Veterans love Ron Paul

Mother Jones:

Paul's anti-war stance is certainly part of the draw. Last weekend, the group Veterans for Ron Paul 2012 organized an anti-war President's Day march on the White House. That organization's leadership includes notable Iraq Veterans Against the War member Adam Kokesh, who unsuccessfully ran for Congress as a libertarian Republican candidate in 2010, and Jake Diliberto, a former Marine who's previously worked on Rethink Afghanistan, an anti-war project funded by the left-leaning Brave New Foundation. "I have always been a conservative, and I recognize that I am the kind of conservative that doesn't exist anymore," Diliberto told me. As for what unites servicemembers behind Paul, he said, "It is fair to say, we all do not like the current trajectory of US foreign policy, and we are cynical about US national security policy." He added that he's personally concerned about Obama's "targeted killing campaign" against alleged terrorists.

Bloggingheads' Carroll and Weigel discuss the primaries

A third-party candidate needs fame, money, qualifications and a constituency

The Washington Post:

Add it all up, and these contenders had one or more of the following: fame, money, political qualifications and a built-in constituency. Near as I can tell, every third-party presidential candidate who took 5 percent or more of the vote was reasonably well known before the campaign (Anderson became well known in losing the nomination). That’s not to say that Walker or Goode couldn’t possibly “succeed” in some way, but neither of them really fits the profile of past successful third-party candidates. The truth is that the way it really works most of the time is someone with a big ego and the resources to make it happen decides to run and probably then fills in whichever issues seem to resonate. Starting with the issues is pretty much getting the whole thing backward. If you want to push some set of issues, try to get a major party candidate to adopt them. It’s a lot easier.

The GOP primary map as it stands 2/23/11

Romney wins in areas where Mormons constitute a large chunk of the population and in the "liberal coasts." If the pattern continues, the map could look like this:

The pattern could change a couple ways:

• The South (Georgia in particular) could favor Gingrich, or Gingrich and Santorum could split the "conservative" vote providing Romney with an opportunity to win.
• Major metropolitan areas like Illinois and Dallas could pull their states toward Romney.
• Italian-Americans in New Jersey (17.9% of population), Rhode Island (19%) and Connecticut (18.6%) could relate to Santorum's backstory and turn out in greater numbers.

Michigan polls, polls, polls!

American Research Group: Santorum 38%, Romney 34%, Paul 12%, Gingrich 7%
[Santorum +4]

NBC News-Marist: Romney 37%, Santorum 35%, Paul 13%, Gingrich 8%
[Romney +2]

Detroit Free Press-WXYZ-TV: Santorum 37%, Romney 34%
[Santorum +3]

Michigan Information & Research Service: Romney 32%, Santorum 30%, Paul 9%, Gingrich 7%
[Romney +2]

Mitchell Research and Rosetta Stone: Romney at 32%, Santorum at 30%
[Romney +2]

Rasmussen: Santorum 38% , Romney’s 34%, Paul 10%, Gingrich 9%
[Santorum +4]

Real Clear Politics: (average of other polls) Santorum 33.8%, Romney 33.2%
[Santorum +0.6]

Is anybody tracking Republican delegates?

The Campaign Spot:

A reminder of the official delegate count, as seen by the RNC: Mitt Romney 73, Newt Gingrich 29, Ron Paul 8, Perceived Frontrunner Rick Santorum 3, Jon Huntsman 2.

And:

The AP has Romney at 105, Santorum at 71, Gingrich at 29, Paul at 18, and Huntsman at 2.

Santorum ahead 11% in Washingon

Public Policy Polling:

At least for now it looks like it could give Rick Santorum some momentum headed into the critical March 6th contests. He leads there with 38% to 27% for Mitt Romney, 15% for Ron Paul, and 12% for Newt Gingrich.

A very small number of people are participating in the primaries

The Electoral Wasteland:

Less than 1 percent of registered voters turned out for Maine’s caucus. In Nevada, where Republican turnout was down 25 percent from 2008, only 3 percent of total registered voters participated.

This is not majority rule by any measure; it barely qualifies as participatory democracy.

The electability/competency of Rick Santorum

The Dish brings out three experts.

Steve Kornacki of Salon:

He’s a genuinely competent candidate. Not dazzling, but competent. He’s in line with the party base on just about every key issue, doesn’t have much personal baggage, can think on his feet in debates, and deliver a solid stump speech. This is more than can be said for Gingrich, Rick Perry and Herman Cain. This may be Santorum’s best hope: that the desire of the party base to nominate someone other than Romney is so strong that this basic competency is enough to overcome all of the advantages that Romney still enjoys.

Why does Ron Paul attact young voters?

The Dish analyzes:

But above all, I think it's his foreign policy. The post-9/11 generation has seen what war has achieved - virtually nothing but the death of a hundred thousand Iraqis, 5,000 Americans and tens of thousands of maimed and injured vets - and believe the wars were huge errors. They also rightly understand that the world has changed thanks to globalization of capitalism, and see the Cold War mentality of America policing the planet to be at least condescending, and at worst utterly counter-productive and unaffordable. They see their retirement savings disappearing to fuel neocon fantasies of permanent war.