Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Farewell, Frothy.

Well, I guess the non-stop food fight Republican primary fight is finally coming to an end. No really, it's all over now.

Rick Santorum called Mitt Romney Tuesday to say he is ending his presidential campaign, Yahoo News has learned.
Santorum is scheduled to make an announcement at a press conference in Gettysburg, Pa., at 2 p.m. ET.

Calls to several campaign aides from Yahoo News were not returned before the event.

Let's face it. This was bound to happen. Mittens now has a virtually insurmountable delegate lead over Santorum. And especially now that the big money G-O-TEA types are all in for Willard, there was no hope left for "po' lil' Frothy".

However, Rick Santorum will nonetheless continue to make a lasting mark on this year's election. After all, we learned that all the money in the world can buy a few primary wins, but it can't buy love from "the base".

Oh yes, and there's this.

New numbers from ABC News and the Washington Post show President Obama with a seven point lead over former Massachusetts Gov. and likely Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney among registered voters nationally. The lead is mainly built on a large gender gap among women, with female voters breaking strongly toward to the President after the debate over contraception took hold in Washington and the national media during the first part of the year.

But the poll also shows how Americans’ view Obama’s competence on key economic issues, revealing that despite general fustration with the situation and his performance generally, they see him as sympathetic to their plight and equipped to address issues facing the middle class, numbers that will be important all the way to the election.

The President’s approval rating in the new ABC/WaPo poll is at a positive 50 - 45 split. But a large majority of Americans, 76 percent, still say that the economy is in a recession, and therefore a majority are dissatisfied with Obama’s job performance on the issue — 54 percent, with 44 approving. That’s an improvement from their March poll, when Obama was way down on his economic rating at 38 - 59.

Where the President does better is on the specific issues of economic performance, where Americans are not completely sold on the idea that a Romney administration would do much better. Romney holds a four point advantage on who would better handle the economy. But Obama leads over the former governor when Americans are asked who would be better at “Protecting the middle class,” “Creating jobs,” “Supporting small business,” and “Handling taxes,” usually an issue that Republicans do very well on.

Romney worked hard to "out tea party" Santorum and Newton Gingrich, and apparently it worked! In fact, it worked so well that Romney has essentially tied himself to the most extreme "G-O-TEA" elements of the Republican Party. And that, in turn, is scaring away swing voters. Yes, believe it or not, "CUL'CHUR WARZZZ!!!" and endless class warfare don't really attract voters who don't identify with the radical right.

So at least Mittens doesn't have to worry about the primary any more. Now, it's a matter of whether anyone believes "General Election Romney" running away from "Primary Romney".

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