Iowa is over and New Hampshire is MOSTLY irrelevant

I have a lot of observations:

The first is that you could fit all of the Iowa caucus goers into the Michigan University football stadium. I honestly don't know why we place so much emphasis on this caucus. That said, Rick Perry (TPR- Texas) spent over $800 for every vote he got. Santorum (SCR- Pennsylvania) spent $1.65.

The second is that there are some important primaries left, but none of them are "traditional" primary states. New Hampshire is not one of them. Mitt should win by 3-1 margin because he LIVED IN BOSTON FOR 8 YEARS and has his gubernatorial team running his campaign in NH. If he gets less than 40 percent, it will only be seen as a loss. If he gets 60% it will only be seen as a "duh, of course he did.

After NH, South Carolina is next - also, not relevant to Mitt Romney. He has no chance of winning there unless the vote splits perfectly between five other candidates. I think this result will be the same tie in Iowa, except it will be between Newt and Santorum (if he is still viable in two weeks.)

Florida is a toss up. Latinos will love Newt's immigration reality. The older folks will love Santorum because he reminds them of their grandchildren. Romney will have trouble picking up many voters here.

Nevada is key for Romney. He can, and should, win that state. No one else except Ron Paul will do well there. Michigan should vote 60-70% for Romney.

Super Tuesday will be a total toss up - with each candidate having a state they can claim as their own. In April, New York can push Mitt well ahead of everyone else, but who cares - its New York! He can't hope to win that state in the general.

Conclusion - unless Mitt wins soon, we will have a brokered convention. If he shows up at the convention with 35-45% of the delegates, there is absolutely no guarantee that he will win the nomination. First of all, on the second ballot, his delegates will be the most nervous. Second of all, you might see a real galvanizing force pull them all together. Or, as Newt would say, a true Reagan Republican. The longer the nomination lingers, the more likely the forces opposed to Romney will win little snippets of votes - and they will all have their chip in the game come August. I don't by this malarkey that by staying in the race, all the others are helping Mitt. He has to win 50% of the delegates or he will not be the nominee. He isn't going to convince anyone to come to him.

There is a catch-22 in play. Absent a game-changing event/campaign, on paper, Mitt Romney (LD-Mass) is the only candidate who can give Obama a run for his money. Except that he can't, because his candidacy will create at least one third party candidate, if not two. The WAY-right e-conservatives (C) will find their Ross Perrot (D- Arkansas) and the Tea-vangelicals (C) will do the same. That will shave 2 points off on either side. Obama wins 36-8 states, maybe more.

Newt Gingrich (R- Reagan) can stop Romney with his serious full frontal attack on him. It is not likely that he can win the nomination, but he would make an excellent Dick Chaney (R - 43*) to whomever is the nominee - and ironically, would compliment Romney the best.

Santorum and Newt both guarantee Obama's re-election because they will motivate Obama supporters to come out and work again. This is Obama's biggest problem - motivate the 10% of non-voters who voted last time and the 100,000 or so volunteers to GOTV. Romney doesn't scare them the same way either of the others do. Right now, a lot of former Obama activists are not thrilled with their President. Motivating them is the last thing the republicans want to do.