It was no secret that Romney would win the Granite state's primary. But just how consequential is the New Hampshire open primary, that allows Democrats, libertarians, and whoever else might drag themselves into a booth to vote in a Republican Party primary? A primary with half of its voters declared as 'independents'? A primary that chooses a Massachusetts moderate as its first pick, with a libertarian-esque wing-nut playing second fiddle? I'd contend, 'not very'. And it shouldn't take a liberal Republican ambassador to China under Obama to figure that one out (who by the way came in third). "Tonight, we made history" alright, Republican Party. They say Iowa doesn't matter, now that New Hampshire is here. Live free or die? I'd say the Republican Party of New Hampshire has proven quite the contrary by killing the process altogether.
So rather than turn Fox News on and listen to Rove or Kristol, maybe sourKrauthammer, drone on about how Romney has this nomination all sewn up with only a single primary (nevermind that Reagan didn't catch fire until as late as North Carolina), the truly amazing commentary of the night (on the candidates, capitalism vs. corporatism, a stroll down 20th century presidential history and much more!) came from none other than the Great One well before the New Hampshire polls closed.
"If I were voting today, it'd be for Santorum." ... "Romney's a corporatist, Gengrich's a corporatist." ... "Huntsman was a fairly liberal Republican in a fairly conservative Republican state" ... "then there's this [Paul] crackpot!"
"Let's be blunt. We've got a pathetic Marxist president who's an incompetent, a man who wants to transform the greatest country on the face of the earth into something that isn't great. He can be beaten, in fact, he can easily be beaten with the right candidate and the right message, and here we are with this..."
"So you have independents voting in the Republican primary, you have Republican hacks on tv, establishment types, telling us, 'if Romney wins, that means nobody has ever won Iowa and New Hampshire...' No, what it means is the independents pushed a candidate in New Hampshire, when the rest of us still haven't had a chance to vote. It's not over until we say it's over. We need more time, ladies and gentlemen. Sorry Iowa, sorry New Hampshire, you don't get to decide all this for me."
UPDATE: An Examiner report reveals precisely how Tuesday's open primary in NH resulted...
GOP Presidential candidates Ron Paul and Jon Huntsman finished the New Hampshire Primary in second and third place, respectively, largely due to liberal Democrats who crossed over to vote in the Republican primary.
With both receiving more Democrat votes than Republicans (Huntsman with 41, Paul with 24 + the libertarian vote), the sham of open primaries is yet again exposed. Once you take all the 'bogus' votes away (i.e., those who won't vote for either in the general), those two did terrible among Republican voters. Also to note, Romney only pulled his usual under 25%...
Less than half - 49 percent - of those polled identified themselves as Republicans. Nearly half of those - 49 percent - voted for Romney.
This race is far from over, folks, not just for conservatives, but Republicans in general.
