So Rick Santorum Really "Won" Iowa

Reuters
Alexander Abad-Santos 1,092 Views Jan 19, 2012

The final results of the Iowa Caucuses put Rick Santorum ahead of Mitt Romney by 34 votes, though the Iowan Republican Party's executive director, calls it a "split decision." It might all boil down to semantics and, yes, that is a slim number (keep in mind there are eight counties in Iowa whose votes will never be certified), but the 34-vote margin that separate Santorum (29,839) and Mitt Romney (29,805) is still bigger than the eight  votes which spurred Romney's history-making, back-to-back "wins" in Iowa and New Hampshire. Romney's move isn't exactly broken if you count ties--which is what Iowa's GOP officials are calling the final results.  "I can’t speculate without documentation from the missing eight,” GOP Chairman Matt Strawn told The Des Moines Register referring to the eight counties and their missing votes. “The comments I made at 1:30 a.m. Jan. 4 congratulating both Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum still apply." Scott Olsen, the Iowan Republican Party's executive director, added "It’s a split decision." So what's this win tie do for Santorum?  “It will be a story and Santorum will seize upon it, but it won’t change the current political narrative,” a Republican operative told The Des Moines Register. 

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