Should Ron Paul, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum Call It Quits?

I’ve heard lots of people mouthing off lately about how one or more of these people should realize they’re not going to win and drop out of the race.  The general idea being that a ton of money is being spent on this little preliminary step that could be better spent to fight Obama. 

I disagree.  Entirely.  Completely.  Whole-heartedly.

Yes, there is a metric butt-load of money being spent.  There’s always a ton of money being spent.  It’s what politicians do.  They spend a ton of money given to them by supporters to get into office and demand money from everyone so they can spend even more.  Tis the way of the world in the 21st century.  While that’s not particularly a good thing, the people complaining about it are really a little out of touch with reality. Here’s a quick fact check.

IF all three of these candidates dropped out and left only Romney, he would most certainly get he nomination.  The Republican National Convention would be over before it started, and we’d be on to the press covering Obama as he talks about how horrible the GOP and Mitt Romney are because they want to kill old people and deport starving students.  Maybe he’d be more creative than that, but not much. 

On the other hand, with all these candidates, we’re helping to keep some people focused on the race.  Even the Democrats are watching to see what happens.  Some of them like what they are hearing from some of the Republican candidates.  Ron Paul in particular has a great deal of pull for some Democrat party-line voters, but there are some Dems that like Santorum or Newt as well.  There are a lot of Dems who are not happy with Obama, being that he broke nearly every promise he made during his campaign.  Some of those people will gladly support another candidate, if they hear from one they like, but they don’t think they’ll ever support a Republican.

They just don’t know it yet.  The circus that the GOP has going on right now is keeping people interested, keeping the media covering the Republican candidates, and keeping people hearing messages that normally they would not hear.  If we want to just drop all that and have Romney go head to head with an incumbent President, we can do that.  And he’ll lose.  Badly.  At least this way, even though I believe Romney will lose, he has a fighting chance. 

Keep people focused, keep people listening, and keep people caring about what is going on.  The more we’re hearing from the R’s, the less we’re hearing from the D’s.  That’s a good thing in and of itself.