Michigan Primary Prediction 2008

I'm going to take another shot at exposing myself to unnecessary ridicule and predict guess what I think will be the result of the Michigan primary

Once again, the Republican race is a toss up between McCain and Romney. Michigan, like New Hampshire is an open primary, which means and any registered voter can vote. That again leaves us wondering whether independents will turn out and vote for McCain?

Republicans
Romney - 31%
McCain - 30%
Huckabee - 17%
Thompson - 10%
Paul - 7%
Giuliani - 4%
Duncan Hunter - 1%

The Democratic primary doesn't count because the Democratic National Committee voted to disenfranchise Michigan Democrats by stripping Michigan of all of its 156 delegates to the party’s 2008 nominating convention in Denver.

The Democratic Party leaders are punishing Michigan Democrats for scheduling their presidential primary earlier than the national party leaders think they should. Democratic Party rules allow only Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, and South Carolina to hold 2008 primary contests before February 5.

The Democratic candidates all agreed not to campaign in Michigan and Edwards and Obama withdrew their names from the ballot. A whisper campaign is under way to get Edwards and Obama and supporters to vote for uncommitted, thereby embarrassing Hillary.

Democrats
Hillary - 56%
Uncommitted - 41%
Kucinich - 2%
Gravel - 1%

You can find more New Hampshire at predictions at Election Projection.

Don't Confuse Our Democracy With Weakness

Rudy Giuliani has released a powerful new ad entitled “Freedom.”
In the ad, Giuliani discusses the strength of America and references Sept. 11, 2001:

"The Islamic terrorists would make a terrible mistake if they confuse our democracy for weakness," Giuliani says, "But when you come and try to take away from us our freedom, when you try to come here and kill our people, we’re one and we’re going to stand up to you and we’re going to prevail."



Giuliani was the first candidate to release a statement on the death of Bhutto.

The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is a tragic event for Pakistan and for democracy in Pakistan. Her murderers must be brought to justice and Pakistan must continue the path back to democracy and the rule of law. Her death is a reminder that terrorism anywhere — whether in New York, London, Tel-Aviv or Rawalpindi — is an enemy of freedom. We must redouble our efforts to win the Terrorists’ War on Us.

Giulian's "Freedom" ad was released before the news of the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

Giuliani The Vampire

Rudy Giuliani isn't done yet. He may down, but if he can keep the money flowing until January 29, when Florida holds its primary, Rudy's late state strategy may still work.

David Saltonstall reports Rudy can afford to lose some ground because of the size leads in large, later-voting states with significant delegate counts:

There are 29 states that hold primaries or caucuses between now and Feb. 5, which combined offer a total 1,313 delegates - or 122 more than a Republican needs to win the nomination.

In the 24 states that have conducted public polling, Giuliani remains ahead in 13 - many of them big, winner-take-all states such as New York, New Jersey and Missouri.

Romney and Huckabee, by contrast, are front-runners in only four states each. Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson leads in two, and Arizona Sen. John McCain can claim top billing only in West Virginia, polls show.

The bottom line? If Giuliani wins every state where the most recent polls showed him still ahead, he'll end next month with some 758 delegates.

Using the same standard, Huckabee will end the month with only 170 delegates and Romney with 112, while McCain and Thompson will trail with fewer than 100 each.

On the other hand, no one can predict what will happen following the media frenzy that is sure to follow victories Huckabee, McCain Romney may achieve in Iowa, New Hampshire and Michigan.

Chris Matthews discusses Giuliani's chances with Charlie Cook in the following video and says that it might be like a vampire awakening.



It is just as likely that the bottom could completely fall out of Giuliani's campaign if Romney wins a come from behind victory over Huckabee in Iowa and then goes on to defeat McCain in New Hampshire.

Obama Takes The Lead And McCain Closes The Gap In New Hampshire

A new Boston Globe Hew Hampshire poll finds Barack Obama now leads Hillary Clinton, 30 percent to 28 percent. In last month's Globe poll Hillary had a 14-point lead.

The Globe poll also found John McCain is still surging in New Hampshire. The resurgent McCain is now within three percent of front-runner Mitt Romney. Last month McCain was in third place behind Romney and Giuliani.

The Globe poll also found wide partisan divide in voter opinions on domestic issues.

The bad news belongs to Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee and Hillary Clinton:

Yet while Romney's support has declined from recent polls, the survey has more ominous signs for Giuliani, who once vied for the lead in New Hampshire.

Giuliani's support has diminished in every category of candidate characteristics - from leadership and experience to electability and judgment.

Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, despite a surge in polls in Iowa and nationally, has not translated that success to New Hampshire, winning the support of just 10 percent of voters. More than 40 percent of respondents said Huckabee was the leading GOP candidate for whom they were least likely to vote.

[. . .]

Aside from a CNN/WMUR poll conducted by UNH last week, which had Clinton with a 12-point edge, surveys have generally shown Obama closing in.

Once trailing Clinton by more than 20 points, Obama appears to have benefited from voters' increasingly positive perceptions of him. Clinton is still viewed by far as the most experienced Democrat, and her supporters are firmest in their preference. But Obama has cut into her leads in the areas of electability and leadership. Voters indicated they also now believe he possesses the best judgment and is the candidate most likely to bring change.

Hillary needs a plan C.

The survey was conducted from December 16 to December 20, and has a margin of error for each party subsample of plus or minus 4.9 percent. It should also be noted that about 40 percent of likely voters in both parties indicated they are still undecided.

Obama Does Better Than Hillary Against Republicans

Gallup's hypothetical 2008 general election trial-heat matchups between Democratic and Republican presidential candidates found Obama does better than Hillary Clinton against the Republican candidates:

The Dec. 14-16 USA Today/Gallup poll pitted Clinton and Obama against Giuliani, Romney, and Huckabee -- yielding six separate matchups (all data reported here are among registered voters).


[. . .]

Obama does as well as or better than Clinton against the three Republican candidates. These results are of interest against a backdrop that shows that an increasing number of Democrats are interested in nominating a candidate who has the best chance of beating the Republican in the November 2008 election.

Polls such as this are little more than interesting discussion material for political junkies. National polls aren't worth much in the presidential campaign, which consists of 50 separate races. Opinion surveys polling on registered voters should always be taken with a bigger grain of salt than surveys of likely voters.

Rudy Discusses Polls And Campaign Strategy With Russert

Appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press," Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani was engaged in a brawl with host, Tim Russert. The show started off with a relatively friendly discussion about recent polls and Rudy's campaign strategy:

MR. RUSSERT: Let’s go right to it. Mason-Dixon, MSNBC have done some polling. First the Democrats, just to share with our viewers and give you a sense of that race. Here’s Iowa: Hillary Clinton, 27; Obama is 25; Edwards, 21--three-way dead race. New Hampshire, Clinton ahead by just three. South Carolina, Clinton over Obama by three. And the Nevada caucus, which is September 19th—November—excuse me, January 19th, Clinton, 34; Obama, 26.

Now the Republicans. Here they are, Iowa: Huckabee, 32; Romney, 20; Thompson, 11; McCain, 7; Giuliani, 5. Fifth place, is that a problem?

MR. GIULIANI: I wish you had shown Florida. It would—it would have—it would have looked better, where we have an 18-point lead. There are, there are some polls we’re behind, some where we’re ahead. I think there are 21, 22, 23 primaries and caucuses going up to February 5th. I think we’re ahead in 16, 18 of them. I don’t expect to win all of them. We’re going to work real hard in every single one of them, maybe surprise some people in Iowa, maybe in New Hampshire, work real hard there. South Carolina, Michigan, Nevada. Then we get to Florida, where I think the latest poll was 16 to 18-point lead, and we’ve had a lead there of that magnitude pretty much throughout. Every once in a while it slipped back to like seven or eight.

MR. RUSSERT: But in fifth place in Iowa, would it be better for you if Huckabee beat Romney in Iowa? Wouldn’t that be helpful?

MR. GIULIANI: The best thing is if you win. That’s the very best thing.

MR. RUSSERT: But that...

MR. GIULIANI: Who knows. Who knows. I—you’ve been through so many of these, Tim. You know that no candidate has won all the primaries in a, in a hotly contested one. This is one in which that’s not very conceivable, given all the good candidates there are. So if we can win a couple at the beginning, you know; win Florida for sure. We go into February 5th, then, ahead in New York, Illinois, California, New Jersey, Connecticut. We’re actually ahead right now, I believe, in Missouri. Kit Bond’s endorsement probably helped there more than me. But the reality is we’ve got, we’ve got a lead probably in, like, 15 of the 20 on February 5th, Florida, and we’re competitive. But we’ve got a long way to go in some of them. So we’re going to see. We’re going to work real hard.

MR. RUSSERT: Here’s New Hampshire: Romney’s ahead of—as you can see, 25; Giuliani, 17; McCain, 16. South Carolina: Huckabee is ahead 20; Giuliani, 17; Romney, 15. And Nevada, we’ll show you Nevada: Giuliani is ahead 25, 20, 17.

MR. GIULIANI: Now do Florida. Do Florida.

MR. RUSSERT: We, we haven’t done Florida. But we’ll, we’ll get there eventually.

MR. GIULIANI: No, but you look, you look at South Carolina, that’s, that’s a good place to be for someone who has, you know, campaigned all over the country. We haven’t concentrated on any one state. We’ve kind of had a proportionate campaign all over. Some of the candidates have concentrated on a state. We got a real good organization in South Carolina. That’s a very competitive place to be.

MR. RUSSERT: But if you lose...

MR. GIULIANI: New Hampshire.

MR. RUSSERT: ...Iowa, if you lose Iowa and New Hampshire, South Carolina, you’re still in?

MR. GIULIANI: I’m, I’m, I’m in, all right? The idea is you want to win the first one. If you lose the first one, you want to win the second one. If you lose the second one, you want to win the third one. And you want to be there for, you know, Florida, at the end of the month, big state. And you want to be there, certainly, for February 5th when we’re going to have more primaries on one day than we’ve ever had in our history. And some real big states, you know, New York, Illinois, California, New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to some important issues first.

MR. GIULIANI: Oh, and Michigan is in there, too. We shouldn’t miss Michigan is in there in January.

You can watch the discussion in the following video:




Rudy has a point. The race for the presidential campaign is wide open and theoretically Rudy can wait until Florida for his first win. But the dynamics and the polls will change as voters start to pick their favorites in the caucuses and primaries. The winners always get a big boost from the ensuing press coverage. Forida may be too long to wait.

Manchester Union Leader Endorses McCain

New Hampshire’s largest newspaper, the Manchester Union-Leader endorses John McCain:

We don't agree with him on every issue. We disagree with him strongly on campaign finance reform. What is most compelling about McCain, however, is that his record, his character, and his courage show him to be the most trustworthy, competent, and conservative of all those seeking the nomination. Simply put, McCain can be trusted to make informed decisions based on the best interests of his country, come hell or high water.

Competence, courage, and conviction are enormously important for our next President to possess. No one has a better understanding of U.S. interests and dangers right now than does McCain. He was right on the mistakes made by the Bush administration in prosecuting the Islamic terrorist war in Iraq and he is being proved right on the way forward both there and worldwide.

McCain is pro-life. Always has been. He fights against special-interest and pork-barrel spending, and high spending in general, which ticks off liberals and many in the GOP who have wallowed at the public trough. Yet he also has the proven ability, unique among the contenders, to work across the political divide that has led our government into petty bickering when important problems need to be solved.

The value of newspaper endorsements is debatable, and the Union Leader hasn't backed the winner. Nevertheless, the endorsement can't hurt McCain's resurgent campaign.

Rasmussen Reports" latest New Hampshire poll finds Mitt Romney with a nineteen-point lead at 34%. Giuliani, McCain, and Huckabee are in a virtual tie for second place:

Support for Romney and Huckabee in the current survey is the highest yet recorded in a Rasmussen Reports New Hampshire survey. For Giuliani, the 15% reflects his lowest level of support in the six New Hampshire primary election polls.

Fifty-seven percent (57%) of McCain’s supporters are certain they will vote for him on January 8. Fifty-four percent (54%) of Giuliani’s supporters are that certain along with 49% of those for Huckabee and 48% of Romney voters.

At Captain's Quarters, Ed Morrissey thinks conservatives might forgive McCain-Feingold long enough to support McCain. Ed might be right, but then there is McCain's failure to support the Bush tax cuts and his support for immigration reform proposals many saw as amnesty.

Huckabee, Obama Now Lead

The Des Moines Register's new Iowa Poll finds Barack Obama has pulled ahead of Hillary:

Obama, an Illinois senator, leads for the first time in the Register's poll as the choice of 28 percent of likely caucusgoers, up from 22 percent in October. Clinton, a New York senator, was the preferred candidate of 25 percent, down from 29 percent in the previous poll.

Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who led in the Register's May poll, held steady with 23 percent, in third place, but part of the three-way battle.

Obama is beating Hillary among women and younger voters:

In the new poll, Obama leads with support from 31 percent of women likely attend the caucuses, compared to 26 percent for Clinton. In October, Clinton was the preferred candidate of 34 percent of women caucusgoers, compared to 21 percent for Obama.

Women represent roughly six in 10 Democratic caucusgoers, according to the new poll.

Obama also dominates among younger caucusgoers, with support from 48 percent from those younger than 35. Clinton was the choice of 19 percent in that group and Edwards of 17 percent.

The under-35 bloc represents 14 percent of Democratic caucusgoers, up from 9 percent in the October poll.

Rasmussen Reports calls the Iowa Democratic race "far too close to call."

On the Republican side the new poll finds Huckabee leads Romney, 29% to 24%:

Huckabee wins the support of 29 percent of Iowans who say they definitely or probably will attend the Republican Party's caucuses on Jan. 3. That's a gain of 17 percentage points since the last Iowa Poll was taken in early October, when Huckabee trailed both Romney and Fred Thompson.

Other poll findings indicate that the former Arkansas governor is making the most of a low-budget campaign by tapping into the support of Iowa's social conservatives.

Romney, who has invested more time and money campaigning in the state than any other GOP candidate, remains in the thick of the Iowa race with the backing of 24 percent of likely caucusgoers. But that's a drop of 5 points since October for the former Massachusetts governor.

Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, the frontrunner in national polls, holds third place in Iowa at 13 percent, despite waging a limited campaign in the state.

Thompson, a former U.S. senator from Tennessee who waited until September to formally enter the race for the Republican nomination, has slipped to fourth place in the Iowa Poll, at 9 percent.

U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona and U.S. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas are tied for fifth place at 7 percent each. Four other candidates trail them. The new Iowa Poll, conducted over four days last week, has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points.

The new poll also found that Giuliani is seen as the most electable and Thompson is tied with Huckabee as the candidate who is most like Ronald Reagan.

According to Robert Novak, Romney's strategists should be pleased with another poll showing Huckabee's rise:

Strategists for Mitt Romney's Republican presidential campaign were actually pleased that fast-rising Mike Huckabee moved ahead of Romney in the Rasmussen poll in Iowa, eliminating surprise if Huckabee finishes first there in the Jan. 3 caucuses.

The latest Rasmussen Reports Iowa poll found Huckabee ahead with 28%, Romney with 25%, and everyone else "far behind."

Rudy On Security Bills

Rudy Giuliani addresses the report questioning how his security bills were paid when he was mayor of New York City:

Thompson: Police Should Enforce immigration L

Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson says state and local police should help enforce federal immigration laws:

On a brief fundraising swing through Arizona, Thompson said it makes sense to have sworn officers working "in cooperation with the federal authorities."

"I've been places where they're working hand-in-glove," the former Tennessee senator and "Law & Order" star said. "That's the ideal way to do it."

Thompson told reporters he's not concerned that putting local police in the position of trying to determine who is in this country illegally might lead to racial profiling "any more with that kind of cooperation than otherwise."

During the CNN/YouTube Republican presidential debate Thompson got in his licks by chiding former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani about what he said has been that city's "sanctuary" policies. CNN/YouTube question number 3 was posed was directed to Thompson:

Good evening. There are thousands of people in Canada and Mexico waiting to come to America legally. They want to become American citizens. They want to be part of the American dream. Yet, there are those in the Senate that want to grant amnesty for those that come here illegally.

Will you pledge tonight, if elected president, to veto any immigration bill that involves amnesty for those that have come here illegally?

Thank you.

Cooper: Senator Thompson?

(Applause)

Thompson: Yes, I pledge that. A nation that cannot and will not defend its own borders will not forever remain a sovereign nation. And it's unfair...

(Applause)

We have -- we have thousands of people standing in line at embassies around the world to become United States American citizens, to come here to get a green card, to come here and to assimilate and be a part of our culture. They are part of what has made our country great. Some of our better citizens. We all know them and love them.

Now, it's our country together -- their's and ours, now together. It's our home. And we now get to decide who comes into our home.

And to place somebody above them or in front of them in line is the wrong thing to do.

We've got to strengthen the border. We've got to enforce the border. We've got to punish employers -- employers who will not obey the law. And we've got to eliminate sanctuary cities and say to sanctuary cities, if you continue this, we're going to cut off federal funding for you, you're not going to do it with federal money.

(Applause)

Now, there are parts of what both of these gentlemen have just said that I would like to associate myself with.

First of all, of course, Governor Romney supported the Bush immigration plan until a short time ago. Now he's taken another position, surprisingly.

(Laughter)

As far as Mayor Giuliani is concerned, I am a little surprised the mayor says, you know, everybody's responsible for everybody that they hire, but we'll have to address that a little bit further later. I think we've all had people probably that we have hired that in retrospect probably is a bad decision.

(Laughter)

He did have a sanctuary city. In 1996, I helped pass a bill outlawing sanctuary cities. The mayor went to court to overturn it. So, if it wasn't a sanctuary city, I'd call that a frivolous lawsuit.

(Applause)

Giuliani was allowed to respond:

Giuliani: New York City was not a sanctuary city. New York City did three exceptions. The three exceptions were to allow children to go to school, to allow those illegal immigrants who were the victims of crime to report the person who assaulted them, beat them up, mugged them.

And third, to allow emergency care in the hospitals, which we were required to do by federal law. We had a policy of reporting every single illegal immigrant other than those three who commit any kind of crime or were suspected of crime, and we reported thousands of them to immigration service. Few of them were deported.

McCain was asked to address the same question and came off as much more compassionate:

McCain: You know, this whole debate saddens me a little bit because we do have a serious situation in America. In 1986, we passed a law that said we would enforce our borders, and gave amnesty to a couple of million people. We gave the amnesty. Now we have 12 million people and still borders that are not enforced.

I came to the Senate not to do the easy things, but to do the hard things. Mel Martinez and I knew this was going to be a tough issue, but we thought the status quo was unacceptable: broken borders; 12 million people here illegally; a need for a temporary worker program, certainly in my state in the agricultural section, certainly in this state of Florida.

And we tried to get something done. We said we'd enforce the borders. The American people didn't believe us. They don't believe us because of our failure in Katrina, our failure in Iraq, our failures in reining in corruption and out of control spending.

So we tried and we failed. And I appreciate the president's efforts. He comes from a border state too. And what we've learned is that the American people want the borders enforced. We must enforce the -- secure the borders first.

But then you've still got two other aspects of this issue that have to be resolved as well. And we need to sit down as Americans and recognize these are God's children as well.

(Applause)

And they need some protection under the law. And they need some of our love and compassion. [From the CNN/YouTube Republican debate transcript.]

I don't disagree with McCain. But I strongly agree with Fred. State and local police should help enforce immigration laws, we must control the border and end the sanctuary policies that some cities, such as New Haven and San Francisco have adopted.

You can watch the exchange between Thompson, Giuliani and McCain in the following video:

Fred Attacks

Fred Thompson attacks his fellow Republican candidates so the Dems don't have to.



This is more of Thompson's 12th Commandment. I prefer Reagan's 11th Commandment — Never speak ill of a fellow Republican, but I'm not running.

The Iowa Race Is Close

Political Wire got an advance look at a new Strategic Vision poll in Iowa that shows Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama tied in the Democratic presidential race at 29%, with John Edwards trailing at 23%.

On the Republican side it shows, Mitt Romney barely leading with 26%, followed closely by Mike Huckabee at 24%, Rudy Giuliani at 14%, Fred Thompson at 10% and Sen. John McCain at 7%.

That's quite a move on the Republican race. Strategic Vision's previous Iowa poll found Mitt with an 11 point lead:

Mitt Romney 30%
Mike Huckabee 19%
Rudy Giuliani 12%
Fred Thompson 11%
John McCain 7%
Ron Paul 5%
Tom Tancredo 2%
Duncan Hunter 1%
Undecided 13%

The Democratic race is more settled with Hillary stalled:
Hillary Clinton 29%
Barack Obama 27%
John Edwards 20%
Bill Richardson 7%
Joseph Biden 5%
Chris Dodd 1%
Dennis Kucinich 1%
Undecided 10%

Perhaps Newt's prediction wasn't such a stretch and we can see why Hillary is bracing for a loss.

Romney's Perfection

Does Mitt Romney appear too perfect? The Los Angeles Times suggests the answer is yes:

Mitt Romney arrives at his campaign headquarters here 10 minutes early, a knife-blade crease in his khakis, winter tan, lots of hair, all of it in place. He skips the coffee and doughnuts in favor of skim milk and the home-baked granola sent along in a zip-lock baggie by his wife. That's Ann, his high school sweetheart -- the mother of his five handsome sons -- with whom he says he has never had a serious argument in 38 years of marriage.

[. . .]

Romney's life looks like a photo album of the American dream: two homes, one in a posh Boston suburb and the other on a New Hampshire lakeside; four cars (he drives a red Mustang, Ann a Cadillac SUV); a friendly dog, big Christmases, church every Sunday, meaningful family discussions (Web viewers can watch as the Romneys gather on the sofa to ponder his run for president). If he has a vice, it's chocolate malts.

At the same time, his glide path was remarkably free of hardship, not the Horatio Alger story Americans sometimes warm to in a candidate. The son of Michigan governor and former American Motors Corp. Chairman George Romney, Willard Mitt Romney was born into privilege, raised in a devout Mormon home and educated at Harvard. He made a fortune in business and then entered politics, just like his dad. His first real tragedy was his wife's 1998 diagnosis of multiple sclerosis, which he calls the worst day of his life. (Her illness is in remission.)

Romney runs his campaign operation like the business executive he was: disciplined, on message and on time -- often early.

Romney's not perfect, but his storybook personal life could backfire on his presidential campaign. I hear many people refer to Romney's presidential appearance as "too slick." According to the Times, when Rudy Giuliani warned voters this week to beware "this pretense of perfection," he mentioned Democratic candidate Barack Obama's acknowledgment of past drug use, but he was really aiming at Romney's picture-perfect past.

As Giuliani implies we don't need a paragon of virtue for president, but I like the fact that there are no Clintonesque scandals in Romneys past.

Hating Hillary

We have discussed Hillary haters and her extraordinarily high negatives. But those cold polling statistics are nothing compared to what the Daily Telegraph's Toby Harnden found in his tour of America's flyover country. Harnden crisscrossed America from Portland, Maine, to San Diego and from Seattle to Merritt Island on Florida's Atlantic coast.

After visiting the America where "people shop at Wal-Mart, eat at Dairy Queen, work two jobs to make ends meet and have a Bible at home," Harnden concludes "America hates Hillary Clinton and Co.:"

Mrs Clinton might be the frontrunner in the polls, but almost everywhere we went people questioned her candidacy. Many stated bluntly that they did not want a woman in charge. "It's a man's world," said Hugh Laflin, 62, a Kansas truck driver. "Would a Middle East sheikh talk to a lady president?"

A Vietnam veteran in Arizona and a Florida gun-shop owner were among those who made crude jokes about America "going to war every 30 days" under a female president. We never brought up Bill Clinton's sexual dalliances, but many ordinary Americans did. "She couldn't keep her own home together, so how can we trust her to manage America?" asked Micki Martinson, a housewife in Somerset, Pennsylvania.

While we found many people who hated Mrs Clinton, those who loved her were few and far between. Certainly, many said they would vote for her, but the reasons cited tended to be her status as the top Democrat, the fact that she was battle-tested against Republicans and - for some women - the fact that she would be the first female president.

Such support might register in the opinion polls, but could melt away should the former First Lady lose in Iowa. And the frequently expressed nightmare for Democrats is that she will win their party's nomination but lose to a Republican next November when most Americans decide they don't much like her.

Obama has recently overtaken Hillary in Iowa. In response the Hillary campaign has started lowering expectations, preparing for a possible loss in Iowa.

Nor does Harnden have good news for Barack Obama:

Beyond the coasts and outside the college towns, Obamamania was difficult to find. His lofty, professorial manner has made it difficult for him to connect with ordinary Americans and he could well go the way of earlier "outsider" Democrats running on a platform of change, including Gary Hart, Paul Tsongas and Bill Bradley. Obama's lack of experience was a staple of conversations about him.

Although few people cite Obama's race as a negative factor, there are clearly worries about whether he is too exotic a creature for Middle America. Some openly speculated that he was a Muslim - the result of snippets from his background cited in emails that have dropped into inboxes everywhere.

A childhood in Indonesia and Hawaii and mixed-race parentage in some ways epitomize modern America. But voters are often most comfortable with the candidate they can best relate to - something Bush tapped into in 2000 when he played down his Yale education and chose not to reveal how often he had traveled abroad.

Harnden did find support for Giuliani:

The great and the good of Washington decreed long ago that Mr Giuliani, who favors abortion and gay rights and has previously advocated gun controls, was too liberal to secure the Republican nomination. Not so in the flyover states, where in the post-9/11 world, defending America trumps everything else among conservatives.

"I have always admired Giuliani, especially after 9/11," said Grita Poehle, a German-born new citizen in San Diego. "If he can do for America what he did for New York, that would be good."

I grew up in flyover counter. I agree with Harnden, flyover folks don't care much for Hillary and remain security voters first.

Rudy's Leadership Ad

The Giuliani campaign is running this new television ad entitled, “Leadership,” in New Hampshire and Boston.



Compare Rudy's 27 years of public executive leadership experience to Hillary's unique inexperience.

Hillary Plays Leadership Card

In a very public "strategic memoranda" Hillary's chief strategist Mark Penn today announces Hillary will try to play the the leadership card in tonight's Democratic debate:

Poll after poll shows it's leadership that people see in Clinton, her pollster says.


He cites a number of independent media polls to make his case.

Penn didn't do his homework on all those polls.

A recent Gallup poll found Hillary, Obama and Rudy Giuliani all rate "roughly the same'' on the question of leadership.

Marc Ambinder has posted an annotated version of Penn's strategic memo.

To paraphrase President Clinton, it all depends on the meaning of leadership.

Solving Illegal Immigration

While Romney and Giuliani go at it over the "sanctuary state of mind: "

As for Mr. Romney, he spared no political stripe in denouncing candidates on the subject:

"We’re not going to give people who are here illegally drivers licenses, nor are we going to give them tuition breaks in our institutions of higher learning,” Romney said. “This ‘sanctuary state of mind’ which exists from Hillary Clinton to Mayor Giuliani to Governor Huckabee is simply an attitude we’re going to have to change."

Updated 4 p.m. Maria Comella, spokeswoman for the Giuliani campaign, shot back this afternoon at Mr. Romney’s criticisms:

"Once again Presidential Trail Mitt Romney completely ignores the record of Governor Mitt Romney. Under Governor Mitt Romney the number of illegal immigrants skyrocketed, while he recommended millions of dollars in state aid to numerous sanctuary cities and to companies employing illegal immigrants, not to mention the illegals working on his own lawn."

Fred Thompson airs a new ad in which he talks about how to solve the illegal immigration problem - securing the border, enforcing the la, and w opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants.




Thompson has proposed the government should take away federal dollars from cities and states that don't report illegal immigrants. Under his proposal, so-called "sanctuary cities" would lose discretionary federal grants, as would colleges and universities that allow illegal immigrants to pay in-state tuition.

Makes sense to me.

Rudy's First TV Ad - "Tested"

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani will begin advertising this week in New Hampshire with a commercial that presents him as the man who turned around a crime-ridden and unmanageable city in spite of typical human foibles:

The spot features gritty, black-and-white images of New York — a Harlem movie house marquee and the words, “Sex World;” riot police struggling with an unseen perpetrator — as Mr. Giuliani describes a mess that he inherited: “They used to call it unmanageable, ungovernable. A large majority of New Yorkers wanted to leave and live somewhere else. It was a city that was in financial crisis, a city that was the crime capital of America.”

Then the screen floods with color and brilliant images of New York City — a new-model Volvo cruising along Park Avenue with virtually no traffic and a light-filled and crowd-free Grand Central Terminal — and the music becomes decidedly upbeat.

“By the time I left office, New York City was being proclaimed as the best example of conservative government in the country,” Mr. Giuliani says, adding,

“We turned it into the safest large city in America, the welfare-to-work capital of America, and most importantly, the spirit of the people of the city had changed. Instead of being hopeless, the large majority of people had hope.”

The New York Times finds "Tested" reminiscent of the famous 1984 Reagan reelection ad “Morning in America,” which featured a flag being raised into a blue sky and inspirational music.

More On Robertson's Endorsement Of Giuliani

Pat Robertson's endorsement of Giuliani is discussed on "Hardball with Chris Matthews."

Pat Robertson Endorses Giuliani

Deeming Giuliani, "more than acceptable to people of faith, Pat Robertson endorsed Rudy Giuliani's presidential bid this morning:

Robertson said although he and Giuliani disagree on social issues, those disagreements "pale into insignificance" when measured against the import of the fight against global terrorism and radical Islam. "We need a man who sees clearly how to deal with that issue," said Robertson.

Pat Robertson is one of the most influential figures in the social conservative movement. He is probably best known as the founder of the Christian Coalition. More recently, Robertson's influenced has lessened as he made one controversial statement after another.

Robertson's endorsement of Giuliani is a setback to Mitt Romney. Romney, like many of the Republican presidential hopefuls sought Robertson's backing. Giuliani can now counter Romney's recently endorsement by conservative stalwarts Paul Weyrich and Bob Jones III and support his claim that despite his positions supporting abortion and gay rights, he is an acceptable choice to conservatives.

At The QandO Blog, Bruce McQuain belittles Robertson's endorsement posting "Dems get union endorsements and Reps get religious endorsements." McQ misses the point that it matters that this "religious endorsement" went to Giuliani. This endorsement matters because voters have heard of Pat Robertson.

UPDATE: I've added Video of the announcement of the endorsement.