Why perry decided to remain in the race

Less than 12 hours later, Perry - still in Iowa - surprisingly declared that he would continue in the race, and make South Carolina his make-or-break state. Senior Perry aides, friends and staff members told Reuters that after a restless night, Perry and his staff ultimately decided there were four reasons the campaign should continue. And Perry aides determined that their campaign - more so than those of Santorum, a former U. Finally, Perry decided that he did not want to leave the race without competing in South Carolina, a state whose conservative voting base is more in line with his politics than middle-of-the road Iowa or New Hampshire, which will hold its primary on Tuesday.

The scrutiny surrounding Santorum has increased since his finish in Iowa. Hypothetical Scenario B : Mr. Perry was prepared to drop out of the race, but his advisers saw a credible path to victory and urged otherwise.

Moreover, he received a string of phone calls, text messages and e-mails from major donors, Republican elected officials and conservative activists who expressed their support and told him that he should press on.

These party elites were concerned that Mr. Romney was going to waltz to the nomination, and they were either poorly disposed toward Rick Santorum or convinced that Mr.

Santorum lacked the resources to seriously challenge Mr. In Scenario A, Mr. Perry would have made a highly idiosyncratic and personal decision, and one that was somewhat willfully disconnected from the realities of the Republican nomination race. Scenario B is just the opposite: a highly informed and strategic decision, one made expressly because Mr.

Perry had credible reasons to believe that he was still viable. Scenario B is potentially very bad news for Mr. It implies that party elites are not coalescing around him. In fact, it suggests that a subgroup of party elites are so dissatisfied with Mr. Romney that they are behaving strategically in an effort to maximize their chances of denying him the nomination.

Scenario A is potentially very good news for Mr. It implies that Mr. Perry is continuing along in the race despite having no chance of winning the nomination, the consequence of which is that he is consuming scarce resources like cash and votes that might otherwise go to one of Mr.

Political scientists tend to prefer explanations like Scenario B. In the maximal expression of this philosophy, any candidate who displays any interest at all in running for the presidency is in fact running for it, whether or not they take official steps like forming an exploratory committee or raising money. According to this philosophy, candidates like Mitch Daniels, Haley Barbour and Sarah Palin actually ran for president in , but were winnowed from the field during the invisible primary once it became clear to them that there was not much support for their bids.

Pundits tend to prefer explanations like Scenario A. Sometimes these are taken too credulously, without consideration of the strategic factors at play. I find the political science perspective more persuasive on this issue. It can be taken too far and can sometimes overrate the rationality of political actors.

Very strong reporting can sometimes help us to delineate between these two paradigms, and there happens to be some very strong reporting in the case of Mr.

Martin reports that a group of conservative leaders like James Dobson are thinking very explicitly about which candidate might have the best chance of toppling Mr.

If Mr. Perry is among these candidates, it would make a lot of sense for him to wait out their decision. But does Mr. Perry actually have a shot? This is a very difficult question to answer because of the highly ambiguous polling situation in South Carolina , where no public polls have been conducted in two weeks. My guess is that if you polled South Carolina today, it would show a close race between Mr. Romney, Mr.