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Q: Who lost big in the MN caucuses?

February 5th, 2008 by Gary M. Miller

A: Tim Pawlenty.

With early returns in Minnesota pointing to a robust Romney victory, it is the Gopher State’s boy governor who is the biggest loser.  After leaning on every elected official in the state to back his candidate of choice, Mr. Pawlenty’s inability to deliver will hurt him in the 2008 veepstakes.

While that may have conservatives breathing a collective sigh of relief, the bad news is that Mike Huckabee’s stock will rise with his impressive wins across Dixie.  The only ticket that could make conservatives even less enthusiastic with a ticket headed by McCain — if that’s possible — would be McCain-Huckabee.


Posted: February 5, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Under: Pawlenty, elections | 7 Comments »


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7 Responses to “Q: Who lost big in the MN caucuses?”

  1. Jeff Kouba Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 1:05 am

    Good call. K-Lo agrees with you.

    (Though, I’m not certain how he could’ve “delivered” the state. I mean, I never got a call from him asking me to vote. Is it more a bully pulpit thing?)

  2. First Ringer Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 1:55 am

    Didn’t surprise me much – McCain got less than Alan Keyes eight years ago and despite Pawlenty leaning on some of the GOP machinery, you also have to remember that Pawlenty got whomped by Brian Sullivan in the 2002 caucus straw poll (something like 51-38%). But of course, those are facts that are practically unknown by most national political pundits, let alone most local ones. I agree that Pawlenty “lost,” but given that, as Jeff points out, Pawlenty did nothing for Mac locally other than getting some of the usual suspects to endorse him when he was the frontrunner a year ago, it shouldn’t sting him too badly.

  3. Sam Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 9:09 am

    Yeah Conservatives hate Huckabee, like those in AL, TN and GA. Key, Dark Red, Conservative States.

    Please point to all those conservative victories for Romney – He can’t win anywhere excepts states that are Blue or states that he lived in.

    Romney is done. The flip-flopping, pro-abortion, gun controlling Northern Liberal is done.

    In fact Romney played spoiler or Huckabee would have won a few more conservative states he was leading in, that went to McCain.

    And and before the religious bigot go to the Romney talking points – exit polls from 16 states show that evangelicals split votes evenly among all three candidates.

  4. Gary M. Miller Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 10:02 am

    Sam, I think we have a case of mistaken definitions. When I said ‘conservative’, I was refering to those who believe in limited government — not those who believe you should vote for someone because they share the same doctrinal position on eschatology.

  5. Sam Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 10:32 am

    I was speaking of conservatism.

    So we know Mitt’s not conservative on Social, everyone agrees to that.
    And on constitutional issues – didn’t like that pesky 2nd amendment among others
    Fiscal – Raised taxes (sorry fees) in MA, Government forced health care (and if he wanted to make sure we knew his social stance with cheap $50 abortions mandated), supported Minimum wage increase with indexing for inflation.

    And of course his desire to never be like Regan.

    No wonder he keeps winning in liberal states.

    And the “He’s run a business so he a conservative”
    Take a look at you leading Money folks – Soros, Gates, Buffet – all liberals.

    And might I add that people are always complaining about candidates not following the platform – Check out Section 2 of the MN GOP Platform or around page 84 of the 200 Platform.

    So I assume since you talk of conservatives and Romney, by limited government you mean government control of health care, taking more of our money, support for judicial activism, government wage and price control and of course disarming the people.

    Yeah, those horrible big government state like TN and GA that went to Huckabee. Good thing Romney was able to win small government states like MN and MA.

  6. John K Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 12:09 pm

    As co-chair for the McCain campaign, Romney’s big victory in Minnesota must be an even bigger embarrasment for Pawlenty. In retrospect, considering all of the states Pawlenty campaigned in for McCain, perhaps he should have spent more time in Minnesota doing the job he was elected to do.

  7. Sam Says:
    February 6th, 2008 at 12:29 pm

    I think we need to encourage him to campaign more!

    Maybe take the whole legislative session off.