Newt Gingrich's 28-minute attack ad received four pinocchios for being dishonest. In his attempts to attack Mr. Romney, he's really just making attacks on the free enterprise system. He's trying to pretend that he isn't, but he's simply making distinctions without a difference. He's embarrassing himself and the entire GOP in the process. In the meantime, Mr. Santorum has had the integrity and the dignity to avoid making similar ridiculous comments.
Rick Santorum is having to live down previous opposition to right-to-work in a state that is facing the loss of many jobs to union interference. In addition, his record as something of a big-spending Republican will not fit well in a state that once elected spending hawk Mark Sanford, continues to elect spending hawk Jim DeMint, and in 2010 elected Tea Party spending hawk Nikki Haley. You can whine to your hearts' content about Governor Haley being a RINO for endorsing Mitt Romney, but her election through the Tea Party movement is a sign that South Carolina Republicans are not that friendly to a bigger spending Republican. Rick Santorum's other problem with consolidating the anti-Romney vote is that he's behind Newt Gingrich, so he'd be asking for more people to switch to come to him than would be needed for his people to switch.
Rick Perry's attempt to make an issue of "vulture capitalism" was as silly as Newt Gingrich's tantrum ads. One of his major donors left him for Mitt Romney's campaign because he made those silly attacks. In all ways, he's embarrassing himself and to some extent the party, but his money keeps him in the race.
One of these candidates may leave the race before Saturday, but none are showing any signs of being the one. Until we see those signs, we don't have a reason to believe that they won't all continue through South Carolina.
Newt Gingrich would like to believe that a win in South Carolina could lead to a win in Florida and enough momentum to win. That strategy has several problems. First, South Carolina, like Iowa, was a state that Mitt Romney never expected to win. Mr. Romney's being ahead now is a surprise, and a close second place for him still means that he's outperformed expectations. Secondly, Florida Republicans are trying to take South Carolina's place as the state through which the nominee must come. Many of them will be tempted to vote against the South Carolina winner just to break South Carolina's streak of picking nominees. That temptation will be particularly strong if a weak candidate like Newt Gingrich wins in South Carolina. Thirdly, Mitt Romney has planned for a 50-state campaign. Newt Gingrich has only been planning and organizing for impromptu campaigns set up by the momentum of the latest win. Even sweeping every state, no one can win enough delegates to win the nomination until late March or so. Newt Gingrich's angry elf routine is going to wear quickly on voters, and he hasn't shown the patience to stay on message and be positive for that long.
Rick Perry and Rick Santorum may have a better chance than Newt Gingrich does for this reason. Neither of them is quite as polarizing or uninspiring as Dr. Gingrich is when he's in angry elf mode. If one of them survives long enough to be the "not Romney" in March, he would have a much better chance than Newt Gingrich does.
Newt has clearly been rising since he went to "angry elf mode." Ask yourself why. People are looking for a fighter to take it to Obama. Rick and Rick have a better chance? That's just embarrassing.