So close yet so far Thanks to Marf for tonight’s cartoon. All eyes are now on New Hampshire where Romney should have an easier time. One thing’s “almost certain” is that the winning margin next Tuesday night will be a lot larger. So certain are Ladbrokes that this will be the case that they have introduced a handicap market. Will Romney’s lead be greater than 18%. Also to add interest they are taking bets on the winner excluding Romney. The…
Betfair Politics The reaction of punters on the Betfair markets to the overnight victory by just 8 votes in the Republican Iowa caucuses has been twofold: to make Mitt Romney an even tighter favourite for GOP nomination and for more money to be piled on the Democratic party retaining control of the White House in November. For although Romney did get it by a whisker the result has not been anything like as emphatic as he might have liked and…
CNN I’m off to bed without knowing yet who has won the Iowa caucuses. As I write at 6.45am there are just 18 votes separating Santorum and Romney with only 2 precincts to report. It could go either way though the big message in the media is that essentially it’s a tie. Where does the race go from here? Rick Perry appeared to be saying that he was pulling out and it’s hard to see Michelle Bachmann staying in there….
..Marf gives her view The massive challenge for the campaigns in Iowa is ensuring that as many as their supporters as possible are at the venues for the caucus meetings in time for the 7pm local time start. There’s very little time to carry out a round up and so much depends on the early work that they’ve done. Who knows what the outcome will be but one things for sure – the fight for the Republican party nomination will…
PB 2012 competition predictions now out Mitt Romney is headed for a win in today’s GOP caucuses in the Hawkeye State, will win the New Hampshire primary and the Republican presidential nomination – but will then lose to Barack Obama in the battle for the White House in November, according to the findings from the Politicalbetting 2012 Prediction Competition. Rick Santorum is seen as the leading “not-Romney†candidate – but trails by a country mile in predictions for the eventual…
BBC Will it be his day in Iowa? We are here at last – January 3rd the day of the Iowa caucuses which is the first step in the process of the US choosing its next president. Tonight at 7pm Iowa time tens of thousands of ordinary voters will be attending caucus meetings at more than 1,700 venues throughout the state. It will be the aggregate of votes taken at those meetings which will be the “result”. We should start…
Could the demos start to have an impact? Ladbrokes have put up a market this afternoon offering 4/1 against Vladimir Putin failing to become president in the elections scheduled for March. It’s just a month since Russia’s general election when there were widespread allegations of ballot rigging. This prompted demonstrations on a scale that has not not been seen there for decades and put into question the outcome of March’s presidential election. Could it be that the storm that’s been…
Could Mitt really be pipped at the post? I can’t recall a survey in recent times that has been scrutinised as much as the one by the respected US pollster, Ann Selzer for the Des Moines Register. What sets it apart is Selzer’s track record, the scale of the phone survey and the effort to only to count those most likely to take part in tomorrow’s caucus meetings at 1,700 location across Iowa. As Politico reports: “Selzer…said in an interview…