Hugh Hewitt quoted Romney supporter David Parker as having crunched the numbers and concluded that “there is NO scenario wherein Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich, or anyone else other than Mitt Romney can accumulate the needed 1,144 delegates; unless of course that Mitt Romney withdraws, which is not likely!” The nut of the argument:
… With proportional allocations and 851 of 2,286 delegates having been through the primary/caucus process; Mitt Romney has won nearly 50% (he has also won 14 of 22 states), Rick Santorum has won about 19% and Gingrich has won about 12%. From another vantage point, Mitt has to win approximately 50% of the remaining delegates, Santorum and Gingrich have to win approximately 70% and 73%, respectively. …
Those numbers, if correct, don’t quite mathematically eliminate Santorum and Gingrich, but they sure make Romney’s eventual victory highly likely.
I suppose I’m OK with that. I’ve expressed before my strong dislike for Santorum’s big-government social conservatism. And Gingrich strikes me as narcissistic, unpredictable, and too clever by half (as demonstrated by his partnering with Nancy Pelosi on the issue of “climate change,” for instance).
Ideally, I’d like to see the Republicans nominate someone with a Reaganesque vision of a brighter future, not just a competent executive to “manage the decline,” in Gingrich’s memorable phrase. But, like many people today (most, I hope), I’ll settle for someone who can defeat Obama — and who’ll hopefully have a majority in both houses of Congress, where people like Rand Paul, Jim DeMint, Marco Rubio, and Paul Ryan can provide the vision.
