The Republican Nomination For President: The Race For The Race For The White House

Wed Feb 15, 2012 at 12:30 PM PST
Announcing Operation Hilarity: Let's keep the GOP clown show going!

by kos

It's time for us to take an active role in the GOP nomination process. That's right, it's time for those of us who live in open primary and caucus states—Michigan, North Dakota, Vermont and Tennessee in the next three weeks—to head out and cast a vote for Rick Santorum.

Why would we do such a crazy thing? Lots of great reasons!

Republican turnout has sucked, and appears to be getting worse by the contest. Unlike the 2008 Democratic primaries, which helped President Barack Obama and the Democrats to build a national organization, the GOP is an organizational disaster, with waning voter interest. That means that it takes fewer votes to have an impact than if Republican turnout was maxed out.

Several of the contests have produced razor-thin margins of victory. Rick Santorum won Iowa by 34 votes, Mitt Romney "won" Maine by 194 votes. It won't take many of us to swing contests the way we want them to swing.

The longer this GOP primary drags on, the better the numbers for Team Blue. Not only is President Barack Obama rising in comparison to the clowns in the GOP field, but GOP intensity is down—which would have repercussions all the way down the ballot.

The longer this thing drags out, the more unpopular the Republican presidential pretenders become. Just look at Mitt Romney's trajectory, which followed Herman Cain's trajectory, and Newt Gingrich's trajectory, and Michelle Bachmann's trajectory, and so on.

Rick Santorum will inevitably follow the same path once he gets properly vetted. Mitt Romney has been unable to stem the bleeding despite his tens of millions. Just imagine Santorum, with the far more radical record and a continued inability to raise real money.

It's a no-brainer! The following states have completely open contests coming up:
2/28: Michigan (Primary)
3/6: North Dakota (caucus)
3/6: Tennessee (primary)
3/6: Vermont (primary)

If you live in one of those states, pledge to participate in Operation Hilarity by voting or caucusing for Rick Santorum. Click here for Michigan, here for North Dakota, here for Tennessee and here for Vermont.

If you live anywhere else, please contribute $5 to our Facebook ad effort to turn Democrats out in those elections. You can see a sample ad at the top right of this post.

And if you're squeamish about this, just remember what's at stake—not just the White House, but Nancy Pelosi's gavel and a Senate run by Mitch McConnell. The weaker the GOP standard bearer, the better our chances in November. Rush Limbaugh and his ilk have had no problem meddling in our own contests. And if there's one thing Daily Kos is about, it's about fighting fire with fire.

And in any case, it's freaking hilarious. I mean, Rick Santorum? Really? The Republicans have offered up this big, slow, juicy softball. Let's have fun whacking the heck out of it.

Please, contribute $5 to help us turn out Democrats in open Republican primaries and caucuses.

Anyway he said that Newt would win the Repub nom - but lose the election.

Arizona and Michigan will hold their primaries on Feb 28th. Romney has a solid lead in the former and something like 30% of the expected turnout have already voted.
Santorum has a surprising lead in Michigan but Romney has almost two weeks to spend a zillion dollars on advertising. He will have to do that as MI is one of his home states and a loss there would be pretty devastating.
A week later, on March 6th, is Super Tuesday when some 10 states hold contests. The results will probably decide the race.
Or perhaps not. A Repub candidate needs 1144 delegates to nail down the nomination on the 1st round.
California will not select its 172 delegates until June 6th. And tonight comes word that Texas will likely delay its primary with 155 delegates until late in May.
Something like 14% of delegates are allocated to those two states.
Texas, after the census, gained a bunch of people. Redistricting is a messy battle down there. They could go ahead with the Repub presidential primary earlier and come back later to other races but that would be expensive.
Gingrich perhaps has a lead in TX so the late date might allow him to hang on.

Perry has to be just absolutely kicking himself for dropping out.
Getting exciting, isn't it!
Cycloptichorn