Following developments in the Republican presidential nominating contest the instability of the race is stark. Every political contest involves flawed candidates: how could it be otherwise? But often the public develops a firm sense of the perspective of the candidates and chooses to join a team. As primary campaigns are waged on a state-by-state basis, it is expected that in some realms one candidate will do better than another, but psychiatric mood swings are something else. We saw the politics of allegiance in the competition between Barack and Hillary (and the wormy love apple: imagine our blue dress politics in an Edwards presidency!). In the states of the industrial Midwest, home to Reagan Democrats, Hillary posted strong numbers; Obama was more successful in states not so hard hit by industrial decline, states with a rainbow electorate, and those open to a new type of politics. Soon one knew the metrics of the race, even if the outcome was uncertain. But the Republican campaign upends these rules as voter preferences lurch wildly. This is a campaign year that reminds us of voters’ cultural fickleness – their political ADD. They are watching a reality television show and so are we (Jeff Goldfarb describes his pained reaction in “The Republican Reality Show”). If one is not newly tickled, one turns away. Media narratives set our politics.
We have gazed at candidates, quasi-candidates, and proto-candidates – Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich, and The Donald – dance with the stars. Can parties fire their voters? Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty could have had his turn had he the internal fortitude or cockeyed optimism to recognize that to be dismissed in August might lead to be crowned a year later. If politics were based on a comparison and conflict of ideas, this would be inconceivable.
But American politics has become, as Jeffrey Goldfarb emphasizes, a reality show – adore it, dismiss it, or despise it, but depend on it. Voters demand diversion; they want bread and circuses, at least circuses. Around the scrum are kibitzers, now Sarah Palin and Donald Trump, who, after deciding to disengage, demand that attention be paid. Palin seems committed to pursuing Rush Limbaugh’s 2008 “Operation Chaos,” designed to prolong the Democrats’ primary contest and undercut the eventual nominee. In her case, the fleeting Governor undercuts what is ostensibly her own party as she tells her admirers to vote for Newt to continue debate, and, presumably, her role in it. Our rogue muffin, a mildly progressive governor of a mildly libertarian state, has assumed her role as a mistress of ceremonies of the grand guignol of tabloid politics.
At this moment, after the Florida presidential primary, Mitt Romney seems to have surmounted Newt’s second surge, despite Sarah Palin’s counter-cultural rap to “rage against the machine” by voting for the former speaker. Images, even those of the heavy metal left, are to be plucked by anyone plucky enough to do so. No doubt twists and turns will continue in this drama on the road to Tampa, as voters get bored with the pragmatic lassitude of Mitt, a man who would be Ike or at least Bush 41. Perhaps Ron and Rand Paul will galvanize voters to throw the TSA off the island, raging against those airport scanners and the bureaucratic touch that follows. More plausibly, we might discover that the sad illness of Rick Santorum’s special needs young daughter Bella, now hospitalized in Philadelphia (from the effects of the genetic disorder Trisomy 18), will provide sufficient weepy pathos to propel his candidacy among an electorate weaned on Love Story.
But what if Mitt triumphs? Mitt as nominee poses challenges for an ADD electorate that demands the frisson of thrills and the flutter of delight. Elections in which a President is on the ballot can be referendums or choices. The incumbent hopes that the voters will see the contest as a choice. The challenger, particularly in parlous economic times, hopes for a judgment of the sitting leader. Despite his deep pockets, if Romney is the Republican nominee, Obama will provide the only electricity in the room. He will be the Ozzy Osborne, Paris Hilton, and Kim Kardashian of October. Perhaps Mitt Romney will find it difficult to energize his base, but Barack Obama will achieve that for him. With Newt on the ballot, the choice will be stark, but with tame, vague Mitt, the election might be a referendum. Our ADD electorate will have to determine the narrative of the moment on that first Tuesday in November. On that day will the president be imagined a Greek naïf, an acolyte of Fidel, or the Great Leader of the resurgent East? Or is being an American Idol enough?
If you read the county by county results, and the women’s vote differential, there is nothing mysterious here. In counties like South Carolina, Gingrich won by huge margins. In Miami, Romney ran way above anywhere else in the state. In the places where he ran ads at a forty to one rate and did endless robocalls, he got the country club republican vote and won at the rate of the state as a whole. Women did in Gingrich in these counties.
Does this tell us anything about November? Probably not. Obama won’t get the voters who hate Romney, and Romney will damp anyone’s enthusiasm. So he has no edge over Obama in that department. The lesson– ultra-negative campaigning works, and will be the formula for both sides in November. Florida was just a testing ground, and AFSCME was out in force against Romney, with brutal and very compelling negative ads. They have the big money, and they will be back.
Without explicitly using the terminology of Irving Goffman’s dramaturgical perspective, I think that Gary and Jeff capture aspects of the primaries as a performance. Almost all the front stage aspects of the campaign are presented to us through traditional and newer media. A few of us participate in person. We occasionally get a peak backstage, and many people have a hard time with what they learn. Once in a while, the candidates while onstage break expectations, and/or communicate out of character. These are the sound bites that are frequently repeated throughout the 24-hour news cycle. We are both the audience, the critics, and some of us are participants. Our reactions influence their performances. At the appropriate point in the process, someone will receive critical acclaim and move on to the next stage in the Presidential Election process.
I think Republican voters are undergoing an identity crisis, and this has much to do with the wild swings in fortunes of the candidates as they move from state to state. Indeed it does appear as if they are suffering from ADD as they’re assaulted by Super-PAC fueled vitriol from all angles. If neither Romney nor Gingrich are true conservatives, and hence have underwhelmed conservative voters, and the only true conservative in the race, Ron Paul, is too conservative, then this leaves the field in a state of disarray, and perhaps leaves voters in a state of confusion. But I wonder what else is at work here. Both Gingrich’s victory in South Carolina and Romney’s victory in Florida were solid. What differences in the demographics in the two states could account for such a swing in fortune for the candidates?
Santorum won three straight primaries? Has April Fool’s Day come early? Needless to say, I didn’t see that coming. As a former resident of the state of Pennsylvania, where he was senator, he became a laughing stock and was chased out of office, and to my hopes, never to be seen or heard from again (except on Fox News, where conservative laughing stocks tend to end up).
My scorn for the man aside, he seems to possess two qualities that the other candidates do not: sincerity and consistency. Whatever kind of objectionable thing Santorum says, we can be relatively sure he will continue saying the same things in front of different audiences. That may change as more attention, and more attacks, come his way, but I think at least for now, Santorum’s victories say more about Romney and Gingrich, than they do about him.