Republicans electing the next-in-line, re: Romney/breakdown of order

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Jacobtm:
Folk wisdom says that Republicans in the modern era always nominate the next-in-line, reflecting their more orderly, or top-down nature. This more orderly process allowed the Party to coalesce around one candidate, build up a strong campaign, and beat the Democrats 9 out of 14 times since WWII.

Eisenhower won because he beat Hitler. Since then Republican Presidents have followed a remarkably orderly pattern of royal succession:

Eisenhower
Nixon (Eisenhower's VP)
Ford (Nixon's VP)
Reagan (Challenged Ford for nom in previous election)
Bush Sr. (Reagan's VP)
Bush Jr. (Son of last Republican President)

Only 3 Republican Nominees since Eisenhower have been blocked out of the Presidency: Goldwater, Dole, and McCain.

Goldwater had no ''next in line'' cred.

Dole had challenged Bush Sr. in '88.

McCain had challenged Bush Jr. in 2000.

Dole and McCain couldn't pull it off.

Only Reagan bounced the ''I challenged the last nominee'' card into a successful run for President, and that was largely because of Reagan's personal charisma and the terrible economy under Carter.

Romney's ''next in line'' cred is that he challenged McCain last time around. Of course, we have seen a huge number of candidates flouted as the ones to beat Romney, seeing as Reps are really not enthusiastic about him. From Palin and Christie, who aren't even running, to a series of right-wing nutjobs, who appeal to the base but not swing voters in battleground states, the Republicans have been scrambling to find an anti-Romney. And even though Romney hardly matches the mood of the Party, they can't seem to find anyone better.

This is a huge departure from the normally orderly process Republicans have had in selecting a candidate.

For all the problems of Obama and the economy, I really doubt that this crop of Republican hopefuls will produce a President. They are too all-over the place. You can see the party ripping at the seams.

Definitely not orderly, united, or top-down.

Maybe after this election Republicans will get the message, and the Party will coalesce around one candidate early in 2015 so that they can begin to rev up their campaign early while the Dems are busy fighting over who should be their nominee.

But out of this chaos, good luck...

Mr. Morden:
McCain's nomination in 2008 was hardly "orderly".  The fact that the GOP always nominates the "next in line" doesn't mean that the next in line candidate always leads every poll, or maintains their frontrunner status throughout the entire campaign.

Every single non-incumbent frontrunner for both parties has always run into some rocky patches on their respective paths to the nomination.  Even Gore's campaign was looking shaky for a while in the fall of 1999, when Bradley surged into the lead in NH polls.  Sure, Romney isn't a solid favorite for the nomination in the same way that Bush was three months out from the 2000 primaries, but you can say that about a lot of past frontrunners.

milhouse24:
You can say that the Democrats have no "next in line" policy because there has never been a "good bench" when you lose so many Presidential elections, so the Democrats rely on obscure "C" squad players because they don't have any "A-national" candidates or "B-vice presidents" to nominate and are stuck with small-time "C-regional" politicians. 

On the other hand, after FDR, Republicans have won numerous presidencies and have numerous "Vice Presidential" candidates ready to become president. 

Also, the whole "next in line" theory is created by the candidates themselves, in that they run "many times" like Reagan and Romney to build up support and name recognition.  Then the media talks about them because of familiarity and they become supposedly unstoppable to the media. 

But Democrats do have random liberal causes which help grassroots candidates more, like the anti-war platform and other anti-authority and anti-status quo.  Republican issues like Business and Evangelicalism benefit from name-recognition. 

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