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The Spectacle Blog
Over at Investor’s Business Daily, Sean Higgins notes that the rest of the Republican primary race could have looked a lot more like Virginia if everything had gone according to Ron Paul’s plan:
The Paul campaign knew it was unlikely that the 76-year-old Texas congressman could ever be the pick of most Republicans, thanks to his foreign-policy views, among other reasons. But they also knew he didn’t have to be.
His vast network of small-dollar backers and volunteers would allow him to continue even after another candidate assumed front-runner status. Paul’s libertarian message would give him a cause to continue to push - and little reason to make nice with the front-runner.
Paul could simply continue to campaign, picking up delegates - and media attention - as he went along. This would be bolstered by his status as the only alternate available to disgruntled Republicans wishing to make a protest vote.
This scenario wasn’t terribly unrealistic. After Rick Perry imploded, Paul was the only candidate besides Romney with a significant fundraising base or organization. Newt Gingrich bombed in both Iowa and New Hampshire, a scenario that might have forced him out of the race in previous years. Paul was competitive in both states.
But Rick Santorum managed to get the win in Iowa. Gingrich won South Carolina. Sustained by super PACs, neither dropped out. Santorum finally reemerged as the conservative alternative to Romney. Paul has seen his raw vote totals increase in most states and his campaign believes they are doing much better among the unbound delegates than anyone is reporting. Yet he’s obviously not having the same impact he would have had as the last non-Romney standing.
Virginia, where Romney only beat Paul 59 percent to 41 percent, is a good indication of what such a race might have looked like. I made a similar point yesterday.
View all comments (4) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by W. James Antle, III
http://spectator.org/blog/2012/03/08/virginia-as-a-parallel-paul-un
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Sean| 3.8.12 @ 1:33PM
Ron Paul has to deal with a complete hostile media. As the only conservative in the race he faces an almost complete blackout of anything positive about him. This negative media includes Fox News, which is basically just a controlled opposition for the establishment.
You know something is wrong when people that support individual mandates, TARP, global warming, trillions in deficits, and such are all considered conservative by Fox News and the neocon media.
Conservative Not Republican| 3.8.12 @ 1:42PM
Dr. Paul never had a chance. Mainstream conservativism is world cop neoconservatism, a warmongering shadow of the traditional Old Right. Fortunately, the younger generation has it right. They are Paul enthusiasts, non-interventionists with no respect for know-nothing populists like Cain, Palin and Limbaugh. Rand Paul will be their standard-bearer. The future looks bright for freedom.
tired of the same old saw| 3.8.12 @ 1:34PM
Did Rick Perry implode or just quit?
Okay, he had a few on stage gaffes. So what? We don't elect guys that are supposed to be the next Johnny Carson showmasters.
Rick Perry did not "implode." HE QUIT.
And someone needs to tell us why. He quit before we even started voting and before we even hit the first states in the south.
Mr. Antle, you really need to stop with the same kinds of milquetoast articles day in, day out. Tell us what is really going on.
We were down to these four candidates before this primary horse was even out of the barn. And we keep getting places like Virginia where the GOP leadership did everything to deliver all 49 delegates (a clean sweep) to Romney.
The Virginia GOP's eliminating Gingrich, Santorum, Perry, Bachmann, Huntsman, and Cain off the primary ballot in late November 2011 told us what the "game" is, didn't it?
Haven't yet seen the American Spectator article that would tell us empirically that Romney would have lost -- as sure as the sun rises in the east -- to Rick Santorum if Rick Santorum's name had been on ALL Ohio ballots on Super Tuesday.
Any American armchair retiree watching this week by week fiasco on the boob tube could tell you that Santorum would have won Ohio.
Give us some real reporting and commentary.
W. James Antle III | 3.8.12 @ 1:41PM
Look at the poll numbers. Perry imploded well before he quit.