Wall Street Wants Mitt - Teabaggers Don't

There's no doubt who the bankers and crooks on Wall Street would like to see win the Republican presidential nomination. They want Mitt Romney, because he's one of their own. He may have been born with a silver spoon in his mouth (which Wall Street loves), but he's made himself super-rich running an investment firm (Bain Capital) and showing other capitalists how to hide their money off-shore to avoid paying taxes. Putting Romney in the White House is Wall Street's wet dream.

The above chart makes that abundantly clear. The Wall Street lobbyists have given the Romney campaign more money than they've given all of the other Republican candidates combined. In the first six months of this year the lobbyists have forked over $137,650, or 51.6% of all the money contributed by lobbyists. The other candidates lag far behind -- Tim Pawlenty ($63,204), John Huntsman ($31,600), Newt Gingrich ($25,500), Rick Santorum ($8,800), and Michele Bachmann ($125). And that doesn't count the millions Wall Street is pouring into Romney's "super PAC", Restore Our Future.

But while he's the choice of the money moguls on Wall Street, Romney has had trouble selling himself to the real powers in the Republican Party -- the teabaggers. With his speeches and pronouncements Romney has tried hard to make it look like he is a rabid right-winger, but so far, the teabaggers are just not buying it. They are having trouble getting around his Wall Street connections, his mormonism, and his signing into law in Massachusetts a health care program that looks an awful lot like "ObamaCare".

Romney has held the lead in the Republican race for months now, but has been unable to separate himself from the pack. In most polls he is still only getting in the low to mid-twenties. But the teabaggers have yet to settle on who they really want to win the nomination. A few weeks ago the flavor of the month was Michele Bachmann, and for a time it looked like she might catch Romney.

The current flavor of the month is Texas governor Rick Perry. Republicans are still trying to pass as real the ridiculous notion that Perry has created some kind of economic "miracle" in Texas which he could pass on to the entire nation. It's not true, and I've posted about this "miracle" here and here. I expect his star will start to fade as people outside of Texas begin to learn the truth.

Sarah Palin is supposed to announce her big decision on whether she'll run about the first week of September, so maybe she'll be next month's favorite flavor. She's not any more likely than any of the others to get a majority of delegates though, and it's still looking like that race may go all the way to a teabagger-controlled convention to pick a candidate. Anyway, here are the latest standings according to a new Marist Poll (taken August 2nd through 4th):

Mitt Romney...............21%
Rick Perry...............18%
Sarah Palin...............10%
Rudy Giuliani...............9%
Michele Bachmann...............8%
Herman Cain...............6%
Ron Paul................3%
Rick Santorum...............3%
Newt Gingrich...............2%
Tim Pawlenty...............2%
Gary Johnson...............2%
Buddy Roemer...............2%
Jon Huntsman...............1%
Undecided...............14%

The truth is that none of these candidates could beat President Obama at the present time. All they can hope for is that something happens between now and November 2012 that would give them a chance -- which is probably why congressional Republicans are trying to tank the economy (hoping Obama gets blamed for it). Here is how the poll leaders would do against Obama now:

Obama..........46%
Romney..........41%

Obama..........48%
Giuliani..........43%

Obama..........49%
Pawlenty..........36%

Obama..........52%
Bachmann..........35%

Obama..........52%
Perry..........33%

Obama..........56%
Palin..........35%