GOP Presidential Candidates In 2012

2012 Presidential Candidates

Discussion about the 2012 Presidential Election is already starting to heat up despite being nearly two years from November 2012. Although no 2012 Republican Presidential Candidates have officially entered the race there are 4 politicians who have formed a sort of "front-runners" group and most pundits think the Republican challenger will come from this group.

What follows is a very short overview of each of the four Republican politicians who are in the front-runners group. Their names are Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, and Newt Gingrich. One of these Republicans is likely to face President Barack Obama in November of 2012.

Sarah Palin is the most well known of the possible Republicancandidates due to her stint as John McCain's running mate in 2008 and because she has been able to stay in the news quite a bit since then despite quitting her job as Alaska's Governor half way through her term in order to make more money by appearing on Fox News, giving speeches, Facebooking, and selling ghostwritten books. While Palin is well known she is not particularly well liked outside of the Tea Party base.

Mitt Romney is probably the strongest possible GOP candidate in a head to head match-up against President Obama. Luckily for Obama, Romney's reputation as a "RINO (Republican In Name Only)" and a flip flopper (he was for universal health care before he was against it) will probably doom him in the Republican primaries. He is simply too moderate for the modern Tea Party controlled Republican Party. His "RomneyCare" health care plan's similarity to "ObamaCare" will be the top subject of his Republican opponents.

Mike Huckabee came in second to McCain in the 2008 Republican primaries and if recent Republican history is a good indicator that should make him the the odds on favorite in 2012. But it seems likely that his quite liberal tax and spend record as Arkansas Governor will doom him in the GOP primaries. If he is able to the general election then his far right wing views on social issues will likely be his undoing.

Newt Gingrich rounds out the list. Although I find it very to believe, Gingrich does quite well in GOP primary polls. Unfortunately for Gingrich he does terribly when faced up against the President in a general election match-up. This makes sense because Gingrich was an incredibly unpopular Speaker of the House in the 1990s and many American voters still remember that he was a terrible disaster when he was last given any power.