It's Romney and Clinton

It’s political crunch time. The media’s talking heads and writers are dissecting every nuance in the presidential campaigns. These experts, saturated in supposition, polls and sitting in front row seats, can’t decipher the tea leaves.

None are predicting the outcome of the primary election. And with good reason—it’s really murky out there. Most believe that Senator Clinton will be the Democratic contender, although the word “inevitable” is heard less and less. They all run for cover when asked which Republican will win.

It’s the shrewdness of the American electorate that has the experts befuddled. They can’t find the answer to the big question. Will the Democratic and Republican party faithful vote for their favorite candidate, or for the candidate they perceive as having the best chance of winning the general election? My money is on the latter.

In the primaries, voting for the lesser of two evils is not in the calculus. This distain is reserved for the candidates in the general election. The primaries are about selecting winners. The intelligent members of both parties vote with an eye on the independents, knowing the candidate must appeal to this block to win the Oval Office.

And never confuse the voters who register as independents with the real independent voters. The truly uncommitted constitute about twenty percent of the forty-four percent of the voters who classify themselves as independents.

The rest are wolves in sheep’s clothing. Despite registering as non-affiliated, they uniformly vote for the candidates of the same party time after time after time. It seems they perceive the non-affiliated category as a status symbol—a sign of their independent thinking. And they love to be courted.

Of course, political correctness has contributed to the stampede of voters registering as independents. This inoculates them from being associated with any of the negative attributes ascribed to either political organization.

Unless a fourth wife, or some such, appears on Mayor Giuliani’s resume, or Senator Clinton is indicted for a criminal offense, conventional thinking is that they will most likely be elected to face off in the general election. With good reason, this is a predictable outcome.

The Democrats would rather coronate a woman with fifty-percent negatives than gamble on a black man with ten minutes experience. They have their fingers crossed, hoping enough women will select one of their own sex, which will carry Senator Clinton into the White House. And it’s not a bad bet.

Few conservatives perceive Governor Huckabee as a national contender. Mayor Giuliani will win if the southern conservatives back away from Romney’s Mormon religion. The Mayor has the added advantage of being perceived as the best street fighter. But this scenario assumes that only religious credentials are important to southern voters.

Governor Romney is the best candidate, the best prepared and the best human being. He is a class act, articulate and presidential. It’s as if he was born to be President. The South will give him the nod. It’s going to be Romney and Clinton.