The guy can practically barnstorm the state at will every weekend from his place in Boston and never mind fifty percent, he can't even break forty? Seriously? This should be Romney and "Ah, Your Majesty, there is no second place" and it's not.

I can't stand Romney. He's too shiny. I have lived in New Hampshire for 13 years. This poll doesn't mean much - New Hampshirites are cagey, contrarian, taciturn and unlikely to tell you what they really think. Also, they take a long time to shop around before they make up their minds.

But you just know that there's a huge man-crush on Romney from the GOP elite. Have you ever witnessed a man-crush in the corporate world? It's a wonder to behold as otherwise reasonable men go ape over someone onto whom they can project their eluded dreams.

Time to declare the Republican Party a damaged brand, much as they wish to do to Palin. They are damaged and they are confused if they think we will give them our vote "just because."

Once'd uponnatime, Romney the Rino built his house out of straw poll, and then Sarah, She Wolf of the SS came and blowed it AWWWWW DOWN!

Joan, we just gave the GOP elite the boot and elected tea partier Jack Kimball as NH Republican party chairman. Kimball rose to prominence right up Route 1 from where I live, by putting up taunting, not-politically-correct, anti-Obama messages on the sign in front of his business, Great Bay Facility Maintenance.

If punditry follows the historical formula, I think we'll see a Republican National Convention that ends somewhere darker than the last scene of "Unforgiven". When the currently unknown now but by then victorious Big "C" conservative candidate (abhorrent to the elite RINO caste and terrifying to the Legacy Media) takes the stage, he or she will begin by naming the names of the Old Guard who need to go before the Party is ready to return to being grand...

It is a time for great people to stand up.

The time left that even great people can stem the disaster is dwindling. Put me down for "too late".

But I've been wrong before. Pray, let me be wrong this time.

I would like to create a Frankenstein monster Obama-challenger out of Sarah Palin, Chris Christie (dig his youtube teacher-union smackdowns), budget geekboy Paul Ryan, supergov Mitch Daniels, soon-to-be-5-star-general Petraeus (best last name), and, who?? I think there's someone out there.

The new guv of South Carolina, Nikki Haley seems to be sprouting up some brave and sturdy shoots, Amy.

Good! There shouldn't be just One, but many.

"Instead, the current rise is exclusively a direct result of three interrelated phenomena: 1) the tragic January 8, 2011, Tucson shootings; 2) the hysterical left-wing scapegoating of everyone from the Tea Party to Sarah Palin for the violence; and 3) the sudden emergence of a sober and judicious Mandela-like Obama, quite admirably calling for calm on all sides — while suggesting simultaneously that the horrific killings had no connection with the right wing, but also that the horrific killings offer an appropriate moment to reconsider all political zealotry in general."

http://pajamasmedia.com/victordavishanson/obamas-mandela-moment/

If VDH is right, and he usually is, this will be forgotten before the Cherry Blossoms bloom.

Obama will be formidable in 2012 as long as there is no third party candidate on the left, which is unlikely. A third party candidate splitting the anti-Obama vote is much more likely.

The same institutional forces that supported him in 2008 (unions, universities, mainstream media and entertainment, the Left, blacks, and the 40% or so who always vote Democratic) will be behind him. All of the advantages of incumbency will be with him. There won't be a Ross Perot or John Anderson to split the vote.

The Republicans will have one chance only, and they have to reconcile the enthusiasts for people just like them who say the things they like to hear, with the need to get someone who can actually govern.

Oh yeah, the real issues are likely to be foreign policy and national security, all the while the Republican base is obsessing over the relatively minor differences the candidates have over close-to-home domestic policy. So the process and the public are not aligned for guaranteed success for whoever gains the nomination. If anything, the odds against are steep and growing steeper.

I don't care if his numbers are up. I want to hear that his TIME is up.