Iowa and After: Where the Almost-Too-Close-to-Call Caucus Leaves the GOP-Nomination Fight
By Adam Sorensen | @adamsorensen | January 4, 2012
... Romney and Santorum finished the night with 24.6% and 24.5% of the vote, respectively, while Ron Paul claimed third with 21% and Newt Gingrich notched 13% in fourth. The turnout was close to 2008 levels, showing no swell of Tea Party vigor, and Romney’s finish wasn’t far off his performance there four years ago ...
If the photo finish failed to give reporters a clear winner to fawn over, the losers of the night were easy to pick out. Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann put everything into Iowa, and their respective fifth- and sixth-place finishes all but sealed the end of their campaigns. Perry canceled plans to jet to South Carolina on Wednesday, choosing to return to Texas instead to “reassess.” “With a little prayer and a little reflection, I’m going to decide the best path forward,” he said on Tuesday night. Bachmann’s speech wasn’t as sober, but her prospects were just as dim, with her campaign manager expressing doubts in an Associated Press interview about whether she’d stay in the race. Influential Iowa Evangelical Bob Vander Plaats, a Santorum backer, urged her to drop out on Tuesday ...
The message was loud and clear for Gingrich as well. After turning every cheek in Iowa and paying dearly for it, Gingrich signaled on Tuesday night that he’s prepared to respond in kind to the negative ads that cut him to ribbons in recent weeks. He called Romney “a Massachusetts moderate managing decay,” and set a sharp tone for the next week of campaigning. He still insisted on decrying negative ads, but no amount of spin could mask Gingrich’s acid tone when he said he reserved the right to “tell the truth.” ...
There’s now a long week — one of the longest in politics — before the Granite State primary. Two debates, hours of TV ads and countless campaign events remain between the GOP field and the first proper primary of 2012. But the race there may be too far gone already for anyone but Romney to win. His lead is commanding, 26 points up on his nearest rival in a recent survey, and his operation well entrenched. Romney has lived in the state for much of the past three years — no, seriously, his house is in Wolfeboro — and given tens of thousands of dollars to the state’s GOP apparatus. John McCain, who won the state handily in 2000 and edged out Romney by 6 points in 2008, is lined up to endorse him on Wednesday ...
http://swampland.time.com/2012/01/04/iowa-and-after-where-the-almost-too-close-to-call-caucus-leaves-the-gop-nomination-fight/
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