(ThyBlackMan.com) The Iowa Caucuses are over and now it’s on to New Hampshire. But exactly who’s focused on New Hampshire and who has turned their attentions elsewhere is not completely clear. At 2:30 this morning I was intently watching MSNBC for the announcement of the final Caucus results. I needed the final number to put into my show before air time. As we all know by now Mitt Romney won the caucus by just 8 votes. The first thing I thought when Matt Strawn, Iowa’s GOP Chair, announced the results was that the likelihood of the scenario in the movie Swing Vote is real and unprecedented.
Romney won by eight votes, 25 percent, but was statistically tied for second with the out-of-nowhere candidate, former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum who also received 25 percent of the vote. For the first in the Nation contest to produce no clear winner out of a crew of far fetched candidates 
shows the GOP is in worst shape for 2012 than we give them credit for.
Whether you agree Iowa is representative of the Nation’s electorate or not no longer matters when voters in a traditional swing state simply can’t make up their mind about who or what they want. I think that fact, evidenced by this morning’s caucus results, is indicative of the mood of the country. The caucus results show what no poll ever will; no one is happy with any one person promising to take the Nation over and turn it around; not even the man already in office.
So where do we go from here?
Right now we will begin to see the GOP field dwindle as the party tries to find not only a long term front runner but a candidate they can get behind and take to the White House. That candidate will not be Rick Perry. At midnight he said he was going back to Texas to “reassess” his campaign. 12 hours later he was full steam ahead toward primary states that hold actual primaries and not wishy washy caucuses that he can’t win. (His summarized words not mine.)
“This is a quirky place, a quirky process, to say the least, and we’re going to go into places where they have actual primaries and there are going to be real Republicans voting,… Not that there aren’t real Republicans here in Iowa, but the fact is, it was a pretty loosey-goosey process, and you had a ton of people who were there that admitted they were Democrats voting in the caucuses last night.”
We also know Michele Bachmann will not be going any further in this race. Quite frankly I’m surprised she made it to the caucus. At midnight Bachmann glossed over her sixth place finish. (She received 5 percent of the vote from the state that she was born in. I’d also like to point out that’s only 4 percent more than Jon Huntsman who didn’t spend anytime in Iowa what-so-ever.) At midnight, Bachmann was not defeated. She was full steam ahead. Her horrible showing in her native state was not an indictment on her bat-shit crazy, one talking point only campaign. It was just a sign she had more work to do. 12 hours later she’s out of the race yet still using her one trick pony to critique a President who would’ve made mince meat out of her in a debate had she been the nominee. (Could we have been so lucky)
“I will continue fighting to defeat the president’s agenda of socialism,… The people of Iowa spoke with a very clear voice … I have no regrets. I never compromised my principles.”
The next candidate whom is probably going nowhere fast is my favorite of them all, Jon Huntsman. He’s pulling a Rudy Giuliani circa 2008. He’s putting all of his eggs in New Hampshire’s basket and hoping the electorate their doesn’t throw them at his face. Huntsman has yet to hold breakout frontrunner status. However, he’s also avoided some political downfalls that have sunk the other candidates. The only problem he faces is that no one knows who he is. Maybe he can pull a Santorum. If he doesn’t he’s toast. Yet the likelihood of two come-back kids in the same race is highly unlikely. But then again so is having two frontrunners after Iowa.
This leaves us now with four GOP candidates vying for a spot on the top of the Republican ticket without any of them being worth their weight in dust. Newt Gingrich blamed his fourth place finish on attack ads. I’m sorry, well actually I’m not sorry, if the former Speaker of the House who famously boasted about shutting down the government can’t take the heat of 24/7 negativity then what the hell are you doing in the political kitchen. Mitt Romney’s been campaigning since 2008. He wants the Presidency more than a virgin boy wants his first nut. Newt why don’t you take your Tiffany’s credit and use it toward your campaign. Buy yourself some airtime and extol the virtues of veracity.
“We are not going to go out and run nasty ads,… But I do reserve the right to tell the truth. And if the truth seems negative– that may be more a comment on his record than it is on politics.”
Gingrich my man, This. Is. Politics. It’s time to piss or get off the pot. Not whine because your opponent — whom you will probably endorse — is playing dirty.
This brings us to our top three, the man who see’s the White House from his front porch, and two of the unlikeliest to lead the pack I’ve ever seen; a crazed social conservative and a doom and gloom endorser of racism.
Oh bring it on.
Mitt Romney has always been the electable candidate. He’s always been the viable candidate. He’s always been the candidate that could give Obama a run for his money. Not just now but in 2008 as well. The only problem is that no one wants to suck on his Mormon cockiness or lick his flip-flopping persuasion. As much as the GOP should rally around Romney, no one wants Romney-berries for breakfast because of how the Republican party has transformed over the last four years.
I blame Rick Santelli’s birth of the tea party.
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Then there is Rick Santorum. The candidate who couldn’t get the time of day during a debate to say no more than 30 seconds worth of rebuttals in two hour increments now has the GOP before his feet waiting patiently to see what he’ll say next. We’ve received the gem of not helping Black people get welfare but helping them get jobs… in the manufacturing sector. Newsflash Ricky, the industrial revolution has long been over, America doesn’t make anything but celebrities. I thought you knew. Then he’s also given us the gem that Obama should be pro-life because he’s Black. I won’t even harp on this, let’s just note that even though the rate of abortion is higher among the Black community does not mean every Black child is/was a potential abortion victim and therefore supports the end to the legal practice.
Rick Santorum received the vote every candidate was vying for in Iowa. The evangelicals. The social conservatives. Those that believe abortion and gay marriage should be banned in federal amendments while second amendment rights shall never be infringed. Rick Santorum is the candidate who believes in a balanced budget, even though when the budget was balanced the country was still running a deficit. No one talks about that fallacy of the Gingrich/Clinton accomplishment. O_O
Rick Santorum is the real wild card in this race. He is the antithesis to Mitt Romney and Ron Paul — who I’ll touch on in just a minute. He is a career politician who knows campaigns are about the long haul. He’s served in some form of government since he was 28. He’s 53 now. Santorum has the potential to steal Romney’s thunder; especially going into southern primaries like South Carolina and Florida. But carrying the bible belt alone won’t be enough to give him the edge over Mitt Romney to clinch the nomination. You need more than social conservative values in this country to be anyone’s nominee, and fiscal conservative values are more easily said than put into practice. Just ask W.
This brings me now to Ron Paul. He’s the John McCain candidate with a twist. He’s old and he’s been in Congress the majority of his life. The difference though is that Ron Paul’s Libertarian views are so vastly different from any other parties he has no home party but his own. He appeals to few others but his own; and the Libertarians as a whole have yet to clinch the White House or a Republican Party nomination. Ron Paul’s view on defense and war put him at odds with both the Republican and Democratic parties. His views on the economy, abortion and health care make him a hard-right leaning Republican while his views on Civil Rights, legalized integration — to undo legalized segregation — leave him alone amongst would-be allies. There are some things you just can’t express about your beliefs in this country and yet still expect to find multitudinous support.
With one candidate down, two going down and four more looking to come out on top the GOP electorate has a big decision on their hands that they don’t seem like they want to make. They must pick from a crop of unpickables. This election season they received the low hanging fruit of candidates; asking anyone and everyone to join the race to free them of Obama’s nation, yet there isn’t one candidate who has proven himself to be able to do that. As they try to find the best of the worst, the incumbent is spending time beating it over the heads of all American people that the best of the worst is probably still the best thing you hope to never have.
Pick on GOP.
As for the rest of you, Why don’t you pass the peas like you used to do.
Who’s the best of the worst for the GOP and can he win?
Staff Writer; Nikesha Leeper
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