Political India: Engaging America

As the season of caucuses and primaries for selecting the Republican presidential nominee kicks into fourth gear next Tuesday in Iowa, Mitt Romney, former Governor of Massachusetts, has garnered a firm but narrow lead over his rivals in an eclectic, and according to some, weak field of contenders.

Though President Barack Obama still enjoys a comfortable lead over Mr. Romney, with a Gallup poll in December placing the former's approval rating at 47 per cent, Mr. Romney's 27 per cent still sees him breaking away from his principal challenger of recent weeks, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Fuelled by his sometimes high-octane oratory at the Republican presidential debates, Mr. Gingrich's campaign to win his party's nomination took its first beating over the summer when most of his campaign staff abruptly quit their jobs.

More recently, despite a strong poll surge in November, Mr. Gingrich was said to have been wrong-footed by a shortage of campaign funds and an inability to respond to a series of negative ads that the Romney and Ron Paul teams ran against him.

As per the most recent Gallup poll, which came out earlier this week, Mr. Gingrich was slipping fast and had dropped to 23 per cent, with the libertarian candidate Congressman Paul at a distant 11 per cent, Texas Governor Rick Perry at 8 per cent, Tea Party-backed Congresswoman Michele Bachmann at 5 per cent, and former U.S. Senator from of Pennsylvania Rick Santorum at 4 per cent.

Mr. Romney has consistently maintained a top, if not the lead, position among the candidates throughout the season of debates in 2011. While his Mormon religion and record of implementing Obama-like policies in healthcare are contentious with the hard core of conservatives in the Republican Party, he is seen as possibly the most credible candidate to challenge Mr. Obama.

The caucuses which begin in Iowa next week will continue into March, across U.S., and then the primaries will extend until the end of June.