Gambling on Florida

Is Rudy Giuliani pulling out of New Hampshire? From the New York Sun-

Rudolph Giuliani's decision to largely abandon the early voting state of New Hampshire and concentrate his efforts on the Florida primary three weeks later reflects an uncomfortable truth for the former New York mayor: The more he campaigned in the Granite State and the more he spent on advertising there, the more his poll numbers dropped.

Mr. Giuliani appears to be making a virtue of necessity by sounding the retreat in New Hampshire, where he continues to be outgunned by the Republican front-runner there, Mitt Romney, and where he has been beaten into second place by the resurgent campaign of Senator McCain.

He must now be sure to win Florida on January 29 to capture its large cache of delegates, as part of a strategy that sees him withdrawing from the smaller early states in favor of states such as New York, California, and Florida, which send large numbers of delegates to the nominating convention.

This is a risky strategy, but not illogical. Iowa and New Hampshire are tiny specks so far as the delegate count goes at the GOP convention. Florida, even after being penalized for moving its primary date, carries more weight. Dr. Taylor is right about this strategy when he says-

but it assumes that a win in Florida, and other early states, can counteract the positive press for the winners of the two early contests, and the commensurate negative press that the losers of those contests will receive.

You would hope as important an election as President would be decided on issues, not on horse race momentum. We do live in a real world. Giuliani for a long list of reasons, is no longer looking like the person I thought six months ago would be the Republican nominee next November. I've always felt the other candidates were better,(McCain, Romney, Thompson, and till I got to know him better Huckabee) but wonder how electable any of them are come the general election.

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