It's Time for Newt to Bow Out

Before Super Tuesday, I said it would likely be Newt's last hurrah.  I then submitted that IF and ONLY IF he could win BOTH Mississippi and Alabama would he have a legitimate argument to be the conservative alternative.  He'd then have four top notch Southern states to his name.  But that did not happen. He came in second place in both states, beating Mittens by 1% or less in both. He also came in third in Kansas.

There comes a time when one needs to be pragmatic.  Do I still believe that Newt is the best candidate to face Obama? Absolutely.  Do I still believe Newt's platform is the most conservative?  Yes I do. But what I no longer believe is that he can win this thing.  More importantly, the longer Newt stays in, the more likely we are to see Romney as our nominee.  He's not even coming in second place. 

When he was in second place, there was a strong argument to say Santorum should drop out and allow the conservative vote to coalesce behind Newt.  I'm no hypocrite...the door swings both ways. Newt is stopping Santorum from beating Romney in many places, and stopping Santorum from squashing Romney in others.

Just to give you some comparison of states, giving the combination percentages of the two conservatives vs. Mittens:

KS - Conservatives 65%, Mittens 20%; AL Conservatives 69%, Mittens 29%; MS - Conservatives 63%, Mittens 30%; GA - Conservatives 66%, Mittens 25%; ND - Conservatives 47%, Mittens 23%; OH* - Conservatives 51%, Mittens 29%; AK* Conservatives 43%, Mittens 32% 

There's far more, but again, Mittens is in trouble when the conservatives consolidate.  Furthermore, it's clear that Santorum has the edge over Gingrich.  Also, Newt is hurting Santorum in the delegate count.

If Gingrich tells his delegates to vote for Santorum, again, this is a big game change.  Currently, Mittens leads Santorum 495 delegates to 252 delegates.  That's a about 50% lead by Romney.  Now if Gingrich's delegates go to Santorum, now Mittens' lead drops to 495 to 383, only a 33% advantage. In raw numbers, Santorum is only a little more than one hundred votes shy of Mitt.

Most of us want better than Romney.  Most of us Newt fans also agree that Santorum would be a pretty decent second choice. It's time to do the math, friends.  You can have a candidate who is 100% perfect for you (Newt) but doesn't have a snowball's chance in July of winning the nomination, a candidate who is 85% perfect for you but can beat Mittens (Santorum) or you can have a candidate who is 50% perfect for you by default.  The choice is yours, my friends.

As for me, as the editor of Biblical Conservatism, I am hereby withdrawing my endorsement of Newt Gingrich.  I am not going to publicly endorse anyone else at this time, because I believe it is far more important to focus on why we must defeat Obama, and so I will focus on the Somebody Else 2012 campaign.

*Denotes State Romney won in a 3 way race