Now it's on to Florida, and it's not a slam dunk for Gingrich, his momentum notwithstanding. Florida's filled with snow birds and retired country club types, which Romney would have a natural appeal to. I don't think that Florida will decide anything, though Santorum may feel compelled to drop out if he polls poorly there.
I was reading that some of the snow birds from NY voted in both FL and NY.
Santorum is still very competitive, btw.
“I find it ironic that the media’s attempt to destroy Newt’s candidacy assured his victory.”
The MSM is the modern equivalent to such trash as “Tokyo Rose” from WW2. They are the enemy.
Britt Hume was melting down last night. I lost all respect I had for him.
Newt Gingrich deserves credit for a surprising win. This was no eked-out bare-margin victory but rather a blowout.
We in the conservative movement who are not fans of Gingrich need to congratulate him. He won, fair and square, and we need to deal with it. He's not my choice, but he's not the worst guy out there, either, and he's now proved he has at least a shot at defeating Romney.
I find it especially interesting that some of the most religiously conservative parts of South Carolina decided to back Gingrich rather than Santorum despite Gingrich's admitted past history and despite the new allegations against him.
Something caused that. I'm not yet sure what and my “on the ground” information in South Carolina isn't solid enough to have a good explanation.
Maybe Gingrich, despite being a Northerner, learned enough about the South during his time in the Atlanta suburbs to realize that the South is not only the Bible Belt but also the Sunday NASCAR races and “Dukes of Hazzard” mentality — and sometimes those disparate personalities are present in the same person. Southern “fighting fundie” fundamentalism is not far from the rebellious spirit of bootlegging hillbillies portrayed by the Dukes of Hazzard. Callista Gingrich obviously isn't Daisy Duke or a NASCAR trophy girl, but equally obviously, Gingrich was able to win Carolina votes somewhere and I don't have a good explanation of how or why, other than perhaps a perception that he was the only candidate feisty and aggressive enough to defeat Mitt Romney.
If that's the answer, Carolinians may just be right. Gingrich is feisty and I do admire that in him.
It's no secret that I have major problems with Newt Gingrich's admitted infidelity and now the accusations of asking for an open marriage. This is not new. I had major concerns about Herman Cain after the allegations started about him, I objected to Rudy Giuliani's zipper problems, and I objected to Bill Clinton's zipper problems. I have to be consistent and I can't have a double standard because I like many of Gingrich's political views while despising the politics of Clinton.
I'm not sure yet why evangelical voters pulled the lever for Gingrich, but it clearly happened, and by proving he can win South Carolina in the midst of a flurry of horrible accusations, Gingrich has considerably strengthened his hand in the rest of the Deep South.
That is not irrelevant in the Republican Party, and even if Romney wins Florida, a winner-take-all state, what happened in South Carolina will make it possible for Gingrich to say to Republican evangelicals that if he can win South Carolina he should be able to win other socially conservative states.
He may well be right. If he can stop Mitt Romney, that's not a bad thing. One huge positive of Gingrich is that unlike McCain, Gingrich really does seem to “get it” about the need to include Christian conservatives in a winning coalition. If we can't have the head of the table, at least with Gingrich we'll get a place at the table.
I don't want to have to make a choice between Romney or Obama. I can vote for Gingrich this fall if I have to do so. Maybe Gingrich is the way to prevent an Obama-Romney choice.