Santorum's Wins Reveal Romney's Weaknesses

Howard Kurtz takes a look at the state of the Romney campaign after going 0-3 in caucuses and primaries on Tuesday:

Rick Santorum’s dramatic three-state sweep this week may have been a triumph of pluck and perseverance, but it was also something else: a startling rejection of Mitt Romney.

It’s easy to wave away Santorum’s triple triumph in Minnesota, Missouri, and Colorado as an exercise in symbolism that netted him no delegates. But as a snapshot of the state of the GOP race, it’s a rather dark picture for Romney.

“These results are a serious blow to Romney that crystallized the conservative questions about his bona fides and punctured it,” says Ari Fleischer, the former Bush White House spokesman. “If your campaign is built on inevitability, a puncture can take you down.”

Ed Rollins, the veteran GOP strategist who briefly ran Michele Bachmann’s campaign, says Romney “has been running for six years and never quite connected. He’s spent no time talking about his years as governor, which is not exactly an all-star four years. He now wants to pretend he’s a right-winger, and it’s just not believable.”

Adds John Feehery, a former House Republican official: “Santorum doesn’t have any organization or money—he’s able to win based on the idea that the base doesn’t like Romney.” Romney “struck a bad chord” with his gaffe about not being concerned about the very poor, says Feehery: “Many conservatives, especially Christian conservatives, actually care about the poor.”

One again Romney's statement is taken hopelessly out of context, but that's apparently the way it's going to be forever and Romney's going to have to live with his choice of words...mainly because nobody seems smart enough to read the entire statement.

All that aside, Romney has tried for years to give the impression that his nomination is inevitable.  It's clearly not, though he still has the wind at his back.  He has the money advantage and the media advantage since he still seems to be the favorite of the media who desperately want him to be the chosen loser to Obama.  They know a Romney candidacy completely immunizes Obama on the Obamacare issue, and that's the biggest threat to his reelection.

Some pundits are starting to look at the rest of the primary season and do see a way that the primaries end without Romney having enough delegates to clinch.  That would take the nomination to the convention floor, and wouldn't that be something.  That would be some good TV.