Eight For 08

After a week of the press drooling over the possibility of an all-out Obama v Clinton brawl, the candidates decided to end the nastiness and debate nice just in time for super Tuesday [NPR]. So now, it’s the Republicans’ turn [Bostonist].

What’s interesting is that you don’t hear anyone among the candidates, their surrogates, or the press calling for McCain and Romney to chill out, end the bitterness and focus on the issues.  The Dems got a lot of that, but everyone seems content to watch the Republican front runners duke it out - particularly the Republican front-runners. The LA Times looks at the historical roots of this battle:

 On Sept. 19, 2000, John McCain rose in the Senate to rail against what he called the “staggering” sums that the federal government planned to spend to help Salt Lake City stage the 2002 Winter Olympics…

Mitt Romney, who headed the Olympics, counseled calm when reporters from Utah’s Deseret Morning News reached him in Sydney, Australia. Romney challenged McCain’s arithmetic, arguing that taxpayers would provide only $250 million…

The clash over Olympics spending, which dragged on for two years, helps explain some of the acrimony that now characterizes the race between the two front-runners for the Republican presidential nomination. The dispute provided an early preview of the fissures that still divide McCain and Romney as they face what may be decisive contests Tuesday.

“It may be a source of the sniping between the two,” said Quin Monson, assistant director of the Center for Elections and Democracy at Romney’s alma mater, Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. Kelly Patterson, the center’s director, agreed: “People have long memories in politics.”

This piece is on the right track, though it needs to be a lot longer. The context of the ‘02 Olympic feud only underscores the futility of Romney’s amnuition against McCain - the former Mass. Governor wants America to believe that Washington is the problem in this country, while his opponent represents nothing of the sort [washingtonpost.com, Zachary Goldfarb]:

For his part, Romney belittled McCain’s endorsements, saying, “I know that the political establishment is going to try and pull for John McCain, but I expect that I’m going to get the support of the people.”

As if McCain needed a reason to dislike Romney more.

So let the Democrats touch, feel, and unite - Romney/McCain will continue to get nasty right through Tuesday’s polls. Oh, and don’t forget about the Huckster, he’s making a great fan for the flames and a great surrogate for McCain [Conservative Pulse]:

Huckabee is someone who has been known to hold the occassional grudge and he feels badly burned by the brass knuckles campaign that Mitt Romney ran in Iowa.  By staying in the race, Huckabee is drawing votes that might otherwise go to Romney.  And if he stays in the race until Wednesday, Huckabee will be able to help tip things to McCain.

Huckabee would like to be Vice-President and all signs suggest McCain would like having him on the ticket.  The two men get along well and have a great deal of respect for each other.

I said it once, and the New York Times will say it again for me: it’s not just politics, the Republican candidates don’t like Romney. Yes, this is, in many ways, a junior high popularity contest:

“The glee the other candidates go after Romney with is really unique…”

“They think he didn’t pay his dues…”

“John McCain and his friends used to beat up Mitt Romney at recess…”

And Romney’s locker-room style defense:

A spokesman for the Romney campaign, Kevin Madden, said, “I think it’s largely driven by the fact that everybody’s taught to tackle the guy on the field with the ball.”

Please. McCain’s venom for Romney was strongest when he had already stripped the ball from the former Massachusetts Governor. Romney has a distinctly different approach to the veteran politician. Mitt knows the rules well, but he’s use to playing in a totally different arena, a totally different sport than McCain, Huckabee and Thompson. I’d bet that even Romney’s staff end up drinking alone while everybody else is joking about them at the bar next-door…

“Never get into a wrestling match with a pig,” Senator John McCain said in New Hampshire this month after reporters asked him about Mr. Romney. “You both get dirty, and the pig likes it.”

I was concerned we were going to see a tv first last night and one of the commentators may actually have to take a breath for a second amidst grandstanding about “the most incredible primary comeback in history!” I heard drivel like this way too much last night, but I think Gideon Rachman presents a much more realistic take with his sobering “Maybe These Things Are Simply Hard To Predict” FT blog post.

So the Democratic race is officially interesting but analysts are already starting to ignore the Republican race, which was interesting from the start and only got more so last night. I can’t understand why anyone thinks Romney was ‘embarrassed’ last night: New Hampshire is its own beast, it may be New England, but it was not home court for Romney.

That’s not to say the former Massachusetts Governor shouldn’t be concerned.  Here’s what I glean from the Boston Globe’s handy interactive exit polling tool:

•  Most Republican voters in NH who are concerned about the economy voted for McCain - that hurts.
• Voters identify Romney with GW Bush - wonder if that’s probably not a good thing right now (definitely not in NH) but one that might be corrected by inevitable rise of Giuliani.
• McCain won out on electibility - again, Romney should be concerned because McCain isn’t exactly a Republican-establishment candidate, shouldn’t be too hard to convince voters Romney is more electable…
• Which brings us to the promising news for Romney: he won among registered Republicans and those who identified as Conservative (Independents boosted McCain).

The last data-point speaks to the uniqueness of the Granite State (and  its process) and should serve as promising for Romney. Of course, if Romney loses Michigan to McCain by more than a couple points, he should probably shift from concerned to panicked.