{"id":34826,"date":"2011-12-28T22:20:31","date_gmt":"2011-12-29T05:20:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=34826"},"modified":"2012-01-02T22:22:29","modified_gmt":"2012-01-03T05:22:29","slug":"a-ron-paul-surge-what-surge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/12\/a-ron-paul-surge-what-surge\/","title":{"rendered":"A Ron Paul surge? What surge?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Ron Paul<\/p><\/div>\n

Update, Dec. 31, 8:45 p.m.:<\/strong><\/em> Since this blog was published on Wednesday,\u00a0Mitt Romney\u00a0has officially surged ahead of\u00a0Ron Paul\u00a0with respect to SocNets. Specifically, in this past week, Romney added 23,103 new FB Likes\/Twitter Followers, while Paul fell behind with the addition of only 18,040 new FB Likes\/Twitter Followers.\u00a0And so the Paul “surge”\u00a0was\u00a0<\/em>but a blip.<\/p>\n

For the sake of perspective, President Obama added 73,647 new FB Likes\/Twitter Followers this week.\u00a0While it seems like the president has a huge SocNets advantage, I would bet this is only temporary given that the GOP is currently split between seven candidates to Like\/Follow.<\/p>\n

(Note: The source of my information comes from a\u00a0new website at the nexus of politics and social media –\u00a0whistlestop.com<\/a>.\u00a0Whistlestop is launching in January and will change the course of politics and “grassroots” campaigns. Watch for a blog from me on it.)\u00a0Happy 2012!<\/p>\n

Original post:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Ron Paul<\/a>. Let’s chat about him.<\/p>\n

A friend, actually Heath, suggested I write about Ron Paul’s “surge” and whether it matters in the Republican primary race.<\/p>\n

My gut reaction to the suggestion of a Ron Paul surge is precisely this – “what surge?”<\/p>\n

Let’s put this “surge” into perspective by looking at\u00a0two things: SocNets and that decievingly unassuming state out there called Iowa. (Note that\u00a0SocNets is a techie\u00a0abbreviation for all things related to\u00a0“social\u00a0networks.” Think Facebook\u00a0(FB) and\u00a0Twitter.)<\/p>\n

SocNets<\/h3>\n

<\/strong>Ok, let’s be frank – we are all well aware of the fact that Ron Paul is rocking it out of the park amongst the Republican field of nominees in recent months <\/em>in terms of FB likes and Twitter followers. <\/strong><\/p>\n

To be specific, we know that\u00a0over the past few\u00a0months Paul has been adding more FB\u00a0likes and Twitter followers per week than his GOP-nominee competitors. Not quite sure we can call this a surge, however,\u00a0seeing that Paul’s SocNets gap advantage (per\u00a0week)\u00a0is narrowing. As of Wednesday of this week, for example, Paul has added 7,740\u00a0likes\/followers compared to Mitt Romney’s<\/a> 7,693.\u00a0Last week (Dec 18-24), the gap was wider. The surge seems to be more like a blip.<\/p>\n

But does this matter?<\/p>\n

Do SocNets matter in general, with respect to elections? Absolutely, but\u00a0that’s another blog.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Sarah Lenti<\/p><\/div>\n

Back to Paul. Does his upward-blip on the SocNets scene\u00a0matter with respect to cinching the GOP nomination?\u00a0I would say no. Bear in mind that Romney still\u00a0has an all-time total of around 1.4 million combined FB likes and Twitter followers to Ron Paul’s 800,000. So, all-time\u00a0combined and all-in-all, Romney is still ahead.<\/p>\n

And, just to put it in perspective: Barack Obama<\/a> has 35,983,315 all-time combined, and has added 42,530 so far this week.<\/p>\n

Iowa<\/h3>\n

<\/strong>Point 2, Iowa. We are all also aware of the fact that Paul is slightly ahead in Iowa, according to the most recent polling. To be exact, the latest PPP poll<\/a> (Dec. 26 and 27) has Paul up by 4 points in Iowa, while the latest Real Clear Politics average<\/a>\u00a0(Dec. 18-27) has Paul up by 0.5 points.\u00a0Contrast these numbers to Newt Gingrich’s<\/a> 10-15 point lead in Iowa a few weeks ago, and one could argue that Paul has certainly gained ground.<\/p>\n

But does this matter?<\/p>\n

Paul’s rise in Iowa matters exactly as much as Rick Perry’s<\/a> rise, then Herman Cain’s<\/a> rise, then Gingrich’s rise…\u00a0In other words, it doesn’t matter.\u00a0Paul’s gain could evaporate tomorrow. And even if it doesn’t, he can’t compete with Romney in New Hampshire, nor Gingrich in South Carolina. So there you go. This field does not depend on Iowa.<\/p>\n

Further, I would point you to a recent Iowa State University poll<\/a>, which furthery nullifies whatever it is that Paul is currently doing in Iowa. The poll says this:<\/p>\n

“A recent Iowa State University\/Gazette\/KCRG poll of likely caucusgoers found the race “remarkably fluid” with 37.8 percent of respondents indicating they were still trying to decide and another 34.1 percent only leaning towards one candidate. Only 28.1 percent indicated that they had definitely decided who they would support.”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Slow and steady<\/h3>\n

A concluding thought: Slow and steady wins the Republican presidential primary race.\u00a0That’s what I think.\u00a0As such, you can probably read between the lines in terms of whom I am predicting will end up being the GOP nominee. And, no, it’s not Paul.\u00a0 Blips, or even mini surges, don’t matter.<\/p>\n

Slow and steady wins this race.\u00a0And it’s going to be a long one.<\/p>\n

(Disclosure: Lenti previously worked on Mitt Romney’s policy book, as a researcher, in 2008 and 2009.\u00a0She is currently a political consultant and would urge you to check out a favorite site – sglf.org<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

Sarah Lenti is the blogger behind NMPolitics.net\u2019s\u00a0<\/em>The Savvy<\/em><\/a>. E-mail her at\u00a0<\/em>sarah@nmpolitics.net<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UPDATED: Ron Paul’s rise in Iowa matters exactly as much as Rick Perry’s rise, then Herman Cain’s rise, then Newt Gingrich’s rise… In other words, it doesn’t matter. Slow and steady wins this race. And it’s going to be a long one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192,181],"tags":[156,226,116],"class_list":["post-34826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary","category-the-savvy","tag-2012-election","tag-presidential-race","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34826\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}