David Jones on the Surge of Rick Santorum and the Road to the Nomination

A key bellwether state for both Super Tuesday and the General Election is Ohio.  It is a must win state for Republicans.  If Santorum can win both Michigan and Ohio, he will be well on his way to earning enough delegates to win the Republican nomination.  It would put him in an enormous position of strength before going into Texas on April 3d.  Rick Santorum is not an Anti-Romney candidate.  He is our conservative alternative to President Obama.

P>ST. JOSEPH,MO (Catholic Online) - Last week was one of the most amazing episodes in modern political campaign history.  Rick Santorum, the winner of the Iowa Caucus, won three important races. Any time that a candidate can beat an opponent by double-digits in one state, it is a very big deal. 

However, on Tuesday, February 8, 2012, Rick Santorum beat Romney in Missouri by 30% and won every single county.  Santorum then beat Romney in Minnesota by nearly that same percentage and won nearly every county there as well.  In the most surprising upset of the night, Santorum beat Romney in Colorado by 5%.  Romney had won that state in 2008 with over 60% of the vote. 

A political earthquake was felt throughout the Heartland and headed West. The results of those three contests radically changed the dynamics of the Republican Presidential Primary race.
 
Quickly following those events, Romney won both the CPAC straw poll and the Maine Caucus last weekend.  However, even though Santorum did not even compete in Maine, he garnered 18% of the vote.  In addition, he fared very well at CPAC. In fact, the pundits reporting on the event, and the free press generated by it, gave his performance more notice than the results.

There were several important developments that came out of last week's events for Presidential candidate Santorum which position the candidate well for the future.
 
The first was an enormous boost in fundraising for the Santorum campaign.  In just a few days he brought in over $3 million dollars, which reflects growing support and momentum for his candidacy.The upcoming races in late February going into Super Tuesday are going to be expensive. 

Money, an obscene amount of it, is a necessity in modern politics.  It does not guarantee victory though.  Look no further than the millions in the bank for Romney. However, it does ensure survival, life for another day.  Without money a campaign is dead, which brings me to the second important development of the Republican race.
 
Santorum also crushed Gingrich in all the races.  That is very significant because Santorum has now become the last conservative in the race facing Romney.  Romney has always needed multiple conservatives in any state to break up the votes so that he could win a plurality of them. 

Gingrich has not withdrawn form the race as of yet, but political and financial reality is staring him straight in the face.  It is reported that Gingrich's campaign is $600,000 in debt and that his major donor for his Super PAC, Sandy Alderson, has now turned off the tap. 

Another nail in his coffin came when the most prestigious conservative publication in the country, National Review, called for Gingrich to leave the race.  How long he stays in the race is any body's guess.  The longer he stays only helps Romney to continue to divide and conquer in upcoming states.
 
There is only one debate between now and Super Tuesday. It is a CNN Debate in Arizona on February 22d.  Gingrich, Santorum and Romney have all had strong debate performances and they do make a real difference.  Gingrich's strong performances in South Carolina propelled him to a victory there and Romney's strong debate performance in Florida guaranteed his victory in Florida.

Santorum's consistently strong debate performances, winning a few in fact, kept his campaign very much alive and provided the strength so that he could have the 3-state sweep mentioned above.  The importance of the February 22d debate cannot be underestimated because of the two races which follow it.    
  
The next major races are two weeks from now, Tuesday, February 28. They are Arizona and Michigan.  Romney was expected to win both races before heading into Super Tuesday.  Arizona is strongly favoring Romney and it is a winner take all state. 

Michigan is proportional representation though.  Surprisingly in the most recent poll there, Santorum is 39% and Romney is 24%. Santorum's Made in America economic populist plan to rebuild our manufacturing base really seems to be connecting there.  That is not surprising because Michigan is the automobile center of our country. 

However, Michigan is also Romney's birth-state and the state where his own dad was the President and CEO of American Motors Corporation and its former governor.  If Santorum can beat Romney on his own home-turf, his own front yard, it will be the equivalent of a polar shift in the Republican race just before Super Tuesday. 

Santorum doesn't need to win in Michigan, but if he does, it is a game changer.  It is one that is so significant it could garner the momentum necessary to win the Republican nomination. 
 
It is reported that we should know by March 1st if Santorum got on Indiana's ballot.  Romney's Indiana co-chairmen, Dan Dumezich, also happens to be a member of the four-member bipartisan Indiana Election Commission that will decide Santorum's fate there.  He has publicly stated that he will not recuse himself.  If Santorum is blocked off the ballot there, it will be a scandal. 
 
Then on March 3d comes the Washington Caucus - just before Super Tuesday on March 6.   The Super Tuesday states which look very favorable as of now for Santorum are North Dakota, Oklahoma, and Tennessee.  Georgia could be in play if Gingrich drops out before then, but if not, Santorum could finish a strong second there. 

A key bellwether state for both Super Tuesday and the General Election is Ohio.  It is a must win state for Republicans.  If Santorum can win both Michigan and Ohio, he will be well on his way to earning enough delegates to win the Republican nomination.  It would put him in an enormous position of strength before going into Texas on April 3d. 
 
Several favorable states for Santorum come before Texas though.  Kansas and Wyoming hold their Caucuses on March 10.  The Alabama and Mississippi Primaries are on March 13.  The binding Missouri Caucus is March 17. 

Santorum is no longer the "nice guy" who many would like to support but do not believe that he can win.  Santorum for the first time is now leading Romney in the RealClearPolitics national average of polls.  The inevitability of Romney's victory has exploded before our eyes and fallen to earth, like a zeppelin of old.  
 
Rick Santorum is not an Anti-Romney candidate.  He is our conservative alternative to President Obama.
 
Disclaimer - The opinions expressed in this article are those solely of the author and not those of the U.S. Army.

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David Jones holds a Masters in Theological Studies from the Institute of Religious and Pastoral Studies, University of Dallas. He is a member of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation, a Pontifically recognized and approved ecclesial movement. He also runs a popular blog entitled La Nouvelle Theologie. His conversion story is published in the Italian book entitled Sotto Il Cielo D'America (Under the American Sky) written by Marco Bardazzi. The introduction of this book has been translated into English and is available on-line here.  

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