After the close call in the Iowa caucus, Santorum seems to be betting his chances that he can win the votes in South Carolina. Sure, he disappointed Tuesday in the New Hampshire primary, but Santorum is pretty confident that he can regain the momentum he had in the Iowa caucuses when he almost won. Santorum may not have spend large amount of money in advertisements in New Hampshire which may explain part of the loss, however, Mitt Romney had a great lead in there even if Santorum had done television advertisements. His campaign guessed that even if Santorum had gained some percentage points, it would still not be worth spending money on advertisements in New Hampshire.
Since Iowa, Santorum has raised $3 million and has already put $ 1.5 million of the money in television ads in South Carolina where he feels he has a greater shot than he had in New Hampshire. Santorum top adviser and media strategist has said “the moderate voters of New Hampshire were not a natural constituency for Mr. Santorum… the campaign decided to compete [in South Carolina] because doing so offered priceless national media exposure without draining scarce resources.” The campaign has also stated that Santorum potential voters would go to Newt Gingrich if he did not compete in South Carolina. Gingrich already is the main competition for Santorum since he is the conservative alternative.
Santorum conservative messages come to his advantage in South Carolina while Romney and Huntsman Jr. explicit comments to appeal the moderates in New Hampshire will hurt their chances of winning by making it harder for them to appeal to conservative voters in South Carolina. Santorum definitely has a great advantage over the Romney in South Carolina because of the doubts that many evangelicals and Tea Party adherents have on Romney. In addition, Gingrich and Perry are calling Romney a “heartless job killer” in South Carolina that may hurt Romney chances, but may solidify Santorum possible win.
Do you believe that Santorum campaign has a bigger presence in South Carolina strong enough to beat the other candidates? Can South Carolina strong stand on the Mormon issue not be as strong as it once was enough to give Romney a chance to win? Can the economy issue prevail over the faith issue?
1 comment:
South Carolina is known as a conservative state. I do think that Santorum can win South Carolina and maybe the Republican nomination but not the general election because he is too conservative and religous. Republicans are more evangilical than Democratic. I think that because Romney is a mormom, it makes it hard for him. I wish that the economic issue but I think that religion does play a big role, unfortunetly.
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