Caught In A Long Primary Fight, Mitt Romney Faces Dilemma

Slogging through a GOP primary season which increasingly looks to be long and contentious, Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney must solve a key condundrum, according to a New York-based political science professor.

Will Romney temper his message? Or will he continue hitting his top Republican rival, Newt Gingrich, hard?

Either strategy has drawbacks, says political theorist and Borough of Manhattan Community College (BMCC) political science professor Geoffrey Kurtz. Romney's dilemma, according to Kurtz, is to decide when it's in his best interest to come out swinging in order to secure sufficient support from the conservative base, and when he'd be better off dialing back the anti-Gingrich invective and making his appeal to the broader American audience in the event he wins the nomination and faces off against President Obama in November.

"Even if he winds up as the Republican nominee, a long, negative primary campaign will almost certainly make him a less attractive candidate to the Americans in general," Kurtz says.

Gingrich, the former House speaker, isn't making the choice any easier for Romney. Although Romney won recent contests in Florida and Nevada, Gingrich gives no indication of dropping out.
Indeed, a tea party group in California announced Tuesday that Gingrich would appear at a town hall meeting next Monday in Pasadena to fire up the right wing against Romney, the former Massachusetts governor.

Further, the process itself won't be kind to Romney, according to Rick Klein of ABC News.

"The proportional allocation of delegates -- as opposed to the winner-take-all format that dominated previous cycles -- combines with a back-loaded calendar to leave virtually no chance for Romney to end the race quickly, unless his rivals cooperate," Klein says. "As of today, only 143 delegates have been awarded -- barely 6% of the full complement of 2,286 who will be selected to cast ballots at the Republican National Convention. Fewer than 200 additional delegates are up for grabs through the remainder of February."

As November approaches, Romney faces a a second problem, as well, whether he "is a good match for the American mood," says BMCC's Kurtz. "Someone like Romney, who made his fortune in the finance sector, and is a son of privilege, doesn't fit the national mood. That could hurt him in the general election."

But Kurtz also feels Obama also is vulnerable on this question, too.

"It's not clear that a former college law professor like Barack Obama fits the national mood either," says Kurtz. "So we might find ourselves choosing between two candidates who have a hard time speaking to some of the discontent that American voters feel right now."


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