Chaos Keeps Winning

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney should have been dancing, singing, and doing his best imitation of John Travolta's "Staying Alive" when the Michigan results rolled in on Tuesday night, because that is just what he did: He kept his campaign alive.

When Romney invested millions of dollars and scores of days campaigning in Iowa and New Hampshire, he was counting on getting a tremendous boost from back-to-back victories -- but no victory meant no boost. His native state, where his father was governor, was a pass/fail test that Romney simply had to pass.

The size of Romany's 9-point triumph, 39 percent to 30 percent, over Sen. John McCain of Arizona, who carried Michigan eight years ago, may have earned him a couple of bonus points, but it didn't create enough momentum to transform him into the contest's front-runner. He simply stays in the game and heads to the next round. Although Romney might have soldiered on if he had lost in Michigan, his chances of clinching the nomination would have plunged or even vanished.

With former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee's victory in Iowa, McCain's in New Hampshire, and now Romney's in Michigan, we have three Republican winners in three states. To have total chaos, all we need now is for former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee to win in South Carolina on January 19 and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani to win in Florida on January 29. But Thompson is running fourth in South Carolina, with only about 10 percent support in recent polls, and Giuliani appears locked in a four-way tie in Florida with Huckabee, McCain, and Romney. Just about anything could happen in the Sunshine State.

On the Democratic side, the party's beauty contest in Michigan didn't give us any clarity either. Although Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York won, the Democratic National Committee does not recognize her victory because the state broke party rules by moving its primary up. Thus, Clinton won no delegates.

Exit polls showed that 68 percent of African-Americans voters in Michigan voted "uncommitted" -- in effect supporting Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, who had taken his name off the ballot. That's an ominous sign for Clinton as she heads toward the January 26 primary in South Carolina, where half of the participants are likely to be black. Clinton once enjoyed a commanding lead in the state, but that was when African-American voters were solidly behind her.

Clinton turned in a strong debate performance in Las Vegas on the night of the Michigan primary. But the Democratic race is no closer to resolution today than it was a week ago. Nevada holds its caucuses on January 19, the day of the South Carolina GOP primary.

Perhaps South Carolina will begin to narrow the Republican field. A case can be made that McCain is in the best position overall, but the disparity between his support in New Hampshire, where independents could and did vote in the primary, and in Michigan, where independents could have voted but generally didn't, is a troubling sign for the Arizonan, who depends so much on independents for support. In 18 states, independents are barred from voting in GOP presidential primaries.

Any McCain advantage is at least partly offset by Romney's personal fortune -- and his willingness to tap it. Huckabee has yet to demonstrate strength beyond his base of evangelical voters. And Giuliani and Thompson have put no points on the scoreboard.

Democrats no longer have winner-take-all contests for convention delegates, but the GOP has a good many. That means that, at least theoretically, it is easier for the Republican race to pop quickly -- move from a muddle to a done deal in a short period of time. A few wins, no matter how narrow, in large winner-take-all states could give one candidate a big advantage very quickly. That's been Giuliani's calculation all along.

We've never seen two such chaotic and unpredictable nomination fights at the same time. What a fascinating season to be a political junkie. What a maddening one to be an analyst or a candidate.