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The New Work Times EXCLUSIVE

Poorly told political fortunes

Frank Bruni
***As for momentum's role in this election cycle, the fabled "big mo " is a seeming no go. Gingrich supposedly had it coming out of South Carolina, long billed as the best bellwether of all the early states, but it was wrested by Santorum after
Colorado, Missouri and Minnesota. It's now Romney's yet again.***
WITH his time served on the trail in 2008 and the money he had going into 2012 and his momentum coming out of Florida, Mitt Romney was supposed to be turning much of his attention to the fall by now, not looking over his shoulder and sweating Ohio. But this presidential race has been all about upended expectations. At the mile marker of Super Tuesday, it's worth pausing to look at how frequently we've erred and how much we've learned.
By "we" I mean not only the news media but also most political analysts. For starters, most of us grossly miscalculated the ardour, the stubbornness, the spleens of a great many conservative voters, who thrilled to Newt Gingrich despite his leaden baggage, swooned for Rick Santorum in all his frigid sanctimony and would not be wooed by Romney, no matter how many dozens of roses he promised.
This was a likelihood that had been staring us in the face, an easy extrapolation from the far right's behaviour during the debt-ceiling showdown last summer. Still we missed it, so certain that a determination to defeat President Obama would cause Republicans to coalesce before this point.
As fortunetellers we stink, and we stink with possible consequences. Because we didn't see Santorum coming, we homed in on his extremism late, so that he was able for a long while to play offense instead of defense and choose his talking points.
Did that help him get this far?
We overestimated the sway of money, factoring it into our glowing predictions for Rick Perry, who burst out of the gate with considerable campaign funds and the hope of much more. His lead was fleeting, his collapse spectacular.
Romney’s financial edge hasn't yet slashed rivals quite as brutally as once envisioned. Santorum plodded through the opening phase of the contest on a shoestring and caught fire before Foster Friess opened his checkbook wide. Even now he's not on a financial par with Romney; nor
are Gingrich and Paul. They linger nonetheless.
To the extent that Santorum and Gingrich have been kept afloat by a crucial baseline of financing, they owe thanks to the dawn of super PACs, a development that was thought to be dangerous to Obama but might, in a roundabout way, wind up helping him. The longer the Republican battle grinds on, the bloodier its combatants become. A new NBC/ Wall Street Journal poll shows that the percentage of voters who view Romney unfavourably now trumps those who view him
favourably by 11 points. Bob Dole, in contrast, had a mere four-point negative spread at this point in 1996. He fared well.
As for momentum's role in this election cycle, the fabled "big mo" is a seeming no go. Gingrich supposedly had it coming out of South Carolina, long billed as the best bellwether of all the early states, but it was wrested by Santorum after Colorado, Missouri and Minnesota. It's now Romney's yet again.
Meantime, the culture wars have resumed — usually something Republicans relish.
But the surreal focus this time is on birth control as opposed to abortion, and conservatives keep overplaying their hands. Rush Limbaugh fished tired epithets from a misogynistic toilet; advertisers proceeded to flush him. (On the environmental front, Lou Dobbs attacked "The Lorax" as a tree-smooching Commie, but the movie is cleaning up at the box office.)
Democrats sense an advantage, and are seizing it with the kind of gusto more commonly associated with Republicans. So aloof and cerebral so much of the time, Obama got
warm and fuzzy with Sandra Fluke, calling her up to say her parents should be proud. Nicely done.
Fluke could be the Joe the Plumber of 2012, drafted by political circumstance into a pitched debate about the rightful role of government and given a symbolic currency she couldn't have foreseen. In the "American Idol” era, the people with the most compelling claim on our attention are those plucked from obscurity.
"American Idol" brings us to Fox, whose anchors during the campaign have also strayed off script. Possibly because they needn't worry about being tagged with liberal bias, probably because tense theater equals good television, they have subjected Republican candidates to some of their toughest questioning.
Bret Baier cornered Romney on his inconstancy. Chris Wallace asked Michele Bachmann: "Are you a flake?"
On Sunday morning he grilled Santorum about having given a much lower percentage of his income to charity than Obama had. He also confronted him with federal statistics that 99% of sexually active American women between the ages 15 and 44 have used artificial birth control.
"All of those women have done something wrong?" he wondered aloud.
I got the sense that he was placing his chips on Romney. And I'll say that's right, though I'm aware in doing so of all the wrong turns to date.
© New York Times. Distributed by the New York Times Syndicate.