Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich are the newest
Not Romneys (Donna W. Carson/Reuters)
Public Policy Polling (PDF). 11/10-13. Republicans. MoE 4.1%. (Previous results in table.)
This is the second poll released today showing Gingrich and Cain ahead of Romney. Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway
released a survey of Iowa Republicans showing Gingrich and Cain both leading Romney.
While CNN's poll showed a steeper drop for Herman Cain, and Romney still atop the field, it's abundantly clear that Newt Gingrich is taking flight. So the big question is whether nor not we're about to see a scenario where there are two Not Romneys atop the field.
It's clear that Romney's strategy is for his opponents to grind each other down and to split the primary vote. He doesn't mind facing a bunch of Not Romneys, but if two of them consistently poll better than he does, he's going have real trouble explaining how he plans to win the nomination ... let alone actually winning it.
Whatever ends up happening, it's still amazing that Republican primary voters are so desperate to find an alternative to Romney that they are having trouble choosing between a guy who has been accused of sexually harassing multiple women (reaching financial settlements with two of them) and a guy who is now married to a former staffer with whom he had an affair while trying to impeach Bill Clinton.
And as numbers like this keep on coming out, it's hard to do anything other than burst out in laughter at the state of the GOP's 2012 field. Of course, if one of them ends up winning the presidency, the joke will be on us — and the rest of the country.