After Iowa

Rick Santorum: He’s the new anti-Romney, and unlike all the others, he has a virtual election victory to prove it (his actual eight-vote loss is essentially irrelevant). Santorum proved in his victory speech that he had earned Iowa. Here was someone quite capable of moving a crowd and of persuading. It was a very different glimpse of Santorum than the one that had come through in the debates.

Even if he can raise a lot of money quickly, Santorum doesn’t have much time. He has spent some time in New Hampshire, but he’ll have to catch fire there spontaneously if he is to avoid the fate of Mike Huckabee, who decisively won Iowa and went downhill from there.