Jim Robinson
Posted on 02/17/2012 12:40:44 PM PST by Red Steel
ATLANTA – The campaign trail in Georgia is getting crowded.
With less than three weeks left until the state's March 6 presidential primary, candidates in the topsy-turvy Republican race are turning their attention to Super Tuesday's biggest delegate prize.
Newt Gingrich will play up his roots when he returns to his old home state to campaign for two days, beginning with a rally in Peachtree City Friday night.
Surging after a trio of wins in recent weeks, Rick Santorum will focus on his evangelical base, appearing Sunday night at a "God and Country" rally at First Redeemer Church in Cumming.
Mitt Romney headlined a rally in Atlanta last week and a political action committee backing the former Massachusetts governor has purchased a modest amount of air time in the state to run an anti-Gingrich ad. And Romney campaign spokeswoman Andrea Saul said Thursday the candidate plans to spend "a lot of time campaigning in Georgia and Ohio ahead of Super Tuesday."
With 76 delegates at stake -- the most of the 10 Super Tuesday states -- the three GOP candidates are eying Georgia closely.
Texas Congressman Ron Paul won a Republican Party straw poll in the state last summer but hasn't been seen in the state campaigning.
Gingrich clearly holds an edge. The former House speaker represented a suburban Atlanta district for two decades and was in the trenches building up the state Republican Party at a time when Democrats dominated Georgia politics.
A recent poll confirmed Gingrich's front-runner status in the state. The survey, conducted by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research Inc., found Gingrich leading Romney 43 percent to 29 percent among likely voters in Georgia.
Santorum had 12 percent, while Paul trailed with 6 percent
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Maybe he should run for governor of Georgia?
Naw, running for President is better.
By ELIZABETH WILLIAMSON
A year into his first full-time teaching job, Newt Gingrich applied to be college president, submitting with his application a paper titled “Some Projections on West Georgia College’s Next Thirty Years.”
Newt Gingrich fashions himself as the history professor of the GOP presidential field. So what exactly was he like as an academic? Elizabeth Williamson on Lunch Break looks at West Georgia College, which employed the former Speaker in the late 1970s.
Mel Steely, a history professor who played a role in Mr. Gingrich’s hiring in 1970, said the bid drew “a chuckle” from administrators. The following year, Mr. Gingrich applied to be chairman of the history department. That wasn’t greeted so kindly, Mr. Steely said, with some favoring a longtime professor and World War II veteran.
“We weren’t going to make Newt our chairman, but he liked the idea of competing for almost anything,” said Mr. Steely, who later wrote a complimentary biography of Mr. Gingrich titled “The Gentleman From Georgia.” “He figured ‘I’m capable of doing this,’ and it didn’t bother him so much that it offended anybody.”
Mr. Gingrich often says his experience as a historian would make him a superior president. During Monday’s GOP debate, he lectured “as a historian” on “a fact-based model” for revamping Social Security, citing the success of programs in Galveston, Texas, and Chile.
So what was Professor Gingrich actually like? A clutch of little-known records from what is now the University of West Georgia in Carrollton suggests the ambition and intellectual grandeur of Newt 2012 aren’t a long way from the 1970s vintage. In addition to seeking the college presidency, Mr. Gingrich was often absent as he pursued political goals. He embarked on an effort to moonlight as a paid consultant. And, it turns out, he spent little time teaching history.
Mr. Gingrich coordinated the school’s fledgling environmental-studies department and by 1976 was removed from the history department because his “interest in long-range and broad-range planning for the future...is clearly more appropriate to the orientation of our Department of Geography,” a 1975 letter from then-college president Ward Pafford reads.
Gingrich campaign spokesman R.C. Hammond emphasized that Mr. Gingrich’s backing in history includes a master’s and doctoral degree from Tulane University and extensive research and writing on the subject. “He’s talked about teaching environmental studies” at West Georgia, Mr. Hammond said.
Then as now, “There was this whole wealth of information that he was communicating in digestible bites,” said J. Randolph Evans, a West Georgia student of Mr. Gingrich who was his legal counsel when he was House speaker in the 1990s and chairman of several Gingrich ventures. He described Mr. Gingrich as an engaged and energetic professor.
Isn’t he from Pennsylvania & France?
If Newt doesn’t do well in the Georgia primary I’m sure it will be pointed out by the Newt Brigade that he’s actually from Pennsylvania.
Well, isn’t it just tooooo bad that Santo and Myth are losing Georgia.
Info ping.
The Newt Brigade-—I like that!
I know this won’t rain on your parade, but the poll was taken the 6-8th. The 3-state sweep was on the 7th. The Landmark/Rosetta poll on the 9th shows Gingrich 35, Santorum 26. From what I have seen in polling from that time(in other states), that seems to be holding up in later polls by different vendors, Santorum jumped big when he showed he could take on Romney.
I won’t rain on your parade, but Santorum’s boost, especially in Georgia, is a mile wide and a quarter inch deep.
Newt just received another $10 million in campaign funds from his Nevada friends. Yay. He’s in it to win it.
No I think we will just put him in the Whitehouse and let him run the country.
Newt is the other candidate from Pennsylvania, but unlike Santorum he knows what a hoe cake is and has an appreciation for grits and greens.
Better chance of Newt winning gov. in GA than Rick in PA.
If Rick doesn't do well in PA will you Ricky-fans point out that Rick is actually from VA.
One lame remark deserves another.
whatever, you believe what propoganda you want. The fact of the matter is that as the previous FReeper just pointed out, the poll numbers you put in parantheses are obsolete. Santorum has gained ground in the south and is now leading in TN and OK.
Even if Santorum doesn’t win GA, based on his rise, it’s highly likely Gingrich won’t eclipse 50% in the statewide vote, or by Congressional District either (with the exception of maybe the 6th).
And this is important based on how delegates are allocated in GA. The race is looking like it may be 40% Gingrich, 30% Santorum, 20-25% Romney, and Paul the rest. In this result, I assume Gingrich would carry all 14 CD’s, however, he would not get over 50% in those CD’s to win all the delegates. In that case, the 2nd place finisher in the CD gets 1 of the 3 delegates. I expect Santorum to finish no worse than 2nd in at least 12 of these CD’s, and Romney to finish 2nd in no more than 2. Additionally, if Newt cannot win GA with 50% of the statewide vote, the delegates get allocated proportionally, so what you have is:
Gingrich (2*14CD’s) + (.40*31) + 3 Bound GA RNC members = 44 Delegates.
Santorum (1*12CD’s) + (.30*31) = 22 Delegates
Romney (1*2CDs) + (.25*31) = 10 delegates
This is supposed to be Gingrich’s best Super Tuesday state. Everyone mistakenly is believing he’ll get the bulk of 70+ delegates here, but it is unlikely because he would have to win 50% across each CD, and based on current polling, it just isn’t happening.
So yeah, that Santorum support that’s a mile wide and quarter inch deep, is still going to net him at least a 1/3 of the GA delegates.
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