ThePest179
Banned
What if Mitt Romney doesn't run for President in 2012 (by choice or not)? Who would become the Republican nominee in 2012 instead?
WI: Romney doesn't run in 2012?
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I think Christie would have a good chance of winning the nomination in that event. This was before Bridgegate and the so-called hug. http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/08/watch_fox_news_host_apologizes_to_christie_for_oba.html But I don't think Christie would do any better than Romney in the general election. The brashness that delighted Republicans would likely come off as bullying to many undecided voters.
2012 was too early for a Bush--voters had not forgotten who was president when the Great Recession started.
Second Place
Wouldn't Ron Paul fill Romney's vacancy? Assuming that all the candidates are the same and the results are the nearly the same, with the exception of Romney.
Wouldn't Ron Paul fill Romney's vacancy? Assuming that all the candidates are the same and the results are the nearly the same, with the exception of Romney.
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usertron2020
Donor
Fixed it for you. "Big Time"
I have a feeling that Star Trek's version of WWIII will occur before it's late enough for another Bush.
There WAS NO Republican in 2012 who could beat Obama.
Romney and Ron Paul appealed to totally different kinds of voters. Romney was the candidate of the Republican Establishment--which would have found another candidate had he not run. Maybe Christie, maybe Daniels, maybe Ryan.
The assumption "that all the candidates are the same and the results are the nearly the same, with the exception of Romney" is extremely unrealistic. Even if it were true, remember that both Santorum and Gingrich got more votes than Ron Paul in OTL. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party_presidential_primaries,_2012 If limited to the candidates who ran in OTL, I think most Romney voters woud prefer Gingrich to either Santorum or Paul. But I think it very unlikely that they would be so limited.
Ron Paul has a very solid ceiling of support with the Republican base and it's far short of that needed to win the nomination. He is, quite simply, not nearly belligerent enough for them. His laissez-faire attitude towards drugs doesn't help either.
Without Romney, 2012 could fall to Gingrich *shudder*.
I can speak from the perspective of being a 22 year old delegate to the Minnesota GOP State Convention. Without Romney in the race I believe Newt Gingrich would have captured the nomination. Not sure if the same delegate shenanigans would happen to Ron Paul at the national convention in that event. My favorite memory of that year was seeing Michele Bachman's face when I told her I was an atheist anarchist who made it all the way to the state convention LOL.
TinyTartar
Banned
I ended up voting for Santorum in my primary in 2012, mostly because I had a feeling that Romney's economics would not resonate on a national stage. I made the wrong pick, as likely Santorum would have been demolished on trivial social stuff, but I found his economic ideas interesting and decided to go with him, as he was basically the anti Tea Party.
The Republicans would have needed to find a different establishment figure that long time party loyalists would feel comfortable with. I think that in this case, someone whose campaign never really got off the ground (Pawlenty, Huntsman, etc.) would have gotten the cash to compete. Possibly, you might even see some of the retreads from this year get interested, like Pataki or even a guy like Lindsey Graham, who would get some McCain voters interested.
Some of the Kasich fans on this board might be thinking that he would jump in, but what got him attention enough to do so was his astoundingly dominant landslide in Ohio this past election, where he even won inner city Cleveland (which had precincts in 2012 actually have ZERO votes for Romney) and all but two counties.
The Republicans would have needed to find a different establishment figure that long time party loyalists would feel comfortable with. I think that in this case, someone whose campaign never really got off the ground (Pawlenty, Huntsman, etc.) would have gotten the cash to compete. Possibly, you might even see some of the retreads from this year get interested, like Pataki or even a guy like Lindsey Graham, who would get some McCain voters interested.
Some of the Kasich fans on this board might be thinking that he would jump in, but what got him attention enough to do so was his astoundingly dominant landslide in Ohio this past election, where he even won inner city Cleveland (which had precincts in 2012 actually have ZERO votes for Romney) and all but two counties.
usertron2020
Donor
It's hard to imagine that someone wouldn't have stepped up to the plate to stop The Grinch. No way, not even with Republican primary voters. The Evangelicals will hate him for his private life and not rejecting his lesbian cousin (apparently, they're quite close, which is a point for him). He'll have Neo-Cons and the Establishment, but not the grass-roots. Those who in the GOP don't hate him for leading the Impeachment will hate him for failing to get to the finish line.
Though I think we can all agree that Gingrich in the General Election will be buried in a landslide of Reagan-like (1980) proportions.
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What did she do? PLEASE tell us more! Or at least PM me. If not that, then for God's sakes make something up!Of the candidates who did run IOTL, the ones I see as realistic candidates to become the "establishment" consensus candidate in Romney's place would be Pawlenty, Huntsman, and Gingrich, in roughly that order.
Pawlenty was a very strong candidate on paper who dropped out very early because he failed to get traction, partly because his style was too mild to compete with Bachman, Cain, or Santorum for media attention, but also at least as much because the segment of the party most likely to support him had already coalesced behind Romney.
Huntsman also had a strong resume, but the decision to run to Romney's left in the primaries (when Romney was already perceived by much of the Republican primary electorate as too liberal) established a pretty low ceiling for his potential support. If Romney doesn't run, and if Pawlenty's campaign fails to get traction, Huntsman can safely run in roughly Romney's ideological position.
Gingrich is a well-known figure in the party and has a number of established relationships and owed-favors from back when he was Speaker, which works to his advantage, but he's also been on the shelf for quite a long time, and he's remembered as being divisive and unpopular, which is why IOTL most of the party establishment backed Romney and not him.
Pawlenty was a very strong candidate on paper who dropped out very early because he failed to get traction, partly because his style was too mild to compete with Bachman, Cain, or Santorum for media attention, but also at least as much because the segment of the party most likely to support him had already coalesced behind Romney.
Huntsman also had a strong resume, but the decision to run to Romney's left in the primaries (when Romney was already perceived by much of the Republican primary electorate as too liberal) established a pretty low ceiling for his potential support. If Romney doesn't run, and if Pawlenty's campaign fails to get traction, Huntsman can safely run in roughly Romney's ideological position.
Gingrich is a well-known figure in the party and has a number of established relationships and owed-favors from back when he was Speaker, which works to his advantage, but he's also been on the shelf for quite a long time, and he's remembered as being divisive and unpopular, which is why IOTL most of the party establishment backed Romney and not him.
The party hates him, sure, but he managed to turn his private proclivities into a strength before South Carolina and even got the evangelicals on side.
In the debate before the SC primary (IIRC), the CNN anchor asked Gingrich about dumping his first wife when she was dying of cancer to run off with his mistress. Gingrich blasted the man, got the biggest applause line of the night, and came out of nowhere to win the primary. The Republican base want a real conservative who can draw blood. Gingrich's blast of the journo and his going after a democratic president would have been solid pluses. And without a front runner to rally behind, the rest of the party would've been as helpless as they were when the Tea Party ruined their chances of taking the Senate in 2012.
Also Cheney has a lesbian daughter he's quite closed to, didn't affect him one bit. Ideological consistency is meaningless in modern American politics. You just need to seem like an uncompromising and unrepentant warrior for Team Red or Team Blue.
usertron2020
Donor
Thanks. BTW, I goofed. Newt's lesbian relative is his half-sister, not first cousin. Not sure how I made the mix up. You've changed my mind. Newt could have gotten the nomination, though I think he'd still have a worse general election than almoat any other candidate this side of Mike Huckabee. Nice guy, Huck. Up close and personal. But a fundie POTUS? In this day and age? They wouldn't even accept the idea of a Fundamentalist POTUS in the 19th century, and he (William Jennings Bryan) got three shots at the job.
I would agree that in the absence of Romney, it would than likely be Pawlenty as the GOP nominee. I would argue though that Romney not running may prompt Huckabee to run to, although he won't get the nomination. If the nominee isn't Pawlenty, I would agree that it goes to either Huntsman, Gingrich, or if Romney not running produces enough Butterflies to prevent his many gaffes and terrible campaign, the nomination could end up going to, god forbid, Rick Perry. Either way in the absence or Romney, Obama probably wins the general by a bugger margin than OTL.
That name brand is still too toxic. You might have Huckabee give up his job on Fox, which would split the Santorum vote...it certainly makes a Ron Paul nomination not completely impossible
But in all liklihood the establishment coalesces behind Newt.
I'd say that the only GOP candidate at that time with a chance to beat Obama was probably John Huntsman. But did he really had a slight chance of getting though the primaries at a time when the Tea Party was probably at its height?
Didn't Michelle Bachmann have similar views on foreign policy to Ron Paul, though? I remember reading interviews with her in which she condemned Obama for being basically too hawkish and more interested in the freedom of non-Americans.
Didn't Michelle Bachmann have similar views on foreign policy to Ron Paul, though? I remember reading interviews with her in which she condemned Obama for being basically too hawkish and more interested in the freedom of non-Americans.