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By awarding a narrow win at Iowa to Mitt Romney, the conservative base has given a clear signal that they'll rather have a Mormon in White House than a "Leftist”
It is singularly impossible to explain to non-Americans who exactly Mormons are and what are their beliefs. I mean it is difficult for an audience who generally tends to identify Christians as Catholics or Protestants to comprehend what kind of religious-socio dogma Mormonism is. And that is precisely why it is difficult for them to understand why even a near-tie achieved at the Iowa Caucus by Mitt Romney is no less than a triumph.
In short, Mormons are basically Wahhabis in tuxedos with equally bizarre sets of rules and regulations, many of which are anathema for regular Evangelical Christians. Although they have reformed under pressure both from inside and outside, the Evangelicals, at the most, regard them as “almost there” Christians and not the true-blood kind. And US watchers will tell you that it is a big consideration when voters get out of their homes in the Midwest to vote. And that is why with a tie at Iowa, Mitt Romney has given a clear signal that he is here to stay.
Returns from nearly all of the 1774 precincts showed both Romney and his closest rival Rick Santorum with 25 per cent votes whereas moderate Republican Ron Paul polled a solid 22 per cent, which was good but not good enough. A state that polled a hundred thousand-plus votes, the difference between Romney and Santorum was merely eight votes. It was a dead heat in the truest sense of the word.
Among the other candidates, Newt Gingrich polled a paltry 13 per cent, followed by Rick Perry, 10 per cent, and Bachmann with 5 per cent. It has also been made clear by the officials that they will not go for recount even if the difference is of a single vote. Although the result appears inconclusive prima facie, it has offered some interesting answers.
Let's start with Ron Paul. Any casual listener who has heard Ron Paul speak might mistake him for a Left-wing Democrat on a delightful sunny morning.
His opinions on a range of issues such as war in Afghanistan, a possible war in Iran and a host of others would be music to the ears of liberals. That they will appear as musical to conservative ears to fetch him a respectable 22 per cent in Iowa has surprised even the pundits.
Matt Stoller, a fellow at the Roosevelt Institute and a Republican watcher, tells TSI, “The most puzzling character in Congress, ideologically considering, is Ron Paul. The fellow is a Republican for all technical purposes, who is also an unswerving opposer of American empire and big finance. His concepts on the Federal Reserve, earlier fluid, has grounded itself recently, and he has taken potent runs at President Obama on what appears an obscure theme of monetary policy. Paul never goes by the rules of engagement and that is why while old pamphlets bearing his name showcase apparent white supremacy, he is probably also the lone outstanding politician, let alone Presidential candidate, who agrees openly that the drug war in the US has racist origins. That this fellow has bagged so much among the ultra-conservatives is evident that people here are really fed up with old politicking.”
Now that surely is a compliment coming from a liberal. And Ron Paul seems to deserve this. How much will he sustain in the long run is not very clear but he definitely has managed to pull out his libertarian message from the fringes and put it in the mainstream.
On the other hand, what Rick Santorum has managed from Iowa is also nothing short of an achievement considering he is considered by the Republican rank and file as an “upstart” who even lost the Senate run 6 years ago. Also, Santorum's purse is hopelessly lighter than both Paul and Romney when it comes to that and that is why his campaign in Iowa was a curious (and definitely intelligent) mix of some crisp speeches, ground strategies and less goodies. But having said that, one must not discount the fact that he would have never been the first choice of Evangelicals had he been fighting against anyone but a Mormon Mitt Romney. It won't be an exaggeration to say that many of those who voted for him don't actually like him. But they hate Romney more. However, it will be difficult for him to repeat the performance in upcoming caucuses and primaries specially those in North Carolina and New Hampshire, which are up next, in the absence of funds and volunteers.
That leaves us with Newt Gingrich. Gingrich is everything that Ron Paul is not. Gingrich is from the creed that still believes that Republicans are stuck in the Reagan-Bush era and need more than occasional pep talks. On his sober days, Gingrich appears to be on a mix of Ecstasy and Acid. Under the hangover of hubris, he gives a few social anthropology lessons to Americans on races and people who have been “invented” and who haven't. But that was before a sustained campaign by a few lobby groups pulled the carpet from beneath his feet.
Talking to TSI, Joel S. Hirschhorn, a political scientist and sociologist based at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, says, “His [Newt Gingrich] candidacy offers an important chance for a new, bigger form of failure that could elucidate to most Americans just how damaged the electoral system is. Counter intuitively, a President Gingrich could help resuscitate American democracy. He is the failure we have been waiting for, just the right old, fat, loud mouth, hypocritical white guy. I mean how low can you go.” Ouch. That would have hurt.
His below average performance in Iowa has virtually hammered the death-nail in his campaign for all practical purposes. Technically speaking, he can still revive his campaign but that will need either a colossal blunder or a damaging skeleton-in-the-cupboard on Romney's or Santorum's part to do that.
Perry and Bachmann at the most can be called “also rans”. And that pretty much leaves us with the dapper Willard Mitt Romney.
“All three of us will be campaigning very hard... This is a campaign night where America wins. [Obama is] a president who is a nice guy but who may be in over his head. ...This has been a failed presidency. ...I think he gets his inspiration from the social welfare states of Europe,” Romney said after his win.
His winning speech gives a clear idea how his campaign has shaped in all these weeks. To start with, he has focused more on the failures of Obama in his speeches than on the possible inability of his fellow Republican aspirants to challenge him. And that has struck a chord with the voters. Such has been the fear-mongering about a possible shift to Leftist policies that even Iowans finally decided that they will have an 'almost' Christian in the White House than a “Leftist”.
But that's purely the thinking of the conservative base. Polls suggest that the majority of Americans still believe that President Obama is not the cause of economic uncertainty. He has just inherited it from the Bush administration. Unless the Euro-zone crisis goes spiral and its effect is seen on the US economy, things will only improve for President Obama in the run-up to Election Day. Also, lately, Obama has been very categorical and clear in his criticism of Republicans in the Congress. More and more voters have begun to shift the blame from Obama's administration to the acts of GOP Congressmen. Under the circumstances, Romney's bellicosity vis-a-vis Iran will only evoke the dreaded gung-ho, trigger happy Bush era. And that will push more and more indecisive voters towards Obama.
A ridiculously few of these voters would ever be expected to root for a Republican. Having said that, a president who managed to win the election with merely 53 per cent of the popular votes does not have a comfortable enough margin to simply sit back and do nothing. Among other things, Obama also needs to seriously do something to uplift the ever sinking morale of his one-time ardent supporters. And that won't be easy at all.
It is in through these breaches that Romney has seen his realistic chance to topple him. But he needs to buck up. Iowa results have in fact again raised questions on Romney's ability to build support beyond the 25 per cent level that he seems to have held for quite sometime now. And this when Republican and Democrat experts both agree that he will be the only formidable challenge to Obama who will have a realistic chance to unseat him.
And if you look at it through that prism, the actual winner who has come out of the Iowa caucus is none other than President Obama. He'll have another month or two to set his house in order as the Republicans will slug it out in state after state. A definite result at Iowa wouldn't have necessitated it.
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