Sunshine State

No, I don’t mean the amusingly cynical movie of the same name.  Coming back to that Florida poll, I should note the obvious: the vast majority of Floridians live in the center and south of the state, and these are the regions where McCain and Giuliani do best, where Romney is only moderately strong and where Huckabee is weakest.  Huckabee has to hope for high turnout in the less-populated northwest where he has overwhelming support, and obviously needs weak turnout in the big urban centers and the I-95 corridor where all three of his rivals have more support than he does.  The three or four-way split field is allowing Huckabee to live off the land and free media, relying on this regional backing from core supporters, but if he cannot start gaining ground among urban voters he may prove to be as limited a candidate as his critics originally claimed.  This would be somewhat surprising to me in some ways, but in another sense it isn’t at all surprising: Huckabee is doing best in that part of Florida that is still culturally most like the rest of the South, and he is weakest in the most multiethnic and polyglot part of the state.  Of course, a strong showing in Michigan and/or South Carolina could jumble the race in Florida yet again, so we’ll have to see.