A Place to Stand

Gingrich not only won, but with a convincing majority. Gingrich took 40% of the vote, Romney 28%, Rick Santorum 17% and Ron Paul 13%.

  That may not absolutely clinch it but when Ron Paul doesn't win, as Ron Paul has confidently predicted he won't (he is in it more to stir debate on principles than to win, which is an honourable position)(I think Ron Paul would make a great supreme Court judge but a poor chief executive) it would be reasonable to expect at least 99% of his supporters to prefer Gingrich to Romney.

   Romney has simply failed to generate any enthusiasm and the only reason for supporting him is that he is so "moderate" that he won't frighten anybody away. There may be a little to that but elections are won by generating at least some support. On this basis the fact that Gingrich has been the debate winner inn most of the TV dabates is important. He may have said

“It is not that I am a great debater. It’s that I articulate the deepest-held values of the American people.”

    but that is not bad debating. When the campaign comes down to ??? V Obama on TV debates and Obama has no teleprompter, if ??? is Gingrich he will win.

   Another point is that Romney has had very gentle media coverage whereas Gingrich has faced literlally hundreds of "ethics" complaints which were so obviously and wholly false that they are all one needs to know about the corruption that not merely exists but is endemic in the party that made them.

   And Gingrich actually wants to do something not merely to get his feet under the table as Obama so obviously did. When Romney said in one of the debates that he disagreed with Gingrich's belief that humanity should be mining the Moon, Gingrich not only didn't downplay it but gave it as a reason to support him. Gingrich understands that X-Prizes can get space industrialisation, and other forms of technological progress, going. He knows that Free Enterprise + Cheap Energy = Growth. Pournelle may not have yet endorsed him but Gingrich has endorsed Pournelle.

    Can one imagine Britain having a prominent leader with as much competence and gumption?