Romney leads in Iowa, Paul 2nd, Santorum 3rd
The Des Moines Register poll covered Tuesday through Friday. The results:
Romney 24%
Paul 22%
Santorum 15%
Gingrich 12%
Perry 11%
Bachman 7%
According to the Register: If the final two days of polling are considered separately, Santorum rises to second place, with 21%, pushing Paul to third, at 18%.
Perry spent millions of dollars on media in Iowa and has nothing to show for it. He ran anti-Santorum spots and they only increased Santorum’s percentage. Santorum’s success is almost entirely due to his endorsement by evangelicals. He currently stands fifth in the state, a point behind Gingrick. The three leaders are uncatchable.
Perry has said that he would continue in the race if he comes in as high as fourth in Iowa. He may achieve that, but it won’t be by much.
South Texan says:
Poor Pitiful Perry. The only thing he has going for him in the presidential race now is the money he raised early.
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Blue says:
Way I see it, Iowa right now ends up being important if and only if Romney wins, because it virtually ensures the Republican nomination ends quickly.
The guy who must be KICKING himself right now is Tim Pawlenty. Had he just stayed in the race he surely would have gotten an anti-Romney boomlet.
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More Paul, Paul! says:
Hi Mr. Burka,
I love reading your articles in Texas Monthly, as well as your blog. Lots of good, interesting stuff. Your viewpoint is a huge part of what makes Texas Monthly great, and I enjoy really enjoy your writing.
Can I just ask why more than 50% of your posts of the last month were about Perry? He has no chance of winning the nomination. The only thing he has going for him is whatever’s left in his campaign bank account. And I guess his Bum Steer Award (nice!).
But as you know, there’s another Texan in the Republican primary. He’s been leading Perry in Iowa every day since October 16th, and he’s been leading Perry in national polls since December 1st. (I’m going by the RealClearPolitics averages.) So why aren’t you talking about this other Texan, Ron Paul?
Yes, I know, you made a very grandiose prediction that Perry was going to win the nomination. And yeah, Perry’s been the sitting governor of Texas for way too long. And it appears that you have a teeny-tiny man-crush on the dude. (Just sayin!) But Perry’s out. So how about some coverage of Ron Paul?
And please spare us the “but Ron Paul can’t win” line. Have you seen the polls? He’s pulling in supporters from every party, independents, and even former non-voters. He is the only candidate that is serious about: getting the U.S. out of debt, not catering to Wall Streeters and big corporations, not starting pre-emptive wars we can’t afford (in dollars or lives), not signing new laws that allow Americans to be detained indefinitely without a trial, and so on and so on. Ron Paul is getting traction because he is the only one with a non-status quo opinion on the issues that matter. He is the only candidate that says what he means and means what he says.
Why is Ron Paul’s name on a handful of awful newsletters? I don’t know, and frankly he hasn’t given a good explanation for them. But Barack Obama has Jeremiah Wright (and an enormous amount of terrible policy). Mitt Romney believes in a religion that is nuts, and he has flip-flopped on nearly every issue. And Newt Gingrich is a cheater in too many ways to count.
So how about some balanced blogging on the Texan who’s been leading Perry in the national polls for a month, and who now has double the national poll numbers of Perry? Don’t be bullied by some of the folks who often comment on your blog. These folks are just scared to death of someone who doesn’t look and talk like them and who isn’t bought and paid for. And don’t avoid posting about Ron Paul because your most prolific (and eccentric) commenter is supporting him. Ron Paul has all kinds of supporters, and its time you cover him. And end the Perry-palooza.
Please give us some Paul, Paul!
Sincerely,
A loyal reader
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Robert Morrow Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 2:23 am
I predict that Paul Burka will be doing a 7,000 word piece on Ron Paul and the liberty movement for the February issue of Texas Monthly, on the stands in January.
If so, I say super. It is about time the Texas political class start to digest Ron Paul and more importantly what his *movement* means to politics.
I also predict that the Ron Paulers are absolutely locked and loaded for the Iowa caucuses. I predict a flat out win for Ron Paul in Iowa. Ron Paul is running second with evangelicals in Iowa – I bet you did not know that. His platform is pro-prosperity, anti-war and pro-liberty. And he means it. Paul’s foreign policy is the most important part of his campaign and he would be WISE tokeep hammering this home down the stretch in Iowa and New Hampshire.
Ron Paul is *golden* with independent voters and some Democrats. Any neocons he would lose in a general election are small and Ron Paul is the GOPS’s brightest hope to beat Obama and get the nation back on track.
Santorum is closing strong, but he has no money, nno ground game, too little too late. But a solid 3rd behind Romney and Paul.
Gingrich and Perry – the glue factory is your next campaign visit.
Agreed. So let’s talk about someone relevant: Ron Paul.
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José Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 7:15 am
We can all agree that Rick Perry made a lot of news in this nomination sequence, and there remains a remote possibility that he can regain first tier status as a candidate despite being the Charlie Sheen of politics. Plus he remains the governor of the State of Texas. That’s still worth reporting.
Over the past few decades Ron Paul has run for President multiple times, always with the same message. He has pretty much the same level of support, time after time. That’s not news. His story was amply covered in 2008 campaign. Granted, Paul is doing a bit better in this campaign there is still NO indication that he can break out and get the nomination. As Congressman, Paul has little impact on legislation and he is not running for reelection. His most noted accomplishment in Congress is that he has been the solitary vote more than anyone else. (I think it’s more than all of the other representatives combined.)
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paulburka Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 11:52 am
Why were more than 50% of my posts about Rick Perry? Because he is the governor, and the focus is always going to be on whoever has the bully pulpit. Ron Paul has a lot of interesting insights, but he is not going to be president. Perry’s struggles are more newsworthy than Paul’s efforts to knock off the leaders. I try to use my news judgment about what people want to read.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 1:54 pm
Actually, they are not. Most people of all political stripes are sick of hearing/reading about Rick Perry. Perry is a non-factor/irrelevant and he does not have a prayer of winning. Ron Paul is going to get a lot more votes/delegates than the Oops campaign.
And beyond that, Perry’s chance in a general election are zippo; whereas Ron Paul would have a very legitimate chance in a general – just look at the polling.
And, finally, Ron Paul’s interesting insights including being 100% correct about the debt time bomb blowing up the economy, the Federal Reserve cartel and his anti-war policies are gaining traction.
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Alan Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 2:48 pm
Paul Burka’s blog primarily covers Texas politics – and national events to the extent they affect Texas politics. Ron Paul has always been a marginal figure in Texas politics. His niche appeal is a national phenomenon, and the fact he basically had his district gerrymandered away from him despite being one of the more senior members in our delegation tells you how irrelevant of a figure he is in this state.
He is one of the most honest, principled people in Congress, but the reality is that honesty and principles alone have never taken anyone very far.
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More Paul, Paul! Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 7:09 pm
Well, that’s really a shame Paul. Yes, I know people haven’t listened to Ron Paul in the past. People likened him to Chicken Little running around saying “The sky is falling!” He went on and on about the economic collapse that America was going to face if we didn’t reform our fiscal policies.
But guess what? Turns out his prediction came true. So for the first time, people are listening to his solutions to the fiscal crisis we’re in.
He’s also been a crank about civil liberties, when he strongly opposed the PATRIOT Act. He said it’s a slippery slope that we’re on, with our rights eroding further and further.
And it hasn’t taken our leaders long to keep descending down that slippery slope. In the just the last couple days, Obama signed legislation that allows Americans to be detained indefinitely without a trial. Oh, but he promises he won’t do it. (How sweet of him.) Is Ron Paul again just a kook for opposing this destruction of our rights? I’m amazed that the Dems on this blog don’t see the merits of Ron Paul’s position on this issue, which is aligned with that of the ACLU.
So it appears that daily polls and Perry’s idiocy are more entertaining than talking about the most serious issues our country has faced in a generation or two. I guess in your news judgment, Paul, that’s what people want to read.
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Robert Morrow says:
Doug Wead is a very big reason for Ron Paul’s success nationally and in Iowa. 4 years ago Wead was predicting Ron Paul could win the Iowa straw poll and then the caucuses.
Wead has played a big role in Paul’s outreach to evangelicals and has cast him as a modern day Thomas Jefferson, which of course he is.
For your journalists out there – Doug Wead is a great story for you.
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anita Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 9:16 am
And, of course, for any journalist willing to write a favorable piece on their modern day Thomas Jefferson, you’re entitled to a free water bong from The Gas Pipe or other smoking accessories. Just ask for ‘Stoney’ and give the password “Ron Paul Love Revolution is all bud, no seeds” and they’ll hook you up.
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anita says:
Its been pathetic to watch Perry make his way across Iowa of late and bend long-held positions to whatever his audience wants — no abortion even in cases of rape and incest, english as the ‘official’ language of the US. The rejection he’s found on the trail is not due to his positions — it’s him personally, especially his inability to perform.
As for Ron Paul, the Houston Chronicle appears to have caught him in a lie about his newsletters — an article from 1996 where he admits and defends horrible racially-searing statements about Barbara Jordan, contrasted to today where he claims he didn’t write them — and did not even know of them. So he was either lying then or he’s lying now.
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Governor Toolshed says:
The best work Ron Paul ever did was his interview with Bruno. When you meet a Ron Paul supporter, ask them if they have ever visited Brazoria County. Historical home of slavery in Texas, you still get an uneasy sense that not a lot has changed there. Other than the petrochemical industry, the economy is horrible and the environment is poisoned. Home of fast food joints and Dennis Bonnen.
Ron Paul can’t get elected because he shouldn’t be elected.
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anita Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 9:03 am
Link to Ron Paul caught in a lie regarding his newsletter:
http://blog.chron.com/rickperry/2011/12/in-1996-paul-acknowlegded-bashing-barbara-jordan-in-a-newsletter/
Disgusting.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 10:58 am
Well, Anita, the Barack Obama 2008 campaign was all about racism wasn’t it? Vote for me because I am BLACK; vote for me because I am BLACK; vote for I am because I am BLACK.
And that is exactly what African Americans did all over the country both in the primary and the general election.
And your other racist leaders of the Demo party, the Clintons unsuccessfully tried to play that card, too.
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anita Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 1:09 pm
I don’t believe Barack Obama EVER campaigned on the basis of being Black. In fact, I think it’s been widely viewed as a negative as opposed to a positive — note that only one president in 200+ years has been Black.
You and Dr. Paul seem to have something in common — the inability to see African-Americans and Jewish Americans as full humans. You can’t see past their racial makeup or religious beliefs.
And you’ve skirted the issue at hand — why Dr. Paul is lying about his newsletters and their content. Was he lying then or is he lying now?
JohnBernardBooks Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 3:52 pm
“I don’t believe Barack Obama EVER campaigned on the basis of being Black”
hahaha….
Alan Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 4:24 pm
That is a really pathetic characterization of someone who, whether you agree with his policies or not, did a very good job of being a Candidate Who Happens to be Black rather than a Black Candidate.
I don’t think people who didn’t vote for Obama are racist. I do think it’s interesting that so many white, blue collar Democrats in places like Oklaoma and Tennessee voted for John Kerry in 2004 and then turned around and decided to vote for McCain four years later. It completely flies in the face of the national trend. Someone who thought John Kerry was worth voting for and then jumped on the Palin Train must just not know how to pick winners.
Blue Reply:
January 3rd, 2012 at 12:28 pm
“I don’t believe Barack Obama EVER campaigned on the basis of being Black. ”
Yeah, it had absolutely nothing to do with “change.”
jpt51 says:
Gone in the future will be the deafening silence as the bigger-than-life Gov. Perry walked the halls of the Capitol in the latter part of the legislative session. We now know the man is as pitifully empty of thought as the guy behind the green curtain in the Wizard of Oz.
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Julie says:
Perry has only himself to blame for his failure to mount a successful campaign. His recent comments on abortion and English as the official language show he is willing to say almost anything in an attempt to win votes. That say anything approach is truly pathetic.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 10:59 am
Rick Perry first needs to learn how to speak English himself.
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truth says:
Ron Paul won’t tell the truth about his newsletter. So he isn’t taken seriously. The Republican party poobahs obviously can’t associate with avowed racists like Paul.
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John Johnson Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 6:13 pm
Ron Paul wasn’t taken seriously before the newsletter stuff broke nationally…and he will not be our next President… yet he makes some very good points on several topics, that when objectively analyzed, make sense.
A report was released last Friday that informs that our Fed Reserve has doled out $16 trillion under the table that we didn’t even know about. Heard any real national news about it? Me neither.
Paul was the first one I remember that had the balls to pound on them to open up their books.
I’m for loading up and bringing all the troops home now and using the spies, special forces and drones to get the bad guys. So is Ron P.
Wouldn’t we be better off if we put ourselves in the other guys shoes before we started lobbing grenades? Maybe ask ourselves how we would feel if some government was propping up a slimey, egotistic dictator in our country instead of letting us decide who we wanted? Think we might not like them…might want to do them harm?
With us…it’s all about oil and money. We didn’t go help the oppressed in Ruwanda, Sudan, the Congo and other places because it is not to our strategic advantage to do so. There’s no oil there; theirs no oil transport route that can be disrupted.
Don’t look at Paul; don’t listen to him; just read what he says and promotes. Lot’s of it makes perfect sense.
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Cow Droppings says:
Paul, you really ought to stop practicing politics without a license. Your statement about perry’s radio ads not impacting santorum is amateur inanity. The Perry radio ad was released late wednesday. The poll started Monday and concluded thursday. That means it had one full day to take effect. Radio is a frequency medium. It takes a few days to burn in at the least. In fact, there is probably not enough time for it to have an impact with so much clutter on the airwaves. But for you to declare the ad a failure after it had been up for 24 hours is a tremendous example of your inability to understand the basic blocking and tackling of campaign politics.
Stick to the legislature, where you can write about process and those who violate unwritten rules you hold sacred. Please stop embarrassing yourself with campaign analysis.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 8:09 pm
Cow Droppings, do you ever look across the table at Rick Perry and say Robert Morrow and Glen Maxey were the ones telling the truth… but you and Anita were the ones lying to everyone?
One of the basic blocking and tackling fundamentals of the Bible is to tell the truth.
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anita says:
Why is Ron Paul lying? Why won’t he simply own up to his treatment of Barbara Jordan?
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Robert Morrow Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 9:40 pm
Yes, Ron Paul is lying about not knowing who wrote what in his newsletters. I condemn that.
But it is perfectly ok to call Barbara Jordan a 1/2 educated victimologist.
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John Johnson Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 10:54 pm
Anita, I certainly defend your right to call Ron Paul a liar, but how did you react when the opposition was calling Bill Clinton a liar? Can you condemn lying across the board or is it all selective with you? It would appear from months of viewing your posts that it is the later. Do you ever take a middle position?
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anita says:
I’m a Texan and I value integrity. I’d have a serious problem supporting a liar with a vote for the highest political office in the land.
Mr. Morrow’s admission above — that he believes Ron Paul to be a liar — is significant as to how he values integrity (not much, clearly). I’d also seriously question the judgment of someone calling Barbara Jordan “a one-half educated victimologist”. That’s a ridiculous statement for anyone to make, especially someone seeking to be POTUS.
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John Johnson Reply:
January 2nd, 2012 at 9:45 am
Anita…like so many involved in the poltical process, you did not answer my question. Is this defense mechanism a natural trait in some, or is it a learned behavior?
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anita Reply:
January 2nd, 2012 at 8:17 pm
I believe that I clearly condemned lying across the board. I’ll pass on assessing the integrity of every presidential candidate since the founding of the republic. There seems to be broad agreement that Dr. Paul is now lying — so that’s where my focus will be. You’re more than welcome to try to argue that he’s not lying, but his own words seem to hang him.
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Bodhisattva Reply:
January 2nd, 2012 at 9:54 am
I’d love to see Barbara Jordan and Robert Morrow in a duel of wits. From what I’ve seen of his comments, Mr. Morrow would come out on the very short end of that. Of course, he could resort to smears and name-calling.
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Robert Morrow says:
Oh, Anita probably had NOTHING to say about all the lies that Bill and Hillary Clinton tell and have told. Now those are Olympian liars, even the Demos admit that.
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anita says:
If that were the case, Robert, I’d be the moral equivalent of you. Give that some thought.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
January 3rd, 2012 at 12:11 am
I have already condemned Ron Paul for lying about not knowing who wrote his politically incorrect newsletters. I don’t have much of a problem with the content of them.
And I did this several Burka posts ago.
All in all, it seems pretty minor to me, and you folks are pushing on a string on this issue.
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