Presidential nomination. Obviously.

Also Receiving Votes: Scott Brown, Jeb Bush (too soon, Jeb, too soon), Eric Cantor, Mitch Daniels, Luis Fortuno (it’d be fun to watch *his* star rise), George Pataki, Ron Paul (too old, Ron, too old), Mike Pence, Tom Ridge, Rick Santorum (because what everyone wants is another senator as president), John Thune (ibid.).

Who’s “The Field”? It’s a bunch of people who aren’t really getting much speculation at present, but who are going to decide they might be interested over the next six-to-12 months. Maybe someone like: Jan Brewer, Jim DeMint, Carly Fiorina, Mitch McConnell, Bob McDonnell, Rick Perry, David Petraeus, Condoleezza Rice, Meg Whitman, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson… Possibilities are somewhat endless.

Newt Gingrich, Georgia
Supporters: Old-School Republicans, Cranky People, Readers of Military Fantasy Fiction, FoxNews
Detractors: Consensus-Builders, Big Government Republicans
Comment: Has said (in effect) that he has no intention of running for president, but that he’ll consider doing so in 2012. He’s essentially Ronald Reagan without all that debilitating charisma and has always looked better (to Republicans) on paper than in person.

Mike Huckabee, Arkansas
Supporters: Flat-Earthers, Dinosaur Denialists, People Who Hate Mormons, Preachy Big-Government Types
Detractors: Scientists, Anthropologists, Mormons, Libertarians, Those Who Have Never Spoken in Tongues
Comment: Wouldn’t have thought he’d have been a viable candidate in 08 either, but did a passable job of depriving Mitt Romney’s campaign of oxygen. Hard to imagine a former Southern Baptist minister being the leader of the free world — but come 2012 the world may not really want to be all that free anyway.

Bobby Jindal, Louisiana
Supporters: Multi-culturalists, Catholics, American Dream Romanticists, Moralists, Anti-Tax People
Detractors: Civil Libertarians, Darwinists, Anti-Youthists
Comment: You get the sense that the GOP wants Jindal to be some sort of conservative Obama. You also get the sense that he’s only 36 and not above pandering to evangelicals. Just a sense. And frankly, aside from being not-white, he doesn’t seem like he’s done anything very special. Actually, not being white isn’t “doing” anything either. But he’s definitely not white.

Sarah Palin, Alaska
Supporters: Russia Denialists, Big Oil, Pageant Winners Everywhere, Religious Types
Detractors: Both Republican Environmentalists, Foreign Policy Wonks
Comment: She’d be the first president to have college-transferred four different times before getting her bachelor’s degree, so she’d have that going for her.

David Petraeus, New Hampshire
Supporters: Military Strategists, People Who Think Being PotUS is All About Counter-Insurgency, Eisenhowerists
Detractors: People Who Think a Candidate Should Have Some Stated Positions or at Least Say They Have Some Interest in Politics Before Being Considered a Candidate
Comment: OTOH: war hero!

Tim Pawlenty, Minnesota
Supporters: Alliterationists (Headline: “President Pawlenty Pulls Pollsters Perfectly!”), Both Republican Environmentalists, Big-Government Republicans
Detractors: Small-Government Types, Pro-Corporatists
Comment: More electable than Republican, Pawlenty comes across as a smiling so-called moderate who’s all about making compromises and getting things done that people think they want to have done. Probably plays better to the locals than he does to the idealists, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing if the objective is to get “elected”.

Condoleezza Rice, California
Supporters: Both Hawkish Academics
Detractors: Jilted Pac-10 Members, Isolationists
Comment: It’s hard to imagine anyone carrying the Taint of the W will be a serious contender in ‘12, but then again, four years is a long time. Maybe not long enough to make people forget her flip-flop from being an anti-US-as-police-force powerhouse to being a leading proponent of Iraq intervention, but still: long time. Her few published statements on matters of domestic policy make her look less like just another Neo-Con.

Tom Ridge, Pennsylvania
Supporters: Neo-Cons, Terror Paranoiacs, Blue-Bloods
Detractors: Libertarians (when, as a pubbican, you give up 13 points to the Constitution Party in your gubernatorial election, well…)
Comment: Sort of a war hero, but, more importantly, from a state with a lot of electoral votes. Also important: seems like he might actually be *retired* from politics.

Mitt Romney, Massachutah
Supporters: Venture Capitalists, Mormons, Paul of Tarsus Devotees, Both Massachusetts Republicans
Detractors: Effective Campaign Planners, People Who Hate Mormons
Comment: Given that his primary skill is as an astute businessman, having his 08 campaign derailed by a desire to run away from his weaknesses rather than run toward his strengths might make one wonder if he’s not so much an astute businessman as he is a fairly fortunate one.

Mark Sanford, South Carolina
Supporters: Old-School Republicans, Anti-Beltwayists
Detractors: Neocons, Big-Government Moralists, Welfare Staters
Comment: An electable Ron Paul? Possibly neither, but his insistence on foregoing federal stimulus moneys would have to make him bona fide in the eyes of any remaining small-government pubbicans.

John Thune, South Dakota
Supporters: Both SoDak Residents, Big Rail, Corn Farmers, American Conservative Unionists
Detractors: People Who Recognize that Corn-Based Ethanol Is an Awful Idea, Darwinists
Comment: On the one hand, he did defeat tax-dodging Tom Daschle to become senator. On the other hand, I don’t know that anyone has heard anything out of him since.

Eh — that’s good enough. Next time around, we’ll do some power rankings around these fine, upstanding titans of clowndom and make believe that it’s somehow sensible to talk about their stock rising and falling when we’re two years away from any of them even acknowledging that there’s even going to be an election in 2012.

-bkd