“But if we are to look at what is really happening in Iowa, Rick Santorum is doing well. He has been to every country, some more than once. His message resonates with Conservatives. He’s the real deal.”
I wish he were doing better and who knows? He might do much better than expected when the votes are actually counted.
“Paul is only in this race as a spoiler. He knows he isn’t going to get the nod.”
I don’t think his motivations are malevolent; I think he wants to win. Not so much because he wants the office, but he wants to see his ideas put in place.
That said, I agree with the second part of your statement: he is probably well aware that he will not get the gop nomination. I don’t think he much cares.
Ultimately what I think he will do is run as good a campaign as he can as a gop candidate and build the electability creds. He’ll finish a respectable third in several early primaries. And then it’s decision time, probably in mid April. If he’s doing really well, he’ll stay put. If it’s looking like someone else will be the gop nominee, he’ll leave the gop and make a 3rd party run.
The Libertarian party has it’s nominating convention in early May. He ran as their nominee once before in 1988. I don’t see anything to stop him from running as the LP candidate again. The LP has ballot status already in most states and if Ron Paul is their nominee, I don’t see them having any problem getting ballot status in all 50 states.
Then things get interesting. While I personally doubt that RP would win the general election, it’s not outside the realm of possibility. He would get a healthy chunk of the vote and more than enough to influence the end result.
Paul knows he can’t win, so then what is the motivation? Seems pretty selfish to me. But when the race ends you get to keep the cash, so.... RP is no different from Ralph Nader, and others who took votes away from real candidates. I don’t respect him for pretending to be a Republican when in fact he is really a Libertarian. The Libertarian Party will never see a president, in my opinion.
Santorum is doing better by all accounts except what the media doesn’t want us to hear. The question is why?