It looks like the big boys are telling the girl that it's time for her to step aside for the good of the cause:
Iowa evangelical leader Bob Vander Plaats called Michele Bachmann and urged her to drop out of the race and endorse Rick Santorum, a source with knowledge of the conversation told POLITICO Tuesday.
The phone call took place Saturday, three days before Vander Plaats announced he – but not his organization, the Family Leader – was backing Santorum.
Bachmann declined, the source said, noting to Vander Plaats that she has consistently polled ahead of Santorum in the race and still does.
“It just makes a lot of sense to me,” he said. “You need a team to run a country. So this isn’t about one person, this isn’t just about Rick Santorum." [...] Perry spokesman Ray Sullivan said Perry spoke with Vander Plaats on Friday, but dropping out and backing Santorum “absolutely did not come up.”
Sorry Michele. It's getting close to the caucuses and that means it's time for people to start demanding that candidates drop out. And since your fellow travelers are all patriarchal throwbacks they will, of course, tell you that you need to make the sacrifice while leaving the man's man Rick Perry alone.
This happens in Democratic politics as well, although it isn't confined to the women. Just before the voting begins there is always a call for people to drop out. And if it remains undecided for a while, the calls become shrill and cacophonous. It's the damnedest thing. An awful lot of people don't want to take a chance on the voters making the decision.
But asking someone to drop out in favor of some single digit nobody who doesn't have a ... prayer, may be a first. Singling out the woman pretty much says it all.
But maybe Michele shouldn't have been so eager to serve as the boys' waitress at that religion debate. It looks like it gave them the wrong idea...
Update: Rick Perlstein writes in to say I missed the best part and he's right:
“It just makes a lot of sense to me,” he said. “You need a team to run a country. So this isn’t about one person, this isn’t just about Rick Santorum."
I.e., right wing preachers are upfront in their plain expectation that with a Republican president they will be part of the "team" that "runs the country."
It's reminiscent of the way the NRA boasted that they'd have an office in the Bush White House.
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