Sunshine State Recap: Mitt Wins and Loses

At least it was quick and fairly painless. Not for Newt, but for the rest of us who need to move on to something important like Friday's jobs numbers or the Super Bowl. The bad news was the negative tone of both the debates and the ads that Romney and Gingrich ran.

How'd I do? Again, not bad.

               Prediction       Actual
Romney    43%              46.4%
Gingrich    31%              31.9%
Santorum  14%              13.4%
Paul          11%                7.0%

I thought Paul would do better, but at this point we're beyond the possible phase of the race and have entered the Nomination Zone. Boutique candidates need not apply.

The other issue is this continued talk of the motivated Republican voter. Florida GOP officials had said that they were looking for north of 2 million primary voters, and it looks a s though they fell a bit short. So much for the enthusiasm gap. Democrats are becoming more energized and could match Republican participation in the fall.

Newt says he's staying in the race. We'll see. Will conservatives flock to Santorum as the conservative du jour? I'm thinking not. Mitt is in a commanding position and will be the nominee. The rest of the campaign will measure how much he's been damaged by the infighting and how much that will affect his chances against Obama.

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