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The Democratic Strategist

Political Strategy for a Permanent Democratic Majority

Mitt’s Attack Ads, Big Bucks to Flood MI, AZ

TDS Managing Editor Ed Kilgore takes a look at “The Crux of the Matter in Michigan” at The Washington Monthly, and offers an insightful take on the next moves in the GOP field’s chess game:

…Rick Santorum is harvesting momentum from a great Tuesday night and some mutually assured destruction between Romney and Gingrich to move well ahead in state thought to be a stronghold for Mitt. But Republican elites are certain to be privately beside themselves at the thought of a guy like Ricky–who sometimes seems as determined to repeal the Second Vatican Council as the New Deal–going up against Barack Obama.
In MI, as nationally, PPP finds Gingrich’s favorability ratios cratering (at 38/47) and Romney’s foundering (at 49/39, a vast deterioration in this state from earlier readings), even as Santorum’s stay all clean and starchy (at 67/23)…
You have to figure the prevailing sentiment in elite GOP circles is that they’d love to see Ricky succumb to foul play, but don’t want their own, or even Mitt’s, fingerprints on the weapon. But there’s not a lot of time for dithering or scruples or wishing and hoping Ricky does himself in: a double Santorum win in MI and AZ on February 28 would be a serious problem for Romney, and for the party. I’m not privy to the internal councils of Republicans, but it’s likely they are waking up to this reality, and will ultimately either unleash Mitt to go hog-wild-negative, or push enough money in his direction to saturate media in these two states with enough positive propaganda to nominate the Infernal Prince of Darkness himself (so long as he promised to cut taxes, bash unions and oppose legalized abortion).

Mitt’s avalanche of money and hard-hitting attack ads worked well in FL. Santorum’s hope is that there may be a point at which the strategy produces diminishing returns — even among GOP voters.

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