Saturday, January 21, 2012

Mr. Romney still leads, but that lead has started to slip over the past few days

Mr. Romney still cracks the 35% mark nationally, but that is down almost a point since earlier in the week despite Mr. Huntsman’s endorsement. Mr. Gingrich jumps up over 4 point nationally to be just shy of 21%. Still a way back, but he is on the increase. Until the last few days, it appeared that Mr. Santorum was going to over-take Mr. Gingrich, but the first debate of the week settled the issue of second place in favor of Mr. Gingrich. Mr. Santorum stays stable at 16.3%. Dr. Paul gains almost a point to sit at 15.4%. And ironically, like Mr. Huntsman, Mr. Perry has a mini-surge and gains almost a point to close his bid at 7.4% nationally. In short the dynamics of the race has shifted. Mr. Romney’s poor debate performance combined with Mr. Gingrich’ historic great debate performances has stalled Mr. Romney’s momentum and allowed Mr. Gingrich to challenge him. While Mr. Romney still has a commanding lead, the idea of Mr. Romney getting a quick coronation was putting the cart before the horse to say the least. While Mr. Santorum did well in the debates, his lack of charisma has effectively taken him out of the game.
Mr. Romney loses over 100 delegates since the debate to sit at 1159. Mr. Gingrich jumps to 448. Mr. Santorum this week to sit at 1051; Mr. Gingrich loses over 350 to sit at 550. Dr. Paul rises enough to take third place in the delegate count to sit at 232. Mr. Santorum is stable at 213 and Mr. Perry would have had 68 delegates would been able to stay in the race and maintain his level of support. As things stood a few days ago, Mr. Romney stood to win 45 states. He is now down to 39 or 40. It is not a good week for him as he kind of lost Iowa and will most likely lose South Carolina by at least 5 or 6 point in a few hours. Mr. Gingrich will likely continue to close the gap with today’s up coming win, but since Mr. Romney was more prepared for Thursday’s debate and was able to defend Conservatism without looking like a total fool, he’ll probably rebound into a significant lead eventually. Overall, it is a good thing for all that things are getting slightly more interesting. More people will get involved in the process and both major candidates will have a chance to pull up their socks and get their acts together.

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