Super Tuesday Results thread

[BobLibDem]

I'm starting to doubt that the last 28% is going to erase a 14,000 vote deficit racked up in the first 72% of the vote. Santorum just might pull this out.

[kunilou]

Originally Posted by waterj2

Talking Points Memo just reported (sorry, don't have the link handy) that updated exit polling has the race as a dead heat. The previous batch of exit polls at 8PM had Santorum up by 1 point.

Luke Russert at NBC said they have various projections that have either Romney or Santorum winning Ohio by less than 1%.

Russert also pointed out that Santorum doesn't have a complete delegate slate in every Congressional district in Ohio, so he could conceivably win the popular vote but Romney could end up with more delegates.

[Onomatopoeia]

With 75% reporting in Ohio

Santorum 324,777 38%
Romney 312,670 37%
Gingrich 125,388 15%
Paul 79,941 9%

[Parthol]

Originally Posted by BobLibDem

I'm starting to doubt that the last 28% is going to erase a 14,000 vote deficit racked up in the first 72% of the vote. Santorum just might pull this out.

Here's why I think it could happen:

- the current results show Cuyahoga reporting 41% of votes in, and Romney up by 7,000 votes. If the rest of the county goes the way of the first 41%, Romney will make up about 8,000 votes.

- the current results show Hamilton reporting 46% of votes, and Romney up by 4200 votes. If the rest of the county goes the way of the first 46%, Romney will make up about 4500 votes.

- together, then, when those two counties finish reporting, it's not unreasonable to think that Romney will have made up about 12k of his current 15k deficit.

Not that either result would surprise me at this point.

[Northern Piper]

Originally Posted by BobLibDem

I'm starting to doubt that the last 28% is going to erase a 14,000 vote deficit racked up in the first 72% of the vote. Santorum just might pull this out.

That's what it's starting to look like - I think Santorum has run Mittens out of stones.

[Wesley Clark]

Well crap with 78% reporting Romney has narrowed the race to 7k votes.

[BobLibDem]

Mitt has made up much of the deficit now- looks like it'll be a late night.

[Onomatopoeia]

Here comes Romney

With 78% reporting in Ohio

Santorum 336,052 38%
Romney 329,196 37%
Gingrich 130,124 15%
Paul 82,766 9%

[Happy Lendervedder]

Chuck Todd just threw out that there's a decent chance there will be a recount in OH.

[Onomatopoeia]

Here comes Romney

With 81% reporting in Ohio

Santorum 347,897 38%
Romney 341,880 37%
Gingrich 134,066 15%
Paul 86,083 9%

[Onomatopoeia]

With 12% reporting in Idaho, Romney retains a sizable lead. I predict Romney will win Idaho.

[waterj2]

Any idea if the newer votes are getting through the Cuyahoga and Hamilton backlog?

[Ennui]

Perfect potential result, Santorum wins the popular vote but Romney gains a greater number of delegates. There are three Congressional districts in Ohio where Santorum is not eligible to receive delegates. So of Ohio's 66 delegates 9 of them can not go to Rick.

CNN reporting the lead being 2,500 for Santorum atm.

[Onomatopoeia]

Santorum's barely holding on to his lead

With 84% reporting in Ohio

Santorum 358,742 38%
Romney 356,172 37%
Gingrich 141,280 15%
Paul 89,025 9%

[DSeid]

In terms of delegates the night is Romney's, win or lose Ohio ... even a narrow loss in ohio would still likely give him more delegates there.

A Santorum win in Ohio could still leave Romney gaining more delegates. That's because Santorum's campaign - understaffed even before he caught fire nationally - did not file a full slate of delegates in nine of the state's 16 congressional districts. The majority of Ohio's GOP delegates are awarded by district.

[galen ubal]

Google and the AP have clubbed together on an electoral map of the primaries - gives current results and past, along with a delegate count.

[kunilou]

Originally Posted by waterj2

Any idea if the newer votes are getting through the Cuyahoga and Hamilton backlog?

Chuck Todd said it's unlikely they'll have all the results in before 6:00 a.m.

[Onomatopoeia]

Santorum's holding on for dear life in Ohio

With 86% reporting

Santorum 366,013 38%
Romney 363,527 37%
Gingrich 143,204 15%
Paul 90,456 9%

[Flyer]

Originally Posted by Onomatopoeia

Romney will probably win Ohio, but it's going to be close.

Originally Posted by appleciders

Santorum is doing much better in Ohio than I thought. I figured Mitt had gained enough momentum to pull it out in the last few days, but maybe not. 31% reporting there, and Santorum has a lead of 10,000 votes; about 3%. Damn, but Romney may not be able to credibly claim a mandate tonight.

Originally Posted by Parthol

I'm still in agreement with this. Even with 53% of the vote in, the projected remainder of Hamilton county alone wipes out the entirety of Santorum's lead, and then some.

That said, it'll still be fairly close, which is kind of embarrassing for someone with Romney's monetary advantage.

Edit: if course, as soon as I typed that, they updated the county-by-county tally, and Romney's Hamilton advantage has shrunk. Still, Cuyahoga rates to net Romney about 8000 votes, and Hamilton now another 5000, and Santorum's lead is less than those 13,000.

One interesting thing about this cycle is that Santorum has consistently outperformed his polls.

Also, he's been the beneficiary of good timing more than once--Romney has lost or begun to lose a bounce from previous wins or good publicity just as election day came around.

[Kozmik]

Originally Posted by IceQube

I was hoping to see Gingrich come back. His resurgence should shake the field up a little bit and provide for some interesting soundbites .

He did win Georgia.

[appleciders]

Looks like Romney's ahead in Ohio.

[Airman Doors, USAF]

Originally Posted by Little Nemo

I hadn't realized that only Romney and Paul were on the ballot in Virginia. Seems surprising Gingrich and Santorum didn't make the effort to run in that state. I understand it's a tough state to qualify in but if Paul could do it, you'd think Gingrich and Santorum could also. And Gingrich's base is in the south; he shouldn't have conceded those delegates.

And Virginia has another interesting policy. It's a proportional state, which means that Gingrich and Santorum could have received delegates even if Romney won. But if any candidate wins a majority in Virginia then it becomes a winner-take-all state. So by making it a two man race, they pretty much guaranteed Romney would receive all the Virginia delegates.

I'm surprised that Santorum didn't try in Virginia, either. After all, when he was Pennsylvania's Senator he was living in Virginia. You would think that he'd get the Favorite Son votes.

[Onomatopoeia]

Romney just took the lead in Ohio

With 86% reporting

Romney 390,810 37%
Santorum 388,973 37%
Gingrich 153,793 15%
Paul 96,669 9%

[Onomatopoeia]

And it looks like Romney is pulling away.

With 86% reporting in Ohio

Romney 401,744 38%
Santorum 395,808 37%
Gingrich 156,437 15%
Paul 98,609 9% 37%

Oh well. It was fun while it lasted.

[Happy Lendervedder]

Politico has Romney up by over 6,000-- 0.5%. It's not looking good for the fans of froth.

[waterj2]

Ooooh. Tightening a little:
Romney 411,605
Santorum 407,798

[Ennui]

So, if you held the purse strings of a Romney superpac, would you find a way to funnel cash into Gingrich's campaign? After all odds are probably good that if Newt dropped out slightly more than half of his voters would go to Santorum. I think it's safe to say that if Newt weren't running Romney would have lost Ohio.

[Onomatopoeia]

I don't see how Santorum makes up a 5.5K deficit at this stage of the game.

With 90% reporting in Ohio

Romney 420,112 38%
Santorum 414,748 37%
Gingrich 163,127 15%
Paul 103,140 9% 37%

[Onomatopoeia]

Duplicate post. Weird.

[Frank]

Originally Posted by Kozmik

He did win Georgia.

He finished third or fourth in every other state tonight. He can't win with just the south, and he's not even getting all of that. He won South Carolina but lost resoundingly in Florida and Tennessee.

[Frank]

Originally Posted by Airman Doors, USAF

I'm surprised that Santorum didn't try in Virginia, either.

He did. In both his case and Gingrich's, they failed to submit enough valid signatures to get on the ballot.

[Frank]

I'm going to call Ohio for Romney. The only large groups of votes still out are in Cuyahoga and Montgomery counties, both of which are healthily going for Romney.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by Onomatopoeia

Gingrich and Santorum missed the filing deadline by not having the required number of verifiable ballot signatures.

I understand in the technical sense how it happened. I just don't understand why Gingrich and Santorum didn't devote the resources to preventing it. Sure they have limited resources but so does Paul and he managed it.

And Virginia has its weird split delegate assignment, which makes it important to run a multi-candidate race. Let's say that Gingrich had gotten on the ballot with Romney and Paul. And let's say that Romney got 40% of the vote and Gingrich and Paul each got 30% (a 19-15-15 delegate split). Romney would have still won but by keeping him below 50% the others would have denied him the full slate of 49 delegates.

[Absolute]

Originally Posted by Little Nemo

I understand in the technical sense how it happened. I just don't understand why Gingrich and Santorum didn't devote the resources to preventing it. Sure they have limited resources but so does Paul and he managed it.

I'll stop short of calling them incompetent, but it is incontrovertible proof that they suck at managing their campaigns.

[Onomatopoeia]

Idaho was called for Romney.

[Onomatopoeia]

Santorum is 7K in the hole in Ohio with 93% reporting. Like Frank, I'm going to say it's over and call it for Romney.

[Martin Hyde]

Originally Posted by Absolute

I'll stop short of calling them incompetent, but it is incontrovertible proof that they suck at managing their campaigns.

A big part of it is that believe it or not Romney has by far the most professionally ran campaign. The reason I've always thought the repeated "not-Romney" cycle from Bachman, Perry, Gingrich, Cain, Gingrich, Santorum (I forget anyone who had a run at it seriously?) would peter out is because all of them were basically relying on this idea that some moment of fame would bring in enough money that they'd be able to compete nationwide on the fly.

It's not an impossible feat, but Romney's campaign was essentially working nationwide from day one, and didn't need all the circus act stuff to make it that far because he had deep enough support on a national level.

That being sad it's a sad indictment of the current crop of candidates that Romney really is the best candidate organizationally and even on electability.

In truth though if I were a prominent GOP politician I probably wouldn't have ran against a Democratic incumbent President (let alone Barack Obama who has a strong organization) unless the country was in total cluster fuck Jimmy Carter mode (we may have been there early on in Obama's first term but most people were willing to ascribe it to Bush back then, and things are on the up now.) So it makes sense we have the real dregs.

To me the only interesting thing out of this year's election cycle is what sort of direction the GOP collectively decides to head in after losing the general.

[Onomatopoeia]

Originally Posted by Martin Hyde

To me the only interesting thing out of this year's election cycle is what sort of direction the GOP collectively decides to head in after losing the general.

If Romney's the nominee, which I believe will be the case, then the Republicans will double-down on the crazy, shrieking that Romney lost because he wasn't a real conservative.

[Kolak of Twilo]

MSNBC just called Ohio for Romney.

[Lantern]

A fairly lucky escape for Romney in Ohio which it looks like he will win by a point. It wouldn't have mattered much in terms of delegates but even a small loss in Ohio would have been terrible optics. And Ohio is perhaps the last state where optics matter much; i.e. there is a big difference between a one point loss and a one point win regardless of the delegates. From now on the focus is increasingly going to be on the delegate count.

[kaylasdad99]

Originally Posted by Martin Hyde

A big part of it is that believe it or not Romney has by far the most professionally ran campaign. The reason I've always thought the repeated "not-Romney" cycle from Bachman, Perry, Gingrich, Cain, Gingrich, Santorum (I forget anyone who had a run at it seriously?) would peter out is because all of them were basically relying on this idea that some moment of fame would bring in enough money that they'd be able to compete nationwide on the fly.

That's okay. I'm all right with Barack Obama being a successful Not-Romney come November.

[waterj2]

I'm hearing that Dennis Kucinich lost his primary race against Marcy Kaptur.

[Kolak of Twilo]

Originally Posted by waterj2

I'm hearing that Dennis Kucinich lost his primary race against Marcy Kaptur.

Yep. You know who it looks like her opponent will be in November don't you?

SPOILER:

Joe the Plumber.

Seriously.

[Lantern]

The basic fact of this race seems to be that Romney can grind out a win in any state that really matters. He has done it thrice in a row now; Florida, Michigan and Ohio. A loss in any of these states would have been a major setback. In each one he was behind but orchestrated a systematic demolition job using attack ads, surrogates and his superior ground game. He crushed Newt in Florida but Santorum did hold his own in Michigan and Ohio. The latter is proving a lot tougher than the other contenders that Romney has disposed of. I think he could become a real threat but only if Newt drops out soon and throws his support to Santorum. Newt's ego is probably too big for that but OTOH he does seem to loathe Romney...

[Ennui]

Originally Posted by waterj2

I'm hearing that Dennis Kucinich lost his primary race against Marcy Kaptur.

Yea, in an amazing job of gerrymandering Ohio Republicans combined Marcy and Dennis's districts with only a 100 mile long corridor between Toledo and Cleveland. Honestly, I don't feel too bad for Dennis. While he was making his presidential runs Marcy was serving her constituents. I would have gladly voted for either of them in the general but speaking as someone from Dennis's old district, I voted for Kaptur.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by Absolute

I'll stop short of calling them incompetent, but it is incontrovertible proof that they suck at managing their campaigns.

We're not talking Donald Trump and Herman Cain. Gingrich and Santorum know how to win elections. So I'm surprised they dropped the ball on this one.

[Measure for Measure]

Originally Posted by Martin Hyde

In truth though if I were a prominent GOP politician I probably wouldn't have ran against a Democratic incumbent President (let alone Barack Obama who has a strong organization) unless the country was in total cluster fuck Jimmy Carter mode (we may have been there early on in Obama's first term but most people were willing to ascribe it to Bush back then, and things are on the up now.) So it makes sense we have the real dregs.

No. Intrade currently gives Obama a 60% chance of victory, up from the high 40s in September and October. Moreover, if the economy seizes up, the Republican wins. Last fall, it appeared that Europe would continue with austerity indefinitely. Lately though they've rediscovered textbook economics, so we have probably dodged that bullet. But oil prices could spike following military action in Iran this Spring. Or the recovery could merely peter out: state and local governments are expected to continue to slash spending for example.

Obama could still win big -- we have a lot of excess capacity so the economy could roar as well. But as of a year ago, it was certainly reasonable for an ambitious Republican politician to challenge Obama.

No, the reason why the dregs are running is structural: to garner Republican support in a primary you either have to be crazy or simulate a crazy. Romney is a simulator. Huntsman tried without success to run as a neurotypical and never received even the smallest bump in national polling. The problem with acting crazy is that serious people usually find it demeaning and even when they don't, they have trouble doing it well. Romney will say anything to get elected and it shows. So would Gingrich, but few can demagogue as well as he can. So we are left with reality show contestants, fringe candidates and unconvincing serial fabricators like Mitt Romney.
--------------

I noticed Ron Paul got 40.5% in the two-way Virginia contest. Romney got 59.5. That's interesting, because Paul has in the past faced a ceiling of 25%, while Romney has had trouble climbing above 50%. I think Paul's accomplishment is more noteworthy, as he beat the baseline by 15.5 points to Romney's 9.5 points. Nonetheless, the party establishment has cooked the rules fairly effectively: Romney will collect 43 Virginia delegates to Ron Paul's 3. More generally all but one of the remaining large statewide winner-take-all contests -Maryland, Wisconsin, California, New Jersey and Utah- are friendly territory for the Massachusetts twister. And I certainly wouldn't call Wisconsin hostile. So methinks the fix is in place.

[Lord Feldon]

Well, the educated and literate loser won the Democratic primary for my new congressional district. I was afraid it would be the (seemingly) marginally-literate loser. At least the one I picked will lose with dignity. And the Walmart in the neighboring town had its proposal to sell wine on Sunday rejected; I've never seen that happen before. Also, a lunatic got the Republican nomination for the board of commissioners. I'm hoping he's lunatic enough that the other guy will win. (He won't, because the voters in this county are also lunatics, but I can dream.)

[Martin Hyde]

Originally Posted by Measure for Measure

No. Intrade currently gives Obama a 60% chance of victory, up from the high 40s in September and October. Moreover, if the economy seizes up, the Republican wins. Last fall, it appeared that Europe would continue with austerity indefinitely. Lately though they've rediscovered textbook economics, so we have probably dodged that bullet. But oil prices could spike following military action in Iran this Spring. Or the recovery could merely peter out: state and local governments are expected to continue to slash spending for example.

There's been a few threads now where you cite things like intrade as though you have some sort of absolute factual basis for making election analysis. That just isn't how it works, and I'm not terribly interested in arguments along those lines.

I think your structural analysis is deeply flawed. The GOP electorate isn't dramatically different than it was in 2000, 2004, 2008. In 2000/2004 we nominated a candidate who won, and in 2008 we nominated a candidate who did the expected right ward shift he had to do in order to get nominated but he wasn't a dreg of a candidate. McCain was leading in the polls and then the economy turned sour and people blamed the Republicans.

You can't deterministically ascribe absolute causes to election outcomes based on studies of trends that follow the election results. That's a fine way to develop actuarial type predictors but it isn't actually how you explain real election results in real time.

[Martin Hyde]

Originally Posted by Measure for Measure

I noticed Ron Paul got 40.5% in the two-way Virginia contest. Romney got 59.5. That's interesting, because Paul has in the past faced a ceiling of 25%, while Romney has had trouble climbing above 50%. I think Paul's accomplishment is more noteworthy, as he beat the baseline by 15.5 points to Romney's 9.5 points. Nonetheless, the party establishment has cooked the rules fairly effectively: Romney will collect 43 Virginia delegates to Ron Paul's 3. More generally all but one of the remaining large statewide winner-take-all contests -Maryland, Wisconsin, California, New Jersey and Utah- are friendly territory for the Massachusetts twister. And I certainly wouldn't call Wisconsin hostile. So methinks the fix is in place.

Each State is different, so variation from baseline isn't terribly interesting. There were different realities at play in Virginia than anywhere else. For one, of the major candidates only Romney was on the ballot there.

The "fix is in place" is ludicrous, the rules were adopted long before anyone knew who would be in position to take advantage of them and they were designed to make it harder and harder for anyone to come from behind as the race progressed. This is by design to minimize the length in which the nomination is competitive.