Santorum: It's Not Even Halftime Yet

With twitchy Republicans looking to put an end to an onerous and hard-fought primary season, Rick Santorum is saying not so fast, reports Politico. “This race isn’t even at halftime yet, we haven’t even selected half of the delegates yet,” Santorum told Fox News Sunday this morning. But with Romney closing in on half of the magic number 1,144, Santorum is looking to May. “The map in May looks good for us—Texas and Arkansas and West Virginia and North Carolina and Indiana, Kentucky ,” Santorum said. “We have great states, where we are ahead in every poll in all of those states and if you listen to the folk in the country, stay in there, we need a conservative. ” Elsewhere on your Sunday dial, as per Politico:

• Santorum on Romney: He's “the same old, tired, establishment person” that GOP honchos are trying to “shove down our throat.”
• Mitch McConnell on Romney: “I think he is an excellent candidate, and the chances are overwhelming that he will be our nominee. It seems to me we are in the final phases of wrapping up this nomination."
• Paul Ryan on Tuesday's primaries: "If Mitt wins Wisconsin, if he gets a big delegate count, which I think he’ll get, then we believe as conservatives we should coalesce around the nominee and focus at the task at hand, which is the fall election, and not drag this thing out.”
• Howard Dean on gas prices: Obama will “take a small hit," but "the president is not responsible for the prices any more than" Reagan or Bush. " The American people know it, and there’s more production today than there was four years ago."
• Ryan on what's needed to pass his budget: “We believe that the seeds of a bipartisan budget compromise are there in this budget. The problem we have are the Democratic leaders: Senator Reid, President Obama. They are out in left field. We need new leadership, new leadership in the Senate and in the White House to realize this emerging bipartisan consensus.”
  

(More Sunday morning talk shows stories.)