Posted on 03/17/2012 7:04:37 PM PDT by Steelfish
Rick Santorum: If I Win The Illinois Primary, I Win The Nomination
By Andrew Rafferty EFFINGHAM, Ill. -- Rick Santorum on Saturday guaranteed that a win in the Illinois primary will result in his nomination as the Republican presidential nominee.
"This is a primary, and turnout is everything. You do your job, you do your job, then this is the pledge," Santorum said. "If we're able to come out of Illinois with a huge or surprise win, I guarantee you, I guarantee you that we will win this nomination."
Illinois has largely been predicted to favor Mitt Romney for Tuesday's primary. The vote is expected to be driven by Chicago and its surrounding suburbs, pegged as unfavorable territory for the former Pennsylvania senator's brand of conservatism. But in areas like Effingham, hours south of the Windy City, Santorum hopes to fire up a Republican base that is often overshadowed by its Democratic counterparts to the north.
"You know you don't get a chance to out-vote your friends up in the Chicago-land area very often, but this is a primary and turnout is everything," he said, standing in a warehouse of a local business specializing in kitchen equipment. While stumping in the Land of Lincoln, Santorum said he feels like he's already running in the general election.
“People ask me why I’m the best candidate to run against Barack Obama," said Santorum. "It’s because I feel like, in many respects, I am running against Barack Obama here in this primary because Mitt Romney has the same positions as Barack Obama in this primary.”
The health care bill that Romney signed as governor of Massachusetts is the issue Santorum has been hammering him on most frequently. Santorum says the legislation laid the groundwork for the health care bill Obama signed in 2010....
(Excerpt) Read more at firstread.msnbc.msn.com ...
He is probably correct. If he can win in Illinois, the polls will shift enough for the 11% that keeps jumping to the front runner to move from Romney to him. I do not see Romney ever getting it back if they leave him.
We had NO discussion regarding the Republican Primary that would make Romney the Nominee. We were talking about the scenario of Romney BEING the Republican Nominee.
Do you think I would Vote for Romney in the Primary? Nobody here would do that. We are talking about the General Election IF Romney is the Nominee. That is the only way I would Vote for him, albeit very reluctantly.
Don Quixote? HAHAHAHA, you are a funny guy.
... and he still will do better in Illinois even in this scenario than Gingrich would have done. If Newt still wants to pin his hopes on a divided convention, he needs Romney to be held down here. Otherwise, that “inevitability” will start coming into play.
Amen.
Before you say that, take a look at Romney’s record of court picks in Mass. Also remember, when you see his excuse, that the board that recommended the judges served at the Governor’s pleasure.
The simple arithmetic is that the way to deny Romney a first-ballot win is not to concentrate on how many delegates other people win; the way to deny him is to keep Romney himself from winning more delegates. What matters in this game is Romney’s delegate count in relation to the target majority of 1,144. The only way to slow him down is to give a conservative challenger a chance not just to win more proportional delegates, but to win more via “winner-take-all” rules which deny any new delegates at all to Romney.
Bears repeating. If newt wants to be considered honest he will admit he is helping Romney now.
Also it is a loophole primary (the vote for the presidential candidate doesn’t drive delegate selection; voters vote for individual delegates). Also officially IL delegates are unpledged.
So Santorum could win and still lose....my sense of it is that IL Republicans running for delegate with adequate name recognition generally favor Romney. Santorum needs good organization here and probably doesn’t have it.
Post 39 could enlighten you to the error of your ways but I notice Santorum's supporters borrow a page from these fine folks:
You nailed it- it’s all about momentum. Santorum will have a tsunami working for him if he pulls an IL win. I agree with Yaelle, Newt needs to get the hell out of the race. But apparently he’s ego is getting in the way. This would have been all over for Romney, if Newt did the proper thing and dropped out after Santorum’s smashing trifecta win. Very likely Santorum would have carried WA; almost certainly MI (where Romney won by a mere 3 % points) and definitely in Ohio where Romney won by less than 1% of a point. Newt is now the saboteur. But don’t tell that to some of our FReepers here who have their heads buried not in sand but in concrete.
You always forget to mention Rick blew big leads in Michigan and Ohio, and actually finished 3rd in Washington (even with all Newt’s votes he would have lost).
Why are Santorum supporters so delusional?
Do you have an hour?
I’m ok with newt trying his southern strategy in MS and AL. But at that point it was time for him to be a statesman and step aside. He would and still does have enough power to be a king maker.
>> But at that point it was time for him to be a statesman and step aside
At least he has the potential of being a statesman.
Go Newt!
It would be nice if you would provide some links to all those charges against Rick Santorum.
For instance, I happened to know that there is some interesting information related to Rick Santorum voting to increase the Department of Education, if he in fact did.
You see, in 1979 Newt voted to create the Department of Education. Here’s a link for verification.
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/vote.xpd?vote=h1979-468
The charge under the heading Bankruptcy is fraudulent.
Rick Santorum did not vote to deny abortion protesters the ability get relief from their general debts by filing bankruptcy.
Rick did sign a bill that denied violent abortion protesters from declaring bankruptcy to write off debts incurred by violent criminal acts.
As a Conservative I don’t wish to see people be able to kill, bomb, firebomb, or cause physical injury, then be able to avoid having to be responsible for debt incurred by these acts.
These two charges against Rick have been posted all over the forum for weeks. They imply that Rick is very anti-abortion protester. They also imply that Rick is much worse than Newt because he voted to increase the budget of the Department of Education, when Newt voted to create it.
Folks, I understand your desire to trash Santorum to increase Newt’s chances, but it doesn’t serve Newt welll to use the tactics that include these two charges over and over.
How about some links for verification of these charges so we can look more of them up.
With apologies, I meant to link you to the post just above.
Thank you.
...and I’ll have no way to compete against Barack Obama, no money, no organization or debate skills, but at least I’m a “conservative” so what’s the big deal?
God, I hope so.
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