Romney takes Michigan

Massachusetts former governor Mitt Romney won the Michigan's Republican presidential primary last night with a convincing win over his main rival Senator John McCain of Arizona. Mr. Romney with the help of his homegrown ties to the Wolverine state beat out Senator McCain by a margin of nine percentage points to take the primary with 39 percent of the votes cast to McCain's 30 percent. Former governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee gained 16 percent of the primary vote total for the Republican side.

With the ailing auto industry and Michigan's ranking as the state with the nation's highest unemployment rate serving as the backdrop to the political drama, Governor Romney was able to best Senator McCain's campaign by emphasizing his message of "optimism over Washington-style pessimism". The Massachusetts Republican told voters that he would fight for every Michigan job in contrast to the Arizona Republican's "straight talk" message that "those (manufacturing) jobs aren't coming back". McCain emphasized that workers would need to find other things to do in the new economy citing economists who claim the state's auto manufacturing jobs are gone for good. On the stump, Romney hammered away his message that cars were "in his DNA" referring to his father's career as the CEO of American Motors who later entered politics to become a popular three-term governor of Michigan.

McCain congratulated Romney on his win yet vowed to take the South Carolina primary when voters of that state go to the polls this Saturday. Former Senator Fred Thompson has been campaining in the Palmetto state where he is expected to put up a strong fight to stem the tide of steady losses he has suffered at the hands of his main rivals.

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton won the state's Democratic primary with 55 percent of the vote as that party's only major candidate to 40 percent voting "uncommitted" on the ballot. Michigan would normally have 156 Democratic delegates in play for their party's convention but because of Michigan state party officials move to hold the primary earlier than the normal February 5th contest, the DNC penalized Michigan officials by stripping them of all their delegates. Last year all of the major Democratic candidates pledged to not campaign in Michigan because of the move to an early primary. The decision left Democratic voters with a choice of Mrs. Clinton or "uncommitted" on their ballots, relegating their primary to a "beauty contest" in the rough and tumble world of presidential politics. Even with the severe penalty enacted by the party, it is expected that all Michigan delegates will be seated at the convention later this year.

Attention will now be focused on the South Carolina primary and Nevada caucus to be held on the 19th.