LIVE AT FIVE – 02.08.12

They’re still counting votes in Colorado at this hour — 1 a.m. Eastern, 11 p.m. Mountain — and Rick Santorum is barely leading Mitt Romney with about half of the caucus vote counted there.

Santorum won both the Missouri primary and the Minnesota caucuses, and you have to wonder if Newt Gingrich’s angry rant Saturday after losing in Nevada hasn’t shifted the GOP battlefield.

UPDATE: Readers will excuse my long delay in blogging the results tonight, as I was working on my annual CPAC preview feature for The American Spectator. But as I was writing, I had the TV on Fox News, where the commentators kept repeating that (a) the Missouri primary is just a “beauty pageant”; and (b) the caucuses in Minnesota and Colorado are “non-binding.” In other words, they were trying to suggest that the vote didn’t matter.

The Iowa GOP caucuses were also “non-binding,” but Fox News commentators didn’t say a word about that on caucus night, did they?

UPDATE II: With the Associated Press reporting just 67% of precincts in Colorado, and Santorum leading Romney 39%-35%, the chairman of the Colorado GOP just called into Fox News to say that he has results from 99% of precincts, and Santorum has definitely won there.

UPDATE III: The results from Missouri:

Rick Santorum ………..138,957 — 55.2%
Mitt Romney ………….. 63,826 — 25.3%
Ron Paul ………………… 30,641 — 12.2%

Newt Gingrich didn’t make the Missouri ballot. It is true that no delegates were bound by Tuesday’s vote. However, unlike Karl Rove, I’d say Santorum beating Romney by 30 points might be kinda important.

UPDATE IV: The results from Minnesota:

Rick Santorum ……….20,932 — 44.9%
Ron Paul ………………..12,627 — 27.1%
Mitt Romney …………..7,890 –16.9%
Newt Gingrich ………. 4,993 — 10.7%

Once more, Karl Rove is correct to say that the caucus vote in Minnesota is “non-binding.” But when Santorum got 45% while Romney and Gingrich got 27% combined? Might be kinda important.

UPDATE V: The results from Colorado:

Rick Santorum ……….. 26,580 — 40.2%
Mitt Romney …………. 23,097 — 34.9%
Newt Gingrich …………. 8,457 — 12.8%
Ron Paul …………………. 7,782 — 11.8%

Yeah, Karl Rove, I know: “non-binding.” But Rick Santorum just scored a hat trick — 3-for-3 — in three crucial swing states, and got more votes in one night than Romney got in Iowa and New Hampshire combined.

Might be kinda important.

UPDATE VI: Let me put some numbers on that last point. In Iowa, Romney got less than 30,000 votes. In New Hampshire, Romney got less than 100,00 votes. Tonight in Missouri alone, Rick Santorum got more votes than Romney got in Iowa and New Hampshire combined, and in all, Santorum got nearly 180,000 votes Tuesday.

Might be kinda important.

UPDATE VII: O, ye of ~~little~~ zero faith! Now with the benefit of hindsight, let’s re-read Allahpundit’s preview of Tuesday’s vote:

No delegates at stake tonight, but this is probably Santorum’s last chance to breeze past Newt as the race’s designated Not Romney. . . . If he wins both easily, then he gets a bunch of positive media coverage this week and maybe a few more big-name conservative endorsements, which in turn could mean enough movement in the polls to put him on at least an equal footing with Gingrich. Once that happens, the pressure will shift to Newt to explain why he should stay in and divide the conservative vote on the strength of having won one state while Santorum should drop out after having won three.

Excuse me, Allah: This surprising hat-trick — you kinda low-rated Santorum in Colorado, didn’t ya, buddy? — actually makes it four states in which Santorum has beaten Romney.

And as to the bizarre self-perpetuating media meme that “no delegates” were at stake Tuesday: This was legally true in Missouri, but given Santorum’s 2-to-1 margin in the “beauty pageant” vote, does anyone really think someone other than Santorum will get the lion’s share of the delegates at next month’s Missouri caucuses?

As for the presidential preference votes at Tuesday’s precinct caucuses in Minnesota and Colorado, yes — those votes were “non-binding,” officially. But if a precinct caucus votes 45-27 for Santorum over Romney (i.e., the typical Minnesota precinct), do we suppose that this caucus will then send a slate of Romney delegates to the next phase of the state party nominating process who will vote for somebody else besides Santorum? Or should we, as I suggest we should, assume that the delegates chosen at the precinct level will eventually vote at the state level to send delegates to the national convention in roughly the same proportion as the preference expressed in the precinct votes?

Like I said, the Iowa caucus vote on Jan. 3 was also “non-binding” in the same sense as the Minnesota and Colorado precinct caucus votes, but almost nobody mentioned that at the time. However, it seems that somebody’s campaign — and I’m thinking it might be somebody whose name sounds like “Ritt Momney” — was very diligent in spreading the message about these “non-binding” votes that Rick Santorum won Tuesday.

UPDATE VIII: In politics, as in economics, the New York Times is always caught by surprise:

His candidacy all but dismissed just days ago, Rick Santorum won the Minnesota and Colorado caucuses and a nonbinding primary in Missouri on Tuesday, an unexpected trifecta that raised fresh questions about Mitt Romney’s ability to corral conservative support. . .
His performance added another twist to an unruly nominating contest that has seen Republican voters veering among candidates and refusing to coalesce behind anyone. It came after Mr. Romney scored back-to-back victories in Florida and Nevada that had led to predictions that he was finally on a straight march to the nomination.

By whom was Santorum’s candidacy “all but dismissed”? Why, by all the smart guys at the New York Times, that’s who!

Kind of interesting that Romney’s top surrogate in Minnesota was the state’s former governor, Tim Pawlenty, and yet Romney placed third in Minnesota, with 17 percent. Thanks, Tim!

Tuesday’s trifecta was not “unexpected” by a certain Colorado resident:

What did I tell ya? Santorum’s got game. . . . Nothing is inevitable in politics.

Attagirl, Michelle. And she makes an important point: This would be a good time to go give Rick Santorum some money: $20, $50, $100 — whatever you can afford, give it now. Super Tuesday’s coming soon, and the Romney attack machine is going to pour on millions of dollars in attack ads to try to destroy the Comeback Kid they thought they buried weeks ago.

UPDATE IX: Linked by Fire Andrea Mitchell — thanks! Guess Tuesday’s vote doesn’t bode well for “Sweet Meteor of Death,” eh?

One of my friends from Team Santorum pointed out on Twitter that a tropical storm just hit Vanuatu. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

UPDATE X: My libertarian friend in Missouri, Tom Knapp, seems to grasp the Fear and Loathing element in this campaign. And the truly bizarre thing is, I’ll be hanging out with Rick Santorum this weekend at CPAC. Because the going just got weird . . .

UPDATE XI: Evil Blogger Lady: “This reminds me of that moment of recognition by Michael Corleone in Godfather II that the rebels in Cuba could actually win…” Because no discussion of 21st-century politics is complete until somebody makes a Godfather reference.

It’s 3:30 a.m. Good-night, everybody.

Category: Colorado, Election 2012, Karl Rove, Minnesota, Missouri, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum

Thomas Sowell On Why Romney Actually Doesn’t Care Fig #1 About The Poor

Posted on | February 7, 2012 | 15 Comments

by Smitty

Sowell:

Mitt Romney has come out in support of indexing the minimum wage law, to have it rise automatically to keep pace with inflation. To many people, that would seem like a small thing that can be left for economists or statisticians to deal with.
But to people who call themselves conservatives, and aspire to public office, there is no excuse for not being aware of what a major social disaster the minimum wage law has been for the young, the poor and especially for young and poor blacks.
It is not written in the stars that young black males must have astronomical rates of unemployment. It is written implicitly in the minimum wage laws.

I should think that the Bain of our existence would be a little more knowledgable about the evil effects of minimum wage laws.

The positive examples of policy queering markets are so rare as to be non-existant. And yet, like entitlements, minimum wage laws are among the policy drugs we can’t stop smoking.

Romney, combining the worst aspects of a politician and a roulette wheel, will probably come out strongly at war with Eastasian minimum wage laws, which he has always fought.

via Riehl on Twitter

Category: Mitt Romney, Thomas Sowell

Saint Charles, Martyr of LGF

Posted on | February 7, 2012 | 16 Comments

Because there are so many important things to blog about — hey, CPAC starts Thursday — I seldom take notice of Charles Johnson’s idiocy anymore, but His Weirdness has once again been pursuing his sick obsession with Pamela Geller. And when Donald Douglas of American Power called him out for it, Charles predictably played the victim card.

Having spent two years waging an online campaign to destroy Geller and the counter-jihad movement — his pathetic vendetta failed — Charles keeps projecting his own hate onto her, so that he sees no irony when he claims she is “spew[ing] hate” at him!

Pamela Geller will be at CPAC, hosting a panel Friday afternoon on “Islamic Law in America,” and I can guarantee you that event will be packed. In fact, I’d bet at least one presidential candidate might drop by.

Jazzy McBikeshorts? That bloated loser couldn’t fill the corner booth at Denny’s with his supporters.

Category: Atlas Shrugs, Charles Johnson, CPAC

Your Choices: Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum or ‘Sweet Meteor of Death’

Posted on | February 7, 2012 | 18 Comments

This looks to be a big day for Rick Santorum, which probably explains why last night Erick Erickson began apocalyptic doomsaying:

Influential conservative blogger Erick Erickson said he would endorse the “sweet meteor of death” over any of the current GOP candidates, but would back the party’s eventual nominee in the general election against President Obama. . . .
Erickson has been highly critical of all the remaining candidates, saying the only reason Romney was seen as the eventual nominee was because “the other candidates, right now, are a pretty pathetic lot.”

Here’s a partial transcript from Erickson’s Monday WSB radio program:

It’s time for a moment of candor, I believe. I’m going to give my endorsement for President of the United States tonight. . . . Of the candidates running for President of the United States, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, on the Republican side — oh, I guess I’ll throw in Ron Paul there, as well — my choice for President of the United States is the Sweet Meteor of Death. Yes, that’s right, the Sweet Meteor of Death. Now, naturally, you could presume that, being a conservative, that of course I would choose something like a great fireball coming from the sky, annihilating us all, because women and minorities are hardest hit. . . . I’ve decided, a pox on all their houses. They’re all terrible. I doubt any of them can beat Barack Obama, unless the economy goes back down, which it may very well, in which case they don’t need my endorsement — they’ll have the economy.

(Hat-tip: Hot Air.) I had written a very long rebuttal to Erickson, but then thought better of it. Why bother? Dan Riehl calls Erickson’s rant “basically a concession to Romney and simply another incidence of his being one of the first to quit the battle.” And permit me to quote from Erickson’s Wikipedia biography:

The analysis from one of Erickson’s “Morning Briefing” emails, just after the November 2009 election, was posted on the website of Human Events, referred to on the website of The American Spectator, and by Rush Limbaugh, and “fueled discussion later that morning at two influential weekly meetings of [Washington,] D.C. conservatives”, according to an article in the Washington Post. The Post added, “The ability of a single e-mail to shape a message illustrates the power of the conservative network.” The article described Erickson as one of the American conservative movement’s “key national players”.

Hmmm. Erickson’s analysis was “referred to on the website of the American Spectator,” and thence became an example of “the power of the conservative network.” How do such things happen?

The value of Neutral Objective Journalism is sometimes overlooked, and I would assert that Doug Hoffman’s victory in New York was the irreversible turning point in the Florida Senate campaign. But there were hundreds, even thousands of people who deserved credit for those victories, and it was Sarah Palin’s endorsement of Hoffman that crushed the spine of Dede Scozzafava’s campaign.

Don’t know how that happened, either.

When was the last time Erick said anything nice about Sarah Palin?

Category: Colorado, Election 2012, Minnesota, Missouri, Rick Santorum

President Who Attacked The SCOTUS For Citizens United OK’s SuperPAC

Posted on | February 7, 2012 | 7 Comments

by Smitty

Noted 2010 thought criminal Justice Samuel Alito must feel some satisfaction at the news that #OccupyWhiteHouse has blessed the efforts of Priorities USA.

Let’s have the entire dextrosphere relax here. BHO is no hypocrite. Only conservatives, especially of the white male persuasion, can be hypocrites. More at Da Tech Guy.

via The Moderate Voice

Category: Uncategorized

Today’s Metaphor For Progress

Posted on | February 7, 2012 | 6 Comments

by Smitty

McPherson Square Park, over at American Glob, has the before/after pictures that show us just how swell Progress can be. I’m looking at the Daily Presidential Tracking Poll, seeing that #OccupyOvalOffice has nearly clawed himself to a single-digit disapproval, and wondering if we’re losing sight of the prize.

Between now and November, every number is going to be as cooked as McPherson Square: the jobs number, the approval number, the Dow. You’re dealing with an utterly ruthless crew, in this administration. Do not forget that, ye patriots.

Category: #Occupy, Progressivism

So, After The Left Has Politicized Everything, They Have The Sack To Whine About Those Seeing Political Overtones In Eastwood’s Superbowl Ad

Posted on | February 7, 2012 | 3 Comments

by Smitty

Colmes, emphasis mine:

Leonard Hirshan explains:
“That’s the problem; everything is political now,” says Hirshan, who tells us that he didn’t see the “Halftime” spot until it aired last night, and insisted that Eastwood agreed to make the spot without even consulting his representative of 50 years because it was “something personal he got involved in” that was neither political nor commercial.

Boo frickin’ hoo, dude. Yeah, it was sunnier back ten years ago when I didn’t fret the next legislative rape coming down the pike from DC.

The problem may abate when we break the imperial federal government. Join the fight. More at NewsBusters and the Conservatory. I actually didn’t mind the ad as a pick-me-up speech, but my Pavlovian response to all things Government Motors is overwhelmingly negative. I don’t want to hear a single word about the American spirit if we’re not letting overly unionized organizations eat the fruit of their ‘labors’.

Category: Culture

« go back — keep looking »

About

This is an area on your website where you can add text. This will serve as an informative location on your website, where you can talk about your site.

The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

LIVE AT FIVE – 02.08.12

Santorum Surge Returns: Wins Missouri, Minnesota; UPDATE: Wins Colorado UPDATE: NY Times ‘Unexpectedly!’

Thomas Sowell On Why Romney Actually Doesn’t Care Fig #1 About The Poor

Saint Charles, Martyr of LGF

Your Choices: Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum or ‘Sweet Meteor of Death’

President Who Attacked The SCOTUS For Citizens United OK’s SuperPAC

Today’s Metaphor For Progress

So, After The Left Has Politicized Everything, They Have The Sack To Whine About Those Seeing Political Overtones In Eastwood’s Superbowl Ad

THE FULL METAL JACKET REACH-AROUND AWARD

HIT THE FREAKING TIP JAR!

Search

Recent Posts

RSS reader subscription

MEMEORANDUM

Recent Comments

THE AMAZING GONZO FEED

Major Leagues

Archives

Free Agents

SHAMELESS CAPITALISM

Triple-A Franchises

Blogroll

About

Subscribe to our feed

Search

Admin