Newt says a vote for Santorum is a vote for Romney is a vote for Obama... or something like that

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Desperate to do well in South Carolina and emerge as the only viable anti-Romney, The Newt is throwing darts in all directions. Shifting determinedly into negativity, he's launched some blistering (if for the most part accurate) attacks on Romney and is now also trying to draw a clear distinction between himself and his remaining right-wing rival, Rick Santorum, the man he must knock off if he is to get the mano-a-mano with Romney that could, but likely won't, win him the nomination.

His argument against Santorum isn't ideological, though, it's numerical: He's the only one positioned in the polls to take down Romney and, what's more, Santorum isn't electable (as he proved with his massive defeat in Pennsylvania in 2006, as an incumbent senator running for re-election, at the hands Bob Casey):

If you vote for Sen. Santorum, in effect, you're functionally voting for Gov. Romney to be the nominee. The only way to stop Mitt Romney, for all practical purposes, is to vote for Newt Gingrich. It’s a fact. It’s a mathematical fact... Any conservative who votes for anyone but Newt helps elect a moderate as the nominee.

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Evangelical voters would like to have a nominee that will win a general election, and somebody who set the all-time Pennsylvania record for the size of their defeat has a harder case to make as to why they could be elected.

To the second point first: While Santorum did indeed lose badly, 59 to 41, 2006 was a terrible year for Republicans generally and Santorum lost to a conservative Democrat who was riding that year's electoral wave.

To the first point: He may be right. Santorum may have gotten the endorsement of the religious right over the weekend, but he lacks the organization and broad appeal to mount a serious challenge to Romney at this late date. Iowa was a great story for him, but he fell badly in New Hampshire and is running fourth in South Carolina with just 14 percent support -- Romney is leading with 30, followed by Gingrich at 22 and Paul at 15. He won't be able to make that up, even to second place, in the few days that remain before Saturday's primary. I'm not sure Gingrich has much of a case either, but at the very least he's running a clear second to Romney in both South Carolina and Florida (where Santorum is at 15 to Romney's 39 and Gingrich's 24), even if nationally he's barely ahead of Santorum, if at all.

"If you're a conservative, just look at the polls. I am the only candidate capable of stopping a moderate from winning the nomination," said Newt. Well, again, maybe. Allahpundit explains what he means:

I don't know what he means by "mathematical fact." True, Santorum has slid in South Carolina since his post-Iowa bounce and now trails Gingrich, but if Newt's supporters defected to him en masse, he'd still have a fantastic shot at surprising Romney. What Newt really means to say, I think... is that Santorum's still widely thought of as a boutique social-issues candidate whereas Gingrich is known for being a policy polymath. If you're an independent thinking of rolling the dice on Obama's opponent, who are you more likely to take a chance on: The guy who, according to the media caricature, is obsessed with abortion and gay marriage or the guy who’s known for being able to debate about nearly anything? This is going to be Gingrich's message for the next week, I think, especially at the debates — that Romney can't beat Obama and Santorum can't beat Romney, therefore there's only one truly, frankly, profoundly, fundamentally electable option still on the table. Turns out it’s the guy who finished fourth in both Iowa and New Hampshire. Who knew?

Hey, however remote, it's pretty much all he's got left. I would just note three things:

1) Remember when Newt said that "it's very hard not to look at the recent polls and think that the odds are very high I'm going to be the nominee." Well, he was wrong.

2) Republicans don't much care for mathematics or facts. So to whom is he making this case?

3) I'd really like to see either Gingrich or Santorum emerge finally as the single conservative alternative to Romney, with the other one dropping out. If nothing else, let's have that fight between Romney, who has the backing of the party's establishmentarian elites, and the majority of the Republican Party, which rightly views him as not one of its own however much he may pathetically pander to the right.