by Jonathan Todd

Mitt Romney has always been the frontrunner in the Republican presidential nomination race. There are, however, Republicans with doubts about Romney-care, his religion and his corporate background. Given such concerns, I had thought Rick Perry might usurp Romney by matching his strongest card, economic credibility, and having more appeal to the religious right.

That was before I realised Perry’s oratory makes George W Bush seem Cicero-like. Such a shambles can’t possibly have more ability than Romney to reach out to business people or even evangelicals sceptical of Mormonism. We live in an unpredictable, crazy world but it is surely now predictable that Perry as a presidential candidate is too crazy.

Romney’s other rivals, however, drift inexorably to the same status. Almost as if the whole thing has been orchestrated by Romney’s campaign, with the aim of securing their man victory and everyone else a laugh. The race has been characterised by Romney being the only consistently leading presence, periodically challenged for ascendency by the latest hyped candidate, before this hype dissipates, often in a blizzard of insanity.

Michele Bachmann is accurately captured by John McCain’s daughter, Meghan, now an MSNBC contributor, as “a poor man’s Sarah Palin” – a description which made for an awkward first on-air interview when McCain lined up with Bachmann. (Chelsea Clinton recently got an easier debut gig on NBC, as two political dynasties look to formation through the media). Herman Cain was a pizza manager, whose servings, it transpired, came with a thick crust of lechery. Newt Gingrich was a warrior against Washington DC and a crusader for traditional values, who got rich lobbying DC and is a serial adulterer. Even Donald Trump got in on the action at one stage, as if this is an episode of Ali G, not a process leading towards the election of the most powerful person in the world.

It’s obvious that grassroots Republicans, unlike their party’s establishment, are not sold on Romney. It’s equally obvious, given the hilariously inept efforts to date, that if a serious rival to Romney was going to emerge they would have emerged by now. So, how quickly will Romney be in a race with president Obama for the White House?

Let’s look at the first three contests: the Iowa caucus (3 January), the New Hampshire primary (10 January) and the South Carolina primary (21 January).

The Baptist preacher Mike Huckabee claimed to have started “a prairie fire” by winning the last Iowa caucus. The votes of social conservatives pushed Romney into second place. The presence of these voters in Iowa means that Romney can never have had solid hopes of winning here in 2012 either. But he will, at an absolute minimum, want to avoid the fate of Rudy Giuliani, who was an early frontrunner in 2008, but whose campaign never fully recovered momentum after he choose to put very little focus on Iowa and was punished with a derisory sixth place.

Momentum coming out of Iowa matters as much as outright victory. A Ron Paul victory in Iowa – thought most likely by the Spectator’s Jonathan Jones – isn’t awful news for Romney, as Paul shows limited potential for using such a victory to build out of his relatively small, but dedicated, core of libertarian supporters. And a Paul victory denies impetus to Gingrich, probably the candidate most able to take the momentum of an Iowa victory and convert it into a genuine threat to Romney.

A Romney win on the infertile Iowan terrain cannot be discounted for five reasons. First, the Gingrich bubble seems to be bursting – he once held a clear lead in Iowa but now seems to have slipped behind both Paul and Romney. His failure to make the ballot in Virginia also smacks of arrogance or incompetence or both. Second, there remains time for Paul to buckle in Iowa, as others have already done, under the extra scrutiny that comes with strong poll showings. And there is no shortage of reasons to have second thoughts about him. Third, a social conservative should win Iowa but Bachmann, Perry and the equally preposterous Rick Santorum are splitting this vote (although Santorum seems to be picking up support and many in Iowa remain undecided). Fourth, Romney and high-profile backers are now spending more time in Iowa. Fifth, apparently the weather might help him, according to Huckabee.

While these are reasons to think that Romney may pull off a surprise victory in Iowa, he appears to be pulling ahead in New Hampshire. This is a more moderate, less conservative state than Iowa, the kind of place that both Romney and former governor Jon Huntsman will be pinning their hopes upon. Despite appealing to independents and moving into third place in a New Hampshire poll, Huntsman has never quite been able to cut through into the front rank of candidates. Romney has tacked to the right, but there just doesn’t seem enough political space for him to be undercut by another centrist like Huntsman, though Huntsman appears a relative bastion of intelligence and good sense compared to the rest of the GOP field.

Romney has recently picked up the endorsement of South Carolina governor Nikki Haley and may go into this contest with two wins behind him. If he were to also win in South Carolina, would he be unstoppable?

I’m not sure how unprecedented it would be for Romney to not become the candidate in such circumstances, but sooner or later – and my guess is sooner – a former community organiser will face off against a former Bain CEO in a presidential contest that will be largely determined by perceptions of economic competence.

Jonathan Todd is Labour Uncut’s economic columnist

Tags: Iowa, Jonathan Todd, Mitt Romney, pizza, Republican race

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