Southern sweep: Rick Santorum takes Mississippi and Alabama

Los Angeles Times ^ | 03/13/2012 | Michael A. Memoli

[SeekAndFind]

Rick Santorum has won the Mississippi GOP presidential primary, according to an Associated Press projection, following his earlier triumph in neighboring Alabama on Tuesday. The dual victories are a major boost to the former Pennsylvania senator's campaign at a time when the primary calendar favors him. He's spending tonight in Louisiana, another deeply conservative state which holds a March 24 primary.

[nightmarewhileawake]

think the opposition is messing in our primaries ...

[itsahoot]

Ok, time for little Rickynto get out and let the real men take over. Beat everyone ha, ha.

[SeekAndFind]

We still have Hawaii to be counted today (or tonight as the case may be ).

I suspect Romney takes the Aloha state.

[SeekAndFind]

So, what does tonight’s result mean for Newt’s “Southern Strategy”?

[Bizhvywt]

“So, what does tonight’s result mean for Newt’s “Southern Strategy”?”

Romney had a really bad night. It’s a 2 man race between Newt and Santorum!

[SeekAndFind]

One state still needs to be counted — HAWAII. I bet Romney takes the Aloha state.

[Brad’s Gramma]

No. Now why would you say that? /s

[newzjunkey]

Newt says this, "Thank you Mississippi and Alabama. The fight continues! On to Missouri, Illinois and Louisiana."

With Newt coming 2nd, as it still appears, he'll get plenty of delegates even without the bragging rights of winning.

(Now, the Santorum trolls will flock in, clogging keywords, demanding Newt get out... must wonder why considering Santorum can win anyway).

The sad thing is the establishment has completely sewn up the nomination. Rick & Mitt are flip sides of the same coin.

It's nothing short of amazing an unvetted (and repudiated) senator would be the favorite of so many Freepers just four years after screaming about not sufficiently vetting the candidates.

They've been bamboozled.

[Lazlo in PA]

Hey man. Wheres the obligatory “Little Ricky needs to get out so Newt can win” post? It just doesn’t seem the same on a Santorum thread without it. I guess that is what an updated “southern strategy” will do. LOL.

[no dems]

Romney had a really bad night. It’s a 2 man race between Newt and Santorum!
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Hmmmmm......... Haven’t heard anyone say that. Very interesting.

[no dems]

Newt is my man, but, it’s time for him to go.

[Deagle]

The bigger picture in all of this is remember those that back Romney (and continue to back or make excuses). These are the inside the beltway Republicans that need to be ignored in the future.

It is okay to pull for a candidate, but when those insiders continue to pull against Conservatives, it is time to pay attention.

[GeronL]

denial is not a river in Egypt

[Lazlo in PA]

LOL. Still peddling your nonsense in the face of actual facts. Newts money and support is going to evaporate over night since his Southern Strategy FAILED. Let's look ahead at some of those states he mentions.

On to Missouri, Illinois and Louisiana.

MO- Last PPP poll has Newt and Rick statistically even. Do you think that will stay the same after tonight's loss?

IL- ChiTrib poll has Milt 35%, Rick 31% and Newt at 12%. Good luck there.

LA- Last poll has Rick 25%, Milt 21% and Newt 20%. Newt really strong there, eh?

Let's add that to this map that shows Newt totally dead anywhere but GA and SC.

Newt Purple, Rick Green, Milt Orange and Paul Yellow.

LOL. Yeah. Everything is coming up Newt, isn't it. He is really running a strong national campaign here.

[GeronL]

Mittens is 3rd place... he should drop out now.

[Darren McCarty]

Mitt is saddened that y’all ain’t votin’ for him after he’s learning to say y’all.

[GeronL]

Maybe Newt can triumph in American Somoa!

Might be enough to get him to the convention!

[Mountain Mary]

Hmmm, Laz. The Santo hit squad is strangely silent tonight..maybe drowning their sorrows with Ann and Karl at some bar.

[GeronL]

county by county, interesting!

[Lazlo in PA]

It’s nice to have a break from being used a punching bag for a while. Don’t worry though. By tomorrow they will have some new Rube Goldberg scheme on how Rick needs to get out so Newt can win. LOL.

[darrellmaurina]

5 posted on Tuesday, March 13, 2012 10:16:26 PM by SeekAndFind: “So, what does tonight’s result mean for Newt’s “Southern Strategy”?”

6 posted on Tuesday, March 13, 2012 10:18:54 PM by Bizhvywt: “Romney had a really bad night. It’s a 2 man race between Newt and Santorum!”

11 posted on Tuesday, March 13, 2012 10:35:45 PM by no dems: “Hmmmmm......... Haven’t heard anyone say that. Very interesting.”

I would love to see a two-man race between Gingrich and Santorum, and if Romney had been defeated in Michigan, I think that's what we'd be seeing right now. Romney is a successful businessman who cares about the bottom line, and eventually, as he did four years ago, he may come to the conclusion that he's throwing good money after bad.

In the meantime, let's work to counteract Romney's bottomless budget for negative advertising by going out and trying to convince our Republican friends and neighbors that Mitt Romney is running in the wrong political party's primary election. After that, let's explain why we think our candidate, whether Santorum or Gingrich, is the best of the two real Republicans on the Republican ballot.

If we do that, maybe we still have a chance of winning this thing.

While both candidates have baggage, I sincerely hope their supporters don't bite and devour each other so badly that Romney ends up being the main beneficiary.

I'm sitting here at my computer tonight, and when I should be writing articles on local government and reviewing the resume of a potential new employee, I'm instead reading Free Republic and listening to election reports which say Rick Santorum won both Mississippi and Alabama. Newt Gingrich is being quoted saying the two conservative candidates got 70-plus percent of the votes in those two states.

Let's all be grateful, regardless of which candidate we supported, that despite our own internal disputes, at least Romney didn't win tonight. In the long run that's the most important message from what happened tonight.

The backers of Santorum and Gingrich need to repair our frayed relationships enough to defeat Romney in the primary and Obama in the general election. I have a feeling that Gingrich and Santorum get along considerably better than a lot of their supporters.

[Jim from C-Town]

To say Santorum is unvetted is not only disingenuous, it borders on SLANDER!

Rick Santorum is and always has been a strong family values Conservative who spent four years in the Congress where he represented a Democrat district. He then ran for and was reelected in PA to the U.S> Senate, a left leaning state. It was only when GWB and was at his all time low and he ran against a huge name in the state, Bob Casey, that he lost in PA.

He isn't perfect, but has strong Conservative principles and is a legitimate contender in the race. He is a Damn sight better than Romney and unfortunately Newt lost in his own back yard.

I love Newt Gingrich, he can stay in, but I hope tat Santorum and he can continue to roll Romney. i would hate to think that Gingrich actually ends up handing the nomination to Romney.

That being said, Gingrich is right.

If Romney doesn't clinch BEFORE the convention, he will not leave the convention as the nominee!

[achilles2000]

Mitt is saddened that y’all ain’t votin’ for him after he’s learning to say y’all.”

What Mittens really regrets is having to eat those cheese grits.

[hosepipe]

Are Ricks voters gonna be surprised when he bends over and assumes the position for the UNIONS.

[Jedidah]

It means Newt needs to get on the Santorum bandwagon so we can rid ourselves of Obama in November.

[HerrBlucher]

No matter how many delegats a candidate has, they can always use somoa.

[darrellmaurina]

17 posted on Tuesday, March 13, 2012 10:50:19 PM by Darren McCarty: “Mitt is saddened that y’all ain’t votin’ for him after he’s learning to say y’all.”

I heard that comment by Romney on FOX radio.

I'm a Michigander living in the Ozarks. My parents were raised in the days before television, which means I speak with a nasal West Michigan accent that is so pronounced that I sound like someone from a generation older than I really am, and since most Michiganders no longer have an accent, down here in the South, I sometimes get people asking what country I used to live in.

Romney's accent sounds much less like a Michigander than mine, but if I tried to make his asinine comments about learning to like grits and properly pronounce “y'all,” all I'd do is drive home the point that I'm “not from around these here parts.”

What idiot is running Romney's campaign to let him say such stupid things? I'm willing to bet there are lots more Southerners who care about carpetbagging Yankees than people who care about a candidate's view on contraception.

And yes, after a decade living down here in the Ozarks, I have picked up an occasional y'all in my speech. Can't seem to help it; I think it's something in the water.... ;-)

[Graybeard58]

IL- ChiTrib poll has Milt 35%, Rick 31% and Newt at 12%. Good luck there.

My prediction for open primary Illinois is that more democrats than republicans will vote in the republican primary.

Who knows how they will vote? I'm guessing Romney, they know obama will kick Romney's a$$ in the general election.

[darrellmaurina]

25 posted on Tuesday, March 13, 2012 11:05:42 PM by hosepipe: “Are Ricks voters gonna be surprised when he bends over and assumes the position for the UNIONS.”

Might like to tell that to the AFL-CIO which endorsed President Obama today and is planning to mobilize massive numbers of union members for get-out-the-vote efforts to reelect Obama and other Democrats.

I've said this many times before, but I don't think there's really that much difference between Gingrich and Santorum on this issue. In a northern industrial state, economic progress until recent years has depended on keeping the unions happy so they won't strike, disrupt production, or demand totally unreasonable pay and employment conditions. In a Southern state where manufacturing plants often relocated to get away from Northern union influence, economic progress depended on keeping the unions out to attract more companies.

Both Gingrich and Santorum care about economic progress. As elected officials, they voted the way their constituents wanted, and that's what elected officials are supposed to do.

In modern politics, Reagan Democrats (who were often unionized blue-collar Roman Catholics from the rustbelt) mean less than they once did, but that's the core of Santorum’s support in Pennsylvania that put him over the margin of victory in a Democratic constituency. It's not a group to which Gingrich had to appeal in Georgia. I'm not saying Gingrich can't reach those voters, but I **AM** saying whoever wins the presidency needs to win swing states like Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan, and I'm more confident in someone like Santorum being able to peel off blue-collar union Democratic voters.

[houeto]

It's nothing short of amazing an unvetted (and repudiated) senator would be the favorite of so many Freepers just four years after screaming about not sufficiently vetting the candidates. They've been bamboozled.

Thank you. Now, please excuse me while I go get ill.

[Darren McCarty]

I thought it was called cheesey grits. LOL. (shakes head) My girlfriend's a Southern Belle. Her parents are in Georgia. They wondered why I couldn't stand Mitt, until it was their turn to vote.

Pandering does that to people. Midwesterners and Southerners alike don't like to be treated as idiots.

[houeto]

Polls??? Seriously???

What were Rick's numbers in the polls yesterday?

[Houghton M.]

Well, at least he has Nancy Pelosi’s vote and Dede Scozzafava’s vote. What Newt lacks in numbers, Newtie makes up in big league quality. And the ladies really love him.

[hosepipe]

NO Newt.... NO win... its simple really..

America is too Doped-Up to vote for Santo or Willard..
The Obamaoid hasn’t even started the brain wash yet..
A billion dollars and ABS, cBS, nBS and pBS giving much FREE advertising(propaganda)..
Its not begun YET.

Many of them can vote for the evil Newt..

[Hildy]

I am sick to my stomach tonight. As always, this party grabs defeat from the jaws of victory. There will never be a President Santorum.

[El Gato]

I suspect Romney takes the Aloha state.

If so, and it seems likely, the media will spin the heck out that.

But the fact is that Hawaii has only about 20 delegates, while Mississippi has about 40, and Alabama about 50.

So the real response to that should be "who cares". :)

[El Gato]

What Mittens really regrets is having to eat those cheese grits.

Why? They're great. Been eating grits since I was in the Air Force stationed in Oklahoma. Cheese grits since one of my AF Reserve compadres introduced me them at the mess hall one Saturday Morning. He's now a retired Lt.Col. :) One of our commadres is a retired Major General. But she's from Indiana, and I don't think she eats grits, even if she did, I don't know where she'd put 'em. :)

[Darren McCarty]

Which Michigan accent? To me, Mitt sounds like a East Coast Prep School accent. He probably picked it up at Cranbrook. That would hurt him down South too (My longtime girlfriend's a Southern Belle from Shreveport via Atlanta suburbs so while I'm not an expect, know a little about how Midwesterners are viewed down there).

For some reason, I picked up the lesser known south MI country accent commonly heard outside of Adrian, Jackson, and Hillsdale. I didn't realize it until I did some work there and realized they talked like me. Grandpa's from Jackson, and dad worked the auto factories, so I picked a little of that up.

[Darren McCarty]

I think Rick Santorum has the best chance (of a admittedly weak lot) in the general. Santorum can get the blue collar Reagan democrats, as compared to "spoiled rich kid Romney" who made his money being a Kirk Kerkorian. That doesn't sell well in these parts.

Obama's going to run a faux-populist campaign in the general to try and win. He needs to pick off as many blue collar white ethnics as he can to win, and that's a group that doesn't really like that snob very much right now. Romney will make it easy for him.

Santorum can do it IF he can remember his Pittsburgh roots and take his foot out of his mouth.

[Hildy]

I can’t stand him.

[CharlesWayneCT]

When Santorum won his 3-state victory, the Newt folks started on the “Now he’ll be vetted”, and “nobody can stand up to Romney’s money” — which was their message of why Newt failed in Florida.

Then Santorum almost took Michigan, losing by a few thousand votes thrown to Gingrich.

And we were told that NOW he would be vetted, and he was dropping like a rock, and would be an afterthought.

Then he won multiple states on Super Tuesday, and lost Ohio again only by a small number of Gingrich votes, and lost Alaska only by a few hundred Gingrich caucus votes.

And we were told “Now Santorum will be vetted”.

Then he won in Kansas, and we were told “But now he’ll be vetted, Newt will sweep the south”.

Now Santorum has won (pending any recount in Mississippi, I guess), and we are being told again that Newt is rising, and Santorum will be vetted.

Apparently, either Santorum is doing a much better job of handling the Romney attack machine than Newt did in Florida, or nobody is ever going to vet Santorum.

[SaraJohnson]

Santorum can do it IF he can remember his Pittsburgh roots and take his foot out of his mouth.

---

You are right but that is a big if. He’s not all that smart on the spot and liberals will scalp him with his help.

[Darren McCarty]

That's my view of Romney from seeing him in action in his birth state over a six year period. Santorum for me was the lesser of four evils.

Personally, I'd actually like to see a brokered convention. I may get ripped for this, but I'd vote for Mitch Daniels in a minute. Pawlenty probably would have clinched the nomination if he stayed in. Those two are the winners and the actual "electable ones" .

[Hildy]

This entire process was too long...we need to change so much in this Country.

[darrellmaurina]

39 posted on Wednesday, March 14, 2012 12:03:43 AM by Darren McCarty “Which Michigan accent? To me, Mitt sounds like a East Coast Prep School accent. He probably picked it up at Cranbrook. That would hurt him down South too (My longtime girlfriend's a Southern Belle from Shreveport via Atlanta suburbs so while I'm not an expect, know a little about how Midwesterners are viewed down there). For some reason, I picked up the lesser known south MI country accent commonly heard outside of Adrian, Jackson, and Hillsdale. I didn't realize it until I did some work there and realized they talked like me. Grandpa's from Jackson, and dad worked the auto factories, so I picked a little of that up.”

Interesting question!

I went to college with several Cranbook and Detroit County Day School people so I understand the attempt of some of their graduates to sound refined and cultured in their clipped quasi-Yankee speech. Maybe that will help the graduates if they get into Harvard or Yale but I can't imagine it helping Romney in the South.

I grew up in Grand Rapids and lived most of my life until the last dozen years in either Holland, Grand Rapids, or the rural area west of Kalamazoo, which means basically the “Hollandse colonie” of the Dutch. Other than learning how to mangle some Dutch pronunciations -- try saying Christelijke Gereformeerden five times fast with proper guttural vocalizations -- I don't think that ethnic proximity had any effect on my speech.

However, my parents both came from families that had spent several generations in northern Michigan since shortly after the Civil War. My mother was from Traverse City and my father was a Yooper (Michigan's Upper Peninsula for the Southerners reading this thread who have no idea what we're talking about.) My father's family moved to Flint during WW2 to work in the war defense plants and later my father traveled all over the Southern US during his time in the military; my mother's family moved to the Battle Creek-Kalamazoo area but she spent most summers with family in Traverse City.

Where this becomes relevant is that because my parents grew up before the age of television, they spoke with a pronounced accent that isn't heard today in Michigan, and the only thing I've heard much like it is the rural farm accent of people from Bob Dole's generation in the upper Midwest. I grew up with the nasal twang of a West Michigander which was once shared all along the Lakeshore; the standard joke was that due to bad weather we always had our noses stuffed up and couldn't talk right.

I don't know that this has anything to do with the subject at hand, but you asked, so I hope at least one person was interested!

[dirtboy]

Now, the Santorum trolls will flock in

The biggest troll I see on this thread is you, with your claim that Santorum is unvetted.

How about you make the case for Newt instead of posting bald-faced lies about the other conservative in the race?

[John D]

Rick Santorum is and always has been a strong family values Conservative

He may be a strong social conservative, but he is no fiscal conservative. He is a big spending big union supporting liberal.
At this point in time we need a fiscal conservative like Newt.

[Gaffer]

While Newt may still press on, the news isn’t good for him, particularly in the way of donations he can expect in future. Georgia and SC wins aren’t enough to pull in the big bucks - AIR TIME.

He will still garner delegates in the coming contests, but he’ll have to fight tooth and nail for them — from Santorum.

I voted for him here in the Georgia Primary, but I suspect that will have been the last time I see his name on a ballot. The best thing we can hope for now is a convention that is fractured, split and undecided. Perhaps there, if it gets to that, he can get one big last spotlight and a chance to plead his case before the delegates. It had better be one hell of a speech.

Lastly, at this point, I feel like the denizens of South Park in the School Mascot Naming episode with respect to the mascot choices.

[SeekAndFind]

RE: But the fact is that Hawaii has only about 20 delegates, while Mississippi has about 40, and Alabama about 50.

1) BTW, Romney also won American Samoa ( as if anybody cares )

2) If you add up the delegates Romney added in Alabama and Mississippi to the ones he won in Hawaii and Samoa, that’s still a huge chunk he collected last night.

The only chance Santorum has of reaching Romney’s tally is for Gingrich to quit and pledge his delegates to Rick, but that ain’t gonna happen, so the best we anti-Romney types can hope for now is he MISSES the 1,144 delegates to officially win the nomination.