Having followed politics for a while now, I can admit that there is a lot I still don’t know. It is hard to analyze the whole scope of it and very few people can do so effectively. Perhaps it’s my own status as an outsider that allows me some insights that other people don’t see, but I still miss a lot.
But there is one thing I am certain of this year and I know this because of my own experience with the like-minded folks: if anyone other than Ron Paul wins the Republican nomination, then the Republicans will lose the Presidency yet again.
One the primary reasons is that Ron Paul stands apart from President Obama in so many issues where as the other candidates are not as good at making a distinction. Willard “Mitt” Romney, for example, is a moderate progressive and probably agrees with most of President Obama’s policies. Sure there will be subtle differences, but those differences will be less apparent in comparison to the bigger issues. The big issues are the fiscal crisis in the Federal government and the foreign entanglements, both of which would be shared policies by Obama and Romney. Personally, I’d rather have Obama just to reinforce that big government doesn’t work in the mind of the public. Remember, everyone blamed capitalism when the housing crisis hit because the Democrats weren’t in power.
Rick Santorum cannot possibly win because he main focus is social issues, which garners at best 28% of the vote. I am certain that the estimate is too high. The Republicans have played the social issues card for so long now that most people are tired of hearing about. Many of my generation (both X & Y) see social issues as minor issues and that so long as they are not forced on the general public via laws or judgments, then we are OK with things like the gays who want marriage, even if we disagree with it morally. In essence, we’re more tolerant, in the true sense of the term. Either that or we simply do not care. In any case, social issues are a dead on arrival. Also, I’m pretty sure he has a daughter who is dying, so that’s a major distraction. Well, for most people anyway.
Newt Gringrich is a snob. Most people don’t like to vote for snobs, no matter how smart or well-intentioned they are.
Another reason that Ron Paul is the only winnable candidate is because of his supporters. While I do not bank on the fact that anti-war Leftists (the true believers) will vote for him nor do I think he can necessarily bring in independents, because they’re really just Democrats who won’t say it aloud, I think his supporters will reject anyone else. This will have a devastating effect on the Republican nominee on election day. Consider that Ron Paul has been consistently getting second and third place in most states so far, along with a possible win in Maine, if just half of those people refuse to vote or vote third party or write in on election day, then the Republicans lose a good chunk of needed votes.
The fact is, there are more and more Ron Paul supporters who fail to see the distinction between Romney, Gringrich, Santorum, and Obama. While there certainly is a movement that surrounds Ron Paul, I suspect that his movement will continue long after his death.
The primary reason that John McCain lost in 2008 is because he did not provide a distinction between himself and Barack Obama. Even though he picked Sarah Palin as his Vice President, he ended up squandering that momentum when he went off and voted in support of TARP. In doing so, he pretty much soured any chance he had of winning. When Dave Ramsey did his show on Election Day in 2008, he had callers tell him who they voted for. Most of those who said that they voted for John McCain said abortion was the primary reason why, which is just another indication that social issues are loser issues.
So far, Ron Paul is the only candidate with a clear plan to balance the budget in the first term. All of the young people like this because they know that they will not have to pay higher taxes in their elder years as a result of Federal debt deflation.
In any case, I doubt that the Republicans will let Ron Paul gain the nomination, even if he wins the necessary delegates. After all, the message from the Republican elites has been that it is their party and they will do what they want with it.
At least we really start to see the end of the Republican party and all the hypocrisy that it encompasses. The Democrats will remain as they gain votes via moochers and looters, which now make up close to 50% of this once great nation.