For months I’ve been hearing about Gingrich and Santorum splitting the ultra-conservative base and allowing Romney to squeeze out narrow victories in state after state. So if Gingrich dropped dead today (because he doesn’t seem willing to leave under his own steam), how good a shot would Santorum have at catching up or overtaking Romney? Or, through whatever means are available, coming out on top in the convention?
Also, can anyone comment about the rules regarding a Republican convention where no one starts with enough votes to sew up the nomination? In particular I’m curious just how the individual delegates are selected, because I have to assume their makeup will be critical in deciding who walks out with the win. My (rather ignorant) assumption os that if the bulk of the delegates are long-time Republican establishment people, Santorum won’t stand a chance. OTOH, if the base has much of a hand in delegate selection, then the delegates will be much more conservative than the establishment, and could easily swing to Santorum.
I did some math in this thread. Short version: Romney has a huge advantage in the winner-takes-all states, which are a bunch of coastal states plus Utah (plus part of Wisconsin). As a result, Santorum needs to take more than 2/3 of the other remaining delegates overtake Romney outright, or about 60% if you give him Gingrich’s delegates (a somewhat dubious proposition).
I didn’t do the math on Santorum getting past 1144 on his own, but off of the top of my head that would be even closer to impossible; he’d need something like 80% of the proportionally-allocated delegates unless he started winning states that he currently looks like he’s just not going to win.
Here’s the states that haven’t been voted yet. They are mostly primaries (Santorum has been better in caucuses) and most or all of them will be winner-take-all after April 1. No, it doesn’t look good for Santo even if Newt quits. I don’t know about the identities of the delegates. I do know that they’re bound to vote for their guy on the first ballot, and I really think there is little chance this is going to be decided at the convention. Romney should get enough delegates in the primaries to win.
There’s a lot of talk among the pundits that even Romney won’t get to the convention with the magic number of delegates to win on the first ballot. Which, if true, means near total war between the VERY conservative wing of the party and the merely conservative wing of the party.
I think Santorum would have a very reasonable and logical case to make that Romney isn’t the candidate the party really wants, if he can back that up by starting to win primaries because Newt is no longer siphoning off his votes.
That’s not to say reason and logic will prevail. Which is why I’m asking about the makeup of the delegates – if the are old pols they will swing toward Romney, if they are Tea Party activists it’s a bit more up in the air. Santorum is still vulnerable to charges that he is a “big government” conservative, but everybody and his brother knows Romney is a lying scum who will be a conservative one day and a liberal the next. Hell, if the Chinese invaded tomorrow, Romney would run around quoting Chairman Mao.
Yes, there are a lot of fascinating and chaotic possibilities. But the most likely outcome is that the primaries grind to their conclusion over the next three months, and at the end, Romney wins the thing outright.
If Gingrich had dropped out prior to Michigan and Ohio, it could have made a difference. As it is now, Romney is going to win Illinois, New York, California, and the nomination. All Santorum can hope for is a silver medal and the knowledge that it will be his turn in 2016, when he is easily nominated.
I’ll try to find it but either Slate or The Atlantic did a good math breakdown of what’s really going to happen. Essentially Santorum (as has been stated) needs to win a large supermajority of all remaining delegates, which just will not happen.
What Santorum and Gingrich (probably in the past tense for Gingrich) are trying to argue is if they deny Romney the outright nomination before the last primary then at the convention there is a realistic chance of them winning.
About 1600 total delegates outstanding are “hard bound” and legally must vote for their guy (first round of the convention only, after that it’s an open field.) However the “unpledged” will mostly break for Romney. There is something like 500 of them who might be up in the air if Romney doesn’t have enough delegates outright before the end of the primaries, but most of them are heavily pro-Romney. They are the old school wing of the party and not tea party or evangelicals.
No he cannot win. Last election in theory Hillary could’ve won had the uncommitted delegates voted for her. There was an uproar saying that if any of them voted for her over Obama, when he had the plurality it’s be a nightmare.
No Romeny will always have the plurality. So any attempt to unseat the front runner, will cause too much of a disruption.
Look for Santorum to run in 2016 when Obama ends his 2nd term
