She won the Iowa Straw Poll just two months ago, but since then, Michele Bachmann has plummeted in the polls, and it’s beginning to look like Ames was her apex. Now, in a series of low-production-value online videos, the self-styled “comeback kid” is telling voters “Don’t Settle”—in life or on a moderate Republican presidential candidate.
“Don’t settle” is basically code for don’t back Romney—or whomever—just because you think he’s more electable than I am. In a race that’s increasingly prefaced by the descriptor “two-man,” one of the few things that can rescue Bachmann’s candidacy will be reporting a major fundraising haul in the third quarter, which ended on Sept. 30. Bachmann has always excelled at attracting small donations, which help prove that she’s a grassroots candidate. But with Texas Governor Rick Perry stealing much of her thunder, she’ll need to cultivate big-donor money trees to buoy her floundering campaign. It’s that or settle for being an also-ran in 2012.
