Even if it is just a narrative to last us a news cycle or three, keep this in mind before settling on the Santorum-is-next-in-line idea...
Santorum's wins weren't wins for Santorum -- they were losses for Romney.
- Rep. Michele Bachmann was the first anti-Romney who was relevant for about 2 weeks. It was at that point the GOP decided she was better off serving them water.
- Gov. Rick Perry had a meteoric rise in August/September and was considered the shoo-in by many on this site (one of whom told me to change my major and drop out of college for not accepting that as fact), then collapsed just as fast after his series of potentially inebriated missteps.
- Herman Cain rose right after Perry and fell off not after he was exposed as a serial sexual assaulter, but after it came out that he had a consensual affair (yay Republican values!).
- Former Rep. Newt Gingrich rose as a "please don't let Santorum be it" candidate and Romney effectively destroyed him with his own words in a barrage of ads.
- Former Sen. Rick Santorum was the last anti-Romney standing at the right time. If Santorum had peaked earlier, it could have been any of the original 8 standing there today resigning to defeat.
Santorum's future is about as predictable as the chance of rain at 4PM next election day. Since the GOP nominates by whose turn it is, it very well could be Santorum. 4 years is an eternity in politics, though. Remember 4 years ago, when all the pundits were just convinced that Sarah Palin would be the nominee right now?
Yeah.
I've seen more and more people run towards that Santorum 2016 prospect, and I just wanted to put it in perspective a bit.