Skip to footer

Super Tuesday: Six things to watch for as results come in

Ten states are voting on Super Tuesday, with 419 delegates at stake. So far, it looks as if it may be a good night for Mitt Romney, but there are many unknowns. Aside from the biggest question – who wins Ohio – here are six things to watch for as the results come in Tuesday night.

1. Watch for who wins the caucus states

AP Photo/John Amis
Voters in Johns Creek, Ga., line up to cast their ballots in the Republican primary at Medlock Bridge Elementary School, on Super Tuesday, March 6.

  • By Amanda Paulson Staff writer

Results in Idaho, North Dakota, and Alaska, where there is no polling and some odd rules, are among the toughest to predict. Given Idaho’s large Mormon population, Mitt Romney is the heavy favorite in that state (and Ron Paul may suffer since voters’ second-choice candidates are taken into account, and much of Mr. Paul’s support is all-or-nothing).

Paul tends to do best in caucus states, and he is the only candidate to have campaigned in person in Alaska. His libertarian message may also resonate with voters there. He has a chance at winning the state – or at least taking a number of the delegates available – while Mr. Romney should get votes from Alaska’s more moderate voters and Rick Santorum from the evangelical Christian voting population.

North Dakota is a toss-up, with Paul, Santorum, and Romney all having a pretty equal shot – and perhaps divvying up the delegates among themselves.

1 of 6
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.