America’s Political Sage Sums Up The Debate

Late last night, Michael Barone posted an article at the Washington Examiner analyzing the night’s debate in New Hampshire. Michael Barone is the main author of The Almanac of American Politics, which is published every two years. He a very knowledgeable political observer and very accurate predictor of future political events.

Mr. Barone states in the article:

At about 10:28pm tonight, as Mitt Romney pivoted from a question on tax loopholes and started in with, “the real issue is vision,” I had recorded this thought in my notes, “He just clinched the nomination.”

Romney said, as he often has, that Barack Obama has put America on the road to decline and is trying to make America more like Europe. He made reference to the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, as he often has—which helps to explain why he polls about as well with supporters of the tea party movement, who revered and often reference the Founding documents, as with non-supporters—and proclaimed that the question in this election was whether America was going to remain “a unique nation”and whether it would “return to the principles on which it was founded.” To which Newt Gingrich then meekly concurred, adding some caveats.

The article goes on to detail the performance of each of the candidates in the debate. According to Mr. Barone, Mitt Romney moved forward in the debate, and Rick Perry positioned himself for the race in South Carolina. The other candidates pretty much stayed where they were before the debate.

I live in Massachusetts. I lived here when Mitt Romney was Governor. He did a good job considering the legislature he had to work with. I think Romneycare would have been a lot worse without Romney as Governor. I could easily vote for him in the 2012 election, although frankly he is not my first choice. I think his success in running against Barack Obama will largely depend on his choice of a running mate. There are a lot of very good options for him out there.

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