Republican Race is Wide Open

Doyle McManus over at the Los Angeles Times argues that the Republican primary race is wide-open:

The resounding victory of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Iowa's Republican caucuses means the race for the GOP's presidential nomination remains up for grabs among at least four candidates and may not be resolved until 24 states vote in a climactic Super Tuesday next month, Republican political analysts said Thursday.

"This keeps the race completely wide open," said pollster Whit Ayres. "This is still the most open race for a Republican nomination in modern memory -- no question about it."

Huckabee, a Baptist minister-turned-politician who was almost unknown outside his home state as recently as last summer, drew the votes of thousands of self-described evangelical Christians to score a decisive victory over former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.

But the race for the Republican nomination moves next to New Hampshire, where Christian conservatives are a much smaller share of the electorate -- and where polls suggest Huckabee stands virtually no chance of winning. Instead, the race there is principally between Romney and Sen. John McCain of Arizona.

After New Hampshire, the campaign moves to Michigan and South Carolina, where Huckabee, Romney and McCain all appear competitive, and then to Florida, where former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani is spending millions of dollars on a risky late-state strategy to seize control of the race.

"This is a big win for Huckabee. . . . But it's also a victory for McCain," said Scott Reed, a Republican strategist who is unaligned in the presidential race. "It's a victory for McCain in that the race is now broken up, and it's coming into a part of the calendar that's favorable to McCain: New Hampshire and Michigan."

McCain, who spent little time or money campaigning in Iowa, finished in a virtual tie for third place with former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee. In New Hampshire, though, recent polls have shown McCain closing in on Romney.

If Romney had won in Iowa, he would have gained a boost for his New Hampshire campaign -- and a chance to score wins in the first two contests of the nomination campaign. Instead, he risks two losses in a row, and suffering "two black eyes in the first two events is going to be very difficult to overcome," Reed said.

"This race is going to extend to Feb. 5," he predicted, citing the date when 15 states, including California, will hold primary elections and nine more will hold caucuses. "It's too fragmented to finish before then. And there are too many delegates on Feb. 5 for candidates to pass up."

The prospect of such a contested nomination battle is unsettling to some Republicans. In recent years, the party has most often entered an election year with a leading candidate who, while challenged by upstarts, most often went on to win.

"This year, there's no heir apparent," Ayres said.

The issue is about more than tradition. Since 1968, the party that has chosen its nominee first -- and thus gained more time to heal the divisions of the primary campaign -- has won the White House eight of 10 times.

I've warned a couple of times about the dangers of a prolonged nomination battle. The intraparty primary fight creates tremendous animosity among the top-tier contenders - the wounds take time to heal, often not until after the convention, leaving the party in a fissiparous state and vulnerable to the opposition.

Perhaps the indecisive nature of the contest this year is good for the voting electorate, and as McManus notes, the February 5 primaries will provide a wider opportunity for more states to make a difference in the nomination.

New Hampshire's next, though, and this New York Times story indicates how Senator John McCain's well positioned there to capitalize on his momentum:

Mr. McCain has been the greatest presence here, often having the state to himself. Seizing on his clean sweep of endorsements from 26 newspapers in the area, he has been able to reinvigorate a campaign that six months ago was largely written off.

New Hampshire, whose voters pride themselves on their independence from party orthodoxy and who are interested in an array of issues not on the agenda in Iowa, is friendly territory for Mr. McCain — a point he is making in a new advertisement released Thursday recalling his victory here in 2000.

A remaining unknown factor will be what role independent voters, who make up nearly half of all registered voters in the state and were critical in Mr. McCain’s victory last time, will play in this election. Voters frequently say they are trying to decide between Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain, which seems striking, given their wide differences on issues, particularly the war in Iraq. But Mr. Obama’s victory in Iowa showed his strength in drawing independent voters to his campaign.

Mr. McCain is also focusing on issues important to many independent voters, like climate change and improving the United States’ image abroad by taking such steps as closing the prison at the American naval base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

Scott Lehigh at the Boston Globe says this is McCain's second chance to make a mark in the Granite State.

Photo Credit: New York Times