Santorum, riding a sudden wave of support from conservatives not sold on Romney, came up short by 8 votes when the official results were finally announced at 2:33 a.m. EST.
It was the closest nominating contest in memory and evoked memories of the 2000 presidential election, decided by just 537 Florida votes. Turnout was just over 122,000, a record for the Iowa GOP caucus.
"Game on!" Santorum declared at 12:18 a.m. Wednesday from his campaign headquarters, vowing to fight through New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida.
"On to New Hampshire!" Romney told supporters at a hotel in downtown Des Moines a while later. He congratulated Santorum but continued to keep his focus on President Barack Obama, trying to maintain an image as the inevitable nominee.
Ron Paul cast his third-place finish as a victory, too, proclaiming only he had the organization to take on Romney. Newt Gingrich came in fourth, followed by Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann and Jon Huntsman, who did not compete in Iowa.
In the first concession speech of his political career, Perry told supporters he's returning to Texas to "determine whether there is a path forward."
Santorum only days ago emerged as a contender after languishing at the bottom of the polls. He worked Iowa the old-school way, going county to county in a Ram 1500 pickup truck to meet with voters in 380 town hall meetings. He ascended as voters embraced then dropped other Romney alternatives.
"The conventional wisdom is Romney is more electable, but there are just too many questions I have about his history in terms of life and social values," said Santorum supporter Tom Henriksen, a 45-year-old software engineer from Pleasant Hill. "I don't know what I would do if he's the nominee."
After Santorum tied Romney in Iowa and landed in New Hampshire, he immediately began engaging hostile college students in long Socratic dialogues on hot-button social issues. A few months ago, Romney had a New Hampshire town hall where he, too, was asked repeatedly by kids about gay marriage. He refused to say anything beyond that he believes marriage is between a man and a woman and that he had already answered the question. Santorum’s approach is more sincere and intellectually laudable; Romney’s approach is more studied and likely to achieve his larger aim.
And less satisfying. Romney’s campaign is all technique and no music. His speech in Exeter was schmaltz piled on top of saccharin in a perfect storm of substanceless sentimentality. First, he said he believed in America. Then, he said he loved America. And in conclusion, he quoted verses from “America the Beautiful.” In Romney’s case, patriotism is the first refuge of a politician who doesn’t dare say anything new or interesting. It wasn’t until New Jersey governor Chris Christie, a Romney supporter, took the stage and slapped down a heckler that it felt like someone had thrown open a window in the tidy structure created by Team Romney to let in a gust of spontaneity and irrepressibly joyful combativeness.
Neither of those will ever be a quality associated with Romney. He continues to excel in debates by routinely coming up with answers that feel as though they were produced by a crack marketing team for maximum unassailability. His stumbles are so rare that they become as noticeable as the tiny wobbles of an Olympic skater trying to nail a triple Lutz. Challenged over the weekend on why he didn’t run for reelection as Massachusetts governor in 2006, he said he “went back into business,” even though he was already running for president when he left the governor’s mansion. Romney wanted to hang on to the scripted presentation of himself as a businessman above all else — plausibility be damned. It was a small falsity that stood for larger worries about his genuineness.
Very few politicians have what it takes to follow the old rules with the proficiency of a Mitt Romney. It takes brains, discipline, and managerial skill. But people have trouble warming up to the (almost) flawlessly executing candidate from a flawlessly executing machine. The Romney campaign notwithstanding, there’s no rule against inspiring people.
No comments:
Post a Comment