In Demcember of 2003 Howard Dean was trading in the 70’s on the IEM market. http://www.biz.uiowa.edu/iem/media/12_10_03.html His nearest competitors were Wesley Clark and Hillary Clinton (who had already ruled out a 2004 candidacy.) John Kerry who, as some of you may recall, was fated to win the 2004 nomination and narrowly lose to President Bush, wasn’t selling at any price.
An open nomination contest is highly predictable, but not if you take polls and expert opinion from the usual suspects seriously as most of the bettors apparently do. Whatever the polls say you’re not likely to lose money betting that voters will opt for the candidate who is best positioned to take their party’s case to the electorate in a general election.
For the Democrats in 2004 that was John Kerry. He was antiwar enough for the rabid Dem base but conventional enough and with enough medals to persuade some gullible moderates and swing voters that he could be trusted to protect the nation.
For Republicans next year it’s Fred Thompson. Neither Giuliani nor Romney has the right history or ideological orientation to argue the Republican case. Of the serious candidates, only Fred is selling what the GOP wants to buy. Whatever the markets may say, he is therefore very likely to be the Republican nominee.
Wait a couple of weeks to see if the price gets a bit better and then bet the house limit on Fred.
it was Dean’s to lose. He had what dems were looking for until he went crazy.
Rudy’s strategy is to split the pro-life vote. He’ll continue to do that as long as romney, huckabee and mccain are in the race. Fred has to stand out a lot and Hunter isn’t making much of a difference so just being solid on the issues isn’t the most important factor.
It won’t be in a couple of weeks, not Fred’s style.
We’ll be arguing this up to the last minute, with Fred in the “tank” according to all the “experts”, including the ones here. Then we will wake up and he has won by 20% because while we are all debating things, Fred will have gotten the votes that count, the ones that come from the voters...
Good thinking ... bad conclusion. When you factor in the bad campaign Thompson is running and the excellent campaign Romney is running there is one conclusion: Romney will win.
“Laughable. Fred makes a “blunder” about abortion and Rudy is pro-choice, pro-gay marriage, pro-gun control, and thrice-married, yet he leading the race and gets the endorsement of Pat Robertson.”
Ahem, that should be a sign of how badly Fred Thompson has blown it!! Back in June the SoCons were looking for the man on the white horse to sweep them away. Fred was riding high as the unannounced candidate, nearly with Rudy in national polls *before* jumping in.
Fred could have been IT, except:
1. Didnt go along with Federal Marriage Amendment.
2. Gets exposed that he did some lobbying work for pro-abort , and that he was squishy on campaign trail on abortion (BFD, long time ago), yet his record was prolife (ok, back on track)
3. Not for HLA (hardcore folks get off the bus)
4. Support for McCain-Feingold is an issue, but on Laura’s show in early Sept, flubs his defense of it (conservatives grimace at a reminder he’s a McCain-lite)
5. Gets bad reviews on his speeches in Orlando and elsewhere (political pros ask - cant he beat Hillary? - and decide “Nope”)
6. Mentions he got his values at the kitchen table not church (great, Hillary can out-Christian him)
7. Shows up with Tim and not only get caught over-explaining on his non-support for HLA, he throws in a point that is not even relevant and is grating to prolifers, its a pro-abort talking point to raise the spectre of teen pregnant women going to jail! (prolifers shake their heads)
What is the result? While Thompson has his Christian Right supporters, the social conservatives have fractured in confusion.
Romney, who has wooed the conservatives pretty consistently, picked up many endorsements, others who don’t like him or have “Mormon” issues have gone elsewhere:
Wildmon endorses Huckabee
Robertson endorses Rudy (WTF!?!?)
Brownback endorses McCain (okay, pro-amnesty types)
Robert R. Taylor endorses Romney - his comment on Thompson “I dont see the energy there”
Bob Jones III, chancellor of the university, told the Greenville News that he, too, is endorsing Romney. “This is all about beating Hillary [Clinton],” Jones told the newspaper. “And I just believe that this man has the credentials both personally and ideologically in terms of his view about what American government should be to best represent the rank and file of conservative Americans,” he said. “If it turns out to be [Rudy] Giuliani and Hillary we’ve got two pro-choice candidates, and that would be a disaster.” Jones, when asked whether Romney’s Mormon faith was a problem for him, replied: “What is the alternative? Hillary’s lack of religion or an erroneous religion?”
The BOTTOM LINE: Romney is the campaign’s alternative to Rudy. Thompson could have been the alternative, but he made all the wrong moves since June. His positions are wrong to unify the conservatives, his campaign speeches are too dull to energize most supporters, and his campaign was too late (yes, Sept was too late a start) and too slow out of the gate. As a result, he has lost conservative support.
His I’ll do it my way attitude may be endearing to some, to be others, like me, we ask: Why should I want Fred to be President more than Fred wants to be President?
And that, in the end, will be an epitaph on his campaign. Fred Thompson won’t be President. It won’t happen, and he may be just fine with that. I just hope his supporters can deal with it as well.