Romney Wins in Nevada and Pretends He Has Won the Nomination (ContributorNetwork)

COMMENTARY | Racking up his second win in less than a week in Nevada, Mitt Romney addressed an enthusiastic crowd in Las Vegas as if he was already the Republican nominee, according to CNN. He did not even mention his Republican opponents.

According to CNN Election Central, Romney is projected to win 48 percent of the votes and 12 delegates out of a total of 28. Newt Gingrich, who has vowed to fight on, is fighting for second place with Ron Paul. Each will take four delegates. Rick Santorum will be a distant fourth with two delegates.

Romney's victory address was more like a general campaign stump speech than remarks given by a man who is still in a primary fight for the nomination. He laid into President Barack Obama with a will, mentioning that unemployment is still above 8 percent. He listed a litany of Obama era legislation and actions that he noted has been of little help in jump starting the economy and has actually hampered that process.

Romney is playing a psychological game with the voters. He wants to convince the voters of upcoming state caucuses and primaries that he is the inevitable nominee. Therefore, one should not bother with the other gentlemen still in the race, particularly Gingrich.

Gingrich is refusing to quit. According to the U.K. Daily Mail, Gingrich has developed a long-term primary strategy that he hopes will bring him to "parity" in the delegate count by the middle of spring. After a few more contests in Arizona and Colorado that favor Romney, the nomination fight turns south with Super Tuesday and in states that might favor Gingrich. If Gingrich can achieve a number of victories in March, leading to the Texas primary in early April, he can catch up to Romney and fight out the rest of the nomination contest on an equal basis.

The one thing standing between this happy outcome and Gingrich is Gingrich himself. Romney has been successfully waging a psychological war against his main opponent, attacking and ridiculing him, and then sitting back and watching Gingrich react petulantly. For Gingrich to take victory out of the jaws of defeat, he has not find a way to parry Romney's attacks in a way that is more attractive to voters.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/gop/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20120205/pl_ac/10929882_romney_wins_in_nevada_and_pretends_he_has_won_the_nomination

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