Romney’s weak sweeps

The mainstream media is portraying tonight’s Romney win in New Hampshire as a big one and saying he swept the first two contests. Technically both are true. He won by double digits and won in Iowa.

But let’s be real here. Romney won Iowa by 8 votes over a guy — Santorum — who was polling in the low single digits just a couple of months ago and appears not to have cracked 40 percent in a state that was a foregone conclusion (he lives there and was governor next door, has huge name recognition and a massive organization).

Rather than showing his strength, the results demonstrate that Romney still has not won over his party and is likely vulnerable to a unified effort by the anyone-but-Romney group. Ron Paul, who is a special case, is at around 24 percent, but John Huntsman, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum totaled 37 percent together — almost exactly the same figure Romney collected.

If Romney was going to be a real presidential contender, wouldn’t have had distinguished himself better from the pack than he has? Especially when his opponents have been Mo, Larry and Curly Joe.

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Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie. View all posts by hankkalet