Romney and Santorum

I'm trying to avoid feeling overconfident; I really am. But as I watch the Republican primary unfold, I keep thinking it's looking more and more like 1984 in reverse.
Check out Jonathan Chait's piece in New York:

In all probability, Romney’s campaign against Santorum will work. What’s Santorum going to say – that Republicans always vote for the debt ceiling when there’s a Republican president, and that opposition to it is nothing but disingenuous partisan posturing that both sides used until last year, when it got out of hand and Republicans almost crashed the world economy with it? If the debt-ceiling issue became the vehicle for persuading the Republican base to nominate the least sincerely conservative candidate in the field, that would really be poetic justice for the tea party.

The 2012 Voting Begins

Finally, tonight, people get to make their preferences known in the 2012 presidential campaign.

True, it's a very, very tiny number of people, relative to the number who will vote in November. But still, it marks an important milestone, and an occasion for predictions. Here are mine:

1) Ron Paul will win the Republican Iowa caucuses. I realize I'm going way out on a limb here, but it seems that the party has been trending more and more toward Kooky over the last three years, and they don't get much kookier than Paul. Republicans have threatened so often to shut down the government that you have to believe that's actually a goal of many of them. And those are the kind of people who turn out in Iowa for the caucuses. Though the other candidates may try, nobody's more anti-government than Paul. Paul's support has famously always been small but intense, and that's also the kind of support that can shine in Iowa in January.

2) There are a few names we won't have to hear anymore. As soon as all the votes are counted, several candidates are going to be counted out. I'm looking at you, Bachman. You too, Perry. You three, Gingrich. The latter may hang in there for a couple of weeks, but he's toast. Expect the first two to drop out before the circus gets to New Hampshire.

3) In the end, Romney will be the nominee. And I suspect we'll know this by about April.