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July 13, 2008

GOP Veepstakes

Rick Moran
Via American Thinker Political Correspondent Rich Baehr, we get an interesting update on the race as well as a look at how the odds for GOP Vice Presidential nominee are shaping up.

Baehr finds a lot of good news in the daily tracking polls:

There has been a very steady erosion of Obama support in last ten days.  Gallup poll has been very volatile. Yesterday they had obama up by 4. The new Newsweek survey which is not a very reliable poll, has obama up 3 in their every two week snapshot of the race. 

On the left wing websites, there is a combination of a bit of panic, and some anger over Obama shift to center.


Obama has clearly lost all the momentum he got as a result of his primary victory over Hillary Clinton less than a month ago. Whatever bounce he got as a result of wrapping up the nomination is now history and the voter is beginning to see the true Obama; a coldly calculating creature who throws his friends and aides overboard at the drop of a hat and whose cynical moves to the center have now begun to anger his base. 

Meanwhile, the GOP Veepstakes is beginning to take shape. Some early favorites have fallen while others have risen. The following is from Nate Silver who blogs at "538" (total number of electoral votes) and who has analyzed the all important futures markets according to the following criteria.

He divides the candidates into 4 main groups; a traditional choice, a "base reach" that would please Christian conservatives, a "center reach," and a group he terms the "insider." Using those four groups, here's what the futures markets and Silver's own analysis reveals:

Romney          3-1     Traditional
Pawlenty        6-1     Traditional
Palin           6-1     Traditional
Huckabee        7-1     Base Reach
Crist          11-1     Traditional
Portman        12-1     Insider
Fiorina        13-1     Outsider
Thune          13-1     Base Reach
Cantor         15-1     Insider
Sanford        15-1     Traditional
Ridge          20-1     Center Reach
Jindal         20-1     Base Reach
Perdue         20-1     Traditional
Lieberman      30-1     Center Reach
Snowe          30-1     Center Reach
Bloomberg      50-1     Center Reach
Graham         50-1     Traditional
Collins        50-1     Center Reach
Kasich         50-1     Insider
Rice           50-1     Insider
Cox            60-1     Insider
Rell           60-1     Center Reach
Whitman        60-1     Outsider
Keating        70-1     Traditional
Huntsman       80-1     Base Reach
Hutchinson    100-1     Traditional
Engler        100-1     Traditional
Fred Smith    100-1     Outsider

Romney has a lot of upside to him, not least of which is that he is acceptable to most factions in the party. His Mormonism would probably not be as big an issue as it was in the primaries simply because he is not gunning for the top spot.

Pawlenty's stock is fallin as Minnesota appears more and more remote as a GOP pickup even with him on the ticket. Surprisingly, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's star also seems to be fading a bit - probably a Romney surge at her expense.

I think Rich would agree with me that the Romney boomlet is being expertly handled by his people. Six weeks ago, few would have given Romney much of a chance at the Veep slot. Now here he is, seen as something of a front runner although a decision like this takes into account a lot of variables. Nevertheless, the Romney crew have gotten their man back on the radar.

Now we see how well that sits with the rest of the party.

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