Warm, Genuine, and Does Not Enjoy Firing People ...

... That's Mitt Romney!

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Their first ad in South Carolina accuses Mitt Romney of being a serial killer. Pure gold ...

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John Sides asks "Does Mitt Romney Have a Wealth Problem?" The answer? Yes. This graph sums it up:

Envy Redux

I said it the other night and I'm saying it again ... this counterargument from Romney about "envy" is a big, big mistake and his speech on New Hampshire Primary Night was a big mistake. Andrew Sullivan agrees.

And his response to the people in this documentary - white working class heartland Americans, the GOP base - is that they are merely envious of his achievements. ... I simply cannot imagine a worse narrative for a candidate in this climate; or a politician whose skills are singularly incapable of responding to the story in any persuasive way.

The problem is that the mood out there is not "an attack on capitalism" as Romney puts it. It is a revulsion about a certain type of economic parasite - the Wall Street money manipulators. The folks who got us into this mess were and are an abhorrent lot to those on Main Street because they produce nothing, at least that is the perception. They simply suck money out of the system.

And when Romney says that people who find what Bain Capital did to be distasteful are "envious," he is offering the worst kind of response. "Aw, you're just jealous." He is rubbing salt in the wound. Nate Silver points out the attack on Romney cuts to the core of his brand. I think Romney's response is making it worse.

Mitt-Mentum

As I posted on Tuesday night, it is being a bit over-stated. Philip Klein of the Washington Examiner does some math:

When you eliminate independents and Democrats from the 2008 equation, actual registered Republicans made up 61 percent of the roughly 239,000 votes cast in the GOP primary, putting the turnout among Republicans at around 145,790. But last night, actual Republicans only comprised 49 percent of the electorate, according to exits. Even if we round up the final 2012 turnout number to 250,000, which would be slightly higher than current projections, that would only leave actual Republican turnout at 122,500, which would represent a 16 percent drop.

Now obviously, there are a number of caveats involved. More and more voters are identifying as independent, especially in New Hampshire, even though they typically behave in a partisan matter. And perhaps disaffection with Obama also led to a spike in turnout among Democrats and true independents. But either way, this is worth keeping in mind when you hear reports of the "record" turnout. From my observations, Republican events have been generally low energy both in Iowa and New Hampshire, especially when compared with what we saw on the Democratic side in 2008.

So, Romney did well in New Hampshire, yeah. But it is (one of) his home state(s) and it is a primary in which just 28% of the electorate was evangelical. 60% of caucus-goers in Iowa were evangelicals and in South Carolina? Probably about 60%.

I'm not saying Romney is going to lose the nomination. He's not. He will be the nominee. But there are still two things at stake: 1) Will Romney be forced to work for the nomination, expend resources, and take fire? 2) Are Republicans going to be enthusiastic about their nominee?

These numbers from New Hampshire tell me (and I'm having trouble convincing people of this) that Romney is still going to face some bumps in the road and that Republicans are not feeling "Mitt-Mentum" just yet.

UPDATE: 3 polls are showing a very close race in South Carolina. 2 of them are from pollsters I don't trust (ARG and Insider Advantage) at all. But PPP is a VERY good pollster and they've got the race tight. So, Mitt is in for a bumpier ride than the really poor analysis done on New Hampshire Primary Night suggested. Again, Mitt is going to be the nominee. But he's going to have to take some more lumps before it is over.

Envy

Mitt Romney has been attacking Obama for employing "the rhetoric of envy."

I really think this is a mistake for Romney. In short, I think it does not look good to be a rich guy telling America that "Obama is just trying to make everyone envious of me." That is not the language Romney uses but I think that is the message that is received.

It is as if two kids are arguing and one accuses the other of being a child of privilege and the privileged child says, "you're just jealous." Well, that line not only acknowledges the wealth, it tells the person who is not wealthy their lot in life is their fault.

To put it in more strategic terms, last night, Romney received 48% of the vote in New Hampshire from Republican Primary voters with over $100,000 in income but just 33% of those under $100,000 in income. But just 37% of Republican Primary voters had income over $100,000. He just stuck out his tongue at people who don't like him already. Now imagine the demographics in low-income South Carolina compared with New Hampshire (lower income in South Carolina). Now imagine the demographics among the broader electorate (much lower income than the Republican Primary electorate).

Mitt Romney appears to be embracing his public persona as a candidate for wealthy people.

Initial Thoughts on Romney's "Win"

Yeah. The airquotes are intended to be sarcastic.

Comparing the initial results from tonight with my pre-primary night post on expectations for Romney, we can see that Romney failed on at least one key measure and I think it really is an ominous sign for Romney. I had said that it would be bad if Romney failed to match his vote total from 2008 but that I thought this was not likely to happen. It appears it is happening:

Although the polls made pretty good predictions of the election outcome tonight, forecasting turnout is harder. So far it looks like rumors of a record Republican turnout in New Hampshire were greatly exaggerated.

With 85 of 301 precincts reporting, 52,191 voters have cast a ballot in the Republican primary so far. That projects to about 185,000 votes statewide, as compared with about 240,000 votes in the Republican primary in 2008.

The drop-off in turnout looks worse for Republicans since a higher fraction of voters - about half this year, compared to 37 percent in 2008 - are independents. That means that turnout among registered Republicans could alone be off by nearly 40 percent from 2008.

- Nate Silver

So, if this is true, what does it mean? Romney appears headed for about 35% to 36% of the vote tonight. That's sort of in the middle between what he was hoping for (40%+) and what I thought would be a disaster for Romney (<32%). It does appear he'll have beaten Ron Paul by more than 10 points ... but not by much more. But the low voter turnout is pretty awful and, if Romney does get fewer votes in 2012 than in 2008, I think that's a real danger sign for him.

Remember that there is no competitive Democratic Primary this year so independents are not being drawn in big numbers away from the GOP Primary as they were in 2008. Turnout should have been higher. It appears to be a lot lower.

Let's put this another way. In 2008, Romney lost the nomination ... but he couldn't even get all of those voters in New Hampshire that voted for him last time to vote for him this time. In effect, his win tonight was simply the result of the failure of the anti-Romney vote to coalesce around anyone in particular. Had they done so, there was plenty of room for Romney to actually lose tonight.

There are two bad things that can happen to a frontrunner on primary night. One is they can lose. Romney avoided that. But the other bad thing that can happen is they can win but misinterpret the result as a sign that they're on the right track. Romney does not seem to be seeing the danger signs here. He has underperformed his polls in Iowa and in New Hampshire. He has received fewer votes in Iowa AND in New Hampshire compared with 2008. But he seems to think voters like him more this time. That's not it Willard. They just like your opposition less.

UPDATE: My initial read of the early numbers is not quite as bad for Romney. It does appear he will get a few more votes than in 2008 (roughly 10,000 more by current projections) but the argument still stands I think. Maybe just not as emphatically.

Mitt Romney's Very, Very Bad, No Good, Horrible Day ...

... and then there's this:



Romney is having a bad day and some (not all) polling shows his numbers eroding a bit in New Hampshire. Will it be enough for Romney to lose in New Hampshire? No. Will it be enough for Romney to "lose" New Hampshire? Possibly.

Romney can "lose" New Hampshire by having a significantly worse-than-expected showing. What is worse than expected? How about ...

1) ... failing to match one's percentage of the vote from 2008? Romney got 31.56% in 2008. It seems unlikely he'll go below that this time ... but it is possible.

2) ... failing to reach his vote total from 2008? There was a lot of energy on the Democratic side sucking up votes that will be there in 2012. So this is very unlikely.

3) ... failing to finish more than 10% ahead of all his rivals. Expectations for Romney's dominance in New Hampshire have been so high that failing to win in a walk would be bad. Paul and Huntsman have both been gaining steam in New Hampshire. Again possible but unlikely.

So, the best-case scenario for Romney in New Hampshire right now is that he meets expectations and wins with say, 40% - 45%. There will be very little bump in the polls from that. There are some bad scenarios for Tuesday night to be watched. Those aren't likely but they are more likely than they were 24 hours ago.

Romney ...

... is simply not a very good candidate. I've said it before. He has this reputation as someone who is very disciplined but he's actually quite the opposite. He's so wooden and on script that he's plastic and makes big mistakes. The reason people seem to think otherwise is he has been in some kind of weird campaign where his opponents declined to attack the frontrunner until about the last 24 hours. Here's a new example of how undisciplined Romney can be:



Now, the point Romney was making was a fair one. He was talking about health care and why it is necessary to have choice among plans. By the way Mitt, Obamacare allows for choice among plans ... so Mitt also happens to be perpetuating a lie about Obamacare here. But let's put that aside for a moment.

There are certain phrases a candidate for president should not say when the sole rationale for their campaign and the central theme of the Election Year is "job creation." One of those phrases is "I like being able to fire people." It is an especially bad phrase to utter when you worked for a corporate "chop shop" in Bain Capital where you had a history of buying companies and ... ya know, firing people.

Breaking News!

Romney's tax plan amounts to a massive tax cut for rich people! Can you believe it?

The full explanation can be found here.

Beyond the fact that it is bad public policy, it is really bad politics. Mitt Romney, a man who is a walking caricature of an out-of-touch rich guy is just cementing the caricature.