Remember when John McCain beat George W. Bush in New Hampshire by 16 points? Upsets happen in politics, just as they happen in life and, of course, in sports. That's the point of an email I just received from Bill Kristol:
Last Saturday night, #1 Missouri and #2 West Virginia lost in college football, blowing their chances for the national championship. And Harvard (!) beat Michigan, 62-51, in college basketball. We're heading towards an Obama-Huckabee presidential race.
Last week the cardinal sketched out how that could happen. Campaigns work in cycles, and it seems as though we're currently in a cycle in which the frontrunners (Giuliani, Romney, and Clinton) look like they are in trouble and the challengers (Huckabee, McCain, and Obama) look strong. However: the first voting is still a month away. Which means we may yet experience additional cycles during which the frontrunners re-assert their status or new challengers rise to the fore. That said, no one other than the frontrunners (and maybe the Club for Growth) seems to be bothered by the prospect of a Huckabee-Obama presidential race. UPDATE, 11:41 a.m.: Bill Kristol sends along another email:
Seeing my email in print (so to speak), I'd add this: I trust people understand that I'm being a bit rhetorical when I say, as if definitively, that we're heading toward a Huckabee-Obama race. That's still not the most likely outcome. But it's not as unlikely as lagging conventional wisdom still thinks.