New America Today tag:newamericatoday.com,2009-02-03:/na//1 2012-02-08T13:35:03Z Movable Type Pro 4.23-en Santorum Delivers a GOP Stunner tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4244 2012-02-08T13:29:53Z 2012-02-08T13:35:03Z Former Senator Sweeps Missouri, Minnesota, Colorado; Romney Campaign Plays Down Nonbinding Contests... NAT Santorum Delivers a GOP Stunner.jpg

Former Senator Sweeps Missouri, Minnesota, Colorado; Romney Campaign Plays Down Nonbinding Contests
]]> THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Rick Santorum jolted the Republican presidential race Tuesday with a three-state sweep of nominating contests in Colorado, Missouri and Minnesota, puncturing Mitt Romney's claim to be the unstoppable front-runner.

Mr. Santorum's three victories--one in the Mountain West and two in the Midwest--give his campaign a much-needed burst of momentum while stirring doubt about Mr. Romney's abilities to woo conservatives to his side in important electoral swing states such as Missouri and Colorado. So far, Mr. Romney has won in states where he has devoted significant campaign time and advertising dollars.

In two of the states, Colorado and Minnesota, Mr. Romney had won by large margins in 2008. He was hugely favored in Colorado in the days leading up to the Tuesday caucus. Two of his top aides have deep experience in the state, and his campaign has been busy organizing there for months.

Of the eight nominating contests so far, Mr. Santorum has now won four, while Mr. Romney has won three and Newt Gingrich one--a tally that seemed unlikely on a few days ago. Until Tuesday, Mr. Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, had won only a single contest, a narrow victory in Iowa's Jan. 3 caucuses.

In Missouri's primary, Mr. Santorum won 55% of the vote, while Mr. Romney followed with 25%. Texas Rep. Ron Paul was trailing with 12%. Mr. Gingrich wasn't on the Missouri ballot.

Mr. Santorum's Missouri victory margin was substantial: He won 75,000 more votes than Mr. Romney and 29,000 more than Mr. Romney's combined Iowa and Nevada totals.

While the Tuesday results didn't directly award any of the delegates needed to claim the GOP nomination, they showed voters rejecting Mr. Romney even in states where he had performed well four years ago.

Mr. Romney had carried Minnesota's caucuses in 2008 but placed third there on Tuesday. With 88% of the vote counted, Mr. Santorum had 45% of the vote, while Mr. Paul had 27%. Mr. Romney had 17% and Mr. Gingrich 11%.

With all Colorado precincts counted, Mr. Santorum had 40%, to 35% for Mr. Romney. Four years ago, Mr. Romney carried Colorado's caucuses with 60% of the vote.

Mr. Santorum has lagged in the primaries held since his Iowa win in early January. His three-state sweep Tuesday will buttress his argument that he, not Mr. Gingrich, is the GOP's top alternative to Mr. Romney. The victories also will likely give a fund-raising boost to Mr. Santorum, who has kept his campaign running on a shoestring budget since launching his bid last summer.

"Conservatism is alive and well in Missouri and Minnesota," Mr. Santorum said at a victory rally in St. Charles, Mo. "I don't stand here to be the conservative alternative to Mitt Romney," he said, prompting loud chants of support. "I stand here to be the conservative alternative to Barack Obama."

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]]> Danger Signs for Mitt Romney tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4243 2012-02-08T13:26:19Z 2012-02-08T13:29:57Z He faces a tight Minnesota race, but a worse problem is his weakening position vs. Obama. Plus, 15 fun facts about Tuesday's primary states.... NAT Danger Signs for Mitt Romney.jpg

He faces a tight Minnesota race, but a worse problem is his weakening position vs. Obama. Plus, 15 fun facts about Tuesday's primary states.
]]> THE DAILY BEAST
HOWARD KURTZ

Mitt Romney would seem to be on cruise control heading into Tuesday's contests in Colorado, Minnesota, and Missouri. But he is suddenly facing a few speed bumps.

He could get upended in the Minnesota caucuses, where the latest Public Policy Polling survey has Rick Santorum at 29 percent, Romney at 27, and  Newt Gingrich  at 22. But that would be offset by the caucuses in Colorado, where Romney holds a 14-point lead over Santorum and a 22-point edge over Gingrich. And while Santorum has a clean shot at the frontrunner in Missouri, where Newt isn't on the ballot, that primary is just a beauty contest, with no delegates at stake.

Santorum, for his part, has ratcheted up his rhetoric, saying in Minnesota: "Governor Romney is absolutely incapable of making the case against 'Obamacare' successfully and therefore greatly damages our ability to be able to win this election." The Romney camp has punched back, unloading on the former senator's "long history of earmarks and pork-barrel spending" and recycling some nice things he said about the former Massachusetts governor in 2008.

But Romney has bigger worries than whether Santorum can revive his long-shot candidacy after four lousy finishes. Among a series of findings in Monday's Washington Post/ABC poll, this one jumped out: "By better than 2 to 1, Americans say the more they learn about Romney, the less they like him."

Yow. Not a good sign.

It's a mistake to make too much of any one poll, and maybe the figure includes those who are being influenced by Gingrich's continued carpet bombing. Perhaps President Obama's approval rating rising to 50 percent is a blip, along with his growing support, to 47 percent, among independents. And February is awfully early to begin sweating over an incumbent president beating the likely GOP nominee 52 to 43 percent, or 51-45 among registered voters.

Romney's camp is challenging the survey, calling it "seriously flawed" because the Obama match-up followed several questions on negative controversies involving its candidate. But the overall direction is clear.

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]]> Romney Support Falls Back in States He Won tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4242 2012-02-08T13:24:13Z 2012-02-08T13:27:17Z NAT Romney Support Falls Back in States He Won.jpg

]]> REAL CLEAR POLITICS

Under the original election calendar, the Romney campaign foresaw victories in New Hampshire and Nevada as a firewall protecting the candidate's path to the GOP nomination: Post big wins in both states, use the momentum to get a major win in Florida, and then lock up the whole thing. Nevada ended up moving its nominating contest back to follow the Sunshine State's, but Romney still posted double-digit victories in all three contests.

And so everything's gone according to plan.

There's just one problem: After waging warfare on his GOP competitors in each of those elections -- all in swing states that could be critical in a November matchup against President Obama -- Romney has left those contests less popular than when he started campaigning in earnest.

The news Monday in a national Washington Post/ABC News poll made waves: Obama's approval rating shot up to 50 percent; the president bested Romney in a general election matchup; and he led his likely GOP rival among crucial independent voters.

And so the Romney campaign issued two memos to effectively distract from those findings. The first one, authored by campaign pollster Neil Newhouse, addressed the new survey.

"The poll introduced specific negative information about Governor Romney immediately prior to asking [about] the ballot matchup against President Obama," Newhouse noted. He re-listed a series of questions the Post/ABC pollsters asked, including what respondents thought of Romney's corporate work and his effective tax rate of 14 percent just before addressing the general election matchup. Newhouse concluded that "the questionnaire design . . . is seriously flawed."

Romney spokeswoman Gail Gitcho distributed the polling memo to the press but did not respond to a request to expound.

The second memo was a rallying cry with the subject line "On a Roll," which Romney political director Rich Beeson sent to supporters Monday afternoon.

"Another swing state -- another big victory," Beeson noted. The memo was brief and pointed out that Romney won key conservative coalitions in Nevada, including tea party supporters, evangelical Christians and "very conservative" voters.

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]]> A Fairness Quiz for the President tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4241 2012-02-08T13:22:25Z 2012-02-08T13:24:23Z THE WALL STREET JOURNALSTEPHEN MOOREIs it fair that some of Mr. Obama's largest campaign contributors received federal loan guarantees?... NAT OB-RR519_moore_G_20120206134500.jpg

Is it fair that some of Mr. Obama's largest campaign contributors received federal loan guarantees?

]]> President Obama has frequently justified his policies--and judged their outcomes--in terms of equity, justice and fairness. That raises an obvious question: How does our existing system--and his own policy record--stack up according to those criteria?

Is it fair that the richest 1% of Americans pay nearly 40% of all federal income taxes, and the richest 10% pay two-thirds of the tax?

Is it fair that the richest 10% of Americans shoulder a higher share of their country's income-tax burden than do the richest 10% in every other industrialized nation, including socialist Sweden?

Is it fair that American corporations pay the highest statutory corporate tax rate of all other industrialized nations but Japan, which cuts its rate on April 1?

Is it fair that President Obama sends his two daughters to elite private schools that are safer, better-run, and produce higher test scores than public schools in Washington, D.C.--but millions of other families across America are denied that free choice and forced to send their kids to rotten schools?

Is it fair that Americans who build a family business, hire workers, reinvest and save their money--paying a lifetime of federal, state and local taxes often climbing into the millions of dollars--must then pay an additional estate tax of 35% (and as much as 55% when the law changes next year) when they die, rather than passing that money onto their loved ones?

Is it fair that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, former Democratic Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, former Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel and other leading Democrats who preach tax fairness underpaid their own taxes?

Is it fair that after the first three years of Obamanomics, the poor are poorer, the poverty rate is rising, the middle class is losing income, and some 5.5 million fewer Americans have jobs today than in 2007?

Is it fair that roughly 88% of political contributions from supposedly impartial network television reporters, producers and other employees in 2008 went to Democrats?

Is it fair that the three counties with America's highest median family income just happen to be located in the Washington, D.C., metro area?

Is it fair that wind, solar and ethanol producers get billions of dollars of subsidies each year and pay virtually no taxes, while the oil and gas industry--which provides at least 10 times as much energy--pays tens of billions of dollars of taxes while the president complains that it is "subsidized"?

Is it fair that those who work full-time jobs (and sometimes more) to make ends meet have to pay taxes to support up to 99 weeks of unemployment benefits for those who don't work?

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]]> Can Romney Seal Deal w/Christian Right? tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4240 2012-02-08T13:19:40Z 2012-02-08T13:22:23Z Missouri's primary seems a minor stopover in the GOP race, but it may show if, crucially, Romney can woo evangelical voters... NAT Can Mitt Romney seal the deal with the Christian right.jpg

Missouri's primary seems a minor stopover in the GOP race, but it may show if, crucially, Romney can woo evangelical voters
]]> THE GUARDIAN

Mitt Romney won an impressive 29-percentage point victory in Saturday's Nevada caucuses. For some analysts, the triumph suggested that Romney is well on his way to winning the nomination. For me, the win was expected and confirms my forecast about where the race is heading. Romney maintains his status as the favorite for the Republican nomination, but potential trouble lurks down the road. 

Romney maintains a great funding and organizational advantage in comparison to his peers. If he senses any candidate (such as Newt Gingrich) might be a serious challenge, Romney can drown out his opponent with television advertising and establishment endorsements (as Elliott Abrams describes in the National Review). Romney's ability to turn a five-point deficit in Florida into a seven-point lead in three days, with an eventual 14.5-point win, shows what his campaign is capable of doing.

The outstanding issue for Romney, though, is that he has yet failed to break through in a state that doesn't favor him demographically. Think about the states where Romney has done well: New Hampshire, Florida and Nevada. Some are liberal, some are conservative, but they share one demographic feature: they have a below-average percentage of Republican primary (or caucus) voters who identify as born-again Christians or evangelicals. The two states, Iowa and South Carolina, in which Romney has fared poorly have an above-average percentage of Republican primary (or caucus) voters who so identify.

Graphically, the relationship between born-again Christian and evangelical and the Romney vote becomes quite clear. Romney's percentage of the vote as opposed to the proportion won by the conservative alternatives (by now, just Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum) tallies quite closely with the percentage of voters in a state's exit polls who say they are born-again Christian or evangelical.

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]]> Poor Tim Pawlenty tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4239 2012-02-08T13:17:59Z 2012-02-08T13:20:08Z WEEKLY STANDARDWILLIAM KRISTOLCampaigns are populated by hacks and trade in cheap shots.... NAT Tim-Pawlenty.jpg

Campaigns are populated by hacks and trade in cheap shots.

]]> But the hacks are usually paid staffers, and the cheap shots are part of their job description. It's sad to see a respected former governor reduced to low-level staff hackery, acting as an attack dog on behalf of a man he once criticized ("Obamneycare") and now supports.

Here's Tim Pawlenty today, as a Mitt Romney campaign surrogate, on a conference call criticizing former senator Rick Santorum for . . . having voted to raise the debt ceiling: "He voted numerous times to raise the debt ceiling and here we as a nation facing fiscal crisis, I mean literally on the edge of the fiscal abyss. We need a next president who's been strong and proven in fiscal and spending matters, and we had Rick Santorum voting numerous times to raise the debt ceiling." (The quotation is from the Romney press shop's transcript.)

Here's a question: Did either Tim Pawlenty or Mitt Romney speak out at the time against any of the debt ceiling hikes Rick Santorum voted for as a member of Congress?

And here's a thought: Perhaps the Romney campaign could stop abusing poor Tim Pawlenty?
]]> Is Republican Party Facing an Enthusiasm Gap? tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4238 2012-02-08T13:15:40Z 2012-02-08T13:18:12Z NAT Is the Republican Party Facing an Enthusiasm Gap.jpg

]]> ABC NEWS

As the caucuses and primaries pick up pace, with Colorado and Minnesota taking center stage today, many are wondering whether the initial enthusiasm surrounding the Republican race is waning, given the remarkably low turnout in the Nevada caucuses, which came and went with little fanfare.

In Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, turnout surged, compared to four years ago and each state went to a different candidate.

But that trend appears to be on the decline. In both Florida and Nevada, turnout dropped sharply from 2008. Florida saw nearly 280,000 fewer voters in its primary last week, while more than 11,000 fewer voters turned out to vote in Nevada on Saturday compared to four years ago. Mitt Romney won both states by a landslide.

Some observers say the declining interest is a reflection of the lack of enthusiasm for the former Massachusetts governor.

Polls show mixed enthusiasm for the current crop of GOP candidates. More Republican and Republican-leaning registered voters -- about 52 percent -- said the Republican field is only fair or poor than did so in early January, according to a poll by the Pew Research Center, and only 46 percent had positive opinions of the field. At this time in 2008, 68 percent of Republican and GOP-leaning voters rated the field as excellent or good, according to Pew.

Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, the only candidate who doesn't have a win under his belt, also blamed the low turnout on the lack of satisfaction with the candidates in an interview on "This Week" with George Stephanopoulos.

Some observers, however, point to a trend of higher turnout in counties where former House speaker Newt Gingrich outperformed Romney.

"He's much more of an attack dog when it comes to not only his primary opponents but also his potential general election opponent, Obama," said Michael McDonald, a professor at George Mason University who runs the United States Elections Project, which monitors election and turnout data. "The Republican voters really crave someone who's going to display that sort of attack mentality when it comes to the general election. That's something you can get enthused upon. Romney's campaign is not a campaign that seems to be able to spark that kind of enthusiasm."

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]]> The Prop 8 Battles Are Back? Thanks, 9th Circuit tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4237 2012-02-08T13:11:35Z 2012-02-08T13:15:58Z NAT The Prop 8 Battles Are Back.jpg

]]> BAPTIST PRESS
MICHAEL FOUST

A federal appeals court Tuesday struck down California's Proposition 8, handing gay groups a big win while avoiding the larger question of whether the U.S. Constitution guarantees gays nationwide the right to "marry." 

The outcome by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals was not a huge surprise, as the three-judge panel seemed inclined during oral arguments to overturn Prop 8, which defines marriage as between one man and one woman and was passed at the ballot in 2008. But it was a landmark decision and marked the first time an appeals court in the U.S. has ruled that same-sex couples in a state have a right to "marry." The ruling will be appealed and could end up before the U.S. Supreme Court. 

The 2-1 decision affirmed a 2010 lower court ruling by Judge Vaughn Walker, now retired.

"Proposition 8 serves no purpose, and has no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians in California, and to officially reclassify their relationships and families as inferior to those of opposite-sex couples," Judge Stephen Reinhardt wrote for the majority. "... By using their initiative power to target a minority group and withdraw a right that is possessed, without a legitimate reason for doing so, the People of California violated the Equal Protection Clause." 

But the ruling was not the home run gay groups had hoped it would be, and its impact could be limited to California, meaning it might not affect the 28 other states with constitutional amendments defining marriage in the traditional sense. Reinhardt -- a nominee of President Carter -- called the decision "narrow" and said it was not answering the broader question of whether states ever can define marriage as between a man and a woman. Walker, in 2010, had said there was a federal constitutional right for such unions. 

"Whether under the Constitution same-sex couples may every be denied the right to marry, a right that has long been enjoyed by opposite-sex couples, is an important and highly controversial question," Reinhardt wrote before adding, "we need not and do not answer the broader question in this case."

Reinhardt was joined in the opinion by Michael Daly Hawkins, a nominee of President Clinton. Judge N. Randy Smith, a nominee of President George W. Bush, dissented. 

Alliance Defense Fund attorney Dale Schowengerdt said that while the decision's outcome was more narrow than Walker's, its reasoning in striking down Prop 8 was broad. 

"It's not a narrow ruling in many regards," Schowengerdt told Baptist Press. "The court basically said there's no legitimate reason to define marriage as the union between a man and a woman. The court said Proposition 8 was supported by nothing but animus."

All of the majority's arguments, he added, could be used to strike down the traditional marriage laws in the 44 states that don't recognize gay "marriage." 

The ruling "could impact marriage in many, many states," Schowenderdt said.

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]]> Where in Brain Is Seat of Consciousness? tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4236 2012-02-08T13:11:32Z 2012-02-08T13:13:24Z Brain signatures lead scientists to the seat of consciousness... NAT Where in Brain Is Seat of Consciousness.jpg

Brain signatures lead scientists to the seat of consciousness
]]> SCIENCE NEWS

Humankind's sharpest minds have figured out some of nature's deepest secrets. Why the sun shines. How humans evolved from single-celled life. Why an apple falls to the ground. Humans have conceived and built giant telescopes that glimpse galaxies billions of light-years away and microscopes that illuminate the contours of a single atom. Yet the peculiar quality that enabled such flashes of scientific insight and grand achievements remains a mystery: consciousness.

Though in some ways deeply familiar, consciousness is at the same time foreign to those in its possession. Deciphering the cryptic machinations of the brain -- and how they create a mind -- poses one of the last great challenges facing the scientific world.

For a long time, the very question was considered to be in poor taste, acceptable for philosophical musing but outside the bounds of real science. Whispers of the C-word were met with scorn in polite scientific society.

Toward the end of the last century, though, sentiment shifted as some respectable scientists began saying the C-word out loud. Initially these discussions were tantalizing but hazy: Like kids parroting a dirty word without knowing what it means, scientists speculated on what consciousness is without any real data. After a while, though, researchers developed ways to turn their instruments inward to study the very thing that was doing the studying.

Today consciousness research has become a passion for many scientists, and not just for the thrill of saying a naughty word. A flood of data is sweeping brain scientists far beyond their intuitions, for the first time enabling meaningful evidence-based discussions about the nature of consciousness.

"You're not condemned to walk around in this epistemological fog where it's all just sort of philosophy and speculation," says neuroscientist Christof Koch of Caltech and the Allen Institute for Brain Science in Seattle. "It used to be the case, but now we can attack this question experimentally, using the tools of good old science to try to come to grips with it."

Knowledge emerging from all of this work has ushered researchers into a rich cycle of progress. New experimental results have guided theoretical concepts of consciousness, which themselves churn out predictions that can be tested with more refined experiments. Ultimately, these new insights could answer questions such as whether animals, or the Internet, or the next-generation iPhone could ever possess consciousness.

Though a detailed definition remains elusive, in simplest terms, consciousness is what you lose when you fall into a deep sleep at night and what you gain when you wake up in the morning. A brain that is fully awake and constructing experiences is said to be fully conscious. By comparing such brains with others that are in altered states of awareness, researchers are identifying some of the key ingredients that a conscious brain requires.

In the hunt for these ingredients, "we decided to go for big changes in consciousness," says Giulio Tononi of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He and others are studying brains that are deeply asleep, under anesthesia or even in comas, searching for dimmer switches that dial global levels of consciousness up or down.

Scrutinizing brain changes that correspond to such levels has led some scientists to a central hub deep in the brain. Called the thalamus, this structure is responsible for constantly sending and receiving a torrent of neural missives. Other clues to consciousness come from a particular kind of electrical signal that the brain produces when it becomes aware of something in the outside world. But rather than one kind of signature, or one strategic brain structure, consciousness depends on many regions and signals working in concert. The key may be in the exquisitely complicated ebb and flow of the brain's trillions of connections.

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]]> Obama/Romney Looking a Lot Like Obama/McCain tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4235 2012-02-06T22:11:35Z 2012-02-06T22:14:01Z NAT ObamaRomney Looking a Lot Like ObamaMcCain.jpg

]]> NATIONAL JOURNAL
RON BROWNSTEIN

One striking aspect of the new ABC News/Washington Post poll released Monday is how closely the internal results of its head-to-head match-up between President Obama and Mitt Romney track Obama's performance against John McCain in 2008. Overall, the poll found Obama leading Romney in a 2012 match up by 51 percent to 45 percent among registered voters. It was the first time the survey had shown Obama (or Romney) crossing the 50 percent threshold against the other in a series of ballot tests since last spring.

Looking below the top-line numbers, the survey found the electorate dividing along lines almost identical to the actual results in 2008, according to figures provided by ABC pollster Gary Langer, the President of Langer Research Associates.

In 2008, Obama carried a combined 80 percent of minority voters; the ABC/Washington Post survey shows him drawing 81 percent of non-white voters against Romney (who attracts just 14 percent). 

In 2008, Obama carried 43 percent of whites, while McCain won 55 percent of them. The new survey shows Romney leading Obama among whites 53 percent to 42 percent. The ABC/Post poll shows Obama holding his ground both among whites with and without a college education. In 2008, Obama won 40 percent of non-college whites, while 58 percent of them voted for McCain. In the new survey, those working-class whites-the toughest audience for Obama throughout his national career-break in virtually identical proportions: 56 percent for Romney, 39 percent for the president.

That showing reflects a modest, but important, rebound for Obama's job approval rating among those non-college whites in the survey. As Greg Sargent noted today, "Obama's approval rating among these [blue-collar] voters is 43-54. While those numbers don't appear too good at first glance...This is his best level among non-college whites since early last year (excluding the post-Bin Laden bump), and they are far better than they were at their lowest point in 2010, when Democrats suffered massive desertions among this constituency." In fact, just 30 percent of non-college whites who voted in 2010 approved of Obama's job performance, according to calculations performed for National Journal by Edison Research. 

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]]> Why Is Callista Gingrich So Quiet? tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4234 2012-02-06T22:08:40Z 2012-02-06T22:11:34Z NAT Callista Gingrich.jpg

]]> COMMENTARY

Maureen Dowd has a new piece out on Callista Gingrich this week, and while it devolves into unnecessary nastiness at the end, this part about the contrast between Newt's and Mitt's wives is worth noting:

Ann Romney often introduces her husband, chatting warmly about his uxorious virtues, and then disappears offstage or to the back of the stage while he talks. But the 45-year-old Callista has created an entirely new model for a spouse, standing mute in her primary color suits and triple-strand pearls looking at the 68-year-old Newt for the whole event, her platinum carapace inclined deferentially toward his shaggy gray mane. ...

That may be why she has a largely nonspeaking role in the campaign, as silent as the slender heroine of "The Artist," even though Newt relays that she has described herself as a hybrid of Nancy Reagan, Laura Bush and Jackie Kennedy. The campaign does not want to remind voters that the relationship, portrayed as so redemptive, was born in sin and hypocrisy.

It wasn't until after reading this that I realized I couldn't even remember actually hearing Callista speak. A Google search for Callista Gingrich interviews - which brought up this 2009 clip of her sounding like a museum guide robot - only managed to amplify the Stepford Wife resemblance. This isn't a person talking, it's rote memorization. Which raises the question: is Gingrich uncomfortable with his wife speaking off-the-cuff?

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]]> Could Evangelicals Block Romney? tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4233 2012-02-06T22:06:14Z 2012-02-06T22:08:44Z NAT Could Evangelicals Block Romney.jpg

]]> REAL CLEAR POLITICS

Jay Cost wrote an important piece last week regarding the divide within the Republican Party that has emerged during the primary process. He observed that conservative voters in northern states like Iowa and New Hampshire are much more sympathetic toward Mitt Romney's candidacy than those in the South, and concluded that "a geographical split among conservatives and Tea Partiers" was emerging in the GOP primary. He concluded, "This is geography, not ideology."

I think Cost is right that the split is about something other than ideology. Romney's vote share has tended to be consistent across ideological groups in each particular state, the opposite of what we'd expect if the divide were primarily ideological. In South Carolina, for example, Romney won 19 percent of very conservative voters, 30 percent of somewhat conservative voters, and 34 percent of moderate/liberal voters. That's not a particularly huge divergence across the ideological spectrum. Similar trends have popped up in other primary/caucus states.

But I think there's more going on here than just geography. Demography is implicated as well. Harry Enten, an up-and-coming election analyst, observed late Saturday night that you could explain Romney's vote share in each state just by looking at the evangelical vote in that state's primary electorate.

This piqued my interest. After all, analysts like Jay Cost, followed later by Nate Silver, had done similar analyses to project a close Democratic primary in 2008 very early in the process. So I think Enten's onto something here. The problem, as he observes, is that when you look at the race at the state level, you only have five data points, which is a thin reed upon which to hang a regression equation.

But at the county level, our data set is quite a bit larger. Now, we don't have exit polling at the primary level. But we can get demographic data at the county level for the most relevant variables. We can build our regression from there (the variables we use tend to divide heavily by partisan affiliation anyway; most evangelicals in a county will vote in a Republican primary).

Before going on, I should note an important discrepancy between what we're doing and what exit polls tell you. Exit polls will tell you that a particular demographic group voted a certain way in a given state. What we're finding is that the demographic makeup of a particular county tells you something. What Enten is saying is that states with large evangelical populations tend to vote more heavily against Romney. While we might then deduce that evangelicals are voting against Romney, we can't infer it. It's a subtle distinction, but a reasonably important one.

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]]> Santorum's Last Stand? tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4232 2012-02-06T22:01:13Z 2012-02-06T22:06:39Z Can he get back in the race with a win in Missouri's "beauty contest"?... NAT Santorum's Last Stand.jpg

Can he get back in the race with a win in Missouri's "beauty contest"?
]]> NATIONAL REVIEW

For Rick Santorum, Missouri's primary is likely his last opportunity to regain momentum.

Newt Gingrich isn't on the ballot, thanks to his campaign's decision not to file. (Missouri's caucuses, held beginning in mid-March, will determine the state's delegates, so the primary is a non-binding "beauty contest.") That leaves Tuesday's primary as a showdown between Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, and Santorum.

Missouri GOP strategist Jeff Roe calls the election a "referendum on Rick Santorum," saying the Missouri primary is a test for Santorum to see if he "can match his narrative that he's the one who can beat Romney and consolidate conservatives."

"This is a chance for him to prove his narrative is true," Roe says, adding that he thinks Santorum needs to either clear the 50 percent mark in the state or beat Romney by double digits to make his case.

While one poll shows Santorum ahead right now, it doesn't give him that kind of win. A Public Policy Polling survey conducted late last month showed Santorum in the lead at 45 percent, 11 points ahead of Romney and 32 points ahead of Paul. His net favorability/unfavorability margin among Missouri Republicans was 42 points. That gives him a significant edge over Gingrich (plus 20 points), Romney (plus 10 points), and Paul (negative 29 points).

"I think Santorum will carry Missouri," predicts Missouri Republican strategist James Harris, noting the state's conservative and pro-life leanings. Another factor that could boost Santorum: In southern Missouri, evangelicals form a considerable chunk of the GOP base.

Norm Baxter, an RNC committeeman from Chesterfield Township in St. Louis County, agrees that there is new interest in Santorum in his conservative-leaning area. "A growing number of conservatives in this part of the state have shown a real interest in Santorum, and they think that he brings the conservative credentials that we need," Baxter says. "I can sense the momentum behind him is beginning to increase and you're seeing a surge for him."

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]]> Romney On a Roll in Republican Race tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4231 2012-02-06T21:59:52Z 2012-02-06T22:02:30Z Coasting to an easy victory over his GOP rivals in the Nevada caucuses, Mitt Romney keeps his focus on President Obama as the nominating contest moves to Minnesota, Colorado and Missouri.... NAT Romney is on a roll after big win in Nevada.jpg

Coasting to an easy victory over his GOP rivals in the Nevada caucuses, Mitt Romney keeps his focus on President Obama as the nominating contest moves to Minnesota, Colorado and Missouri.
]]> THE LOS ANGELES TIMES
MARK BARABAK

Mitt Romney spent years cultivating voters in Nevada, and it paid off with a commanding victory that not only pushed him closer to the GOP nomination but laid a strong marker in a state both parties will fight to carry in November.

Romney also won the Nevada caucuses in 2008, one of the few impressive performances of his failed bid for the Republican presidential nomination, and he never really stopped campaigning here. The only question was whether Romney on Saturday would top the 51% he received four years ago; he was winning just less than that in early returns.

Trailing far behind were former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, who were locked in a fight for second. Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, who eked out a win in Iowa but has faded since, was a distant fourth.

"Thank you, guys. What a great showing," an exuberant Romney told supporters Saturday night in Las Vegas, as they waved white-and-blue placards reading, "Nevada believes."

"This is not the first time you gave me your vote of confidence," he said, "and this time I'm going to take it all the way to the White House."

Gingrich, at a late-night news conference, said he would stay in the race until the late-summer national party convention.

"I am a candidate for president of the United States. I will be a candidate for president of the United States," he said. "We will continue to campaign all the way to Tampa."

It will take 1,144 delegates to win the nomination, and Romney has staked an early lead in that count after winning three of the first five contests, including a Florida blowout on Tuesday.

But more meaningful was the momentum Romney gains from his back-to-back wins, which will propel him to the next round of balloting on Tuesday in Minnesota, Colorado and Missouri.

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]]> Holder Refuses to Come Clean tag:newamericatoday.com,2012:/na//1.4230 2012-02-06T21:57:22Z 2012-02-06T21:59:56Z NAT Slow and Infuriating.jpg

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Last Thursday, Attorney General Eric Holder was called to testify before Congress. His attitude toward  his questioners was by any measure unbecoming of his office. At one point he actually demanded he be "given some credit" for his performance as attorney general. Though, bad as that outburst was, it was slightly less petulant than the earlier insinuation that his critics are racist. 

One hopes Holder isn't expecting kudos for his handling of the Fast and Furious scandal--the reason for his latest testimony. The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform was once again seeking an explanation for the gun-running operation under which the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) transferred some 2,000 weapons to Mexican criminal gangs, including weapons later used in the killing of at least one American, a U.S. Border Patrol agent. Ostensibly, the purpose was to trace the organizational networks of narcotraffickers, but little effort was made to keep track of the guns, and many have not been recovered. There's simply no law enforcement rationale for the scheme that makes any sense. 

Just six days before Holder's testimony, the Justice Department made yet another Friday night document dump. A series of emails revealed that Holder's deputy chief of staff had informed the attorney general of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry's murder on the day it happened, December 14, 2010. The deputy was further informed that Terry had been killed with a gun that was part of the Fast and Furious operation. 

It seems highly unlikely that Holder's deputy chief of staff would apprise the attorney general of Terry's death, but not of the crucial information about the weapon used. This suggests Holder may have lied in sworn testimony to Congress last May, when he said he'd heard about the operation for the first time a "few weeks" before. (Holder has already walked back that statement to a "few months.") Previous Justice Department memos addressed to Holder containing detailed information about Fast and Furious had been released by the oversight committee. Holder improbably claims he did not read them, and this latest revelation only pokes more holes in those protestations of ignorance. 

But not only does it appear Holder is not telling the truth about Fast and Furious, he is fighting any attempt to compel him to do so. Of the 80,000 documents the Justice Department has identified as being relevant to Fast and Furious, it has released only 6,000. Of the 70 Justice Department officials identified as being involved with Fast and Furious, Holder is denying congressional investigators access to 48. (Recall that last July 4, Kenneth Melson, former acting head of the ATF, defied Holder and testified in secret to the House Oversight Committee with his personal lawyer present.)

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