¿Y si Ron Paul ganara IA y NH?

RealClearPolitics:

Ron Paul can win New Hampshire because he can win the Iowa caucuses. (Intraders give Paul's Iowa victory a 40 percent chance.) New Hampshirites have never felt it necessary to follow the Iowa caucus-goers, but the dynamics of the race make their state a likely second pickup.

If those two unexpected events do occur, then all hell will rain down upon the Paulistas. The GOP establishment will throw everything including the kitchen sink, the garage door opener, and two dozen pair of oversized baboon dentures at Paul to keep him from becoming the nominee.

(...) If he can beat Gingrich there [in Iowa], the real contest in New Hampshire will be between Paul's defiant leave-us-alone-and-bring-the-troops-home Republicanism and Romney's managerial competence. Paul seems a better fit for New Hampshire voters, and Iowa can remove the taint of unelectability (see Obama, Barack).

Here comes the fun part. Suppose the implausible occurs and Paul wins Iowa and New Hampshire, with Gingrich and then Romney coming in second in the two contests. South Carolina two weeks later is the Republican Party's firewall to exclude troublesome candidates. They used it to stop John McCain in 2000 and Mike Huckabee in 2008.

To stop a candidate, you need a candidate, preferably along with a few spoilers who can carve into the insurgent's vote share. If Gingrich and Romney both place second, neither would be the obvious default candidate. Would Romney drop out like he unexpectedly did at CPAC last time? Would Gingrich stand down because he can't stand Paul's national not-so-greatness politics?

If Paul falters, all of this will be much ado about not so much. But he might not falter and I guarantee a few Republican grandees are losing sleep over that prospect. In contest after contest, he has done much better than expected, only to have the people who supposedly know better proclaim, "That one didn't count!" Now he is about to march his supporters into much a higher stakes contest of undeniable importance.