Maine & Nevada Are Next - Romney Leads

The next two states to determine their choice for the Republican presidential nomination are Maine and Nevada. In Maine the county caucuses will not necessarily be held at the same time. Each has between February 4th and February 11th to hold their caucus, which means the result of all the seperate caucuses (and its resulting delegate allocation) will not be known for another week. My fellow blogger, Shaun of A Sane Break From The Insanity, has offered me his opinion of how Maine will go. Here is what he says:

Rick Santorum has absolutely no support here - most of the Republicans are just to the right of center (like our senators), and aren't buying his hate-infested nonsense talk. I know Ron Paul is currently (or just finished up) touring the state, and he's really popular with the college kids who don't quite get everything he's about. I myself like some of his ideas, but he's just far too twisted for my taste. Maine will either go to Gingrich or Romney. I'm betting on the latter.

He is probably right about the winner, but I still think the caucus system is tailor-made for Ron Paul and he seems to consistently over-perform in them. He could cut into the share of the other candidates significantly -- in both Maine and Nevada. meanwhile, nevada holds its caucus tomorrow, and by late Saturday night we should know how the delegate allocation is going to shake out there (a least in rough terms).

Right now things are looking pretty good for Willard Mitt (Wall Street Willie) Romney. The Las Vegas Review-Journal has released a new poll done for them, and it shows Romney with a big lead in Nevada. Here are the poll results:

Mitt Romney...............45%
Newt Gingrich...............25%
Rick Santorum...............11%
Ron Paul...............9%
Other/Undecided...............10%

Again, I think the poll underestimates the ability of Paul to turn out his supporters. I don't think Paul will win, but I do think he'll outperform Santorum and cut into the strength of both Gingrich and Romney. But whether I'm wrong or right, we'll know in just one more day.