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January 04, 2008

Roundtable On Republican Race

FOX News Special Report With Brit Hume

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE HUCKABEE, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The main thing I have got to do is the message that one win in Iowa and keep it going. Look at New Hampshire, for instance. At least at this stage it is really not a factor here.

JOHN MCCAIN, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I would hope that Governor Romney might have learned a lesson last night that negative attack ads don't work. And let's have a positive campaign here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUME: Well, maybe, but since when is it necessarily wrong for a candidate to criticize another candidate on his or her record? That seems to be a new standard that gets raised every several year, and it doesn't stand very well.

Question: Mitt Romney found himself in much the same situation that Hillary Clinton is (INAUDIBLE) But he, I think, is in perhaps even more deep trouble because could he even go on from here if he were to lose?

And how can he possibly regain the momentum in this state, which is probably a lot of it is going to go to Huckabee, and McCain has the rest of it? Or am I wrong, Bill?

KRISTOL: No, I think you're right. McCain right now is pretty undoubtedly ahead in New Hampshire once the Iowa factor is factored in.

But, again, there are two debates. Not that many people watch them, perhaps, but they will dominate the reporting Sunday and Monday morning in the New Hampshire papers, and they will be shown over and over again on cable news, on local news.

Romney needs to go after McCain, not so much Huckabee. I think Romney intends to try to make the case to New Hampshire voters as he has done on paid TV, not that effectively so far. John McCain is not a conservative.

HUME: What do you take to be the purpose of McCain's complaining about the so-called attack ads in which Romney, really, I think, reasonably is criticizing McCain's record. He's not criticizing McCain personally, he's criticizing his record.

KRISTOL: Attacking Romney that all he does is attack ads is a clever attack.

And it resonates a little bit. Governor Romney, I think, has hurt himself in this campaign. And it is clear in Iowa. I talked to people in Iowa who said this, it was one different attack and then another different attack. It was immigration one day, and Huckabee's paroles another day, and McCain's not being for tax cuts another day.

Romney didn't do enough to explain who he was and what his vision for the future was. And I think McCain wants to leave people with the impression that all Romney does is snipe at one thing here and one thing here, and John McCain has been seriously engaged in the public's business for 25 years, etc.

WILLIAMS: I think it was a strategy that said I don't have any money to buy a bunch of ads attacking Romney, and he does. And he has deep pockets, and he is going to buy ads attacking me, and therefore I want to put out the message from the start that he is the bad guy who is running negative ads, and I'm not playing that game.

That worked pretty well for Huckabee, as it turned out, in Iowa.

I think that when you look at what is going to happen here is Huckabee comes with some momentum into this state. He is something like 20- something points down in one of the old polls. So he is going to come in and be the X factor on the Republican side.

And it is a challenge to the Republican establishment. Who is going to really be able to claim that they represent what has been the Republican stand on things like foreign policy--remember, Huckabee has been a critic of the Bush foreign policy openly.

Who is going to represent immigration? Huckabee and McCain have both been open to the idea of immigration reform; Romney says he's not. But people point out that Romney is a flip-flopper.

So I think you're seeing a struggle here for the heart and the redefinition of the Republican party.

WALLACE: I think one point, and we all know it, but I don't know if we have discussed it so far tonight, is that we all make it sound like this is one race. It is not one race. It is completely separate races.

When the Republicans were running in Iowa, it was one race. When they're running in New Hampshire, it's a completely different race, it's a completely different electorate.

I remember going back when I covered Teddy Kennedy in 1980, when he would go out to the middle west, Illinois or Iowa. They didn't like him, they didn't know him, didn't understand him, and they didn't vote for him. And yet when he would be in New York State or in Pennsylvania, he did just fine.

Huckabee--it was a very special situation. We can talk about all of his appeal, but when I was looking at the entrance polls this morning, 60 percent of the Republican caucus goers were evangelicals--80 percent of Mike Huckabee's support was evangelicals.

Now we all know there are many fewer evangelicals in New Hampshire. It is a completely different electorate, and I don't think it would be at all surprising if Mike Huckabee doesn't play nearly as well.

HUME: But he can, probably, with his strategy, afford to finish even third here, because he has made very little effort here.

WALLCE: Absolutely.

HUME: He will be here for these debates. He may get some traction. He will probably pick up a little steam out of Iowa. He doesn't have to do well here.

Mitt Romney does, and I think John McCain does. If McCain doesn't pull of something off here, he is a goner. He was down to his last dollar, wasn't he, Bill?

And let me just ask you this question about the independents. There has been a lot of speculation about the independents who can vote in either primary will turn out, as they have in the past for John McCain at the Republican primary, or whether they will get fired up for Barack Obama and be involved in the Democratic primary?

KRISTOL: Some of the independents are really Republicans who registered independent, and some of them are Democrats who registered independent, and they will stay in their regular primaries.

Some in the middle will go to Obama because of the excitement, Mccain will lose a couple of points. McCain has gotten a lot of votes here in the past, but the single best predictor of how anyone is going to do in an election, usually, is has he run in the state before, and has he done well.

McCain has done well. Huckabee will come in with momentum. Chris is absolutely right, you don't have anything like the percentage of evangelicals. You know by age what Huckabee's strongest group by far in Iowa? Young voters.

I think Romney can get pinned between McCain loyalists and Huckabee appealing to young, fresh voters. You will see him in the debate tomorrow and Sunday.

Your sense is that he is in very deep trouble.

KRISTOL: Romney is in deep trouble, yes.

WILLIAM: Without a doubt. I think it was a devastating loss for him last night. One of the newspapers here out of Boston had a headline today over a picture over Huckabee that said "Shazam," making him out to be this Gomer Pyle hick nobody knows.

But I think people are going to be enchanted. The guy has a warm, winning personality, likable guy. So he is going to pick up votes.

Who is he going to take votes away from? I don't think it's McCain. I think it's Romney.

WALLACE: And the only thing I would say is, is there a fallback position, plan C for Michigan, which a week after New Hampshire? It's Romney's home state. It's where he grew up. I know you don't want to lose Iowa and New Hampshire and go into Michigan, but he does have some history there.

HUME: We have all been on campaigns when folks were doing OK, and the tide starts running, and it doesn't always carry that person who is on that tide to the nomination. But it can certainly last for quite a while.

It seems to me that we may have the beginning of a tie here for Mike Huckabee and the Republican Party. It may end eventually, but it may not end in time to help Mitt Romney.

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