Can either Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum meaningfully advance beyond the ideological and demographic beachheads of support they have secured in the marathon slog for the Republican presidential nomination?
That’s probably the most important remaining question in the grueling race. And it will be voters like Mindy Meyer — a surgical nurse from nearby Vandalia who drove with her husband to see Santorum in this small southern Illinois town on Saturday afternoon — who answer it.
Meyer liked everything she heard from Santorum on reducing federal spending and increasing pressure on Iran not to develop nuclear weapons. She even agreed, mostly, with his views on social issues like abortion — although she thinks gay couples should receive equal rights under the law, if not the label of marriage for their unions.
But even after watching Santorum deliver a characteristically fiery attack on both Romney and President Obama to a large crowd on the floor of a kitchen equipment factory here, Meyer is still hesitating about pulling the lever for him in Tuesday’s Illinois primary. Her fear is that Santorum’s unflinching social conservatism will render him unelectable against Obama.
“I appreciate Santorum’s views [on social issues] but I don’t believe he can get the whole mainstream,” she said. So she’s wrestling between Santorum and Romney, whom she believes has a better chance in November.
Meyer and her like-minded husband Tim, a construction worker, are two of the few floating pieces in a Republican race that has become increasingly defined by strikingly stable patterns of support for the leading contenders. As the race has careened from state to state, the issue has been less whether Romney, Santorum (or, for that matter, Newt Gingrich or Ron Paul) will significantly increase their support among the key groups in the Republican coalition, but how many of those voters live in each state.
“It doesn’t make any difference what state you’re in; you are talking about the particular demographics voting the same way in each one of them,” said Republican pollster Whit Ayres.
While Romney has faced considerable criticism for his inability to consolidate the party’s most conservative vanguard, Santorum has demonstrated a parallel inability to penetrate the party’s more moderate, affluent and economy-focused wing.
What it boils down to is that one of them will be the Republican nominee. And whichever it is, we have to rally behind and get the Obama camp out of there! Remember the rally call – ANYONE but Obama! At this point I, and those I’ve spoken to about it feel the same way. We don’t care which of them makes it to the nomination, that’s the person we will back. Is this a perfect solution? No. Are there any perfect solutions? No. This is the best we can do. Just do it.
In that case, I hope you do those of us who *do* care who the nominee is a favor, and stay home rather than vote in the primary. Frankly I find it weird that you can see that Obama is a huge problem, but couldn’t care less which of the (really fairly different from each other) Republican nominees ends up winning.
Not to worry, I’m not voting in the primaries! I do care inasmuch as I want one of them to win the nomination. They both have qualities and policies that I like, and some that I don’t like so much. But all in all, either is still better that what we have now. I will also note that I heartily do not want Ron Paul – but if by some chance of fate he won the Republican nomination, I would hold my nose and vote!
@bbartlog:
As much as I hate to say this, I am quietly rooting for Romney to win the nomination. I can’t stand Santorum. He’s a big government / quasi-social conservative. If Romney wins the nomination and also the presidency, no one can say we tried conservatism and it didn’t work. If Santorum wins, the left will bury conservatism and hold Santorum up as the conservative model. He’s not a conservative. Saying he’s a social conservative gives social conservatives a bad name.