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Excerpt from the article you posted:

“Other encouraging electoral numbers came with Florida election analysis that showed that Gingrich had increased the Republican vote in nearly every county he carried while Romney had had the opposite effect, a pattern that had been true in prior contests. Indeed, Fox News released last week a chart called by commentator Charles Krauthaummer “the Gingrich graphic” that showed that South Carolina — which Gingrich won handily — had a 22 percent increase in Republican voting while GOP balloting dropped off sharply in states won by other candidates.

Gingrich and his staffers were also encouraged by other recent developments. With the endorsements of Fred Thompson, Rick Perry, Herman Cain, Michael Reagan, Todd Palin, and, yes, Chuck Norris — and with Sarah Palin saying nice things about Gingrich on national TV— they saw the populist versus elitist contrast they wanted with Romney who was settling for endorsements from old-line figures like Bob Dole, John McCain and Tom Delay.

In order to win in November, Republicans had to get more, not fewer voters to the polls.

However much it surprised others, some of us in the Gingrich meeting were not surprised to see voters use the blunt instrument of Rick Santorum’s underfunded candidacy to show what they actually thought of the Romney candidacy – a man with a great sense of entitlement but no sense of accountability.

In many ways it was reminiscent of Gingrich’s challenge to Democrats in 1994 – pundits’ incredulity followed by ridicule followed by an unpredictable victory at the ballot box and the first Republican House majority in four decades.

But if Gingrich emerges with a moral authority from the race thus far, Gingrich’s “electability” is being helped in other ways. Besides a reputation as substantive and well versed in the issues – one he advanced last weekend at his CPAC speech with its emphasis on an economic plan that with its flat tax, zero capital gains tax and strong currency position has won the support of supply-siders like Reaganomics architect Arthur Laffer — media reports are noting that the traveling press not only finds Gingrich the most accessible and interesting of the candidates but the most likable.

As a former Gingrich congressional intern who lived in his basement in 1979 and worked in his campaigns through the 80s during the lead-up to the GOP’s 1994 takeover of the House of Representatives, I know something about both Newt’s stick-to-it-tive-ness and his likability.

Faced in these days with skepticism, even scorn, from party elders who disliked his Contract With America and laughed at his hope of winning and keeping a House majority, Gingrich persevered and even (well, most of the time) cheerfully so.

After emerging the day before from the bubble of a hotel meeting room, many of these staffers had been authentically surprised to see press reports saying that at his Nevada Saturday press conference their candidate was going to announce his withdrawal from the race. Indeed just before the press conference one staffer got Gingrich’s authorization to tell the media “Up in Boston they keep saying that it is over. And then it isn’t. Well, it isn’t going to be over until the Tampa convention. Or until Romney drops out. Whichever comes first.”