(CNN) – As Rick Santorum enjoyed a day of favorable headlines following his primary wins in Mississippi and Alabama, Mitt Romney's presidential campaign again pointed to the seemingly inevitable delegate calculus that will propel their candidate to victory.
That's the same tactic the Romney team took following Super Tuesday, when Romney and Santorum both walked away with important victories in states carrying large delegate prizes.
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In a memo sent to reporters, Romney Political Director Rich Beeson asserted that "nothing had changed" following Tuesday night's southern contests.
"Tuesday's results actually increased Governor Romney's delegate lead, while his opponents only moved closer to their date of mathematical elimination," Beeson wrote, laying out a count showing Romney with nearly double the amount of delegates as Santorum.
CNN's current estimate gives Romney 498 delegates, and Santorum 239 delegates. The other two candidates in the race, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Rep. Ron Paul, both trail by large margins, with 139 and 69 delegates, respectively. A candidate needs 1,144 to secure the GOP nomination.
Beeson said the margin between Romney and Santorum would prove impossible to overcome.
"Santorum and Gingrich now trail Governor Romney by margins they cannot mathematically make up," Beeson wrote, adding: "In order to win, both Santorum and Gingrich need to start netting an impossible number of delegates to overtake Governor Romney."
Speaking on CNN Tuesday, Santorum campaign Chief Strategist John Brabender said Romney's math argument wouldn't continue to hold up if he continues to lose big voting contests.
"He said he has to win 50% of the all the delegates out there to get there," Brabender said. "The problem is he's not - like last night was another example where he did not win 50%. On Saturday he did not win 50%, Santorum won more. So by his own math he's having trouble getting to 1,144."
Momentum, Brabender argued, was on his campaign's side.
"It's an exciting time for the campaign," he said. "Rick Santorum said it best, a lot of average Americans are showing people the pollsters don't know as well as they do. It was a big upset last night and certainly gives the campaign a tremendous amount of momentum."
Also see:
When Romney says 'get rid of' Planned Parenthood he means…
From CNN Politics
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Upset? Sounds like some more Santorum/campaign lawyer, double-talk Washington-speake.
Lets say there are fifty (50) bird perched on a tree...and a hunter aims and shoots three birds...Romney how may birds are left on the tree.............? Well if the GOP primary goes to the Convention without any Candidate reaching the requires 1144-delegates than its open to any candidate to win.....Romney learn to count....!
"CNN's current estimate gives Romney 498 delegates, and Santorum 239 delegates"
But, see, that's not necessarily accurate. States like FL are supposed to, under national GOP rules, split their delegates proportionately to the number of votes because their primaries occurred before a ceratin date. Mittens and CNN are counting FL as all going to Mittens. WRONG. Granted, FL's state GOP is trying to force all of FL's delegates into an "all or nothing" calculus...of course they are...they want FL to have more influence over the nomination process. However, it still remains to be seen whether the national GOP rules or the state GOP party's attempts to buck those rules will win out. At the very least, the candidates will be arguing about it bitterly when the rubber hits the road.
"Lets say there are fifty (50) bird perched on a tree...and a hunter aims and shoots three birds...Romney how may birds are left on the tree.............?"
It depends. Was the Cheneybot the one shooting?
Romney's math doesn't hold up to scrutiny. As the Santorum camp points out, Romney is going to have difficulty reaching 1,144, too. At that point, all bets are off. Romney's aces in the hole are three late primaries, CA, NJ, and UT, all in June and all "winner take all". That's 262 delegates, which just might be enough to put him over the top.
Sniffit
"CNN's current estimate gives Romney 498 delegates, and Santorum 239 delegates"
But, see, that's not necessarily accurate.
____________________________________________________________________________________________
Accuracy is important. We are not fooling around here. The winner is going to be the next President of The United States and more than half of the remaining delegates are yet to be voted for.
This pitch should work well for him, because it there's anything that gets voters excited, it's MATH.,
When delegates are awarded proportionally "winning" becomes almost irrelevant. Placing and showing near the top gets you just as many delegates as "winning". Gingrich's stubborn refusal to drop out at this point will ensure Santorum does not get enough delegates to win. I think Gingrich has burned every bridge behind him with his scorthed earth campaign. If this is the way he operated in the past, then you can see why he's made so many enemies in the party.
Sniffit, back at it huh.. the rubber hitting the road will be Romney at the Convention as the nominee.
again, comes across as a rich corporate boss firing you. "just doing the math, crunching dollars...we're going to have to let you go."
Why does Mitt Romney keep trying to present these rational, mathematically based arguments to people who do not want to believe in modern science?
I still like Newt's quote: Why does the supposed front-runner keep coming in third?
Mitten's only chance is to hope that the bigoted hatred for Obama is greater than the distrust of him. Sadly I believe it is.
No matter – Mitt has had to swing so far to the Right that he will never be able to reclaim the center...
calculus!!! That's college talk! What a snob! Elitist!
If Newt would admit defeat, Mittens is history. People are paying Newter to stay in the race to prevent Santorum from getting over 50% of the votes in southern states. Anchor baby Mittens is only getting 28% of the south because teavangelicals are not sure he he is white.
Good grief... Math never lies! Even with Santorum's wins in MS and AL last night, Romney walked away with more delegates than Santorum, 41 for Romney to Santorum's 35. How can they be so ignorant?
I thought only 50 votes from Florida are pledged to Mittens. At convention time, there will be another 50 votes when the GOPers lift the penalty.
Sniffet wrote:
But, see, that's not necessarily accurate. States like FL are supposed to, under national GOP rules, split their delegates proportionately to the number of votes because their primaries occurred before a ceratin date. ........
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With the exception of the traditional first four states, any state conducting a Republican primary prior to April 1 must allocate the delegates on a proportional basis, instead of winner take all.
With the exception of the traditional first four states, any state conducting a Republican priomary prior to Feb 1 must forfeit half of their delegates.
In other words, Florida is in double trouble. They must forfeit half of their 98(?) delegates, and the remaining delegates must be assigned proportionately. Florida has conformed to neither rule. Newt has filed a challenge to the Romney campaign who gladly accepted all 98(?) delegates. This is one major reason why Newt wants to take the race to the convention.
How well can Romney count......
Lets say there are fifty (50) bird perched on a tree...and a hunter aims and shoots three birds...Romney how may birds are left on the tree.............?
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Little Johnny would tell you that there would be none left as they would scatter at the sound of the shots being fired!
it really does not matter if Santorum won those two states. Interesting that only those religious groups are the one voting as if they were to have something against Mormons. I thinl its sad that they are only voting mainly because of religion and not because what the country needs which is jobs. also, it appers as if the only ones voting for Santorum are those with no education, and in the other had we have the highly educated voting for Romney. Hmmmm. somthing to think about it. In the end the one that will be nominated will be Romney, he is the only one that can and will defeat obama.
No matter how you want to slice it.....It's an open convention. Romney math puts him ahead but not on corset to be nominated on the first ballot....so when Newt leaves and throws his support to Santorum all Hell breaks out and we have ourselves a good old fashioned you do for me and I do for you convention. Anyone but Romney wins that!!!!
Sounds like Santorum doesn't get the fact that his candidacy is doomed. Perhaps the "let me get the democrats to vote against Romney" trick in Michigan is partly to blame. The other part is due to his love of earmarks and desire to raise the debt ceiling 5 times.
Dang, Mittens still isn't half way there?? He has outspent every other candidate at least 10 to 1, yet he only has 498? Too bad rethugs, maybe next time you will pick someone worthy. Though I doubt it, you picked wailin Palin and she is dumb as box of rocks.
And the Santorum team again points to supporters who don't believe in math and science-y stuff.
Republicans are confused about math. Is pi r squared or pi r round?
Romney and Santorum in unison:
"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the John Birch Society of America, and to the brothers for which it stands. Koch brothers, not of God, indefatigable in their pursuit of wealth, and loopholes for THEM".
Obama 2012. Seriously America.