Black Box Report

Congratulations, Democrats...

Mitt Wins! Mitt Wins! Mitt Wins!

OK, so exit polls show that, despite the attempts of mischief-making bloggers, Democrats did not flock to Mitt Romney in Michigan's open primary, but to runner-up John McCain. Still, the desired outcome was the same...

He needed a win badly there, so Mitt Romney campaigned as if he were running for President of Michigan, and it paid off. Sure, he had to promise more pork than Jimmy Dean and touted a decidedly un-conservative, big-government-will-solve-your-problems approach to Michigan's economic woes ("a Kruschev-style five year plan for Detroit."), but he got the job done. Romney supporter extraordinaire Hugh Hewitt took to his blog for his chance to, finally!, have something to brag about:

Mitt Romney has now re-established himself as the candidate to beat...Republicans are now voting in large numbers, and they are voting for the Reagan conservative. There is no reason to believe that John McCain will be able to recapture his New Hampshire moment or Huck his Iowa surprise.

Hewitt's enthusiasm aside, there's also no reason to assume Mitt is going to be able to keep this up for much longer:

The biggest question now is when will Romney’s money start running out. Because by some estimates, he has spent upwards of $40 million of his own money on the campaign so far. And if this contest continues in the same manner and these candidates keep splitting up the delegates can Romney spend his way to a brokered convention?

And speaking of brokered convention, in case you hadn't noticed, the race for the GOP nomination is now clear as mud. John Dickerson at Slate gets the funny-of-the-day:

So we're back to square one in the Republican Party. Mitt Romney beat John McCain handily in Michigan, which means there have now been three major GOP contests and three different comeback winners. At this rate, Thompson will win South Carolina and Giuliani Florida. The GOP primary is starting to look like a Pee Wee soccer tournament: Everyone gets a trophy!

Meanwhile, the only major Democratic candidate on the Michigan ballot was Hillary Clinton, which is not to say she had an easy time of it. Clinton eked out a narrow victory over an emerging dark horse candidate, a Mr. Uncommitted:

Clinton split the male vote with Mr. Uncommitted;
Clinton lost the black vote overwhelmingly to Mr. Uncommitted; Clinton lost the under-30-years-old vote to Mr. Uncommitted;
and Clinton lost independents to Mr. Uncommitted.
......
Just to make things even more interesting, Edwards could win Nevada. And they say the GOP race is wide-open.

This Uncommitted guy seems to do well among Democrats and Republicans. Maybe Michael Bloomberg should make him his running mate?