Mitt Romney took a big step toward setting himself back on a path to the Republican presidential nomination, thumping Rick Santorum in the Arizona primary and fending off the potential nightmare scenario of a loss in his native state of Michigan.
Romney was projected the winner in Arizona as soon as the polls closed at 9 o’clock Eastern. Shortly after 10 p.m., the Associated Press and television networks called the tighter race in Michigan. With 67 percent of the vote reporting, Romney had 42 percent to Santorum’s 37 percent. Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich trailed with 12 percent and 7 percent, respectively.
Without conceding the contest to Romney, Santorum addressed supporters in Grand Rapids before the vote was fully tallied — essentially admitting that the numbers were unlikely to turn. He cast his second-place finish as a strong showing in Romney’s native state.
“We came into the backyard of one of my opponents, in a race that everyone said, just ignore, you really don’t have much chance here,” Santorum said. “All I have to say is, ‘I love you back.’”
It has been Michigan where both the Romney and Santorum campaigns focused their financial firepower and time in recent days. Polls showed Romney and Santorum locked in such a close race that independents and Democrats, who can participate in Michigan’s open primary, could decide the race.
Romney’s victory will help stanch Santorum’s recent momentum and validate Romney’s approach to the race, which has emphasized costly TV ads and a message focused narrowly on the economy. A loss in Michigan — where Romney was born and raised — would have struck new fear into the hearts of Republicans already uneasy about Romney’s performance.
Romney seized the opportunity to cast himself as a comeback kid, embracing an unaccustomed role in a primary campaign that’s seen one opponent after another crumple when pitted directly against him.
“The pundits and the pollsters — they were ready to count us out,” Romney claimed. “We didn’t win by a lot, but we won by enough, and that’s all that counts.”
Focusing his criticism on Obama, rather than on his Republican opponents, Romney told the crowd in Novi: “I stand ready to lead our party to victory and our nation back to prosperity.”
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Romney is now ahead by 15,000 votes with about 40 percent of the precincts reporting according to Associated Press. Hopefully, after losing both Michigan and Arizona, Santorum will realize Americans don’t want a “mashgiach ruchani” but somone who can manage our national economy. His mindless obcession with birth control and other scoial issues will go down as a huge strategic mistake. Since he doesn’t have a Sheldon Adelson funding his PAC, his money will dry up so quickly, he will have to pass around a pushka at his campaign rallys for Super Tuesday.
Both Romney and Santorum (as lawyers, unlike Gingrich and Paul, but like Obama) also know that the president has very little power pertaining to “hot” social issues. They should attack some of Obama’s attempt to push his social agenda (on sexual matters in particular) not on the merits, but on the fact that Obama is usurping powers he doesn’t have, and which belong to the Congress or the states – but not to the President.
In all fairness, none of the Republicans disagree with each other when it comes to economic policy (Cain with his opposition to the payroll tax was a bit different but not all that much)– so they have to talk about something. Actually, they don’t really disagree much when it comes to social policies (other than Paul who is a libertarian/anarchist on social matters).
Perhaps they could discuss fashion – but would a debate over the virtues of a sweater vest really interest people?