And Now It All Goes South

Fresh off a win in the New Hampshire Primary--and after becoming the first non-incumbent Republican to ever win Iowa and New Hampshire--Mitt Romney takes his callous caravan (and his rivals) to the Palmetto State, South Carolina, with Florida coming ten days after.

Mitt aggravated a lot of people with his "I like being able to fire people" bit which, if he'd put it as "If you get bad service from a corporation, you should be free to shop around for a better one", might have been a plus for him and saved him a ration of sh-t on the eve of the contest. As it has been said, and I entirely agree, the problem wasn't as much what he said, but that it played right into an established profile: Rich, heartless, and only out for himself. To my mind he said something far worse in his victory speech last night. He accused President Obama of practicing a type of class war of "envy".

Whether you fall in line with Occupy Wall Street or not, you know full well that Americans aren't envious of the top 1%, we just want them to pay their fair share, stop getting bailed out while earning huge bonuses, and to quit screwing the rest of us with under-regulated and unfair business practices. Envy, Mr. Romney? Really? How dare you. (He just said "rhetoric of envy" again on Morning Joe!)

Ron Paul came in second and is taking his "fight for liberty" to the birthplace of session. I'm not sure how he'll play there, and if he continues to intend to skip Florida on January 31st, he'd better grab some delegates in SC.

Jon Huntsman came in third, and I was pulling for the guy to crack 20%--he came in at 17%. I don't think he'll turn many southern heads, but I like his chances in Florida if he makes it that far.

So who will rise in the Old South? Santorum and Gingrich certainly go in with the advantage to pick up any of Romney's renderings, and Rick Perry could come in as high as third. He's working the state pretty hard, and has a head start on the other candidates as far as personal appearances is concerned. He has that I'd-like-to-drink-a-beer-with-you quality that helped W rise to the top of the field in 2000. But I won't get into the weeds of the cautionary tale regarding another Texas governor.

My prediction for SC:  1. Romney, 2. Gingrich (unless the electorate discover that his $ comes from the Las Vegas casino guy, which I hope they do because he's a Scott Walker-type union buster), 3. a tie between Santorum and Perry
My prediction for FL:  1. Romney, 2. a tie between Paul and Huntsman, 4. a tie between Santorum and Gingrich

Then there's Michigan and Arizona. I think it's a shame that we start out with so many currently red states. Skews the process, but I'm not sure what if anything can be done about that. I wonder what it might look like to have a "general election-style" campaigning season with all the caucuses and primaries coming on the same day, or same week. Then again, I'd love it if we could rid ourselves of the Electoral College, too. And have an NCAA football playoff system, and...too bad we already had X-mas.

As it stands now, and with the exception of the Granite State, we let the Midwest and South pick our nominees, and the Texas School Board select our kids' curriculum. Are we sure the North won?