Romney concedes defeat, Obama wins second term

Washington — President Barack Obama rolled to re-election and a second term in the White House on Nov. 6 (Wednesday, Philippine time) with a victory over Republican challenger Mitt Romney as the Democrat overcame deep doubts about his handling of the US economy.

Romney, closeted with advisers in Boston, did not immediately concede defeat because of questions about whether Obama had really won the pivotal state of Ohio. But other projected Obama victories in Virginia, Nevada, Iowa and Colorado carried the president past the 270 electoral votes needed for victory.

He later went live on national television to congratulate Obama.

Republican Mitt Romney conceded the US presidential election to Obama early on Wednesday morning after a hard-fought campaign.

"This is a time of great challenges for America and I pray that the president will be successful in guiding our nation," Romney told supporters in Boston after calling Obama to congratulate him.

Obama defeated Romney in a number of key swing states, despite the weak economic recovery and stubbornly high unemployment that dogged his campaign.

Television networks called the election late on Tuesday, but the Romney campaign waited more than an hour to agree on the results in Ohio.

"I so wish, I so wish, that I had been able to fulfill your hopes to lead the country in a different direction, but the nation chose another leader," Romney said in his concession speech.

This is the second time the former Massachusetts governor has made a run for the presidency. Romney had promised to revive the nation's economy through reforming the tax code, reducing the debt and confronting China on its trade practices.

Obama, America's first black president, won by convincing voters to stick with him as he tries to reignite strong economic growth and recover from the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s. An uneven recovery has been showing some signs of strength but the country's 7.9 percent jobless rate remains stubbornly high.

Obama's victory in the hotly contested swing state of Ohio - as projected by TV networks - was a major step in the fight for the 270 electoral votes needed to clinch the White House and ended Romney's hopes of pulling off a string of swing-state upsets.

Obama scored narrow wins in Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire - all states that Romney had contested - while the only swing state captured by Romney was North Carolina, according to television network projections.

The nationwide popular vote remained extremely close.

There was no immediate word from the Romney camp on the reported results, with some Republicans questioning whether Obama had in fact won Ohio despite the decisions by election experts at all the major TV networks to declare it for the president.

The later additional of Colorado and Virginia to Obama's tally - according to network projections - meant that even if the final result from Ohio is reversed, Romney still could not reach the needed number of electoral votes in America's state-by-state system of choosing a president.

While Obama supporters in Chicago were ecstatic, Romney's Boston event was grim as the news was announced on television screens there. A steady stream of people left the ballroom at the Boston convention center.

At least 120 million American voters had been expected to cast votes in the race between the Democratic incumbent and Romney after a campaign that was focused on how to repair the ailing US economy.

The same problems that dogged Obama in his first term are still there to confront him again.

He faces a difficult task of tackling $1 trillion annual deficits, reducing a $16 trillion national debt, overhauling expensive social programs and dealing with a gridlocked US Congress that kept the same partisan makeup.

The next four years

Obama's victory will set the country's course for the next four years on spending, taxes, healthcare, the role of government and foreign policy challenges such as the rise of China and Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Each man offered different policies to cure what ails America's weak economy, with Obama pledging to raise taxes on the wealthy and Romney offering across-the-board tax cuts as a way to ignite strong economic growth.

Whether both Democrats and Republicans will now be able to come together and craft a compromise is an open question as Republican congressional leaders vow to stick to their pledges not to raise taxes on anyone.

Inside Obama's Chicago campaign headquarters, staffers erupted into cheers and high fives as state after state was called for the president.

Romney, who would have become America's first Mormon president, made last-minute visits to Ohio and Pennsylvania on Tuesday to try to drive up turnout in those states, while Vice President Joe Biden was dispatched to Ohio.

Republicans are likely to face questions about their ability to appeal to non-white voters as Hispanics, a growing minority, voted heavily for the president.

Obama's Democrats held their Senate majority, while Romney's Republicans retained House of Representatives control.

Democrat Claire McCaskill retained her US Senate seat from Missouri, beating Republican congressman Todd Akin, who stirred controversy with his comment in August that women's bodies could ward off pregnancy in cases of "legitimate rape."

Democrats gained a Senate seat in Indiana that had been in Republican hands for decades after Republican candidate Richard Mourdock called pregnancy from rape something that God intended. Democratic congressman Joe Donnelly won the race.

In another high-profile Senate race, Democrat Elizabeth Warren, a law professor who headed the watchdog panel that oversaw the government's financial sector bailout, defeated incumbent Massachusetts Republican Senator Scott Brown.

Former Maine Governor Angus King won a three-way contest for the Senate seat of retiring Republican Olympia Snowe. King ran as an independent, but he is expected to caucus with Democrats in what would amount to a Democratic pick-up.

Florida Democratic Senator Bill Nelson easily beat back a challenge from Republican congressman Connie Mack to win a third term, while Democratic congressman Chris Murphy beat Republican Linda McMahon, a businesswoman who had served as chief executive of a professional wrestling company. — Reuters

source: gmanetwork.com

Obama, Romney locked in tight swing state battle

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney were locked in a tight race with three critical battleground states too close to call on Tuesday as US voters decided between two starkly different visions for the country.

In early results, Obama and Romney piled up victories in the states they were expected to win easily. Early vote-counting in the swing state of Florida showed them running neck and neck. Obama led in the critical battleground state of Ohio and Romney held an early lead in a third swing state, Virginia.

Romney needs all three of those states to navigate a narrow path to the presidency, while Obama can afford to lose one or two of them and still win a second four-year term.

At least 120 million people were expected to render their judgment between the Democratic incumbent and Romney after a long, expensive and bitter presidential campaign that magnified the differences between Americans wanting to continue Obama's approach to fixing the ailing economy and those who want to try a new approach.

In a victory that would seem to limit Romney's path to a victory, Obama won Michigan, the Republican's state of birth but where he ran afoul of voters by opposing an auto industry bailout pushed by Obama. Some polls had shown a tight race there.

MSNBC projected Obama won Pennsylvania, and Fox News projected the president won in Wisconsin, the home state of Republican vice presidential running mate Paul Ryan. Romney had hoped to pull off an upset in either Pennsylvania or Wisconsin and had visited each state recently.

Television networks projected Romney the winner, as expected, in Republican states Alabama,Tennessee, Mississippi, Kentucky, West Virginia, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Indiana. He was declared the winner in Texas, Kansas, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota.

Obama was projected the winner in the Democratic strongholds of Maryland, Vermont, Connecticut,Delaware, Massachusetts and his home state of Illinois, as well as Washington, D.C., New York and New Jersey.

Who Americans choose will set the country's course for the next four years on spending, taxes, healthcare, the role of government and foreign policy challenges such as the rise of China and Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Each man offered different policies to cure what ails America's weak economy, with Obama pledging to raise taxes on the wealthy and Romney offering across-the-board tax cuts as a way to ignite strong economic growth.

National opinion polls before the election showed Obama and Romney in a virtual dead heat, although Obama had a slight advantage in several vital swing states—most notably Ohio—that could give him the 270 electoral votes needed to win the state-by-state contest.

According to Reuters-Ipsos Election Day polling, one in three Obama voters said the economy was the most important issue for them, while half of Romney voters agreed. Healthcare was the second most important issue for Obama voters and the budget deficit was second for Romney voters. Unemployment was third for both.

Three-quarters of both Romney and Obama supporters decided to vote for their preferred candidate before the October debates between the candidates, according to the data.

The Romney side was encouraged by what was described as heavy turnout in Republican areas from Florida to Colorado.

Romney made last-minute visits to Ohio and Pennsylvania on Tuesday to try to drive up turnout in those states, while Vice President Joe Biden was dispatched to Ohio. Obama remained in his hometown of Chicago.

'I'm very proud'

Expressing confidence, Romney told reporters on his plane as he flew back to Boston that he had written only one speech for evening, one celebrating his victory.

"I'm very proud of the campaign that I've run, to tell you the truth," he said. "I'm sure like any campaign, people can talk to mistakes, but that's going to be part of anything that's produced by human beings," he said.

Obama told a Denver television station he had speeches ready for either outcome. "You always have two speeches prepared because you can't take anything for granted," he told FOX31.

The multimillionaire former head of a private equity firm and a former governor of Massachusetts, Romney would be the first Mormon president and one of the wealthiest Americans to assume the nation's highest office.

Obama, the country's first black president, seeks to avoid being relegated to a single term, something that has happened to only one of the previous four occupants of the White House.

Whichever candidate wins, a razor-thin margin might not bode well for the clear mandate needed to help break the partisan gridlock in Washington.

Fueled by record spending on negative ads, the battle between the two men was focused primarily on the lagging economic recovery and persistently high unemployment, but at times it turned personal.

The close race raises the prospect of a disputed outcome similar to the 2000 election, which ended with a US Supreme Court decision favoring George W. Bush over Al Gore after legal challenges to the tight vote in Florida. Both the Romney and Obama campaigns have assembled legal teams to deal with possible voting problems, challenges or recounts.

Complaints and frustration

Although voting appeared to go smoothly in most places, complaints about procedures and possible irregularities surfaced sporadically across the electoral map. But there were no immediate claims of anything widespread or systematic enough to cast doubt on the credibility of the election outcome.

Storm-weary residents across New York and New Jersey encountered long lines as they went to cast their ballots just over a week after the devastating storm Sandy caused havoc in the region. New Jerseygranted a last-minute extension to the deadline for email voting.

The balance of power in the US Congress will also be at stake in races for the Senate and House of Representatives that could affect the outcome of "fiscal-cliff" negotiations on spending cuts and tax increases, which kick in at the end of the year unless a deal is reached.

Obama's Democrats are now expected to narrowly hold their Senate majority, while Romney's Republicans were projected to retain House control.

Former Maine Governor Angus King won a three-way contest for the Senate seat of retiring Republican Olympia Snowe. King ran as an independent, but he is expected to caucus with Democrats in what would amount to a Democratic pick-up.

Florida Democratic Senator Bill Nelson easily beat back a challenge from Republican congressman Connie Mack to win a third term, while Democratic congressman Chris Murphy beat Republican Linda McMahon, a businesswoman who had served as chief executive of a professional wrestling company. –Reuters

source: gmanetwork.com

A look at the 2nd Obama-Romney debate

An aggressive President Barack Obama scrapped with Republican Mitt Romney over terrorism, jobs, immigration and women’s issues in a feisty second presidential debate. A look at what they said:

LIBYA ATTACKS

Obama: “Secretary Clinton has done an extraordinary job. But she works for me. I’m the president and I’m always responsible, and that’s why nobody’s more interested in finding out exactly what happened than I do … Governor Romney had a very different response. While we were still dealing with our diplomats being threatened, Governor Romney put out a press release, trying to make political points, and that’s not how a commander in chief operates.”

Romney: “It was a terrorist attack and it took a long time for that to be told to the American people. Whether there was some misleading, or instead whether we just didn’t know what happened, you have to ask yourself why didn’t we know five days later, when the ambassador to the United Nations went on TV to say that this was a demonstration. How could we have not known? … This was an attack by terrorists. And this calls into question the president’s whole policy in the Middle East.”

ECONOMY

Obama: “When Governor Romney stands here, after a year of campaigning, when during a Republican primary he stood on stage and said ‘I’m going to give tax cuts’—he didn’t say tax-rate cuts, he said ‘tax cuts to everybody,’ including the top 1 percent. You should believe him because that’s been his history. And that’s exactly the kind of top-down economics that is not going to work if we want a strong middle class and an economy that’s striving for everybody.”

Romney: “Why do I want to bring rates down, and at the same time lower exemptions and deductions, particularly for people at the high end? Because if you bring rates down, it makes it easier for small business to keep more of their capital and hire people. And for me, this is about jobs. I want to get America’s economy going again.”

ENERGY
Obama: “There’s no doubt that world demand’s gone up, but our production is going up, and we’re using oil more efficiently. And very little of what Governor Romney just said is true. We’ve opened up public lands. We’re actually drilling more on public lands than in the previous administration and my—the previous president was an oil man. And natural gas isn’t just appearing magically. We’re encouraging it and working with the industry.”

Romney: “I want to make sure we use our oil, our coal, our gas, our nuclear, our renewables. I believe very much in our renewable capabilities. Ethanol, wind, solar will be an important part of our energy mix. But what we don’t need is to have the president keeping us from taking advantage of oil, coal and gas. This has not been Mr. Oil, or Mr. Gas, or Mr. Coal. Talk to the people that are working in those industries.”

IMMIGRATION

Obama: “We all understand what this country has become because talent from all around the world wants to come here. People are willing to take risks. People who want to build on their dreams and make sure their kids have … even bigger dreams than they have. But we’re also a nation of laws. So what I’ve said is we need to fix a broken immigration system and I’ve done everything that I can on my own and sought cooperation from Congress to make sure that we fix the system.”

Romney: “We welcome legal immigrants into this country. I want our legal system to work better. I want it to be streamlined … We’re not going to round up 12 million people, undocumented illegals, and take them out of the nation. Instead let people make their own choice. And if they find that that they can’t get the benefits here that they want and they can’t find the job they want, then they’ll make a decision to go to a place where they have better opportunities.”

THE AUTO INDUSTRY

Obama: “He wanted to take them into bankruptcy without providing them any way to stay open. And we would have lost a million jobs. Don’t take my word for it, take the executives at GM and Chrysler, some of whom are Republicans, may even support Governor Romney. But they’ll tell you his prescription wasn’t going to work.”

Romney: “The president took Detroit bankrupt. You took General Motors bankrupt. You took Chrysler bankrupt. So when you say that I wanted to take the auto industry bankrupt, you actually did.”

CHINA

Obama: “Governor, you’re the last person who’s going to get tough on China. And what we’ve done when it comes to trade is not only sign three trade deals to open up new markets, but we’ve also set up a task force for trade that goes after anybody who is taking advantage of American workers or businesses and not creating a level playing field. We’ve brought twice as many cases against unfair trading practices than the previous administration and we’ve won every single one that’s been decided.”

Romney: “On day one, I will label China a currency manipulator, which will allow me as president to be able to put in place, if necessary, tariffs where I believe that they are taking unfair advantage of our manufacturers … We can compete with anyone in the world as long as the playing field is level. China’s been cheating over the years. One by holding down the value of their currency. No. 2, by stealing our intellectual property—our designs, our patents, our technology. There’s even an Apple store in China that’s a counterfeit Apple store, selling counterfeit goods. They hack into our computers. We will have to have people play on a fair basis.”

source: newsinfo.inquirer.net

Obama camp pounces on Romney outsourcing report

TAMPA, Fla — U.S. President Barack Obama warned Friday Americans did not want an “outsourcing pioneer” in the Oval Office, pouncing on a report that Mitt Romney’s former firm helped ship jobs abroad.

The report, by The Washington Post, threatened to undermine multi-millionaire Romney’s claim that his experience as a venture capitalist equips him uniquely to create jobs in America’s sagging economic recovery.

“Let me tell you, we do not need an outsourcing pioneer in the Oval Office,” Obama said at a campaign rally in the key battleground state of Florida.

“We need a president who will fight for American jobs and fight for American manufacturing. That’s what my plan will do, that’s why I am running for a second term as president of the United States.”

Obama’s camp quickly capitalized on the report, with a conference call with reporters, a campaign video and Obama’s personal remarks, hoping to crank up momentum after several difficult weeks for the president.

“We believe this is a significant moment in this campaign. All of America has learned a little more about the business record Governor Romney is running on,” said Obama campaign senior adviser David Axelrod.

Citing documents filed with U.S. regulators, the Post said Bain Capital, the firm Romney founded and headed for 15 years, invested in companies that led in establishing call centers and manufacturing facilities in other countries.

The report said the private equity firm was involved “early on” as the departure of jobs from the United States was accelerating.

But Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul said the story was “fundamentally flawed” as it did not differentiate between offshoring—sending jobs overseas—and—outsourcing—employing another firm to do work previously done in house.

“Mitt Romney spent 25 years in the real world economy so he understands why jobs come and they go,” Saul said.

“As president, he will implement policies that make it easier and more attractive for companies to create jobs here at home.

“President Obama’s attacks on profit and job creators make it less attractive to create jobs in the U.S.”

Romney has repeatedly accused China of unfairly snapping up U.S. jobs with its economic policies and charged Obama with being soft on Beijing over its alleged currency manipulation.

But Axelrod accused the Republican candidate of recently “repackaging” himself as a “newly minted anti-China warrior” for political gain.

Bain spokesman Alex Stanton was quoted by the Post as defending the company’s practices, saying: “Bain Capital’s business model has always been to build great companies and improve their operations.”

“We have helped the 350 companies in which we have invested, which include over 100 start-up businesses, produce $80 billion of revenue growth in the United States while growing their revenues well over twice as fast as both the S&P and the U.S. economy over the last 28 years.”

The Post story featured two companies: Corporate Software Inc (CSI) and Stream.

The story said CSI once employed U.S. workers to provide services, but by the mid-1990s was setting up call centers outside the country.

CSI merged with another firm to form a company called Stream International Inc and Bain was active in running the firm as a minority shareholder, the Post said, citing Securities and Exchange Commission filings.

Stream, by 1997, operated three tech-support call centers in Europe and was part of a call center joint venture in Japan.

But Romney aides said the call centers abroad were not intended to serve the U.S. market and served foreign markets they were in for language reasons.

They said that Romney left Bain a year before Stream opened an Indian call center.

Another firm cited in the report was Modus Media, which contracted with Microsoft to build software in Australia.

By 1999, Modus was active in outsource packaging and hardware work for IBM, Sun Microsystems, Hewlett-Packard and Dell in Singapore, Taiwan, China and South Korea, as well as European facilities in Ireland and France.

Modus said in 1997 its expansion of outsourcing services took place in close consultation with Bain, the Post reported.

The Romney camp also maintained that the customer support provided to U.S. technology firms by the call centers overseas allowed them to sell products in those markets and create U.S. jobs.

article source: japantoday.com

Obama camp assails 'vampire' Romney in new ad

WASHINGTON — U.S. President Barack Obama’s camp unleashed a fierce assault on his Republican foe Mitt Romney Monday, slamming the former venture capitalist as a “vampire” who got rich by bleeding dry ailing firms.

A new campaign ad airing in battleground states related how Romney’s firm Bain Capital took over and ultimately closed a steel plant in Kansas City, Missouri and featured emotive testimony from workers who lost their jobs.

The assault marked a key moment in the campaign ahead of November’s election, as Obama seeks to shred Romney’s main argument that his business background qualifies him to revive the US economy.

“Since Romney’s central premise is that he’s an economic wizard who can grow the economy—it’s worth examining what that wizardry is all about,” said Stephanie Cutter, Obama’s deputy campaign manager.

“Mitt Romney’s business experience wasn’t about growing companies and creating jobs and long-term economic growth.

“In deal after deal, Romney’s first priority was to make a personal profit, regardless of the cost to others.”

Romney’s campaign seemed ready for the attack—within hours they issued their own ad lauding Bain’s role in starting up another steel firm, which now employs 6,000 people.

The Obama spot, which will air in Iowa, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia, features the story of several steelworkers who lost their jobs, pension benefits and health care coverage in the plant’s closure.

“Bain Capital walked away with a lot of money made off this plant. We view Mitt Romney as a job destroyer,” said John Wiseman, a steel worker who lost his job when GST Steel closed.

Jack Cobb, who was a steelworker for 31 years, added of Bain’s purchase of their firm: “It was like a vampire, it came in and sucked the life out of us.”

The ad juxtaposes clips of Romney saying that he cares about jobs and the unemployed with the testimony of steelworkers thrown out of work when Bain Capital finally closed down their firm in 2001 with the loss of 750 jobs.

“It was like watching an old friend bleed to death,” said steelworker Joe Soptic, in the ad, relating the moment the last steel was made in the plant.

Romney’s campaign hit back at the president’s economic record, which the former Massachusetts governor wants to make the central point of the campaign ahead of the election.

“We welcome the Obama campaign’s attempt to pivot back to jobs and a discussion of their failed record,” said Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul.

The Romney ad told the story of Steel Dynamics an Indiana-based firm founded with the help of money from Bain Capital.

“American workers in a small town-proving that anything is possible in America,” the ad’s narrator said.

The Obama campaign however accused Romney of being selective with the truth arguing that Bain’s $18.2 million investment was dwarfed by the $77 million contribution from Indiana tax payers.

It also said that while Bain was invested in the firm, it only employed 600 people, far short of the 6,000 jobs supported by the company after its later merger with other steel workers.

Romney says that his experience as a venture capitalist responsible for building brands like the Staples office supplies store, have given him a unique understanding of the economy.

But Obama’s campaign sees Romney’s past as a perfect match for the president’s narrative that a greed-laced rampage by Wall Street firms deprived the middle class of a “fair shake” at the American Dream.

source: japantoday.com

Obama raises $53 million; Romney says 'pack your bags'

WASHINGTON — U.S. President Barack Obama basked in a $53 million monthly fundraising bonanza Monday, but Republican Mitt Romney warned him to “start packing” and get ready to leave the White House.

Two new polls meanwhile offered conflicting pictures of the emerging race to November’s general election—with one suggesting Romney had nosed ahead, while another showed Democratic incumbent Obama with a solid lead.

Obama, who is rebuilding his national political machine to battle Romney, the all but certain Republican nominee, attracted 190,000 new donors in March and an average donation of $50 in his $53 million total.

“We are all going to have to dig even deeper, work even harder, move even faster—it’s going to take all of us working together,” said Obama campaign manager Jim Messina.

Obama has now raised over $200 million for his reelection bid and for the Democratic National Committee and up until the end of February, he had spent $75 million, much of it on his new grass roots infrastructure.

Romney had raised nearly $75 million by the end of February, but has spent $66 million on his long Republican primary campaign, leaving him at a significant organizational disadvantage as the general election dawns.

The Republican has not yet announced his haul for March, but accelerating the pace of fundraising and building a national organization to rival Obama’s are now priorities for his campaign.

Romney took a new swipe at the president on Monday, as he tries to defy Obama campaign efforts to cast him in a negative light at this early stage of the general election joust.

“Start packing,” Romney said with a chuckle in an interview with ABC News.

“The president—I’m sure—wants another four years. But the first years didn’t go so well,” Romney said, slamming Obama’s record on job creation and the gaping budget deficit and saying he guided America in the wrong direction.

Romney sat side-by-side with his wife, Ann, whom the campaign is increasingly employing to introduce her husband; he is often criticized as purportedly less able to relate to voters, and to a wider American public.

“I believe it’s Mitt’s time. I believe that the country—needs the kind of leadership that he—is going to be able to offer,” mother of five Romney, who lives with multiple sclerosis and survived breast cancer, said.

Ann Romney emerged as a key figure in the campaign last week, after Democratic consultant Hilary Rosen ignited a firestorm by saying on CNN the multi-millionaire candidate’s wife had “never worked a day in her life.”

In a new sign that election season is approaching, the Gallup polling organization on Monday debuted their daily tracking poll of the Obama-Romney matchup—and there was good news for the former Massachusetts governor.

Romney led Obama by 47% to 45% despite trailing the president, who is seeking a second term, in a number of recent surveys.

But a senior Obama administration official dismissed the methodology of the Gallup poll, arguing that the survey frequently showed unrealistic lurches in support that did not reflect genuine voter sentiment.

A CNN survey meanwhile showed Obama up nine points on Romney, 52% to 43% and found that Obama led Romney among women—shaping up as a vital voting bloc in November by 55% to 39%.

The Obama official admitted however that though the White House was confident of victory in November, the race would be close, as America is a politically divided nation.

The Republican National Committee, meanwhile, Monday launched a new assault on Obama’s economic record, with a new web ad accusing the president of transitioning from “Hope to Hypocrisy.”

“For three years, President Obama has been promising a better economy and said he would be held responsible for the outcome,” RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said.

“But, when he realized his failed economic policies weren’t working, he decided to blame everyone but himself.”

source: japantoday.com

Romney wins 5 states, including Ohio; Santorum takes 3; Gingrich nabs Georgia

Columbus, Ohio (CNN) -- Mitt Romney won five Super Tuesday states including the big prize of Ohio, while Rick Santorum took three states and Newt Gingrich grabbed a vital triumph in Georgia, CNN projected.

Results from one more contest -- the Alaska caucuses -- were still being counted.

The five victories made it a good night for Romney, padding his front-running delegate total in the Republican presidential campaign, but he failed to get the convincing showing needed to demonstrate his ability to generate support among diehard conservatives.

Super Tuesday results

In particular, Romney was unable to attract strong support from tea party conservatives and evangelical conservatives -- voters who are important in a Republican primary but not as significant in a general election.

"He still has a problem with the base," said Ari Fleischer, a CNN contributor who was press secretary for President George W. Bush. "That base problem may make him attractive to independents if he gets to a general" election, but can work against Romney in the primary season.


Opinion: Why can't Romney win big?

In Ohio, Romney took a late lead of more than 12,000 votes over Santorum with 96% of unofficial results counted, and it was clear Santorum would be unable to overcome the difference.


Even if Santorum had managed to win the Ohio vote, he wouldn't get a majority of the delegates because his campaign failed to properly register them in some districts.

Santorum's victories in the Tennessee and Oklahoma primaries, and North Dakota caucuses, demonstrated his continuing strength among conservative voters, while Gingrich's win in the state that sent him to Congress allowed him to keep his campaign going.


source: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/03/06/politics/super-tuesday/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

Romney wins Washington state caucuses

(CNN) -- Mitt Romney won the Republican caucuses in Washington state, according to unofficial results early Sunday, giving the former Massachusetts governor a shot in the arm heading into Super Tuesday contests.

With 99% of the vote in, Romney had 38%. Texas Rep. Ron Paul had 25% and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum had 24%. They were trailed by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich at 10%.

At stake in the contest are 40 delegates.

"We're in a good second place, but the good news is we're doing very, very well in getting delegates," Paul told supporters in Seattle, when about half of the vote had been counted. "The enthusiasm for the cause of liberty continues to grow exponentially."

Washington's caucuses come just three days before Super Tuesday, when 10 states hold primaries and caucuses. And because of that, all four major GOP presidential candidates campaigned in the state, hoping a strong finish would carry over to Tuesday.

State GOP chairman Kirby Wilbur predicted a large turnout and estimated between 500 and 1,500 did not vote in Kennewick city because of overcrowding.

"The leadership might have been unprepared for the turnout, but I don't know what else they can do when you rent the largest facility in the county," he said.

Even as caucuses began Saturday in Washington, the focus was shifting to Super Tuesday states. Romney campaigned in Cincinnati, where he took aim at President Barack Obama.

"He's out of ideas. He's out of excuses. And in 2012, we're going to make sure he's out of a job," he told a cheering crowd.

Romney got a boost earlier this week from wins in Arizona, Wyoming and Michigan. His win in Washington would be his eighth this election cycle.

Santorum similarly campaigned in the Ohio town of Blue Ash.

"This was the industrial heartland of the country," he said. "They now refer to it as the Rust Belt. After ... I take the corporate tax for manufacturers, eliminate it, cut it to zero -- we're going to be the stainless-steel belt across this country."

But in the days before the caucuses, the attention was on Washington state, as all four candidates made the long trip to the Pacific Northwest.

"This is the first time any one GOP presidential candidate has paid attention to us in recent memory, and my memory goes back to the 1970s," Wilbur said. "We used to be the ugly sister invited to the dance, but no one asked to dance. Now we are the princess."

Wilbur said that the state's contest used to follow Super Tuesday, when in most cycles the battle for the nomination was basically over.

Santorum, campaigning Thursday in Pasco, told supporters, "You are the voice that is going to speak very loudly before Super Tuesday and put this race on a whole other plane."

Romney, who campaigned in Washington on Friday, sounded a similar theme.

"There are a bunch of states that are going to make up their minds on Tuesday, but you guys are first, and so your voice is going to be heard," Romney said at a campaign event in Bellevue.

Paul campaigned in Washington two weeks ago and was back in the state Friday and Saturday. He was also running campaign commercials in Washington, as was Gingrich, who made a swing through the state last week.

The caucuses are open, meaning independent voters and Democrats can take part in the GOP contest.

While some smaller caucus meetings were held in private homes, most gatherings were larger and held in public places, such as schools, and included multiple precincts.

Besides voting for delegates, caucus-goers voted in a nonbinding GOP presidential preference straw poll. While delegates to the GOP convention in Tampa, Florida, won't be determined until later rounds of voting this spring, major news organizations, including CNN, will make proportional delegate estimates based on Saturday's presidential straw poll results.

The state GOP projected that 40,000 to 60,000 people would take part in the caucuses, up from the 12,616 who participated in the 2008 Republican caucuses. There was also a primary on the Republican side four years ago, with around a half million voters casting ballots.

source: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/03/03/politics/washington-caucuses/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

Romney wins Michigan as all eyes turn to Super Tuesday

Detroit (CNN) -- A relieved Mitt Romney headed back to the campaign trail Wednesday after sweeping crucial primaries in Arizona and his childhood home of Michigan to revitalize his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.

Romney needed to win both states, but especially Michigan -- where he grew up when his father was governor -- to assert his ability to overcome the conservative challenge from former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.

A Santorum victory in Michigan would have raised questions about how strong a candidate Romney is within his own party.

By early Wednesday morning, the Michigan Department of State had posted unofficial results from 80 of the total 83 counties. They showed Romney with 36% to 33% for Santorum.


Texas Rep. Ron Paul had 10% while former House speaker Newt Gingrich had 6%

Wayne County, home to Detroit, was not among the tallies, but numbers posted on its website also showed Romney with a sizable lead.

The state's 30 delegates will be allocated on a proportional basis, and Romney and Santorum each won three so far, according to the returns. However, it was unclear who would win the most Michigan delegates, which are based on congressional districts.

Romney's victory in Arizona was expected and more thorough. He had 47% to 27% for Santorum, 16% for Gingrich and 8% for Paul with 88% of the unofficial returns counted, according to the secretary of state website.

The result gave Romney all of the state's 29 delegates in the winner-take-all primary.

In a speech to supporters, Romney acknowledged he had to come from behind on his home turf in Michigan.

source: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/02/28/election/2012/primaries/index.html?hpt=hp_t2