Dare We Say: Romney Is Leading In Michigan?

New Hampshire proved once and for all the folly of prognosticating from polls, but something is happening in Michigan that's worth paying attention to:

McClatchy/MSNBC has:

Romney: 30

McCain: 22

Huckabee: 17

And this could be happening. Voters process information so quickly these days that Mitt Romney's liberated stump speech and "Real Mitt persona" could be working in his favor. The press has said it's too little, too late, but maybe not: maybe you can, in this environment, pivot your message and change a lot of minds in the space of only a few days.

Comments

It is truly remarkable how, state after state, Romney's totals have barely faded and that McCain and Huckabee have surged and passed him solely by relying on the collapse of other candidates. In New Hampshire, for example, Romney got 32% of the vote -- just where he was for most of the year. And now in Michigan, Romney has not dropped at all from where he was two weeks ago despite his two losses.

Posted by Daniel | January 13, 2008 3:36 PM

Romney has been working on a businessman/outsider technocratic mr. fixit theme since the beginning of his campaign. It was a secondary theme for a while when he thought he could be THE conservative in the race, but it's not a dramatic "pivot" in his messaging.

His strength is not due, in my view, to an exciting new way of portraying himself. It has more to do with Rush, Hannity, Ingraham, and most of the rest of talk radio and conservative opinion makers going nuts at the idea of a McCain nomination. They've cranked up the anti-McCain volume, and most are saying nice things about Romney being the only guy who can preserve the influence of free-marketers and religious conservatives in the party against the pernicious influence of McCain and Huckabee.

Conservatives know that McCain and Huckabee [and Giuliani] are heterodox, and without a vigorous Thompson campaign, Romney has to be their guy.

Posted by Gyrd | January 13, 2008 4:57 PM

Hello, Marc, commenters-

I do not think that in this particular pair of primaries, that polling will be easy. The chaotic situation on the Democratic side, with HRC running against uncommmitted, makes it difficult to project what share of the GOP electorate will be comprised of independents and Democrats. This is the same situation as NH, with the added nuance that Democrats and Republicans are allowed to vote in each other's primary (unlike NH) and that there is not a full slate of candidates on the Democratic side.

It would be equally difficult to determine what margin of the vote

I was disappointed to learn that Obama and Edwards had asked their supporters to vote uncommitted in the Dem primary, which could cost McCain votes on the Republican side.

Posted by ElectionNightHQ.com (McCain site) Publisher | January 13, 2008 5:26 PM

So Mitt (barely) wins Michigan. So what. All that does is prolong his inevitable burn. The press will spin it as hometown advantage. "...Of course he won Michigan, it's his hometown!"
McCain can still play it as a comeback. Especially if the result is close. He was 17pts down in MI two weeks ago. That is a comeback.

If Romney beats McCain by 1 or 2pts. Is that really a win?

Posted by RothNRA | January 13, 2008 6:06 PM

If Romney beats McCain by 1 or 2pts. Is that really a win?

NO is the answer to this question.

Posted by RothNRA | January 13, 2008 6:08 PM

Romney clearly has the momentum in Michigan, and a defeat of McCain in a state McCain won big-time in 2000 would be a major coup for Mitt. Romney is attacking Gov. Granholm and focusing on economic revival....something he knows a lot more about than anybody else in the race. Michigan could well turn the tide of the race.

Posted by Dave | January 13, 2008 6:48 PM

If Mitt wins by 8 points like this poll suggests after everything he has gone through, he will win Nevada since he is virtually unopposed there, and a bronze medal in South Carolina will give Mitt a dominant lead in delegates and should serve him very well in Florida where Rudy is falling like a rock.

Posted by Dan Chisholm | January 13, 2008 7:15 PM

Many in the press appear desperate to thin the field down. The storyline they want is the Black Messiah who has never really done anything in a leadership position vs. the Democrat's and media's favorite Republican who has come back on his deserving the Presidency on once being a POW and suffering High Victimhood. (And his deep honesty and trustworthiness if you ignore his past, which many Republicans with memories do not).

Hence all the proclaimations of Edwards and Hillary being "finished and needing to bow out soon". And Romney, Giuliani, and Thompson "Done. Rejected by voters, it is just a matter of when"....or media announcing their made up "rules" on the fly for candidates suddenly being non-viable. ("If Mitt loses to McCain by more than 2 points, he should announce his ending his quest for President that night rather than be in denial..With a staggering loss to Obama a certainty here in New Hampshire, what will Hillary do, besides the staff shakeup that looks like it is only rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic") - [a favorite dumb pundit metaphor]

Why do they do it, when more often than not, the primary battle is NOT over in February? Well, in the last 3 contests it was over early, and the poor darlings have been on the trail 6 months early starting last spring when the candidates decided to start early in response to Super Tuesday and other states going earlier than that.
The poor darlings are tired. Tired of the grottier hotels as parent media forms cut back the big expense pad they used to give their political reporting teams. Tired of the same old stump speeches and having to interview the same old voters in Podunk and Incest Springs in the middle of nowhereview who say the same old things.

Pity the facts are that Hillary! and Giuliani are leading nationally and have no reason to withdraw. Especially just for the convenience and comfort of reporters that hate them.

Pastor Huckleberry has the evangelicals he can ride for at least another two months with his likely doing well in the Southern primaries.

Romney and Thompson are both men of substantial accomplishment who, along with Rudy, made more high-level, successful executive decisions in a typical month of the last 20 years than the Black Messiah has in his lifetime. Why should they leave early before Super Tuesday denates?

One fear appears to be that unless they help win it for the Black Messiah soon, other Democrats will criticize elements of his past, and his present fitness beyond the ability to rival Hitler and JFK and Reagan in oratory talents. And criticizing a black candidate in a harsh way is thought by the media as something Democrats cannot do, lest they "anger" minorities.

And McCain, the old crabby warhorse was supposed to be riding the track to redeem illegal immigration as the frontrunner by now so if he wins he is just like the Bob Dole Turkey they and Rep "war-hero" lovers presented like a trussed up turkey for the Clintons to carve up in 1996. With Creationist Pastor Huckleberry as a backup to the man that has milked his special POW status 6 times longer than Rudy has tried milking his "Mr 9/11" status.

Now we have a McCain 527 website posting here urging Democrats hoping on voting for Obama or Edwards in the General to instead vote for McCain!

I was disappointed to learn that Obama and Edwards had asked their supporters to vote uncommitted in the Dem primary, which could cost McCain votes on the Republican side.
Posted by ElectionNightHQ.com (McCain site) Publisher

Disappointed that Democrats wish to vote for Democrats or at least have their uncommitted votes show large dissatisfaction so she can't claim a Michigan victory??

How selfish of the Democrats!!

What the McCain 527 blog did is actually very funny. Openly presume that McCain is preferable to Romney for the long term interests of Obama and Edwards supporters because he is the more old DC, 25 years inside the Beltway type that a new person wishing to bring change to Washington like Obama HOPES he faces.

Or because as it is becoming clearer, McCain is riding a bubble like Giuliani once did and when voters begin thinking again, it is the same old McCain that does backroom deals with his "dear friends" like Teddy Kennedy - and if he doesn't win Michigan and keep momentum going - he starts getting the reappraisal. A reappraisal that just being captured by the enemy 40 years ago before decades of banquets and opportunities were lavished on him - cannot be POW-immunized against.

It does look like Iraq, Iran and the WOT are receeding as issues and people want someone that can regain our prestige overseas, make us competitive again with Asia, focus on economic matters and education, reform a broken Washington DC, get health care.

Obama and Romney are the outsiders that appear to be best positioned to do that, in accordance with the very different philosophies of their Parties. With independents and conservative Democrats and unions in the middle - who will be weighing between Obama's ability to inspire or Hillary big government - and Romneys preference for non-government solutions and his lifelong ability to get results.

Posted by chris ford | January 13, 2008 10:07 PM