Romney is lucky his rival was Santorum, not Palin

The Washington Examiner ^ | April 10, 2012 | Philip Klein, Senior Editorial Writer

[2ndDivisionVet]

As he approaches the task of uniting the Republican party ahead of his all but official general election campaign, Mitt Romney will benefit from the same reality that's worked to his favor the entire race -- the composition of the Republican field. Specifically, Romney is fortunate that he had to beat out Rick Santorum to claim the nomination rather than Sarah Palin.

When Romney decided to seek the presidency for the second time, his moderate to liberal record in Massachusetts was bound to trigger a challenge from the right and set up a showdown, framed in shorthand, as the establishment of the party versus the conservative base. Had Palin been in the race as the conservative alternative, it would have been very difficult for Romney to attack her given the passionate following she has among many conservatives, because he wouldn't want to risk alienating them. Even if he had ultimately triumphed after a brutal primary fight, a lot of her loyal supporters would have found it difficult to bury the hatchet for the general election.

By contrast, Santorum came into the race with a very small following and was polling in the low single digits early on. Only when a number of other hopefuls fizzled did he emerge as the conservative alternative to Romney. Don't get me wrong, as I wrote earlier, I think Santorum raised his profile over the course of the race and proved to be a tenacious campaigner. But the point is that Santorum's support was as much about him being a vehicle for those who wanted to stop Romney than it was about a groundswell of support for him personally. His defeat is a disappointment to his supporters, no doubt, but less likely to sting as badly for as many people as a Palin defeat would have. Now that the primary is over, it will be a lot easier for Santorum voters to get behind Romney in the general election than it would have been for Palin given her built in fan base.

[stpio]

...”i’d still rather support the candidate that will pull America back from the edge of the ravine financially and restore respect for american military leadership in the world. the point is, any conservative that makes the perfect the enemy of the good is a fool that should feel the zot before they contaminate the rest of the people on here”...

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a kind reply,

Thanks. I can’t see the other issues because in my heart,
the gravest issue in God’s eyes is abortion. I wish I had
never viewed more than one Youtube...Romney in his own word
supporting abortion. Until I see him change, act, I can’t vote for him.

And then there’s the most extreme, Herod. Isn’t it awful?