I've never seen one of these guys show up to their own event before ten o'clock," the baffled correspondent from a national news organization told me last night. Senator Bradley's early arrival at New Hampshire College was one of many surprises during Tuesday's New Hampshire Primary. Covering the Bradley campaign for Dartmouth's radio station, WDCR, I was among the many that stood open-mouthed when the news reported that Senator John McCain had smashed all predictions with an incredible eighteen-point lead over Governor George W. Bush (the final tally was 49 percent for McCain to 30 for Bush). Although Bradley lost the race, he too managed to win a larger percentage of the vote than many news sources had predicted (the final tally was 50 percent for Vice President Al Gore to 46 for Bradley).
If politics, like the stock market, is a game of expectations, then yesterday's win for McCain was like an internet stock going public. The main reason that he was able to garner such a large portion of the vote was partly due to the influence of New Hampshire's sizable number of registered independents. CNN reported that out of the 51 percent of voters labeling themselves conservatives, 37 percent voted for McCain, 36 percent for Bush and 25 percent voted for Steve Forbes, Alan Keyes and Gary Bauer. The fact that McCain, who has been labeled a moderate by most and a liberal Republican by some, could garner so many of the conservatives, was yesterday's biggest surprise.
McCain's fight for the nomination however, is far from finished. New Hampshire's Republicans are far less socially conservative than South Carolina's, where McCain has been trailing Bush in recent polls. McCain admits that he will have to focus on South Carolina, and for the most part, plans to ignore other upcoming Republican primary states, like Delaware, and Michigan. Without a serious effort in those other states, McCain will have to rely almost entirely on his momentum from New Hampshire in order to raise enough funds and support to carry him to Super Tuesday on March 7, when New York, California and nine other states will cast their primary ballots. Competing against Bush's massive national organization, it seems unlikely that McCain will be able to spread his recent success to all corners of the country.
Bush, on the other hand, needs to convince the rest of the country that New Hampshire was a fluke, and that the party establishment's golden boy still has that Texas shine. There was no smirking during last night's concession speech, but Bush is actually lucky that McCain won (although the large margin certainly wasn't good news). By keeping himself balanced between the moderate McCain and the conservative Forbes, Bush can steer clear of promises that might hurt him in the general election. Bush's main concern should be pushing Forbes and Keyes out of the race (Bauer is almost certainly dropping out) while maintaining his comfortable lead over McCain in the states leading up to Super Tuesday.
The close finish between the two Democrats is a sure sign that the race on their side of the aisle, is also far from over. Despite indications that the race could get much dirtier, the stiff competition in the Democratic race deserves most of the credit for boosting Vice President Al Gore's poll numbers in a theoretical match up against Bush. Many people saw Gore's small -- "w," win in New Hampshire as a combined result of his mid-campaign crisis/reinvention and his energetic, "non-negative," criticisms of Bill Bradley's proposals, both of which have helped him become a more viable candidate in the eyes of most voters. The only difficulty now is to wrap up the nomination with enough money left over to compete during the summer and autumn stretch. Gore's present objective should be to win over the college-educated males that are at the heart of Bradley's supporters, and to force the Senator out of the race without emptying the Treasury.
Although Bradley managed to come within 5 percent of Gore in New Hampshire (a fairly impressive comeback after losing 2 to 1 in Iowa), he has the toughest battle among the four major candidates. Bradley's biggest challenge is to raise the funds to compete in the T.V. advertising battle leading into Super Tuesday. Luckily for Bradley, there may be an alternative to T.V. ads. Even before the returns had come in on Tuesday, Bradley had challenged Gore to meet him in a debate a week for the rest of the month, and into March. In order to stay in this race, Bradley has to assuage the fears that he is incapable of fighting back against Gore's aggressive campaign and start winning some delegates.
The surprises in the New Hampshire race guarantee that the rest of the country will now be treated to a real campaign (at least for a few weeks), as opposed to a two-party coronation-fest. Unfortunately, the realities of the primary system will undoubtedly take a heavy toll on the losers of Super Tuesday. New Hampshire's voters have done an admirable job at analyzing and evaluating the candidates. It is now up to the people voting in February and March, to decide whether the primaries in April have more than one name on their ballots.
