Posted on 03/15/2012 4:44:42 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Newt Gingrich seems to be making decent sense, in terms of apparent logic, in saying that by staying in the race he can help rack up enough delegates to keep Mitt Romney from winning on the first ballot at the GOP national convention. Sometimes, though, that which seems to make sense does not actually work in practice. Nomination arithmetic is different from normal arithmetic. And no, I am not talking about how he alters the "impressions game" by splitting the conservative vote and thus either handing pluralities to Romney or narrowing the margins of victory for Santorum. That is a very good argument, but that's not at issue here. What I'm talking about here is exactly the sort of "delegate math" to which Gingrich claims to be appealing.
[SNIP]
(Granted, the risk is that if Romney comes out ahead in a certain state, this math would work in reverse, in his favor -- but since he's already ahead anyway, the only way to stop him is to at least have the chance to make up the gap in larger chunks.)
In short, for all those states with rules like Alabama's, a Gingrich candidacy enables Romney to move inexorably closer to a first-ballot nomination victory. Only a Gingrich withdrawal can stop that march.
Now this is not to say whether Romney ought to be stopped or not. This is just to say that if Gingrich's goal is stopping Romney, Gingrich's continuation in the race is directly counterproductive.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
Each state has wildly different rules for their primaries, for the convention, for when delegates are released or how long they are committed; what are soft and what are hard delegates.
Newt has them running around in circles and into brick walls.
Love Newt and am sooooooo glad he is staying in the race!
“In short, for all those states with rules like Alabama’s, a Gingrich candidacy enables Romney to move inexorably closer to a first-ballot nomination victory. Only a Gingrich withdrawal can stop that march.”
Because his “logic” assumes my vote will just breathlessly fall to Santorum, whom I consider just as lousy of Romney?
Sorry. That’s the wonderful attitude that just assume that we all “not Clinton” votes 1996 would just magically go to Dole because All the people that voted for Reagan would naturally vote for a guy from the same party.
Newt I think would be our best chance, but I'll take Santorum over any rino priss any day!
Thanks Newt, open up an industrial strength can of Whoop Ass!
Which is exactly what he would do if he were the President. :-)
Newt’s staying in the race helps Romney.
Newt is the Ross Perot of this election.
As a former member of the good ol boy’s club of the US Congress I’m sure he does not find this as repellant as do true conservatives. He is probably already writing the book that will make him more millions in his comfortable retirement after the election
No, actually you've been played (or the GOP-e thought they could play the base).
Romney is the Ross "get under the hood" Perot - lipstick on a Massachusetts Moderate -- that was supposed to appeal to the base.
The base isn't buying it.
Then there is Rick Santorum, the guy who endorsed the "non-government" GOP-e pick (who's pulling in millions from Wall Street and K-Street) because Rick is a team player.
Then there is Rick Santorum, the guy who endorsed Romney in 2008, the 2012 "non-government" GOP-e pick (who's pulling in millions from Wall Street and K-Street) because Rick is a team player.
No Sonny it's also business--the business of saving the republic from a choice between two shades of Obama...
Really? As I understand it, it was because he wasn't a member of the "good ol' boys club" of the GOP/Congress ("Ruling Class," to use Codevilla's term) that the GOP conspired to bounce him. IIRC, Romney claims that they wanted to replace him with someone "more conservative"; what they replaced him with was Hastert (who, BTW, figures prominently in Schweizer's Throw Them All Out as making money hand over fist in Congressional "insider trading") who managed promptly to lose the GOP majority and who I don't recall as being very effective in any way. Some conservative.
On a related note, I find utterly ludicrous Romney's charge that Newt was "lobbying" for Fannie/Freddie: Dems hate Newt and establishment GOPers hate him possibly even more. Precisely what influence would he have been able to peddle with people whose response would have been "Get that SOB out of my office!"? Surely, lobbyists have to have a friendly relationship with those they're lobbying. OTOH, it's more than plausible that anyone would hire Newt for his brains, i.e., as a consultant.
I forgot.
So many played voters
While it would be entertaining to watch Newt debate and destroy Barry, kinda like watching the mongoose take on the cobra, Newt has shown he can't even win a primary ...if he's out, most of his “intellectual” voters go to Romney. His only voting draw is if there is no one else to vote for. Same draw as Romney. Great. So his staying in is hurting Romney unless surpise- he shows up holding his hand on the podium at the Convention.
The actual voting results are shaping up to show the real real struggle is between Romney, Wall Street's pick, and Santorum with the grassroots. I believe the obamites are still misunderestimating the grassroots or maybe are just a little bit worried at this point.
The criticisms of Santorum are meager compared to the egregious flaws in obama, but something about Santorum evokes the same visceral hate from elitists as Sarah Palin received. Another fundamentalist white bread dumbo who openly displays his faith and wasn't smart enough abort his disabled children? The grassroots seems to be seeing through it.
The GOP has moved closer to the dims model of proportionate winning of delegates with super delegates in the wings. I hate what the party has become. Conservatives so need to get focussed and united for the general. We NEED the House AND the Senate. We NEED a conservative in the WH
The stupidity of the American Electorate is overwhelming.
You've forgotten a lot apparently. And if Newt leaves the race Santorum will be dispatched in quick fashion.
FYI: Newt won S.C., GA and was 2nd in AL, MS. And when the FL rules are reviewed (and if done fairly) Newt should get many delegates from his 2nd place.
It is a four-way pool game, with each of the participants keeping score separately. While it may seem that crazy old Uncle Ron Paul is hopelessly behind, he is racking up points that nobody else, NOBODY, has a chance of attracting.
Still, he remains part of the anti-Romney vote. While by racking up more points than all the other competitors combined, Romney rarely draws much of a plurality over the others, and even slips behind from time to time in certain venues.
Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are both battling over the same turf, with varying success. Newt is the much better extemporaneous debater, capable of marshalling and presenting facts while keeping track and demolishing the opponent’s arguments in a cogent, meaningful way, that is, if you can keep him on topic long enough.
Santorum is also someting of an extemporaneous speaker, but he tends to be didactic, like a lecturer before a crowd of sympathetic listeners, but unlikely to attract the stray crowd now outside the tent.
Mitt Romney is a testament to the power of money in elections. He can penetrate and spread his presence throughout the land, but strangely, whatever message he has is muted, whether by design, or simply because the message is just not that powerful. And there lies the problem.
The incumbent also has a very understated message, one that is being deliberately concealed, but the code words are getting out to his partisans in the urban corners of this country, to hell with anybody else. The plan is to have a Republican with an equally muted message come up as the opponent, then this trading of muted messages favors the incumbent.
A strong conservative message, with emphasis on moral principle and the virtues of clean living, would resonate in a most powerful manner with the majority, and if added to the prospect of reversing this atmosphere of artificial scarcity and destitution stalking the land, would move an easy win to the polls in November, carrying not only the White House, but a flood tide of new members to both the House and Senate.
Romney will just not take the fight to Obama, a hopelessly naive and relatively incompetent individual who has done the near-impossible - make Jimmy Carter not seem to suck nearly as much.
At this point in the 1980 election year, Reagan was some 30 points BEHIND Carter - yet we know how that election turned out. Just keep asking - are you better off now than you were four years ago? Simple question, simple message.
And yet, we cannot count on Mitt to ask that question.
Equally ludicrous that Newt supporters bash Santorum for working on “K Street” when what he was working for was to get conservatives hired into policy influencing jobs
And for endorsements, well we overlooked Sarah endorsing McCain didnt we. As if her personal payback was worth more than getting that sniveling senile goat cashiered out of the US Senate ... but lets bash Santorum who endorsed the odious Specter .... because he thought he was more likely to win, and because he thought even a nominal GOP Specter would be the better PA Senator/judicial committee member when it came to shepherding the next Supreme Court nominee through the Senate. The man miscalculated. Which I guess Sarah, Newt nor Romney never have.
Fact is, there is no knight whose armor is pure white
But there is one man on the stage who has personally walked the walk when it comes to recognizing the sanctity of life by accepting the sorrow and granting the grace of birth to a pure heart that had only moments to beat. And now another who at 3 has outlived her life expectancy
That takes a type of moral courage few politicians have and when people meet someone like that, it shows. Sarah Palin being another one of those few.
Newt is a lot more entertaining. But there is a reason he is not winning when going head to head with Santorum.
Oh, my bad, Newt didnt win one primary. He won 2.
I forgot he won SC after the sympathy vote got riled by his fatal attracton ex-wife’s memoirs.
sorry
Gingrich makes this point well, but the MSM doesn't want it aired.
Regarding Santorum, I see him winning over a lot of voters because most of them don't know enough about his record. He has cynically abandoned the economy/jobs as an issue. It is THE issue on voters' minds. He is unpredictable and out of his league. He will be torn apart.
Lots of nuggets in your post #15.
Well said.
Your review of the candidates was spot on. And it became clear to me that the reason Mittens sounds the way he does is because he completely does not believe what he is saying, because those are not his core beliefs. that is why we instinctively perceive him as a used car salesman.
And this fip lopper is who we are supposed to anoint as our nominee.
Nuts to that.
You are a dishonest debater.
Here's some reading for you.
UNLIKE Rick and Mitt, Newt Gingrich didn't rest on his laurels complaining about the liberal political landscape of his state. Newt CHANGED the political landscape in GA (as he did in Washington), brought Democrats into the party, rallied people to get involved in politics -- all by pushing conservatism.
________________________________________
"ATLANTA — It wasn't so long ago that the Republican Party in Georgia was just an afterthought, and Democrats were in firm control of all the levers of state government. Back then, Newt Gingrich and other die-hard GOP stalwarts ventured across the state with the far-fetched message that Republicans could reverse the tide.
Now with commanding majorities in the Statehouse and control of all statewide offices, Gingrich is hoping his vision for how the GOP could overcome decades of Democratic dominance in Georgia will pay dividends. He sorely needs a victory when his home state votes Tuesday, along with a big chunk of its 76 delegates, to prove his stumbling presidential bid has staying power.
Many Republican figures in Georgia still credit him with championing conservative policies, outlining a framework for what a GOP majority in the state could accomplish and broadcasting talking points to a generation of up-and-coming conservative leaders. He's also applauded for lobbying conservative Democrats, like then-Rep. Nathan Deal, to switch parties.
"Everyone else was trying to lose as slowly as possible, and to die with dignity at the Alamo. He was talking confidently that the Republican majority in Georgia, in the South and nationally was right around the corner," said Ralph Reed, a veteran Georgia GOP operative who founded the national Faith and Freedom Coalition. "On the one hand it was crazy, but on the other it was just the most exciting thing you've ever heard.".....................In Ga., Gingrich helped build conservative base
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.