Why Rick Santorum is NOT Toast

A few hours ago I posted a piece titled Why Santorum is Toast and gave 10 reasons why I think he could be.

Now I am going to take the other side of the argument and provide 10 reasons why one shouldn't write Rick Santorum off just yet:

1)In the two month history of the GOP primaries/caucuses and taking the main states into consideration only once has any of the candidates gone two in a row:

The trend is clear. No candidate appears to have momentum. In football, because of the 16 game season, coaches downplay the role of momentum from week to week. Are we seeing the same phenomenon in this contest? Up to now we are.

Having said that, Romney will still win his fair share of states on Super Tuesday but if Santorum wins the big prize of Ohio, and then Tennessee and Oklahoma and maybe one or two more states could he stop Romney's apparent surge in its tracks?

2)Santorum could still win the Washington state caucus (I did allow for that in my previous piece). Having said that PPP now tweets that "Romney now has a small lead in Washington in our first night of polling."

Still Santorum could pull it out this Saturday and that could change voter's perceptions of him on Super Tuesday if they believe some of his bleeding has been arrested.

3)Word that Santorum split the delegates in Michigan 15-15. How many soft Santorum supporters or fence sitters who were previous Santorum supporters have now shifted to lean Santorum because of that one outcome?

I would like to see a poll to what percentage of the votes in various states has been affected by this result. Certainly the news report shows Rick Santorum in a much more political favorable light than on Tuesday right after it was declared that Romney had won Michigan.

4)You believe that Santorum has bottomed out at 25% support in the Gallup DTP and what goes down must go up; in addition you believe Newt Gingrich will never spike in his support again because of previous difficulties that we all know about so that he does not tie or pass Santorum in the next 4-5 days.

5)Mitt Romney continues to screw up (eg Blunt-Rubio amendment)so that in races where Newt is not a factor Santorum rises in support compared to Mitt. What we saw in Michigan for example.

Remember we only have 5 days of active campaigning left in Super Tuesday states to the vote on Tuesday. For example in the latest Ohio poll from the University of Cincinnati, Newt is polling at 16% and Santorum at 37% and in the latest state poll in Tennessee from Middle Tennessee State University Santorum is at 40% and Newt is at 13%. Realistically what are the chances that Newt can pass Santorum and also Romney who pollsters say is in second place to win either state? And what are the chances that conservatives and evangelical Christians are going to massively move away from Santorum to Gingrich? Is Rick Santorum now that much of an anathema or pariah to GOP voters, especially conservatives, especially after he split the delegates with Romney in Michigan?

Obviously from his current runner-up position, Romney could pull the upset in Tennessee and carpet-bomb Santorum to hell in Ohio, but he only has five days to do so while he had 3 weeks to do so in Michigan and Arizona.

And the percentage of evangelical voters in both Ohio and Tennessee are higher than they are in Michigan.

6)Santorum just released a statement he raised $9m in February. The chances that he can stop his previous bleeding on Super Tuesday just went up appreciably. He can now fight a decent air war with Romney in Ohio and again Romney only has 5 days to dent Santorum's armor in Ohio.

"The numbers indicate he (Santorum) could be close to achieving financial parity with Mitt Romney, who was down to less than $8 million cash on hand at the beginning of January and has also spent heavily this month."

"Romney's biggest advantage in the race was his large war chest, but he gave a hint Tuesday night that fundraising might become a priority."

In war as in politics sometimes victories can be Pyrrhic victories. Could Michigan be considered that for Mitt Romney?

7)News that Rick Santorum is well-organized on the ground in Georgia--according to thestreet.com has 1900 volunteers

8)Voters in Ohio, Oklahoma and Tennessee don't really care about what happened in Michigan and Arizona and do not see Romney any differently than they saw him before he won Michigan and Arizona. They have tunnel vision. This is entirely a new game in a new stadium using football parlance. A follow-up on #1.

9)Rick Santorum is able to still win over conservative voters in these three states despite people like me writing him off in a previous post. He could prove me wrong, as Tim Tebow proved the critics wrong when he propelled the Denver Broncos over the Pittsburgh Steelers in the playoffs.

I still think many Republicans consider Santorum an anathema and an object of scorn. But perhaps their numbers are exaggerated and perhaps conservatives are not as quick to abandon ship as I think.

10)Weather may affect turnout. Santorum did win the vote on election day in Michigan. He can hang his hat on that. He lost overall due to Romney's overwhelming margin in absentee ballots submitted prior to voting day.

I may have sounded like I have dismissed Santorum's chances on Super Tuesday but I do know one thing, if the weather is God-awful his supporters, regardless of how many there are, will show up at the polls. Romney supporters and Gingrich supporters I'm not so sure if they can match their intensity.

In addition if the polls on the weekend in Ohio, Tennessee and Oklahoma still show Gingrich trailing Santorum badly, will we see the same thing that happened in Michigan happen here, where Gingrich supporters cross over and vote for Santorum to stop Romney?

Yes, I provided ten reasons why Rick Santorum could be considered toast. Well you now see ten other reasons why he could survive Super Tuesday and regain his mojo.

Hint: Watch the national 5 day Gallup DTP over the next 5 days to see if Santorum continues to sink further into the abyss and Gingrich continues to climb out of his. I think that will give you a pretty good indication which narrative is more likely to be the most accurate.

And also watch what kind of lead Romney is able to enjoy over Santorum over the next five days. The lead is now 8 points. if Mitt can stretch his margin from anywhere to 12-18 points you can start his coronation.

Yes, I’m a troll, who’s hung out here for 12+ years, just waiting for this moment to say something about the milk toast that is Santorum.. be serious.

Oh wait, I must be a liberal, after all I’ve voted for someone like Alan Keyes in presidential primaries, because he and I have such a bleeding heart and believe the government should be the solution to everything.

Do you people ever look at yourselves when you start throwing around stupid flames at folks who don’t share your opinion? I’ve lived in PA throughout all of Santorums Senate Career, he lost in 06 BIGTIME for a very fundamental reason, and it had nothing to do with Spectre, It being a democratic year, or his oponent being named Casey. He may have lost with those things, but those things are not why he lost by 17 points, those things might have given him a 5-7 point loss. He lost by 17 points because frankly he is MILK TOAST, pure and simple.

He was very effectively painted by the left as too extreme, largely by using his own words against him, and Santorum never was able to counter any of it effectively, and nothing has changed between 06 and now.

Again I ask you, how do you feel Santorum backers, that your guy was out there openly appealing to democrats to come vote for him in the republican primary? Does that sound like someone who is going to hoe the row?? You need to do more than simply listen to what Santorum says, he’s real good at telling folks what they want to hear, even if he is telling someone else what they want to hear that is the complete opposite. IN 06 his own re-election web site was full of anti-illegal immigration on the english version and pro amnesty on the spanish version.

This guy won’t win a national election because he just doesn’t have the intellect or political prowess to do it. I know social conservatives like the guy because he takes stands they agree with, but he isn’t able to defend or articulate those stands very well, and every time he tries he winds up giving another sound bite that will be used against him. Lets not even get into the fact he’s a big government compassionate conservative, not a small government get out the way conservative, because those nuances won’t even matter. The play book to route Santorum was written and executed effectively in 06 and nothing will need to be changed in it to take him out in 12, because nothing has changed about Santorum.

Another reason why Santorum may NOT be toast:

“A Smart Politics tabulation of voting through the first 11 Republican primaries and caucuses of the 2012 presidential cycle finds that Rick Santorum has won more than twice as many counties (360) as Mitt Romney (145) and nearly 60 percent of all counties to date.”

“...Newt Gingrich in third with 79 (all but two from South Carolina and Florida), Ron Paul with 31 and Rick Perry with two.”

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/03/01/romney-wins-wyoming-caucus-santorum-poised-for-washington-win/

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