"Gallup can simulate Republican preferences without Gingrich in the race by removing Gingrich votes and reassigning them to his voters' second-choice candidate. The results of this procedure suggest that national GOP preferences would change little if Gingrich dropped out. The reconfigured preferences show Romney getting 40% of the vote and Santorum getting 33%."
href="http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2860192/posts
Therein lies the problem RS, it speaks to “national GOP preferences” that is quite different from actual state-by-state exit polling data where primary voters have cast their ballots.
New York Times blogger Nate Silver analyzed data from Public Policy Polling to predict that Santorum would get 57 percent of Gingrich supporters and Romney would get 27 percent. Silver estimated that had Gingrich not been in the race, Santorum would have won four states that he lost, but Romney would still be ahead of Santorum in delegates.
Under Silver’s analysis, this would still have made for a dramatic turn in the direction of this race. You can hopefully understand why we who support Santorum are livid with Gingrich playing the spoiler role. Don’t take it personally.