For the moment, anyway, it’s Santorum’s state.

Romney trails Rick Santorum by 11 points in the latest Ohio Poll from the University of Cincinnati.

The poll finds Santorum with support from 37 percent of likely GOP voters surveyed. Romney is in second with 26 percent support, followed by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich at 16 percent and Rep. Ron Paul (Texas) at 11 percent. …The Hill

Which, as we all know (we experienced audience members in the Republican stripshow) doesn’t mean a damn thing. Wait until the “keep Santorum on a leash” money hits Ohio. Santorum, at least for the moment, has tea party support in that state. Is that enough?

Santorum’s lead in Ohio is buoyed by his strength with Tea Party supporters. He received the support of 42 percent of the movement’s backers to Gingrich’s 23 percent and Romney’s 22 percent in the survey.

Santorum also holds the edge with evangelical voters, winning 45 percent of their support to Romney’s 20 percent. …The Hill

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Over at the New Yorker, at least two commentators think Romney will lose if he’s the one chosen to go up against Obama. That said, it’s Amy Davidson who has the best description of the Republican race: “a storm of mendacity.” She also noted that Donald Trump’s short run was particularly awful, setting a standard for the remaining candidates’ rhetoric: “grandiosely petulant; showy and false; gaudy, low, cheap—and, at times, just plain puzzling”!

Romney talked about oil, too. He said he wanted the XL Pipeline built to “get us the oil from Canada we deserve”—is the idea that it would be wasted on Canadians, or that this is crude of a particularly fine vintage? He also, in a prater of giddy, rehearsed denunciations of Obama, told at least one story that was demonstrably untrue, about Obama supposedly saying that he was one of the four best Presidents ever. (He didn’t.)

But then the next week, on the way to Super Tuesday, will be a storm of mendacity covering ten states. (“Ohio is to next week what Michigan was to this week,” John King, of CNN, said.) And what happens, from Alaska to Virginia, won’t stay in those states, but instead set the terms for the general election. Does it matter to us or to the candidates if it’s all mean or tacky or untrue? Trump wouldn’t care. We should. …Amy Davidson, New Yorker

Cross posted from Prarie Weather

Posted on February 29, 2012 at 07:41 AM | Permalink