Rasmussen: Romney 27%, Santorum 24%, Gingrich 18% in SC Primary Poll

There is a reason for this and I will explain it:

Video:

(removed – video auto-played and was annoying…)

The Story:

What a difference a caucus makes. Rick Santorum who two months ago had one percent (1%) support among likely South Carolina Republican Primary voters now is running a close second there with 24% of the vote.
The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in the Palmetto State finds former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney still in the lead, earning 27% support from likely GOP Primary Voters, up from 23% in early November. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is in third with 18% of the vote, followed by Texas Congressman Ron Paul at 11%.
Bringing up the rear are Texas Governor Rick Perry with five percent (5%) and former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman at two percent (2%). Another two percent (2%) of these likely primary voters like some other candidate, and 11% remain undecided. — Via Election 2012: South Carolina Republican Primary – Rasmussen Reports

Okay here is the reason that Romney is doing so well in this polls; First off, name recognition. Second of all, Romney is more of a moderate and those type of Conservatives will gravitate towards him. Santorum is a bit more of a hardcore Republican and Conservative, especially when it comes to social issues, like Abortion. This turns off the more fiscal Conservatives.

Not only this, Romney is appealing to the Independents as well — which will ruin Obama’s chances of relection, if Romney gets the nomination — which, at this point, I believe will be the case. Also, if he is as smart, as he seems to be — Romney will pick Santorum as as his running mate and that will be the ticket come the 2012 general election. Which will put Democrats into a frenzy and you talk about war? Holy crap! 😯

Others: The Hill, The Moderate Voice, American Research Group, Hot Air, CatholicVote.org, GOP 12, LifeNews.com, Big Government, Campaign 2012, Outside the Beltway, ABCNEWS, Taegan Goddard’s …, FiveThirtyEight, Ballot Box, The PJ Tatler, Wake up America and American Spectator

Ha! Newt says he is “not rich”

Man, this is bad.

AllahPundit calls it “laying it on with a trowel”. I was thinking more of a 12 horse motor pump into a 10 inch hose fitting myself. I’m talking about a cement pump.

What am I talking about?

This:

CONCORD, N.H. — Less than 12 hours after finishing in fourth place in the Iowa caucuses, Newt Gingrich opened a new, more aggressive chapter in his campaign, taking pointed shots at rivals Mitt Romney and Ron Paul, who both finished ahead of Gingrich. At one point, Gingrich hinted he would make Romney’s personal wealth an issue, telling a reporter “I’m not rich.”
Speaking to reporters shortly after arriving in New Hampshire, Gingrich dismissed Romney’s razor-thin victory—the former Massachusetts governor ended the night with 25 percent of the vote and only eight more votes than Rick Santorum. “The fact is, three out of four Republicans rejected him,” Gingrich said.
When asked why he chose to congratulate Santorum and not Romney on his caucus success, the former House speaker said, “I find it amazing the news media continues to say [Romney’s] the most electable Republican when he can’t even break out of his own party.… The fact is, Gov. Romney in the end has a very limited appeal in conservative party.”
Later, in a campaign stop in Laconia, Gingrich’s kept up his attack – and it got personal. Asked by a local reporter if he would buy a home in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire, where Romney has a summer home, Gingrich replied, “No, I can’t afford things like that, I’m not rich.” His wife, Callista, added a jab at Romney as well. “We have one home,” she demurred. The Romneys own two summer homes, including one in California.

This coming from a dude who made 1.6 million from Freddie Mac . 🙄

Over to you AllahPundit:

Surely a man eligible for a six-figure line of credit at Tiffany’s has the means to buy himself a cottage in the sticks. Or maybe more: I’ll bet $1.6 million from Freddie Mac would get you something nice and airy in Hanover. This is the second time that Gingrich has taken a dig at Romney’s wealth, do note, but the first time came with caveats: Romney had already taken a dig at his Freddie earnings in that case, and Gingrich wasn’t sniffing then at the fact that Romney’s rich but rather what he did to become that way. Tonight’s little aside is more of a pure class pander, which is yet more evidence of just how bitter Newt is about that beating he took on the air in Iowa.

Indeed.

My question is simply this — if Newt is poor, what the heck am I?!? 😯

Oh and also; pandering?!? That doesn’t even begin to describe it. The dude is flinging poo at Romney desperately hoping something — anything will stick.

Thus another reason why I am not very big on Newt. Him, the heir to the Reagan mantle — yeah right! 🙄

Nate Silver explains it.

This pretty much sums it up…:

I don’t care if you call it a win or a tie. In Iowa on Tuesday, Mitt Romney had a performance that looks ugly on the stat sheet , but which accomplished quite a bit when you consider it in its broader context.
The two most important things that Mr. Romney accomplished are as follows:
First, Mr. Romney eliminated Rick Perry from the nomination contest. Of course, Mr. Romney got a lot of help from Mr. Perry himself. Maybe we should use the passive voice — Mr. Perry was eliminated from the nomination contest. The conclusion is the same: the man who once looked like Mr. Romney’s most formidable rival has suspended his campaign.
The result was not unexpected based on late-stage polling — in fact, the polling average nailed Mr. Perry’s share of the vote almost to the decimal point.
But it was not long ago that Mr. Perry looked like he might finish in a solid third place, at a bare minimum, in Iowa; a poll conducted as recently as Dec. 12 actually had Mr. Perry ahead of Mr. Romney. And there was some chance that Mr. Perry might have done quite a bit better than third place. I’m not convinced that there was anything that happened to Rick Santorum that couldn’t have happened to Mr. Perry, if only Mr. Perry had received the right injection of momentum — say, an endorsement from the Family Leader, a conservative group — at the right time. — via Winning Ugly, but Winning – NYTimes.com

I think is pretty mcu spot on, read the rest, it is very interesting. A little wonkish, but very interesting.

This is a mememorandum thread.

It’s getting ugly between Gingrich and Romney

…and Gingrich does not disappoint with this shot across Romney’s bow: (Via CBS News)

Video:

Of course, the bad part was that Gingrich sort of stuck his own foot in his mouth, when he called Romney a liar and then turned right around and said he would support him if he were the GOP nominee. D’oh! 🙄

Lord Edward Morrissey, who knows this stuff better than anyone, I think, saith the following:

Hey, not to rain on Gingrich’s parade, but how is that different than any other PAC or super-PAC? I’m pretty sure that Gingrich-supporting PACs aren’t run by disinterested strangers, nor are those for Rick Perry or any of the other candidates in the race. That’s a problem in the structure of the campaign finance regulations that impose artificial divisions on contributions. If those were removed, the same money would flow into these races, but the candidates themselves would be responsible for its use instead of hiding behind PACs and super-PACs — and that includes Newt Gingrich.
As I’ve written earlier, there is nothing wrong with so-called “negative” campaigning. Candidates should draw contrasts between their positions and those of their opponents, and their records as well. As long as that is being done honestly, there is nothing wrong or dishonorable about it; in fact, that’s why we have primaries. Gingrich chose to eschew that strategy and now wants to claim some kind of victimization because the rest of the field chose not to follow in his footsteps. On top of that, Gingrich has descended to name-calling, which looks more like a dog-in-the-manger ploy than a way to gather support in the few short hours before Iowa voters trudge to precincts tonight. A confident candidate wouldn’t have sunk to the level of this conversation the morning of a caucus.

Indeed.

Also too, I say this as a kid, who grew up in the inner city of Detroit; there is nothing funnier than watch to rich, white old guys fighting it out like school kids. I find it quite amusing. 😉 😛

Again, as it is has been written many times over in the right-wing political blogosphere and also said by others on Fox News; Gingrich is a thinker, a Conservative intellectual, if you will — but he is also a bomb thrower, who is not apt to thinking on his feet. This video above proves that. In other words, it is okay to be a bomb thrower, you just have to be able to run from the bomb, in the right direction! 😯 😛 😉 😀