Yesterday's Gallup daily tracking poll showed Mitt Romney's national lead over Rick Santorum dropping from 20 to 2 points since early February. As Tricia noted earlier, a New York Times/CBS News poll released this morning found Santorum taking the lead from Romney nationally, 30% to 27%.
The Pew Research Center's latest survey helps bolster the trend.
Rick Santorum's support among Tea Party Republicans and white evangelicals is surging, and he now has pulled into a virtual tie with Mitt Romney in the race for the Republican presidential nomination. In polling conducted Feb. 8-12, 30% of Republican and Republican-leaning registered voters favor Santorum while 28% favor Romney. As recently as a month ago, Romney held a 31% to 14% advantage over Santorum among all GOP voters.
The closer one looks at the results, the worse they appear for the former Massachusetts governor. Romney can't even push the "electability" line, since he appears to have lost this edge, too -- Pew shows President Obama leading Romney and Santorum by similar margins. In the Midwest, Santorum is actually stronger against Obama than Romney (though both trail the president in the region by double digit margins).
What's more, confirming other recent data, the race for the Republican nomination itself is taking its toll on Romney's public standing. As was discussed on the show last night, self-identified independents are moving away from the former governor in droves.
The good news for Romney is he has ample time and resources to get back on track. He's seen credible challengers catch up to him before, only to be dispatched in the wake of millions of dollars in attack ads. The former governor also maintains the support of the party establishment, which has not yet reached for the panic button.
The bad news for Romney is, well, everything else is going poorly. He's slipping in the polls; there are growing doubts about his candidacy; and the more voters get to know him, they less they like him. Romney expected to have wrapped the nomination up by now, and that clearly hasn't happened.
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The good news for the 99% of Americans is that the sheeple are waking up and are realizing that there is "NO QUALIFIED GOP CANDIDATE", so they will either be so demoralized that they stay home or they will vote for Mr. President come November 2012!
Agreed! When the 2012 campaign was just starting to come together, I was worried about Romney and hoping against hope that some nut like Gingrich would be nominated, to improve Obama's chances for re-election. But by this point, it's become undeniable -- as Jon Stewart put it -- "they're all terrible!" Romney just looks worse and worse as this thing drags out. I love it!
Hmmm... wonder if we'll get to see some of Mitt's famous "emotion-free crisis management" now. Maybe he'll get to enjoy firing some of his campaign staff and advisors.
Just a comment on the "emotion free" part of your comment. Have I just missed it or has Mitt ever shown any affection to his sons when he is arriving at the podium to declare victory? He seems to always hug his wife and who I think are his daughter-in-laws, but I've never seen him show affection to his sons. Could be I've just missed it but if not it Just seems odd to me.
If I was Mitten's son and had a share of a $100 Million trust fund, I could live without the hugs!
Rita - I think you're right. The night Mitt won Florida, I did see him hug one young man on stage. I assumed it was one of his sons, but he completely ignored the rest.
My take is that they're still pissed at him about the dog on the roof of the car, but it's probably just as much Mitt's lack of emotion. He probably figures that makes his boys tough enough to dismantle companies and lay workers off in the name of a buck.
This could be an interesting test of who really controls those SuperPACs that have been doing Romney's dirty work. If the money decides that their Romney investment is going south, will Mitt wake up one day to see ads that he thought would be attacking Santorum attacking Romney instead?
The ones who may have been supporting Romney because of the perceived moral values the right, and only the right, supposedly represents may very well become Santorum's billionaires.
Bases do not, nor will they ever, win elections. Right now, though, he can't be the moderate he needs to be for the general election because he'll lose the smaller, but most vocal, part of the base. In the Tea Party's effort to "take back America" the only thing they've really taken is the opportunity for a Republican to win back the Presidency.
Come November Obama still has to fight all the "the enemy of an enemy is a friend" voters no matter who the nominee is. With every gaffe, stance waver, and stroll into extremeville (no matter how brief) he makes independents wake up to the fact that Obama isn't the 'enemy' that the small, but loud, far end right wingers portrayed him as. All the internet trolling and the 3 year old who screams the loudest gets the most attention tactics are losing their effectiveness. The moderate right has been listening to so few, for so long, and worked so hard to placate them, they've completely lost sight of the voters who actually decide the election. The longer the primary contest drags on the lower the candidates will stoop to get the base votes, especially that small fringe section. Each time that occurs Obama's margin of electability increases. Obama's biggest boast has been directly from the people set on ousting him....
My god sure does have a wierd sense of humor. If only she would bring back Ricky Bobby Perry again.
There are many paths to Palookaville. I hope their journey will be a short one.
Romney has to stop being a right wingnut, and be the moderate he said has been(I think) He dosen't want to get into the religious thing because of how the Evangelicals veiw the Mormon religion, but can't win if he can't get to the right of Santorum, who is Mr religion. He is dropping in polls because although a lot the independents want defict reduction, they don't want a interference in their lives and don't want a canidate of the religious right, where Mitt is headed. The Tea party took over the house because they won in rural districts and there was a lot of anger in white America that a Black man is president. Rubio won Fla due the a 3 way race. Paul won in Kentucky because in the country of the blind the one eyed man can becoame king
Push me pull you politics designed to stir up the base with far flung crap that screams for attention.These pukes don't care who gets the nod as long as they can drive fear into their base.
Santorum is just having his 15 minutes in the sun. Remember a few weeks ago, when Gingrich had a lead over Romney in the national Republican polls? How did that work out?
The entire Republican nominating process has been constructed for Romney to win. Winner-take-all primaries in places he figures to win, proportional allocations in places where he's weak. Romney will unload his money guns on Santorum soon, and Ricky's chances of being President will get tossed into the dustbin of history.
Dear Ms Maddow,
You said stuff about states that demanded church supported organizations to pay for birth control.
Mr O'Donnel then ran a segment that disagreed with you.
As a result, you've been down graded from credible to needs back up.
Try to get it better next time.