disconcerting” position on Social Security would hobble him against Obama.

And during a campaign stop in Florida yesterday, Romney explained in frankly tactical terms that he aims to win support beyond “the base of our party.”

“I also want to get independents and women generally and a lot of Democrats to say, ‘Yeah, he’s a pretty good guy, too,’” Romney told voters, according to the Boston Globe.

Romney’s former rival-turned-campaign co-chairman, Tim Pawlenty, also took to the pages of POLITICO to make this argument for nominating Romney: “We have to win.”

“For conservatives to lead America to a brighter future — it’s mission critical that our candidate win the election,” Pawlenty wrote. Romney can. And when he does — America’s future will be immeasurably better as a result.”

Romney supporters have hoped for some time that GOP primary voters would recognize Perry’s potential limitations as a general election candidate. Now, Romney and his surrogates are making the electability argument more openly than ever.

Perry fights back by hitting Romney's vulnerability, the idea that he's not a true conservative Republican:

ORLANDO -- In the hours before another high-profile Republican debate, Texas Gov. Rick Perry is leveling some of the campaign's sharpest rhetoric yet at rival Mitt Romney. In an interview with Fox News' Sean Hannity Wednesday night, Perry said Republicans "don't need to nominate Obama lite -- someone who's going to blur the lines between President Obama and our nominee."

COMMENT:  Ouch!  That may be a bit over the top, but it does show one thing about Perry that no one can deny, and that I like – he's a gut fighter.  If he gets the nomination, he wont take a punch without throwing one back.  It'd going to be a very dirty campaign, and Perry is not known as a wimp.

September 22, 2011       Permalink

POLL STUNNER – AT 8:43 A.M. ET:  We caution that this is one poll, and that New Hampshire cannot be counted as typical because Mitt Romney, former governor of neighboring Massachusetts, is so well known there.  Still, these results from a respected survey are raising eyebrows across the political internet:

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has surged among Republican voters in New Hampshire, and Rick Perry is a distant fourth, according to a Suffolk University/7NEWS (WHDH TV) poll of likely voters in New Hampshire’s GOP presidential primary.

Romney has opened up a 27-point lead over his nearest rival in New Hampshire, and pundits may have to rethink predictions of a two-man GOP race between Romney and Perry.

Romney (41 percent) gained 5 points since June, followed by Ron Paul (14 percent), and Jon Huntsman (10 percent). Huntsman and Paul gained 6 percent each since the last poll.

The single-digit tier consisted of Perry (8 percent), Sarah Palin (6 percent), Michele Bachmann (5 percent), and Newt Gingrich (4 percent), while Rick Santorum and Buddy Roemer each received 1 percent. Eleven percent of likely New Hampshire GOP primary voters were undecided.

“Mitt Romney is saying ‘get out of my back yard’ and making New Hampshire his strong firewall despite showing some weakness in the other states’ early primaries,” said David Paleologos, director of Suffolk University’s Political Research Center. “The anti-Romney candidate at this point could be either Ron Paul, who has polled consistently over the past year, or Jon Huntsman, whose numbers are really growing in the Granite State.”

COMMENT:  The question, of course, is why Perry is so weak.  New Hampshire is a New England state, and Perry must show strength in different sections of the country to convince the party's voters that he deserves the nomination.

It's best to withhold judgment until we see some polling from other northern states, especially across the Midwestern industrial belt, or what used to be the industrial belt.  But this poll should remind Perry of what he must do.

September 22, 2011       Permalink

RUMBLE TONIGHT, BE THERE – AT 8:21 A.M. ET:  Big Republican debate tonight in Orlando, sponored by Fox News and Google.  This is the most anticipated of the GOP debates so far.

It's the most anticipated because the public is getting to know the candidates and has made Rick Perry the frontrunner, but there are serious questions about his electability  The party expects Perry to answer those questions tonight.  If he can't, he might start to run into headwinds. 

Perry is still getting his campaign legs.  He still doesn't seem all that comfortable on the national stage.   He made a strong speech on the Mideast yesterday, but he read it rather than delivered it, and it was pretty clear from the phrasing that he didn't write it. 

The conventional wisdom is that Romney can only catch up to Perry if Perry fumbles badly, and I think that wisdom is correct.  In addition, it's now generally believed that the GOP field is complete...except for the possibility of Sarah Palin jumping in.  She is teasing the press every day with hints that she might, but she's also suggesting that she doesn't have to decide until November, which I think would be a mistake.

No Republican candidate has been able to connect personally, emotionally, with the electorate, or enough of the electorate to have a shot at victory.  But give that time.  People forget that Ronald Reagan didn't make that connection, and begin to bond with the public, until well into the general election campaign.

I'll be watching and live-blogging tonight's debate.  I hope you join us.

September 22, 2011     Permalink