Next Up For GOP – Santorum's Pigeon Stew?

If hunting as a campaign photo op is nothing new, there still is the issue of timing and looking the part — which is something Kerry in 2004, as one example, badly failed to execute.

With the GOP campaign endlessly bound up in “anybody but X” and “savior of the month,” it’s easy to dismiss Rick Santorum’s expedition this week as standard fare. On the other hand, with Newt’s month in the sun on the fade and Santorum quicker on the jump off the Christmas lull, it seems the timing of the caucus and the pitch-perfect symbolism of Santorum’s hunting exhibition – replete with the visual dead aim, take-no-prisoners, sick-the-dogs, NRA juice, lone hunter at dawn, John Wayne rhetoric – makes this Rick’s best chance for a trophy.

And then, with Romney and Gingrich looking all-too-blue blood or 1%, maybe Santorum, and his pheasant soup, also gets a boost (at least for a week or so) as the GOP’s blue plate special.

Photographs by Jonathan Gibby who, even if it’s hard to tell, was part of a gaggle of shooters out on the hustings this week.