Saturday, May 16, 2009

Jon Huntsman Chooses China Over 2012

I was wondering whether Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman was thinking about running for the Republican nomination. He'd staked out a bunch of moderate positions, and there was some chance that he'd try to drive to the nomination through the sane people lane, avoiding the crazy people traffic jam where the Palins and Jindals and Mark Sanford types are all honking at each other. It's not like there's much of a sane people vote in the contemporary Republican Party, but if 10 candidates are fighting over 80% of the voters and you've got the other 20% to yourself, you have a shot. It's not a great shot, because as candidates get eliminated the anti-sane-people bloc ends up uniting against you. But there are circumstances in which it could work.

Anyway, he's now Obama's envoy to China, so that becomes somebody else's meager opportunity.

3 comments:

Jamelle said...

This is probably a good move on Huntsman's part; if the economy recovers - or even improves slightly - then Obama will easily win reelection in 2012. More importantly, there's the very real chance that Obama will win in something approaching a landslide, and whoever bears the brunt of that will be a permanent fixture of the political loser's circuit. Huntsman has a bright political future, and he'd be a fool to run what is likely to turn out to be a quixotic campaign against Obama in 2012 (let Mitt Romney carry the banner).

Neil Sinhababu said...

Yeah... and I can't imagine that dividing the Mormon vote between Huntsman and Romney bodes well for either of them.

john rove said...

I don't think republicans will vote for a mormon, especially one who favors gay marriage.