Romney Wins...the most delegates

Despite Rick Santorum’s two big wins in the south last night, it seems that Romney has still won the night with the most delegates because of proportional delegation.  Yet, last night confirms that Romney will face this frustration throughout the spring – doing just well enough to maintain his delegate lead, but not enough to clear the field and turn his attention to Barack Obama.

A number of items to note about Mitt Romney came from last night’s Republican primaries:

• Mitt Romney is one of the most unloved front-runners in Republican Party history and in recent political history.
• Mitt Romney has not convinced evangelical voters. This is partially due to their disbelief that he is a conservative. And, of course, that some Republican voters don’t seem inclined to vote for a Mormon. On the other hand, it has not proven to be as big a factor as some had predicted.
• It seems that if Romney gets the nomination he will get support from more Republicans than are voting for him in the primaries. Many Republicans will be excited once the convention is over to actually have a candidate, any candidate that could potentially unseat President Obama and conservative talkers will quickly pick up the Romney banner.
• Romney needs to have a serious sit down with his campaign writers and ditch the playful, regional humor and talk of knowing the rich and famous.  Saying you love grits and joking about “y’all” doesn’t work and only invites scorn.  Also, talking about your friendship with NFL and NASCAR owners does not endeer your to the average American.

 

The irony with all of this is that if Romney had been running for the GOP Presidential nomination 20 or 30 years ago, he would be a perfect candidate. But he’s running in a party that has changed and is largely unconvinced he’ll change.