That's not really the issue. Where else can religious/social conservatives go?

The R party is split into 3 groups right now, the strong business types are rallying around Romney, the strong libertarian types around Paul, and the, pardon the phrase, nutjobs around Frothy.

I doubt Paul runs third party since he said he wouldn't and he's never told a lie, but really this is a party that could just about split 3 ways right now.

I am hoping for a Romney win and a Paul outcome that adds the least proability of a Paul third candidate run. I am not sure if that's a strong 2nd or a weak third to be honest.

Lol what is a "strong business type" anyways?

???

We're talking about the primaries, right? My point is that Santorum might have the ability to consolidate the religions/social vote, thereby enabling him to stay in the race for a longer period than a candidate who could not consolidate that vote.

Your thread was merged into this one. Your post is on the first page of this thread.

The 45th President is speaking on Fox at the moment.

Also like people have been predicting Santorum might win for a lot longer than 24 hours, in fact Former DJ's "shocker" prediction and Red Man's "you heard it here first" were neither shocking nor the first place I heard it.

The best result for on Obama supporter is a Romney win. Romney vs Obama is essentially a win-win because there will be absolutely no discernible difference between a Romney or Obama presidency.

Where else would those peoplengo? A Mormon? A witch? A serial adulterer? A guy that doesn't want to bomb brown people?

Bachmann or Perry would be the obv answer. Pretty sure Christine O'Donnell has not entered this race (the witch?) but thanks for participating low key.

obama supporters exist on this forum?

Where are they right now? Splintered all over the place apparently, diluting their impact.

If Perry or Bachman did surprisingly well, some of those people could continue to support them, notwithstanding the witch/mormon/wacko factors.

But this does raise another possibility, though I guess it's far-fetched: if Romney romps in the early primaries, maybe the religious/social conservatives would find someone else to back in a third party? The fact that I can't think of anyone makes me think there is virtually no chance of it happening (though, frankly, I did think this a genuine possibility a year ago).

"Reluctant Obama apologists", please.

Isn't changing his mind/position pretty much his MO? I'd fully expect him to backpedal on anything he says, including remarks about the weather.

Always getting my political ladies mixed up, derp!

I match up closer ideologically with Paul, for what that's worth.

But as I really have a hard time buying that Paul can win the general, whereas I think that Romney is basically a coin flip to win it if he gets nominated, my pragmatic side is winning out. I wouldn't feel this way if you flip Romney with a complete joke like Bachmann/Cain/Santorum, but I've always liked Mitt and think he would be a good President.

What are the key issues where you think Romney is much better than Obama?

The Drudge Report web site has set up a pseudo Iowa Caucus where you can imagine yourself as an Iowa Republican and “vote” among the top eight candidates – including Herman Cain. So I “voted” and then took a look at the poll results. This poll showed Ron Paul in first place with something like 28 percent of the vote followed by Mitt Romney in second with 25 percent of the vote. They had my choice (Rick Santorum) polling at 17 percent. Smelling a rat, I decided to try voting for Santorum a second time, fully expecting my duplicate vote to be rejected. To my surprise, my duplicate vote was accepted. I wound up voting for Santorum five times before I gave up laughing like a hyena. So much for the Drudge Report’s “unscientific” poll meaning anything.

Former DJ

It happens, Bachmann is the one with a gay husband

lol, the absolute best outcome from the '12 elections from a personal standpoint would be a strong 3rd party run by either Paul or Trump allowing Obama to win significantly, but with only a plurality of the vote. Add in Dems loosing the Senate, and I'll be able to troll pretty much all my friends/family

The Repubs for be religious bigoted nutjobs and getting absolutely soul crushed in the vote tally.

The Dems for loosing the Senate and not even being able to rally a majority of the vote.

That seems a really dumb question given he thinks there are no realistic alternatives who could beat Obama. Which he is right on.

Even if he thinks Romney is almost identical to Obama as a Republican he should still prefer Romney for obvious reasons.

Where are they now? It seems like, at least in Iowa, they're backing Frothy. No one else hates the gays enough, so he'll have to do apparently.

Economic issues, first and foremost. The reason I most readily align with the right is fiscal policy. I think Romney really does "get" it and will push to reduce both taxes and spending rather than just haphazardly cutting taxes while increasing spending as too many other Republicans like to do.

I also believe that Obamacare would get repealed under his watch regardless of the SCOTUS outcome.

I'm with him on most social issues; those don't matter as much to me anyway, but they do matter. And I only think that I break with him on gay rights, because I had my Romney Decoder Ring on during the last debate and his answers actually came off to me like they were simply trying to fool the homophobes within the Republican base into thinking that he was with them.

The unfortunate flip side is that on civil liberties and foreign policy, I'm unconvinced that he'll be much of an upgrade from Obama, but since those are hardly strengths of Obama they largely cancel out as a neutral with at least the faint hope that Romney would be better.

I'm probably more to Obama's side than Romney's on immigration, but that's the only issue I can think of where I might openly favor Obama in this likely matchup.

Is this a joke?

Nitpick: I'm not a Republican, though I guess functionally I sort of am one at the moment. I'm just resistant to the label because I don't like Republicans.

But if you put a really awful GOP nominee up then I'm not going to vote for him or her. There are/were several in this field that this would have applied to, but I don't fear any of them getting the nod.