it is now 1:00 a.m. in the east and the race is over will mitt romney, apparent winner after a close race that has taken all night. that is race we've been tracking. romney wins a slim victory in ohio. more results now. in tennessee, rick santorum is the projected winner of the tennessee republican primary. santorum is also the projected winner in oklahoma.

also, the projected winner in the in the in the caucuses. in the idaho caucuses, mitt romney won a decisive victory. up in massachusetts, mitt romney is the winner and nbc news has allocated all that state's delegates to romney. it's former governor. newt gingrich is the projected winner in his home state of georgia and in that two-man race, romney is the winner over ron paul. finally in verlt, mitt romney is the projected winner of the republican primary in the green mountain state. there you have it. howard fineman is now with us. howard, how would you, i love getting this from you because you're a botmrting all night. in addition to the bottom line where it looked like he was losing momentum and he got a lot of wins tonight, three in a very close loss in ohio, what else happened tonight? >> well, what happened tonight,

chris, is that the notion that this is a long, long struggle was reinforced rather than ended. this was yet another chance for mitt romney to say, look, this is effectively over and we can wrap it up fairly quickly now. the results don't prove that even though he had a very good night in terms of delegates, a decent to very good night. rick santorum managed to slip the punch. he slipped the knockout punch. he did it by winning those three states and by taking it to the wire in ohio over though he was outspent nine or ten to one and even though he messed up many features of his campaign in his message. it's a little like groundhog day. we keep waking up every wednesday morning to the same

story. there is a weak front-runner who doesn't make a solid connection with the base of his own party. who nevertheless stays in the lead in a weak position. and two main challengers, who are hurting each other but are remaining in the race because they are closer to, especially rick santorum. closer to the heart of the modern conservative faith-based tea party-based republican party. let me say a couple other things. first the notion that the santorum campaign is going to suddenly mount a big campaign to drive newt gingrich out of the race is silly. at least based on talking to the top santorum people in the last hour or so. they said it is not going to happen. partly because it is unrealistic. newt gingrich is not going to get out of the race before the southern primaries next week and he night not get out at all. but that is sort of the bottom line at this moment. >> if you look at the numbers that mitt romney has only been able to get in the deep south

states, starting in south carolina and across to oklahoma and tennessee, it looks like he never can get above about 28%. does that ceiling on mitt romney's ability to do well, his performance in the south, allow santorum to still be both of them, both he and newt gingrich if he stays in, is there still an opportunity next week for rick santorum to win in alabama and mississippi? even with newt still in the race? >> well, yes, i think so. i think what it shows, chris, the modern republican party as you know was built out of the south. it is built on and out of the south. and mitt romney has very little if any connection to it. he won in virginia by default because the other guys weren't in the race. only ron paul was in the race. as you know, mitt romney did not win the northern part of florida. you know, he has got to show somewhere that he can touch that southern base but i don't

necessarily see him doing it. by the way, one thing that rick santorum did in ohio that put romney on his heels a little bit was to get at the health care issue in a way that really hadn't gotten any traction before. the reason the health care issue is so deadly for mitt romney with the base is that it goes both at the tea party fear of big government, the secular fear of big government, and at the religious base of the party who is worried about the health care bill imposing values on religious people in terms of how they must behave. if rick santorum can drive that, he'll stay alive. i agree with what up in the last hour which is fundamentally, that mitt romney is probably going to be the republican nominee. one fascinating thing that emerged tonight is really the romney campaign is now saying, look, we're not sure we're going to wrap up and acquire the number of delegates we need for a majority by the end of the

election season. that was a sort of admission that they floated out there earlier tonight, which is really kind of interesting news. they hadn't been saying that before. now they're trying to admit that in advance. they have a big event tomorrow in bott. the top romney people will sit down with reporters and go through the delegate numbers and go through them all to try to show that they, the romney campaign, is inevitable. but i don't think they're going to pound the table and say we're going to get the delegates we need by june. they probably aren't. >> howard, and by the way, i believe in the romney strategy as much as i don't like the way it works. it works. it means that he gets to be the nominee against the president in a very rocky time in which a lot of ethnic factors make me think that he can beat president obama in a one-on-one. i think he can do well in the debates. i think he can win one or two of them. i think he can look strong enough and provide this kind of

all american home-grown thing he's sell. i saw him selling it tonight. it is kind of dirty the way he's doing it but he's doing it. he's selling i'm the candidate candidate against guess who. it is rotten, it is subtle and it could be effective. >> as subtle as a train wreck. i was in steubenville, ohio over the weekend which is where rick santorum set up his election night tonight. i talked to a lot of voters and parishioners at the st. peter's church which is right across the street from the high school where rick santorum was. they were all for rick santorum all those people i spoke to. people with big families, traditional catholics of the old school. they said we're to santorum. i said yeah, but if santorum doesn't make it, will you support mitt romney should he be the nominee? and every single one of those people, those conservative parishioners in st. peters said that they would support mitt romney because there's no way, and i mean, no way under the sun that any of those people would

ever vote for president barack obama. >> thank you. and bob woodward said the same exact thing on my sunday show. he said just watch, that 30 to 40% out there, some of them haters, some bedrock conservatives are all ready to back the republican ticket no matter who leads it. that's why this will be one close general election. nbc's peter alexander joins us now. i get the feeling this will be a very professional painful it won't be exciting. it will be numerical. >> i think as you just heard howard say very clearly, this is going to be a groundhog day. mitt romney using the language himself saying, tomorrow we wake up and we start again. just a day ago when we were with the romney campaign in ohio, he said help me get the nomination. help me lock it up on super tuesday so i can organize against barack obama. again they have to continue to focus on rick santorum. i'll be in that meeting with

some of the senior advisers tomorrow as they try to lay out the map for us. the headline they were looking for, at the end of the night, they won ohio. they go five out of ten if they don't win alaska later this evening as well. it's the time of night when they turn into glasses. most hustled home. it was remarkable how quickly the senior advisers, the strategist, disappeared from this room as soon as mitt romney was done with his remarks of several hours ago now. frankly they usually come and turn around to the reporters in the back of the room and try to spin us. they ran upstairs to get in front of the televisions and the computers to see exactly what the number look like tonight. as they go forward, they're well aware of the challenges with march through the south and for santorum trul, it is a senior adviser said to me earlier, he

said we were down 10 or 11 points in this state of ohio about a week ago. we look like we're slightly ahead. if that's the case, that's the expectation, they beat it. clearly they have a lot of work to do. i should conclude by acknowledging, having been with romney from akron to zanesville, the alphabet of cities, even when we ran into santorum, they said when everything is said and done, we will vote for anybody but barack obama. those people, when romney or if romney. >> peter alexander, thanks for joining us. i guess the expression is close but no cigar, huh?

>> well, close but no cigar, chris. with this basketball court behind me, sometimes when you have a close defeat, nose are more painful than the full ones, and that is clear for rick santorum, but he left here tuesday night with three victories, chris, and that is big, because it would have stung a lot more if he were shut out of the victory column. he has a couple of golds here and hand full of silvers. so it is a mixed bag and gives them a ticket to ride down south. and now the question that howard talked about is this notion of whether newt gingrich will bow out of the race, and some of the campaign officials were essentially doing the job to start that conversation, and they are not necessarily going to go to newt gingrich, and request that he drop out of the race, but at least the conversation down in jackson, mississippi, and birmingham, alabama, and the states where this race is headed will start talking about how to consolidate the conservative vote. we have been reporting since many of the media outlets have been reporting that maybe the santorum folks would try to send a word to newt gingrich to bow

out of the race, and that they are going to go down there no matter what and try to win those two states. so we may have a different conversation here, chris, next tuesday if rick santorum can go into newt gingrich's backyard two states away from the home state of georgia and pull out victories there could change everything. >> and it seems that he has to win in alabama with romney and newt in the race. it is do-able, because romney never gets above 28, and he can do it. and ron mott with the santorum headquarters heading south. when we return, michael steele, msnbc's coverage of super tuesday continues in just a moment.

>> big news tonight, mitt romney the apparent winner the ohio republican primary tonight. he won a close victory over rick santorum in the buckeye state. michael steele is with us from washington, and joan walsh is with us from san francisco. it's like the afternoon out there in san francisco. >> yes. >> and there was a comparison to david and goliath, and of course in the bibl war had an interesting result. david won. but tonight david lost, and not as good a story in ohio. >> well, it is not as good a story, but an interesting story. i think it was a terrible night for mitt romney, chris, because we did look at the night looking at a possible night where he could not clinch it obviously, but he could steal some momentum, and he could start to look inevitable if he had a big win in ohio, and took tennessee which people were saying was

possible, so for him to walk away with this and to continue the conversation with michael from earlier, when people compare this race to barack obama and compare, and people say, hey, he is putting up the delegates and doing what obama did, and sneaks in and out and get the delegates and that is all that matters. that is really not true. obama did that and it was awesome and it was an awesome campaign, but he was also turning out 75,000 people to hear him speak, because there was so much energy and passion and love, and he was doing both things, and romney may have the ability to just gut it out and have a death march where he does collect the most delegates, but there's no, there's no fire. there's no love for sure so it is a dangerous comparison to look at 2008. it is not alike at all. >> and are we looking at the death march, michael? what are we looking at? i think that there is a difference and there was a thrill up the leg, and some of the people had the sensational speeches of barack obama

starting in 2004. >> i don't doubt it. >> and i don't know if anybody has had a physical reaction to romney's speech except maybe you. have you had a physical reaction to a romney speech? >> no, i have not. >> so it is all cerebral. >> it's all cerebral. joan hit on a couple of points. i was looking at the math here. to mark halprin's point, romney is running into a math problem, because only eight winner-take-all states left in the process. he's got a numbers game that he has to match and tonight having split the states the way he did makes getting that nomination sewed up before june close to impossible. so there's going to be to joan's point, much more of the personal sell, and he has to now recalculate the steps through the south. he is going to have the figure

out where he can pick off or pick up one of these states in the south to sort of stem the blood flow away from his campaign and put that energy back into it. >> and under the party rules can a candidate like newt gingrich who comes in third or a candidate like ron paul in the first ballot give their delegate his or her delegates to the front-runner, can they do that? >> no, because the delegates in the first wave is some 1,700, maybe 1,100 are bound delegates, and bound to the folks coming into the convention to that first ballot, and you can't come in and say, here are mine. that is a later stage in the process. >> what would happen if he tried? >> oh, you can't. i mean the rules just don't permit it. you can't do it. those delegates are bound. you have to vote the way you were, you lined up on primary night.

>> and so how can you win if you don't get a majority? you have to have a majority? >> well, rounds off voting. it does not stop after the first round, so if no one has the majority in the first round coming into this thing, and if you don't have the 1,144, then you are negotiating like heck between now and the convention to get as close as you can, and you will have to suffer through -- >> and in terminology, you have to get the number? >> suffer through the first round with the low number and having negotiated to the number, you get it to the second or the third round. >> and it is very hard, and michael, you are the expert on mitt romney winning this thing clean right? >> yes. and howard fineman and mark halprin said it earlier. even before when we still thought romney would have a great night and have momentum. they're saying even if he wins big. >> and no mo romney, i did say that. and thank you, michael. and thank you, joan.

it's still the afternoon there. it's late here. and joining us is how we see this things running through the convention, and we will look at how this works starting next tuesday all of the way in. we will be right back.

well, mitt romney escaped

with the slim victory in ohio tonight, and apparent winner after a very close race there. and steve schmidt with us here in new york. and steve, you are the expert on this thing, and how do you see it going right now? >> mitt romney keeps winning and with each win he drives the narrative that he is a weak candidate and we spent a lot of time talking about the comparisons between 2008 and 2012. when barack obama became the de facto nominee in june, the favorable and unfavorable ratio was 51-28, and he was popular. today the "wall street journal" poll, mitt romney is 28-39. and rick santorum is 24-39, and the fact is that both candidates have flipped upside down on the favorable ratio, and weakening as this goes on. >> and if romney gets to the convention and has to do some manipulations and deal making to win it on the second or the third ballot, anything to give away with the nomination being this weak or give away the vice

presidency to someone he does not want or agree to a platform on the fed to get ron paul with him, or some humiliating steps? >> well, it's the law of unintended consequences, and we heard chairman steel talk about how they wanted more grass roots to get involved and it may be that the rule changes decided in the backroom where the voters of the republican process are disenfranchised and the nomination is decided on a bunp of deals that take place under darkness. >> and let's talk about the lds factor, the mormon factor. and we talk about how faith is driving the voting, and okay, you look at the positive part of idaho, nevada, and arizona and they haven't gotten to utah, so people are to some extent voting religion. >> no question about it.

howard fineman wrote a great column about this earlier in the week and talked about it today, and you have 75% of the electorate saying that voting for somebody who shares my religion is important to them. it is a major issue particularly in the southern states. >> and i think it is time for mitt romney to find himself that he has not done it positively. we agree on that. msnbc's coverage of super tuesday will continue in just a moment.

nbc news can project that the apparent winner of the republican presidential primary in ohio is mitt romney. this has been as close as it could possibly be over the course of most of tonight where we have seen mr. romney pulling out ahead over the last hour or so, and mitt romney now the apparent winner in ohio which means that tonight has been a big night for rick santorum. it has also been a good night for mitt romney. mitt romney winning in idaho. winning in virginia where only he and ron paul were on the ballot winning his home state of massachusetts in vermont and squeaking one out in ohio.

these are the overall states won throughout the country up to and including tonight. you are seeing some streaky patterns there, and in terms of regional favorability for these candidates, but right now, it is still a good night for rick santorum. had mitt romney lost ohio to mr. santorum, i think that it would have been seen as a spectacular night for rick santorum. the states that he won the night included north dakota, tennessee and oklahoma, but in the end, not ohio despite having been close all night. this has been a heck of a night. super tuesday tonight, and we are waiting for some of the results from alaska. which, you never know, might end up being definitive at any point. >> and sarah palin voted for newt. >> did she? >> sarah palin voted for newt so anybody who tells newt to get out, she will be all worked up about that. >> well, mitt romney owes thank you letters to newt gingrich and ron paul without whom he could not have won ohio. >> and no question that going for ward a vote for newt gingrich is a vote for mitt romney.

so it is wise for the santorum campaign to start articulating that and see how much pressure they can bring, because they don't have much of a path with gingrich in the race. >> how do you do that? where does the pressure come from? >> well, make a public argument that they've been reticent to make, and as long as he is in the race, it is a vote for mitt romney, and make it loudly and see where the chips fall. >> what can you offer a guy like newt gingrich? what does a guy like newt gingrich want? he likes to be on tv for really long speeches on nights when he wins his home state. >> and he likes to -- >> together, we will take down mitt romney. >> and together. and you put him in the cabinet? >> where would you put him and trust him? >> he can't get confirmed. don't talk cabinet. it is impossible. >> you could put him inside of the actual cabinet and make him think it is the cabinet. >> maybe a drilling lease. i don't know.

>> and what is dynamic is the fact that mitt romney thought he was the same guy than before tonight, which is that mitt romney still sort of looks like the nominee and still sort of winning more delegates than anybody else, but has some problems with core parts of the republican constituency, and neither rick santorum nor newt gingrich can be viable as long as they are in the race, and so the dynamic is whether rick santorum and newt gingrich can whittle down to one. >> and the romney strategy as we all agree from the beginning, is the recognition of the roller derby, your job is to stay on the course when everybody is off of it. under the theory that with the economy still being rocky, whoever the republican nominee is come november or come the fall when you begin the season really head-to-head will have roughly a 50-50 shot, and therefore you want to get there. >> yes. >> because once you get there, and i was with bob woodward the other day, and he will argue that all of the santorum back flow, and the hatred vote and the far-right religious vote will come to you inevitably out of antipathy for the president,

and you will get the 30 to 40 % percentage, many of them haters who will come, so all you have to to is to get into the boxing ring with the president, and debate well and try to win back the center. that is the argument he has followed all along, get there. and he is going to get there in the worst way and the question is will events come his direction to give him a shot to win. they might. we may have a spike in the unemployment rate because of higher gas prices and slower growth, and if that happens, he will be in the ring, and somebody said each candidate, and did you say each has 47%? yes. and that is where we are at again. >> friday we will find out that this country has added private sector jobs for two straight sears and that number is coming. another plank on the horizon is that the labor union will be aggressive here in the next month taking out a lot of radio ads in the midwest really working over the republicans on

the highway bill. they want this passed. and now you are going to start seeing, you know, the wage earners get involved and put pressure on santorum, i think to step up and say, hey, this is the right thing to do. we have infrastructure problems in the country. if he wants to support the wage earners the way that mike dewine has been saying and also last week on the broadcast, this is the perfect opportunity. where is romney going to be on this? this is a great issue for the president. it is a slam dunk for him, and he wants it and middle-classers want it and wage earners want it and this is the next big fight when it comes to wage earners. >> but the fight of mitt romney has been waging against santorum and trying to underscore that people like him for being the more conservative guy, and romney has gone after him, by it has not stuck, and that might help him stick. >> well, on the highway bill is

they are on the blount amendment. that's how focused they are on jobs right now. >>s which going to come back and get them. >> and that is another thing that you have to deal with is outside of the partisan politics to impact the general is that you are going to have, and i think that this is why santorum went there is that you will have the supreme court looking at the affordable health care act, and if they go against it, it could energize the president's base. and they are scheduled an october hearing on affirmative action, so you have a lot of things playing between now and november that could really energize a base for the president that has nothing to do with what goes on in the ring as you say. >> here's a prospect. we have alabama and mississippi and kansas and missouri coming up and we know in missouri with the weird non-contest, santorum won, and kansas is rick santorum territory, and if newt gingrich is persuaded to get out before alabama and mississippi

and rick santorum wins alabama, mississippi, kansas, and missouri, who knows what will happen in hawaii. and say that happens, are we in a position to where we are talking about rick santorum as the nominee and mitt romney as the vice president? how do you reassure? how do you reassure party elites and the centrist mass of americans that you know what, actually, you are not just the man on dog guy, and you are not the guy who can't be googled or the guy who lost by 18 points for being a social conservative that they took mr. charisma bob casey over you and you will have the competence behind you and the competent vice president financial guy with and the guy you can patch it up with. you could be a statesman. >> he's on the short list. absolutely. >> that is not going to happen. >> and i think that newt gingrich would be a good guy on the ticket. >> we, it is then "island of the misfit toys."

>> and he would be the modern day alternative to dick cheney. >> oh, no. >> and you have to focus on the competence issue, and you are focusing on newt's inability to get on the ticket in his home state, virginia. and failure of rick santorum to get delegates slated where he will win well, and this competence thing is working as boring and nonphilosophical as he is, and i would say pathetic as he is, when he genuflects people like trump and limbaugh, romney has the strength and call it the lds mormon confidence and the capitalist strength, and he does not screw up on that stuff. it is infrastructure and ability to proceed ahead and move the plow forward. i believe he will be the nominee, and even with the scenario next week, in the end he could put it together, and santorum -- somebody called him rag tag tonight. he has a rag tag operation. >> who will you bet on?

with newt out, and if newt gets out -- >> i think that santorum can beat romney? >> well, i think that if newt gets out, it gives santorum a whole new momentum. >> but won't he blow it again. >> you think he will win the next five states? >> well, not only win the next five states, don't underestimate romney's ability to blow it. if you end up with a one-on-one race which the media will love, and conservatives will love, this guy can be the nominee. i am telling you that the real story tomorrow is will gingrich get out. that is what you are going to hear. >> and gingrich had not been in today, santorum would have won georgia and ohio, which is the biggest catch of the night. >> you are not convincing me. >> if gingrich was not in there.

>> and the fellow we had on the night, did he look like a campaign manager and chief strategist? >> well, you know, chris, this is why it is interesting. if he can get this close to ohio with no infrastructure and -- this guy has more -- >> and until. >> -- and up to 2:00 in the morning to win. >> and i am saying they could meet somewhere and that is the santorum campaign. >> well, the chief strategist there, he is a low profile in washington, but he is a talented guy. he has won a lot of races. he is the santorum guy, and i think he has done a great job on the wits without a lot of resources running it. but as you look ahead, it is rick santorum not going to pass mitt romney on the delegate count. there's no scenario where mitt romney is going to go into the convention even if he does not have the delegates necessary to be nominated where they nominate the person with less delegates. there is a hypothetical scenario

where they go into the convention and none of them have enough delegates to be nominated and someone else is nominated, but absent someone else nominated it is one of the people running, and that is the person who has won the most delegates, and that is going to be clearly mitt romney. >> i should interject in the ohio congressional race with marcy kaptur, it was a democratic primary where she beat dennis kucinich, and the redistricting to eliminate one of the progressive democrats, and dennis kucinich was eliminated, and you want to know who the republican nominee was? >> who? >> joe the plumber, and samuel wurzelbacher will be running against marcy kaptur in ohio 9 which is nits exciting. >> and that is who rush limbaugh was defending when he went up to the president and said that the media is picking on him. >> how did joe the plumber affect your campaign in late 2008. >> i remember in october when we were on a bus with lindsey

graham, and john mccain and i, and joe the plumber boarded the campaign bus with the official biographer, and i knew we had crossed another line of surrealiality on the mccain bus. and in a serious way in that moment where president obama went to joe the plumber and said, look, we have to spread the wealth around, and that in that one sense by his own hand, he advanced issue that we were trying to talk about unsuccessfully for a long time in the campaign. it was a little sign of life late in the campaign after the global economy had collapsed and we were being massively outspent, and in the middle of two of them. one won, one lost. and you know, in a losing campaign of a presidential side of the late stage where the waltz really begin to feel like they are collapsing on you. it was a little bit of an anecdote. >> could you have had more electoral traction on that if

you had not pick up the mascot for that, for whom we will all be forever grateful. >> and the media age for all that comes with it, and this guy is there and everyone globs on him, and it is a circus. look, it is a republican -- >> and who gives out the appellations, anyway? billy the kid? joe the plumber? where do you get these things? >> i want to know who is the first person -- >> remember the fisherman who found elian gonzalez? >> dalripple. >> and remember when joe was around, but he was not around. let's see if joe shows up when he is running. >> and he was at the next stop. more of a premonition. >> and joe could not be with us. >> and mitt romney the apparent winner in ohio after a long path to that result.

coverage of super tuesday continues. stay with us.

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happy super tuesday and our coverage continues here on msnbc. our big news of the past hour has been the resolution of the hard fought ohio republican primary. i was going to call it the o-tie-o, because it was a tie but that did not work well at this time of the night. and too close to call ohio primary has been won by mitt romney. rick santorum tonight winning in oklahoma and tennessee and in north dakota. this has been a big and interesting night in terms of what happens moving forward in the race. after santorum's campaign said it is time for conservatives and tea party activists to urge newt gingrich to exit the race, in order to consolidate conservative support, in order to consolidate around one

nonmitt romney candidacy. a newt gingrich aide has responded saying that rick santorum does not understand he is splitting the moderate vote with romney. >> cute. cute. >> and that is definitely -- >> we will be the judges of this. and we have decided gingrich campaign that you are the campaign that should drop out to consolidate the anti-romney vote. >> it is all good for the party. >> having seen both of the guys on the stump, i will say that although on paper and in terms of the delegates and the states won, rick santorum looks like the guy with the mojo, newt gingrich is better on the stump. i understand that rick santorum has populism and economic message nit that is appealing in a crossover way, and having seen them both and my personal opinion of having been there, newt gingrich can move people and inspire people, and make people stand up on their chairs to clap, and he says things that

does not help him, but he is more connected. >> i think that newt is a negative force. >> but he can be negative in a way that moves people. he can be negative in a way that can move people who hate the president. >> and he not only looks like the devil, but he does look like the devil, and he has a maniacal look, and diabolical look, and he is a menacing force in politics in america. in the time he came to congress, in the 1990s, he brought it down. he created a environment of hostility in the congress that never have recovered from. >> he was personally the turning point. and he would do evil things like say keep your spouse back in the district and come the washington alone to become a pure politician. just created a terrible environment. he gets all into the social life and everything. >> that is why the beltway and the establishment dislikes newt gingrich so much, and they will try to exploit him as a candidate when they want, but that is not the regular person's

perspective on him. because they want to hear from the presidential candidate what is wrong with barack obama and what could be right about the country, and gingrich tells a better story than santorum. >> when you talk to people who know mitt romney intimately they all say the same thing. this is a great guy and we wish that the people of the country could know mitt romney the way that we do, that he could convey publicly what he does in private. all of the people who have worked with newt gingrich closely and intimately and privately say he shouldn't be president. across the board. >> are you describing george w. bush? >> and it is across the board. so i think that like you would look at that map where you is all of the states that have been won or lost, and it looks like a risk board and newt gingrich is surrounded. so i think that if, you know, you look at the race and looking at it going ahead, there is no chance that newt gingrich is the nominee of the party and very little oxygen left for him in the race.

if they have any plausible chance for rick santorum to make a case for the nominee of the party, then gingrich has to get out. >> i go back to the original point. you have a candidate who leads now in the delegate count. there is an air of negativity surrounding him that he is not strong enough, but he has won florida and arizona and michigan and ohio, and he leads in the delegate count and pretty good real estate out in the western portions of the states. the next round as chuck todd was saying, the rest of the month will be rough for him especially if gingrich gets out, because that is really going to grease the skids for santorum. but this is, who would have thought that a candidate would have gotten those states plus virginia the way he got it, and still have four people in the race? >> yeah. >> and we have not mentioned ron paul tonight who has yet to win a state. what is his program? where he is going? >> let me -- >> he was supposed to do well in the caucus states and get for the delegates, and he has not done it.

>> let me bring mark into this, and mark, on this point of whether or not either newt gingrich or rick santorum has to get out of the race in order for there to be a possibility of a non-romney candidacy, is that the focus moving forward? you are the guy with the thumb on the pulse of the beltway here to mix the metaphors, because that is the central question on the the table right now. >> well, not right now. it will be in april. if you look at at the exit polls and the calendar this month and look at tennessee and oklahoma. the results were almost identical at least based on the returns so far. santorum with 35, 34 or 37% of the vote, and he won decidedly with gingrich getting more than a quarter of the motor. so in the upcoming states in the same region of the country that santorum has won in. he has won in the midwest and the south, and you have kansas, and you've got missouri and

mississippi and you have got alabama. now the romney strategy is to go for delegates, so he has to play there, and he cannot avoid playing in every state now. he goes there for delegates, and can he add to the lead? he comes out potentially with four losses in four republican states, important republican states which he can win i believe right now with gingrich in the race. after those states as we move to april, he can't do it. gingrich has to get out at that point, but he might well, despite the defiance now, if he continues the lose in southern states, in missouri, in kansas, i think that at that point, he may well get out, and then santorum has to elevate the game and become a better speaker. he has to have more organization and raise money off of the victories. if he does that, he goes tone tough places like illinois, but one-on-one with ron paul in and based one-on-one against romney, he can do it. gingrich does not have to get out right away based on the ability to win the two southern states with gingrich in there. but after that, he cannot do it

without gingrich leaving the race. >> thank you, mark halperin, for that. it's going to be the thing to watch. if gingrich stays in and romney loses the states with the non-romney vote divided between gingrich and rick santorum, that is even worse for romney than to lose it to a solo candidate. >> i think that really makes sense. >> and you know, romney to a southern state can't get above 28%, so obviously the two can mix up the vote, and one of them can win. >> msnbc's coverage of super tuesday continues just after this, and again though, the big news out of super tuesday out of this past hour is that the state of ohio is going to mitt romney after a very long night, and very closely fought race with rick santorum. stay with us. we will be right back.