Associated Press
Mark Halperin reports today that Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich have "met face-to-face at least twice in the last few weeks and have also had some very long phone calls recently." The two Republican presidential candidates have reportedly talked about "the path forward," and possible "unity" efforts to "stop" Mitt Romney.
The report coincides with Santorum's ongoing talks with conservative leaders, who met with the former senator today to explore "how to persuade Newt Gingrich to drop out."
The conservative leaders met with Mr. Santorum and his top aides in northern Virginia as Mr. Santorum himself faces questions about the viability of his campaign. The conservative leaders sought the meeting, according to people familiar with it.
As the race narrows and Mitt Romney looks more and more like the inevitable nominee, several conservative leaders have said they still support Mr. Santorum. But Mr. Santorum has been losing some important states by small margins -- in some cases, by the amount that Mr. Gingrich has been siphoning off.
The prospect that Mr. Gingrich might draw enough votes from Mr. Santorum in Pennsylvania -- Mr. Santorum's home state -- on April 24 to cost him the primary has given new urgency to the task of getting him out of the race.
This strikes me as an odd strategy. Gingrich is not Santorum's principal problem right now -- the former Speaker has already laid off most of his staff and largely stopped campaigning. Gingrich has empty campaign coffers, abysmal poll numbers, precious few delegates, a string of embarrassing primary losses, and no credible hopes of getting back on track.
I can appreciate Santorum's search for a new advantage, and there's even some degree of logic here -- if Gingrich withdrew, and his backers shifted to Santorum, then maybe the former senator's standing would start improving. If this were February, and the race were still fluid, I'd probably find the talks more compelling.
But that train left the station a long time ago. Even if one assumes every single Gingrich supporter voted for Santorum, he still would have lost every primary Mitt Romney has won since Super Tuesday, including Wisconsin, Maryland, D.C., Illinois, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii.
Santorum's focused on the wrong problem -- he's failing because the frontrunner is wrapping up the nomination and the party establishment has grudgingly accepted Romney as the nominee, not because Gingrich is dividing the right. If the former Speaker quit tonight and endorsed Santorum, the race wouldn't change in any fundamental way.
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Santorum killed any chance of getting the nomination when he began talking about contraception. This brought attention to the other collateral issues about religion and women's health. If Republicans lose the elections, it can be traced to this point in the primary process when women's health issues became the focus of Republicans on the national and state levels. Despite the unpopularity of Republican views, they pushed ahead and brought more attention to the issues and in the process lost a major constituency, women.
Exactly!
Could this mean that GOD does not want righteous Rick to be in a position of power? Perhaps 'propheteering' is as bad as profiteering!
Santorum's problem is that he doesn't seem to realize that he is running in a presidential race not being elected to be Pope of America. We don't need any more religious "leaders" and we have a great President already. Go home Santorum!
Google is Santorum's problem. That and Santorum.
I suppose there's a slim chance the rationale is as follows - a lot of people currently supporting Romney are doing so because they've been told his nomination is "inevitable." If Gingrich were to drop out - and it was stated or implied that Santorum convinced him to drop out because it was The Right Thing To Do - it would be further implied that Ricky has some mojo after all, he got Newt to do the thing he swore he wouldn't do, and momentum might shift to his favor. People who were planning to reluctantly back Romney in their respective primaries would rethink that decision if it were just Romney & Santorum (OK, and Paul, I suppose).
I doubt it would clinch Santorum the nomination, but it would make the race awfully closer. Because while I'm sure the GOP faithful will coalesce around the eventual nominee, many of them don't like being told that their options are take it or leave it with Mitt. Those who haven't voted in primaries yet want to be wined and dined a little, and the later states often don't get that option since the nomination is often sewn up or close to it by this stage.
I don't think an endorsement of Santorum by Newt will help Santorum. But dropping out supposedly because of pressure by Santorum. Yeah, that would. Just don't know how much.
Rick needs a 'hail Mary' pass, but in reality she would have been a liberal as well.
I love the taste of Santorum's desperation. It's so very, very sweet.
Santorum has made so many bizarre and idiotic statements that now there is talk about him being the "male Sarah Palin"! I don't think Gingrich dropping out of the race is going to change that!
I'm betting he does a "Sarah Palin" and quits before the Pennsylvania primary!
What are the conservatives going to do now with both Santorum and Newt non factors and Romney feeling he has to shift to the center now that the right flank is eroded. What will they do when Mr flip begins his flop, or as they say when the Etch a sketch begins to shake off all the conservative things Mitt said to get to this point. Conservatives have no one to blame but themselves if they get pushed to the side. They split their own vote 3 ways if you count Paul. Now Mitt will become that Massachusetts moderate he always wanted to be, and there is nothing the right can do to stop it. The joke is on them this time