Unlike last time, I won’t be creating a mega-link post. My head is still spinning from an ugly head cold (no, Drinking Right didn’t have anything to do with it; in fact, I attribute the fact that I’m still standing to the 3 Heinekens I had last night), so somebody else can do the collation and get the glory. Before I get to my view from the bunker, however, I do want to point you in the direction of a pro, Brian Fraley. He’s been at this for a while, and more importantly from an objectivity standpoint, his company, The Markesian Group, doesn’t yet have a dog in this fight (attention, your attention please; those campaigns that think they’ll survive until February 19th ought to be considering hiring them to do at least the Wisconsin portion of their campaign). His point; politics is not “Survivor”.
Now, on to my view. In what is a bit of a switch, I’ll take the Republicans first, because there are fewer surprises here. First things first; can we please retire the myth that New Hampshire is a small-government state? True, Fred Thompson kissed off NH, but Ron Paul (who, whatever fatal faults he has, is a no-government type) supposedly burned a lot of his gold there. Their combined NH totals – 9% (I don’t have who all was involved in the 2% write-in totals).
Sticking with Paul, I once again overestimated the Paul-Nut factor. Can it be that his mile-deep support is but an inch wide, or is it that a lot of that “support” is actually coming from the other end of the aisle?
Similarily, I underestimated the support for Mike Huckabee. I am sticking with my earlier assertion that NH is not Evangelical-friendly, though I have to admit I underestimated the effect of the Iowa bounce.
Now, onto the Democrats. How did everybody get this one so wrong? I guess everybody, me included, got wrapped up in Obamamania, and New Hampshire women decided to give us a snow job after Hillary Clinton’s play of the crying card. I guess that old saying has truth – Hell hath no fury like wymyn scorned.
Regarding John Edwards, I believe Marcellus Wallace said it best: “You came close, but you never made it. And if you were gonna make it, you would have made it before now.”
