I fail to see how Romney’s declining poll numbers in these early states months before the primaries establish that he will be one of the finalists for the nomination. The fact that he retains slim facial leads convinces me of nothing. As has been reported, he has been the only one advertising and has spent $8 million on 10,000 ads. Still his lead in New Hampshire is 4 points and declining, and his lead in Iowa is 9 points and declining. His national numbers are, and have been, in the toilet, and they are beginning to exercise significant gravitational pull on his state numbers. People are not going to go out and freeze their tails off in Iowa and New Hampshire in January to vote for someone who is in 4th place and in single digits nationally. And the internals of the Newsweek Iowa poll released last weekend are even more ominous. Thompson’s voters are far more committed, with 39% strongly backing him. Only 26% of Romney’s voters strongly back him.
Intensity of support is key in a primary and even more key in a caucus. So the 8 point lead which Romney now enjoys in Iowa may well be a dead heat with Thompson given the fact that his support is so much more intense(and therefore more likely to show up) than Romney’s. And bear in mind as well that no comparison ads highlighting Romney’s past liberal stands and flip flops have yet gone up. When that happens, his declining lead will erode further.