SANTORUM SURGING

With the GOP presidential race now in a brief period between primaries and caucuses (Arizona and Michigan are next on the 28th), potential voters who have begun thinking about the race are now, or at least it appears to be so, beginning to move toward yet another anti-Romney. Rick Santorum has surged ahead in the national polls. More importantly, Santorum is now ahead in the two most recent polls in Michigan. It is hard to overstate the importance of Michigan in the context of not only the race for the nomination, but the race for the White House itself. If Santorum bests Romney in Michigan, the state where Romney was born and raised, the state where Romney's father was a popular governor, then Romney may very well be mortally wounded.

Every anti-Romney surge was defeated, not by Romney, but by the inadequacies and foibles of the anti-Romney challenger. If Santorum can avoid blowing himself up (as Gingrich has done more than once, and Perry did spectacularly during the debates), and if there are no skeletons in his closet (as was the case with Cain), he may be able to take a Michigan victory and turn it into a big day on Super Tuesday. If he does, then we can expect a race all the way to the convention, which might be the most interesting national convention for us political junkies since Chicago in '68.