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| Rick Santorum’s Hypothetical Challengers for the Hypothetical 2016 Nomination Posted: 11 Apr 2012 07:25 PM PDT
Now, in the first place his analysis of McCain emerging from a strong field is dubious. The three other candidates that made it to the New Hampshire Primary were three people who never held political office (Gary Bauer, Alan Keyes, and Steve Forbes.) The only “strong candidates” in that field were Bush and McCain. True, there were stronger announced candidates who dropped out before in the Summer of 2011and early Fall such as Elizabeth Dole, Dan Quayle, and John Kasich, but I’d contend the candidates who made it to New Hampshire in 2012 represented a far more potent and compelling field. Secondly, is the warning that a hypothetical Santorum 2016 run is threatened by the potential candidacies of Rubio, Ryan, etc. Silver is relatively circumspect compared to other blogger such as the Daily Caller’s Matt Lewis who says Santorum would face a stronger field and lists the usual suspects. This sort of analysis is comparable, in Baseball terms, to trying to predict the outcome of a potential Division Series between the Pirates and Braves three years from now based on who is the top prospect on their AA team at the moment. I remember when Marc Sanford was a popular name in this sort of talk. I read numerous stories of how Tim Pawlenty was the man to watch in 2012. How exactly did that work out again? Most 2012 potential candidates never ran (Haley Barbour, Ryan, Bobby Jindal) or ran poorly (Perry and Pawlenty). and none came close to being the last challenger standing. I will predict that the vast majority of “new faces” cited by bloggers will not appear on a single primary ballot in 2016, in the even Romney loses. In addition, a Santorum or a Mike Huckabee for that matter would be far more likely to succeed than any of them except for Bush for three reasons. First, Republicans like known quantities. While Democrats will take a chance on an Arkansas or a guy who is less than four years out of the Illinois States Senate, Republicans look for known quantities as illustrated by the “next in line phenomena.” Republicans like candidates they know, rather than fresh faces. Bloggers may feel otherwise as it can be tiring writing about the same candidate week after week and year after year. Second, these former candidates know what the campaign is like and know exactly what to expect, making them better prepared than the first time around. Third, Republicans voters like them after they’ve been through a campaign. Most of these potential candidates look good primarily because they’ve yet to exposed to vetting and the heat of the primary campaign. People like Bobby Jindal and Paul Ryan look good because no one has picked their lives apart, no one is funding millions of dollars to fling intra-party dirt at them. Most who get the full treatment will fall apart long before the voting starts. Santorum and Huckabee are fighters and they are survivors. While its absurd to even be talking about 2016 (and I have my own doubts about Santorum running in 2016) , if bloggers are going to do it, they had better give more credit to the survivors than they do to people who are (at best) wannabes. Link to this post!        |
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