Trailhead: A campaign blog.

McCain Wins—Because of Tancredo?

NEWS: McCain is projected to win New Hampshire on the Republican side, but it's unclear by how much.

An initial thought: Is this because Tom Tancredo dropped out of the race on December 20? Without Tancredo, McCain hasn't had an uber, uber hardliner pushing the conversation on the right during the campaign.  Remember, McCain's chief weakness is his relatively tame stance on immigration, something that Mitt Romney harped on over and over this weekend at debates.

But notice what happened at the ABC debate. None of the other candidates rallied to Romney's side when he was hammering McCain. Instead, they turned on Romney and started attacking him, leaving McCain to grin in the void.

Something tells me that Tancredo wouldn't have let McCain off the hook. Instead, he'd link everything back to the border and demonstrate that McCain can never out-Tancredo Tancredo. The pundits keep waiting for the immigration-minded voters to rise up against McCain. But without a fringe candidate like Tancredo rallying the troops, it may never happen.

Tancredo Defeats Thompson

Tom Tancredo didn't only end his own candidacy today. He killed Fred Thompson's as well. 

Thompson had picked up a very, very slight comeback narrative in the past week, thanks to a strong showing at the Des Moines Register debate and a two-week bus tour through Iowa. But, predictably, just as Fred got going, he started stumbling. First came a schadenfreude-rich column from Roger Simon, and then came news that he doesn't have any money.

So, today's Tancredo withdrawal was a last chance that turned into a last gasp for Fred. It was expected that Tancredo would endorse another candidate—most likely Romney or Thompson. And after a close friend of Tancredo's, Iowa Rep. Steve King, endorsed Thompson, Thompson seemed to be in line to get the nod from Tommy the Tank. But that was not to be. 

Tancredo endorsed Mr. Illegal-Immigrant-Groundskeepers instead. The endorsement will help Romney show undecideds that he's Tancredo-tough on immigrants, compared with the recently Tancredo-ized Huckabee.

But an endorsement for Thompson would have helped Fred more than the support helps Romney. Fred would have picked up a signature policy platform—something he currently lacks. Plus, Thompson has more to gain than Giuliani or McCain by finishing in third in Iowa. Tancredo would have helped him get there. 

Now Thompson is once again left without any purpose. Tancredo had become the poster boy for immigration hawks everywhere. Thompson is still stuck on Law & Order pin-ups.

As we have a habit of paying tribute to fallen candidates, we thank Tancredo for his service. I know I wrote a post back in October that called on Tancredo to withdraw, but I had sort of warmed to his wily grin. Here's hoping that Tancredo's political death wishes are followed and his candidacy is buried under the border fence. On the U.S. side, of course.

Debate By Numbers

Using transcripts from CNN and the New York Times debate analyzer, I crunched some stats from last night's GOP debate.

• 3: Number of times Hillary Clinton was mentioned
• 4: Number of times Bill Clinton was mentioned
• 2: Number of times Mitt Romney mentioned health care
• 0: Number of times any other candidate mentioned health care
• 5: Number of times Rudy Giuliani said "Islamic"
• 3: Number of times any other candidate said "Islamic," "Islam," or "Muslim"
  
• 4: Number of times Duncan Hunter addressed Anderson Cooper as "Cooper." No other candidate followed suit.
• 2: Number of times the candidates mentioned President Bush
• 26: Number of times, according to CNN's transcript, the audience laughed
• 5: Number of times the audience laughed after watching a question from a YouTube user
  
• 7: Number of times the audience laughed after a Fred Thompson joke
• 4: Number of times the audience laughed after a Mike Huckabee joke
• 0: Number of times the audience laughed after Ron Paul or Duncan Hunter said something

Also, a breakdown of which candidates speak the fastest. Mitt Romney's mouth was a-flappin', while Fred Thompson, unsurprisingly, was the slowest talker.

If you'd like, feel free to compare the words-per-second statistics to the Democrats'.

The Immigrant Gadfly

The Colorado congressman announced today that he will not seek another term after his expires in 2008. You'd think this would mean Tancredo wants to focus on his efforts to grab the Republican presidential nod. But instead, his spokesman said his decision was partly based on wanting to spend more time with his grandkids.

Last time we checked, somebody doesn't run for president to spend more time with his grandkids. If Tancredo wants out so badly, then why is he still in it?

It may have to do with his other reason for leaving Congress: He thinks he's accomplished all he can on the immigration issue inside of the Capitol. Whereas he feels he can pass the hard-line-immigration baton to other House members, he doesn't see any other presidential candidates who share his anti-immigrant vigor. Tancredo is willing to sully his political legacy to enforce America's borders.

Last week, Tancredo offered Mitt Romney a deal: If the Red Sox lost the World Series, Romney would have to bow out of the race. But if the Rockies lost, Tancredo would drop out. If only Romney had accepted, Tancredo would have said Adios to both of his campaigns today.