The Washington Times more >After Romney jumped on the remark, saying his rival seemed to be dismissing the issue that most voters say is their chief concern, Mr. Santorum responded with this weak explanation: “I’m saying my candidacy doesn’t hinge on whether the unemployment rate goes up and down.”
Mr. Santorum’s campaign was so worried this week about how his personal opposition to contraceptives was playing among female voters that his wife, Karen, went on CNN to say, “Women have nothing to fear when it comes to contraceptives. He will do nothing on that issue.”
Meantime, Mr. Santorum’s campaign also suffers from his complete inability to put together and run a major national campaign organization. This was embarrassingly evident in his failure to meet the delegate filing requirements in many states. Not only did he lose badly in Illinois, but he was ineligible for 10 of its delegates because his campaign had not filed the correct paperwork.
Putting together a well- financed national campaign is a key professional prerequisite in the long primary season, and Mr. Romney has done that from the ground up. Mr. Santorum has been hobbled by a relatively small staff and no state-by-state national campaign apparatus to speak of.
As things stand now, Mr. Romney has won half of the GOP delegates he needs to clinch the nomination, and ahead of him is a long line of state primaries where he is favored to do well and that will put him at or over the top.
The Gallup Poll reports that Mr. Romney leads Mr. Santorum by 11 points in the head-to-head surveys and the president by 50 percent to 46 percent. The nomination battle is all but over.
Donald Lambro is a syndicated columnist and former chief political correspondent for The Washington Times.
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By Stephen Dinan - The Washington Times
The FBI uses drones for surveillance on U.S. soil, though “in a very, very minimal way,” agency Director Robert Mueller told Congress at an oversight hearing Wednesday.
