Has Mitt Romney Been Vetted?

Romney

A few weeks ago, we explored the question of why so many candidates went boom and bust during the primary season. The answer was that voters assumed new candidates had some degree of conservatism and electability, but once they were vetted, voters learned otherwise. Mitt Romney, whom some have dubbed "the last not-Romney," is on the rise. What happens when Romney is vetted?

Although many opponents of Romney demanded to know why Romney wasn't being vetted like the other candidates were, the reality is that Romney was the only candidate who already had been vetted. The key test in determining whether a candidate has been vetted is if the average voter is already aware of the candidate's weaknesses. Even before the primary season began, voters were quite familiar with Romney's vulnerabilities.

A good contrast would be the difference in the way voters perceived Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney in early December, when Newtmania was at its peak. The conservative credentials of both Gingrich and Romney are suspect because each has flip-flopped on various issues. Gingrich was even an early supporter of the individual mandate for healthcare. But at the time, the average voter only knew about Romney's flip-flops, not Gingrich's. Until the barrage of attacks was unleashed against Gingrich, voters assumed he was a pure, Tea Party conservative. When voters learned the truth, Gingrich's numbers took a nosedive. Gingrich (or other candidates) couldn't do the same thing to Romney that he had done to Gingrich, because voters already knew the truth about Romney. In other words, Romney had already been vetted.

That doesn't mean attacks against Romney are completely ineffective. He can still lose support in response to a good negative ad, and he can still be forced into an awkward situation in a challenging debate. But it does mean that Romney's numbers are more likely to be stable--just as Romney's opponents, having now been vetted, are not likely to crash a second time.

It is interesting to note that Romney's opponents, particularly Gingrich and Perry, have now begun focusing their attacks on Romney's tenure at Bain Capital. Perhaps the most fascinating part is what they're not doing: They're not focusing the attacks on Romney's flip-flops or Romneycare. Why not attack Romney's Achilles' heel(s)? Romney's opponents may have come to the realization that they're not going to take Romney down by repeatedly saying what voters already know. If so, it's a tacit admission that Romney was already vetted and survived.

As for the Bain Capital line of attack, it's something of a desperate move. Until recently, Romney's opponents gave Bain little attention. During the September debates when Rick Perry squared off against Romney, Perry attacked Romney on many things, but not on Bain. Indeed, during one debate Perry even conceded that Romney created many jobs at Bain, but simply argued that his own job-creation record as governor of Texas was more impressive and relevant. In addition, Romney was attacked in a lot of different ways during the 2008 presidential primary, but his opponents pretty much left Bain alone.

If Romney's opponents in the 2008 and 2012 primaries didn't see fit to bring up Bain, it's probably because they judged it would be a weak attack. Those who criticize Bain (especially Gingrich) have already received backlash from conservatives--including some, like Rush Limbaugh, who do not favor Romney. Many conservatives feel that the attacks against Bain resemble attacks against capitalism from the left. The direction of an attack can be important. Recall that during the September debates, Perry lost a lot of his Tea Party support when he said that it was heartless to oppose in-state tuition to illegal immigrants. If a candidate sounds like he's coming from the left, the right turns off. That's a poor strategy for those opposing Romney, since the Anti-Romney voters are the ones who think Romney isn't far right enough.

Romney Wins New Hampshire; Rivals Split Vote

Mitt Romney won the New Hampshire Primary on Tuesday, a result which should come as no surprise. With 81% reporting, Romney won with 38%. Ron Paul came second, losing by about 15 points. Romney's margin of victory, though large, was less than many polls had suggested it could have been. The more important story is how Romney's main rivals for the nomination--Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum--will be weakened by the result. The following is the result, as of this posting, and an analysis of how the result will influence the race going forward:

New Hampshire Primary (81% reporting)
Romney -- 38%
Paul -- 23%
Huntsman -- 17%
Gingrich -- 10%
Santorum -- 10%
Perry -- 1%

Yesterday, Elephant Watcher predicted that if Romney finished in the 30s, it would be treated as an underwhelming victory, particularly if second-place was not far behind. After all, winning by 15 points is not a great performance when so many polls had indicated a win by 20 points or more. Some pundits will claim the result shows weakness on Romney's part, offering some version of "This is one of Romney's best states, he's been campaigning here all year (or for the past five years) and only beat his 2008 performance by a handful of points. Romney can't close the deal. He is a weak frontrunner. The voters want this thing to continue." Other pundits will also remark on Jon Huntsman's third-place finish, speculating on whether he can be yet another candidate to surge.

Although it's true that Romney would have preferred a bigger margin of victory, it's important to view the race in its proper context: Romney isn't running against himself or his poll numbers; he's running against Gingrich and Santorum.

From that perspective, Romney had a very good result. Romney's biggest fear is that either Gingrich or Santorum will beat the other convincingly, become the chief Anti-Romney, and coalesce all of the Anti-Romney vote. Therefore, Romney's best scenario was for Gingrich and Santorum to finish well behind himself, and as close to each other as possible. Gingrich and Santorum would then continue to split the Anti-Romney vote. New Hampshire voters gave Romney his wish: Gingrich and Santorum virtually tied at 10% each, an embarrassing and ambiguous finish.

What about Paul and Huntsman? Neither man has a chance of winning the nomination. Paul is viewed by most Republicans as a "kook." Huntsman, who finished barely high enough to justify remaining in the race, entered the race by making the unspeakably poor decision of running to the left of Romney. He will be unable to play an Anti-Romney role, because the Anti-Romney vote is comprised of people who think Romney is too far to the left, not too far to the right. Thus, Paul and Huntsman served only to diminish Gingrich and Santorum more.

Now the race moves to South Carolina. The contests in Iowa and New Hampshire have done nothing to clarify the Anti-Romney situation. Rather than providing Romney with one strong opponent, he has two evenly-matched opponents who weaken each other. Romney's campaign has been professional and disciplined. More important, he continues to be lucky.

New Hampshire Primary Tomorrow

Voters in New Hampshire will head to the polls on Tuesday for the New Hampshire Primary. The winner of the contest isn't in doubt: Mitt Romney has taken first place in every one of the dozens of New Hampshire polls conducted over the past year--most of the time by a sizable margin. The second-place candidate has alternated as various candidates went boom and bust, but Romney has consistently polled in the mid 30s to lower 40s. The question is who will take second, third, and fourth in the primary. The polls are unclear, with several candidates bunched together:

New Hampshire Primary
01/08 WMUR/UNH -- Romney 41, Paul 17, Huntsman 11, Santorum 11
01/08 PPP (D) -- Romney 35, Paul 18, Huntsman 16, Gingrich 12
01/07 Suffolk/7News -- Romney 35, Paul 20, Huntsman 11, Gingrich 9
01/07 ARG -- Romney 40, Huntsman 17, Paul 16, Santorum 12
01/05 NBC/Marist -- Romney 42, Paul 22, Santorum 13, Huntsman 9
01/05 Rasmussen -- Romney 42, Paul 18, Santorum 13, Huntsman 12
01/05 WMUR/UNH -- Romney 44, Paul 20, Santorum 8, Gingrich 8
01/04 Wash Times -- Romney 38, Paul 24, Santorum 11, Gingrich 9
01/04 Suffolk/7News -- Romney 41, Paul 18, Santorum 8, Gingrich 7

Ron Paul is in second in most polls. As in Iowa, he's polling in the upper 10s and low 20s. As expected, Rick Santorum got a bounce out of Iowa, but he has been unable to capitalize on that to get clear of Newt Gingrich, who is about tied with him in the polls. Jon Huntsman seems to be in about the same position as Santorum and Gingrich, though the PPP and ARG polls have him a few points ahead.

Huntsman is an interesting case. As a low-poller, strategic voters would ordinarily abandon him for their second choice. But many Huntsman supporters' second choice is Romney, who is guaranteed to win. Since Romney doesn't need the Huntsman votes, perhaps the Huntsman supporters will vote for their preferred candidate instead of shifting. This would serve to reward Huntsman for all the campaigning he has done in New Hampshire, and maybe to voice a bit of a protest against Romney's inevitable win.

Huntsman is the only candidate likely to drop out of the race in response to a poor performance. How well does he need to do to stay in the race? Though Elephant Watcher calculates Huntsman's chance of winning the nomination has been at zero percent for some time now, Huntsman may stay in for awhile if he exceeds expectations. A second-place finish would keep Huntsman in the race. A decent third would be a maybe. If Huntsman is in fourth when the ballots are counted, we should expect him to leave.

Santorum and Gingrich each desperately want to finish ahead of the other to gain a stronger position as the chief Anti-Romney in South Carolina. But instead, the polls have them right where Romney wants them: Far down and almost tied with each other. An ambiguous result means more splitting of Romney's opposition.

Finally, when Romney wins, the media will focus on the extent of his win. Finishing in the 40s will be treated as a good win. A few polls currently have Romney in the mid-30s, while the rest have him in the low 40s. If the numbers remain static, then adding in the undecided vote should give Romney a finish in the 40s. However, if New Hampshirites have last-minute thoughts, Romney ends up in the 30s. Particularly if second place is close, such a win will be treated as underwhelming. If Romney gets 50% or more, it will be treated as an overwhelming win and lead to more media proclaiming him the inevitable Republican nominee. Reaching the 50% mark would be difficult, even adding in the undecided vote, but is possible if someone like Huntsman sheds votes as they shift to second choice Romney (which hasn't happened so far).

Who Won the Republican Debate on January 7th?

When answering the question of "who won tonight's debate?" this season, most of the time the answer has been mixed. This time, that's not the case. Mitt Romney overwhelmingly won the debate. It was perhaps the most one-sided debate so far, such that nearly every observer would agree that Romney was the winner.

It was expected that most of the candidates would spend their time attacking Romney. Although there were moments when most of the candidates were critical of Romney, they didn't devote much time to it. During the first half-hour in particular, the Anti-Romneys found themselves attacking each other instead. When Romney was criticized, he did not take the bait, but instead calmly made the case for why he should be president. It's clear that he was attempting to look presidential, and he succeeded in doing so more than the other candidates did.

No new attacks against Romney were laid out. There was some criticism of Romney's tenure at Bain Capital, which Romney dealt with even more effectively than in previous debates where the issue was raised. Romney listed specific companies that Bain helped start, and listed statistics of tens of thousands of jobs created by those companies. Romney also scored big against the debate moderator, George Stephanopoulos, who pressed Romney on whether states have the right to ban contraception. Romney found himself laughing at the absurdity of the question, since no state wants to ban contraception. It would be an understatement to say the audience was in Romney's corner. Stephanopoulos embarrassed himself.

The most contentious moments of the debate took place when Ron Paul got into extended fights with Rick Santorum (accusing Santorum of too much spending and taking money from lobbyists) and Newt Gingrich (accusing Gingrich of being a "chickenhawk" for not serving in the military). It was very evident that Gingrich and Paul do not like each other.

There were some odd moments. Rick Perry, falling back into the pattern of making at least one gaffe per night, said that if America did not return to Iraq, Iran would go back into Iraq "literally at the speed of light." Paul claimed that after communists in China murdered 100 million of their own people, America broke the ice with them by playing ping-pong. And in the middle of one response, Jon Huntsman randomly spoke in Chinese for no apparent reason.

Tonight was Rick Santorum's first opportunity to play a starring role in a debate. He gave a vanilla performance: Not bad, but not especially good. It was to his detriment that he was put on the defensive by Paul, as opposed to putting Romney on the defensive. If the other candidates were supposed to provide New Hampshire a reason not to hand the state to Romney, they did not provide it. Instead, they gave New Hampshire an excuse to deliver Romney a landslide.

Primary Debate Tomorrow on ABC

The first primary debate since mid-December will take place tomorrow on ABC at 9:00pm Eastern. The Republican field has been winnowed down to six candidates: Gingrich, Huntsman, Paul, Perry, Romney, and Santorum. The debate will take place just a few days before the New Hampshire primary, where Mitt Romney has been leading in the polls by a significant margin all year. Romney's competitors will be tempted to make him a punching bag. Rick Santorum probably sees himself as the chief Anti-Romney, Newt Gingrich is reportedly steaming after his loss in Iowa, and for Jon Huntsman, it will be the last chance to be relevant. Rick Perry has historically enjoyed going on the attack against Romney, but if his strategy is based soley on South Carolina, he may realize he needs to attack Santorum instead.

Romney has a familiar frontrunner's challenge: How do you deal with a debate where everyone is attacking you, again and again? Though Romney has never experienced the spike-and-crash that others have--leading some to wrongly suggest that he hasn't been vetted yet--Romney should be used to being attacked. The key is to answer the opponent's substantive arguments, but not to show annoyance. Romney has gone both routes in past debates. Sometimes he is disciplined and is able to parry the attacks with good humor; other times he lets his opponents get under his skin. The latter leads to mistakes, like Romney's $10,000 challenge to Perry in a December debate. The debate will therefore be an important test for Romney, because most everyone will be trying to make him stumble.

Is the pile-on-Romney strategy appropriate in this case? For Santorum it probably is, as Gingrich may be falling under his own weight (one South Carolina poll shows Santorum slightly ahead of Gingrich). For Gingrich and Perry, the answer is no. Their target should be Santorum, who threatens to unite the Anti-Romney voters under his own banner. To stand a chance, they must launch an assault on Santorum that brings them down to their own post-crash polling level.

What should viewers look for in the debate? Romney has been criticized over Romneycare and his tenure at Bain Capital in multiple debates, but his opponents may come up with new material. The other thing to watch for is how Santorum's new position affects the dynamic. In previous debates, he was irrelevant and often whined about it. Now he has the chance to show what he can do with a starring role. And attacks against Santorum will be entirely new territory.

Intrade Odds: Mitt Romney Stands Unchallenged

We last reviewed the Intrade market on the Republican primary a few weeks ago, when Newt Gingrich's slide in the polls was first becoming apparent. At that time, Gingrich's Intrade odds crashed, and Mitt Romney held a commanding lead. Since then, the gap has only widened. Now, at 79.4%, Romney stands unchallenged at the top of the market. No other candidate is in double-digits.

Gingrich's fall in the (mostly Iowa) polls, and his poor showing in Iowa, have cut him down to 6.3%. Rick Perry's disappointing fifth-place finish in Iowa has dropped him to 1.7%. Ron Paul's supporters, who normally buoy his Intrade odds, have beaten a tactical retreat as well: Paul is at 2.6%.

What about Rick Santorum? As expected, he has risen noticeably. Before his movement in the polls last week, he was trading at only 0.5%. Compared to that, his numbers have skyrocketed. Looking at it any other way, his numbers are relatively modest: 6.4%, like Gingrich. It's clear that the Intrade investors are skeptical of Santorum for now, but he's likely to rise as Santorum's near-win in Iowa gets reflected in future polls. For now, Intraders think Romney is unstoppable.

The investors are bullish on Romney's performance in the next few states. In New Hampshire, he is trading at 94.1%. In South Carolina, one might think Romney's lower poll numbers would curb investors' enthusiasm. Not so: Romney is at 50.1%. Gingrich, who has a substantial lead in the (admittedly old) South Carolina polls, is only at 21%. Santorum is edging Gingrich out at 22.5% in that state. Thus, we can conclude many investors think Gingrich and Santorum are fairly evenly-matched, and that split will be to Romney's benefit.

The real headline is in the market for Florida's primary, where Romney is at 80%. If South Carolina slows Romney down a little, the investors think he'll take Florida and sail to victory.

Michele Bachmann Quits the Race

Bachmann

In the wake of her sixth-place finish in the Iowa Caucus, Michele Bachmann announced that she was withdrawing from the race. As with Herman Cain's departure, the technical term used is "suspending" her campaign, but it's safe to say she won't return. Bachmann had put all of her time and resources into competing in Iowa, which also happened to be the state of her birth. In August, Bachmann won the Ames straw poll. When the time came to vote, the only person she beat was Jon Huntsman, who was expressly not competing there.

Once again, this reinforces Iowa's non-wildcard history, which we examined back in June. Iowans may flirt with an outrageous candidate for awhile--in this case bringing her to the top of the polls in the summer and giving her the win in the Ames straw poll--but when voting day approaches, Iowans shift toward electable candidates.

Bachmann's inherent weaknesses as a candidate, particularly her lack of electability, doomed her campaign from the beginning. Her early feud with Sarah Palin didn't help matters. Elephant Watcher never gave Bachmann more than a 3% chance of winning the nomination, and set her to 0% about six weeks ago.

Bachmann's departure should give a slight boost to other Anti-Romney candidates by distributing her votes among them. However, Bachmann was already polling badly in the rest of the early states, so there are few votes to distribute.

Romney Wins Iowa Caucus, in Virtual Tie with Santorum

Mitt Romney won the Iowa Caucus on Tuesday, beating out Rick Santorum by a ludicrously narrow margin of 8 votes. Aside from Jon Huntsman, Santorum was the only candidate who never finished first in an Iowa poll. His late rise came at the last possible moment to give him a win--almost. At the final tally, Romney won 30,015 votes to Santorum's 30,007. The following are the vote percentages for each candidate:

Iowa Caucus Results
Romney -- 24.6%
Santorum -- 24.5%
Paul -- 21%
Gingrich -- 13%
Perry -- 10%
Bachmann -- 5%
Huntsman -- 1%

As Elephant Watcher predicted on Monday, Santorum's late momentum gave him the edge needed to outperform his polling and (almost) take first. For the past few weeks, Santorum had the distinction of being one of only three candidates in the race whom Elephant Watcher gave a greater than zero percent chance of winning the nomination. On Tuesday, he demonstrated why. From the start of the race, Santorum was nowhere in the polls--even in Iowa--and was written off by nearly everyone. However, the destruction of one Tea Party candidate after another left Santorum the most natural candidate for the role.

As explained in Monday's preview of Iowa, both Santorum and Romney will claim victory. Romney's campaign will say that he achieved a win in a fundamentally "anti-Romney" state and predict a win for Romney in New Hampshire. Santorum's near-tie will enable him to finally raise his profile elsewhere. Though he's hardly set foot outside of Iowa, he will be able to make the case that all of the anti-Romney voters should rally behind him. Elephant Watcher expects Santorum's numbers to rise nationally and in all of the early states.

The other winner of the night was the state of Iowa, which avoided disaster by not giving Ron Paul (or Michele Bachmann) a win. Back in June, we observed that the history of the Iowa Caucus shows the state is unfairly maligned as a breeding ground for "wildcard" candidates, and that the state's voters actually place a premium on traditional, electable candidates. Tonight's result, particularly with Romney getting first place, is another demonstration of that. Now perhaps the pundits will spare a few kind words about the sober-minded, moderate Iowa voters. However, the anti-Iowa sentiment will return in election cycles to come.

The big loser of the night is Newt Gingrich, who failed to outperform his declining poll numbers. Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann should also be disappointed, as they failed to catch up to Gingrich. New Hampshire's primary will take place next week, and Romney's remaining rivals can spend that time attacking Romney if they like, but afterward they will all need to battle Santorum in South Carolina for the title of chief Anti-Romney.

How did we get here, with Santorum coming from behind to (almost) squeak out a win? It was the first step of Santorum's "winning scenario," charted by Elephant Watcher, along with the rest of the candidates' winning scenarios, back in April:

Scenario: "The 7-10 Split"
Santorum raises his profile among social conservatives in Iowa by focusing on a controversial issue where few dare to tread. Few see Santorum as a threat. As time passes, it becomes increasingly clear that Iowa is hopelessly split among several different candidates. Despite a low vote total in absolute terms, Santorum pulls off an upset in Iowa. Somewhat befuddled, social conservatives and the Tea Party wing see little choice but to rally behind him after a "RINO" wins New Hampshire.

Now comes the real test for Santorum--whether the Tea Party is, in fact, willing to overlook the non-conservative aspects of Santorum's political past. If his conservative credentials are too tarnished by attacks against him, then Romney's electability (along with campaign infrastructure, establishment support, etc.) will easily trump him. In the meantime, Santorum will need to explain to conservative voters who have never heard of him why they should abandon the other Anti-Romneys and support him.

Tomorrow: The Iowa Caucus

On Tuesday, the voting finally begins. The political landscape in Iowa has been very fluid this season. If one includes non-runner Mike Huckabee, seven different candidates have led in the polls at various times: Huckabee, Romney, Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Gingrich, and Paul. And Santorum has come close. It's the complete opposite of New Hampshire, where Mitt Romney has led in every single poll conducted. With one day to go, Iowa is still fluid: Three candidates are in a near-tie in the final polling:

Iowa Caucus
01/01 PPP (D) -- Paul 20, Romney 19, Santorum 18, Gingrich 14
01/01 Insider Adv -- Romney 23, Paul 22, Santorum 18, Gingrich 16
12/30 Des Moines Reg -- Romney 24, Paul 22, Santorum 15, Gingrich 12
12/29 WeAskAmerica -- Romney 24, Santorum 17, Paul 14, Gingrich 13
12/28 NBC/Marist -- Romney 23, Paul 21, Santorum 15, Perry 14
12/28 ARG -- Romney 22, Gingrich 17, Paul 17, Santorum 11
12/28 Rasmussen -- Romney 23, Paul 22, Santorum 16, Gingrich 13
12/28 Insider Adv -- Romney 17, Paul 17, Gingrich 17, Santorum 13
12/27 CNN/Time -- Romney 25, Paul 22, Santorum 16, Gingrich 14
12/27 PPP (D) -- Paul 24, Romney 20, Gingrich 13, Bachmann 11

It's impossible to say for certain who the winner will be. Romney has a very slight lead in most of the polls, has organization, and has the best electability argument. Ron Paul is close behind, and his supporters are intense. Rick Santorum is in third, but has the late momentum and is the most likely to benefit from the coalescing of low-polling Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann. Despite trailing by a few points, Santorum may actually have the edge.

Taking first in Iowa would be a boost for any of the three leading candidates. The size of the boost usually depends on whether the candidate exceeded expectations, and the size of the margin of victory. In this case, no one knows which candidate will win. The only expectation is that it will be close.

In one sense, Santorum is likely to benefit even if he doesn't take first place: He's ahead of other Anti-Romneys like Gingrich, Perry, and Bachmann. He'll have an argument to stay in the race. Ron Paul is going to stay in the race no matter what, and a victory for him would only serve to de-legitimize the Iowa Caucus.

Romney's team will have the most flexible spin on the results. Romney carefully avoided expending too many resources in Iowa, because he wanted to keep expectations low. But he also spent enough to make it possible to win. Obviously a win in Iowa would be an enormous boost to the idea that Romney is the frontrunner. A second-place finish, especially if it's close, would also be taken as a win. If Santorum wins, Romney's campaign would argue something to the effect of, "Iowa is an Evangelical state, and the Evangelical candidate only barely beat Romney." If Paul wins, Romney's campaign would argue that Romney was the highest-ranking sane candidate, and that Iowans should be disregarded. A third place finish behind both Santorum and Paul would be disappointing, but if Paul is close to winning, that fact would be used to attack Iowa's credibility.

Among the lower-tier, it will also be competitive: Bachmann wants to beat Perry to claim her status as the chief Tea Partier. Perry wants to avoid that, and would like to beat Gingrich to claim his status as the chief Southerner to compete in South Carolina.

2012 Republican Primary in Review: December 2011

Each month, Elephant Watcher recaps the activity that occurred in the Republican primary during the previous month. Follow these links to read earlier recaps: May, June, July, August, September, October, November.

December was the month of the rise and fall of Newt Gingrich. Herman Cain was already on the decline, paving the way for Gingrich to become the next Anti-Romney flavor of the month. Most of Cain's support was shifting over to Gingrich. On December 3, Herman Cain dropped out, falling under the weight of yet another sex scandal.

Gingrich's rise took place as quickly as Cain's and Rick Perry's had. Gingrich had become the greatest threat to Romney's candidacy since Perry. But unlike Cain and Perry, Gingrich was able to use his intellect and rhetorical skill to push his numbers higher than those of his predecessors. Rather than collapsing in the debates, Gingrich impressed the audience. In both of the month's debates, on December 10 and December 15, Gingrich was widely proclaimed the winner. While Romney performed ably in the December 15th debate, he made a gaffe in the prior debate when he offered Perry a $10,000 bet.

Gingrich reached his peak around December 13, when he nearly tied Mitt Romney on Intrade. Intrade investors, like the Republican establishment, were skeptical of Gingrich, but his poll numbers washed the skepticism away: Gingrich took a double-digit lead over all his opponents in the national polls, a double-digit lead in Iowa, a lead of about 20 points in South Carolina, and dominated Florida polls by polling at nearly 50%. Even Romney's New Hampshire stronghold buckled, reducing Romney's lead to 10-15 points in some polls.

Notwithstanding Gingrich's performance at the December 15th debate, the tide began to turn against him in mid-December. Romney's campaign, which had shied away from the attacks and negative ads that characterized it in the 2008 primary, understood that it was time to unload. In early December, Romney released a torrent of attack ads against Gingrich, mostly in Iowa. Ron Paul, too, began to spend from his online money chest to attack Gingrich. Even Perry, at long last, realized that he needed to focus on winning the Anti-Romney vote, and shifted his attacks in Gingrich's direction.

It was too much for Gingrich to bear. He had little money to spend on ads of his own to counter the attacks. But what really eroded Gingrich's support was the fact that the ads were based in truth: Gingrich was not the pure, Tea Party-friendly conservative that he pretended to be. Since Gingrich didn't have an advantage in conservatism, there was no counterweight to his baggage and electability concerns. Gingrich steadily fell in the polls, particularly the national and Iowa polls.

By the end of the month, the media increasingly focused on Iowa. With Gingrich (mostly) out of the way there, Romney took a slight lead over Paul, who somehow managed to translate dollars to poll numbers. Rick Santorum, who faithfully waited his turn as the final Anti-Romney, got a last-minute increase in Iowa polls. With the Iowa Caucus just a few days away, polls essentially suggested a three-way tie among Romney, Paul, and Santorum, with the late momentum on Santorum's side. Perry and Michele Bachmann, who placed most (or all) of their hopes on Iowa, were too far behind to hope for a win. Gingrich was left somewhere in between, hoping that a loss in Iowa wouldn't jeopardize his leads in South Carolina and Florida.