How Will Mitt Romney Fare In His Bid For The Republican Party Nomination - Essay Example

The demand for knowledge about how a political process will turn out has increased the concern for what factors go into making intelligent predictions and how they are quantified. In presidential politics, of course, these factors are so innately complex and difficult to quantify that predictions are nearly always prone to failure. However, by looking at history and looking at the present together, one can piece together an accurate picture of chances or odds in formulating a semblance of a prediction.

According to BetAsia, former Governor Mitt Romney’s odds at becoming the Republican nominee stand at 8/11 as of October 12 (Howard). This margin indicates a relatively good chance that Romney will secure the Republican nomination, and it is based on a bookmaker’s financial evaluation of Romney’s chances. Currently, there is good reason to agree with the bookmaker in putting the former Governor’s chances at such a high margin. Indeed, Romney has many objective factors riding in his direction, including being the supposed frontrunner in a field of candidates that have the Republican base restless (Esch).

Having frontrunner status bodes well for a candidate in advance of the Iowa Caucus and Super Tuesday elections: events that have historically either made or broken candidates’ dreams of the White House. Barring any crucial setbacks to those dreams, former Governor Mitt Romney is poised, based on a multitude of those predictive elements, to seize the Republican nomination for President. Section I: A Brief History of Mitt Romney In order to understand Mitt Romney as a candidate for President, one must understand his motives and policy beliefs, as they are relevant to his political campaign.

Romney was born in Detroit, Michigan to George and Lenore Romney in 1947.At the age of five, his family moved from Detroit to Bloomfield Hills, after which his father took over and rescued American Motors from bankruptcy as CEO. George Romney presided over the Detroit Stake of the Mormon Church, which Romney would identify with as his religious affiliation (Cohn). While in high school, Romney’s father was elected Governor of Michigan, for whom he worked as an intern in the Governor’s office.

Taking on odds jobs, such as a security guard and an ice hockey team manager, Romney wished to assume his father’s role. Still in high school, Romney began dating his future wife Ann Davies, whom he decided to marry near the date of his graduation. After graduation, Romney attended Stanford University for one year, taking part in the campus’s conservative movement before going overseas as a Mormon missionary. After finishing his education at Brigham Young University with his wife, now Ann Romney, he pursued a joint J.D. /M.B.A.

program at Harvard University. Romney remained in Massachusetts after graduating, working as a management consultant first independently and then for Bain & Company starting in 1977. Romney began a private equity investment firm with Bill Bain in 1984, called Bain Capital. In 1990, Romney returned to Bain & Company as CEO to restructure the firm facing collapse. In 1999, he took a position as CEO of the Salt Lake City Olympic Games Organizing Committee, leaving Bain Capital once again a tremendously successful company (DealBook). Romney’