Look for the Union Label

Moderate pundits are celebrating today the fact that Mitt Romney won the GOP primaries in D.C., Maryland, and Wisconsin.

Let’s take a closer look at those districts, though.  In the case of the District of Columbia, we’re talking about Inside the Beltway; in fact, the very heart of the Beltway.  Rick Santorum received no percentage at all, as opposed to Romney’s 70 percent.  Well, who lives in D.C. but politicians, their friends and families, and bureaucrats?

Then there’s Maryland, a chief suburb of the District of Columbia.  More bureaucrats, politicians, and government workers.  Still, Romney didn’t pull off a majority, there, although at 49 percent it was pretty close.  There’s no great surprise in Romney’s win in these places.

Wisconsin.  Now that was a disappointment.  We can’t blame the Moderate pundits for this loss.   We can’t blame Mitt Romney.  We can’t even blame the Liberal Democrats and their union thugs.  Rick Santorum has only himself to blame.  Publicly supporting the unions is not the way to win friends and influence people in the Tea Parties.

The race was much closer in Wisconsin:  Romney’s 44 percent to Santorum’s 37 percent.  This is a state that hasn’t forgotten how the union thugs tore up Madison, the capital city.  They haven’t forgotten how the Liberals ran out of town to prevent a vote on the unions.  They haven’t forgotten how those Liberals ran a vicious, but failed, campaign to get Wisconsin’s governor recalled.

Wisconsin was Santorum’s for the taking.  With such a close race, he has to keep an eye on his home state of Pennsylvania in case he doesn’t get the job of president in November.  Failing to achieve the presidency, he’ll have to return to the union miners and factory workers who got him elected in western Pennsylvania. 

According to the Associated Press, Romney has 655 delegates, compared with 278 for Santorum. Newt Gingrich trails with 135, followed by Ron Paul with 51.   It takes 1,144 to win, and Romney has blown past the halfway mark with his wins on Tuesday.  There is the possibility that Gingrich will throw his delegates over to Santorum, giving him a more respectable 413.  He doesn’t stand a chance of getting Ron Paul’s delegates, of course.  Paul is waiting to see how close the race is.  If Santorum gets too close to Romney’s numbers, Paul’s numbers will ensure that Romney gets in.

Santorum will have a more difficult time with Conservatives, having revealed his union label.  Still, “almost a conservative” is better than “a Conservative when my numbers demand it.”  Santorum was also captured yelling at someone or other and using bad language, which doesn’t help to convince Moderates you’re the guy (not that anything would – but swearing doesn’t help).

When we’re vetting candidates in the future, let’s make sure we look for the union label before endorsing them.