As Jim noted below, Ron Paul ended up raising a staggering
amount of money online yesterday, a sum that would would be
impressive for any candidate, even Hillary Clinton. As of this
writing, he is up to about $7.3 million for the quarter. He may
outraise Thompson, Giuliani and/or Romney (less personal donations)
this quarter. Give the man his due--he clearly has a base of
enthusiastic followers.
With that said, I don't really see what impact he'll have on
this race. There are a few basic ways that a candidate can affect
the outcome of nomination battle: either by winning the nomination,
pulling support from one of the other candidates, or by dropping
out and endorsing somebody else. As enthusiastic as Paul supporters
are, there's no evidence from scientific polls that he has any shot
of capturing the nomination. Whether or not his supporters like it,
or think it should be this way, the reality is that Paul's
opposition to the Iraq War, indifference to an Iranian nuclear
weapon, and his general philosophy on foreign policy, put him at
odds with an overwhelming majority of Republicans on the dominant
issues of the day. Sure, Paul can use his money to take out
television ads and he may have a strong showing in New Hampsire
among libertarians and anti-war independents, but he won't win, nor
will he do as well in closed primaries. And unlike Huckabee (who
can affect the race by pulling social conservative votes from
Romney, Thompson, and possibly McCain), Paul is not likely to pull
many votes from any top-tier Republicans, since none of them
endorse his anti-war positions. Ron Paul supporters tend to be made
up of disillusioned libertarians and independents, many of whom are
completely turned off by the Republican Party, and would not be
voting for any of the top Republicans anyway. I would even guess
that a lot of his supporters would not be voting at all if Paul
were not in the race. And it's not as if he's going to drop out of
the race and endorse any Republican. So, the Paul candidacy is
another interesting angle in the most dynamic Republican nomination
battle in decades, but let's keep everything in perspective.
topics:
Foreign Policy, Hillary Clinton, Television, Iraq, Iran
