Mitt Romney might get the biggest benefit out of a Sarah Palin candidacy for the Presidency. Alex Massie in The Spectator says Palin would allow Romney to run the kind of campaign he should have run in 2008.
Until now Romney has been tacking towards the nationalist base. But Mitt's not very good at phoney populism and it shows. Put Palin in the race, however, and the equation changes: there's no point in Romney going after the type of voters most attracted to Palin (and, to a lesser extent, Mike Huckabee) which, mercifully for him, might spare Romney the embarrassment of trying, once again, to be something he's not. That would give Romney the space, and the motivation, to focus on what he does best: present himself as the problem-solvig technocrat who knows how to get things done.
Massie says Romney is never going to be an exciting candidate, and with Palin in the race, he doesn’t have to be.
In a field of adolescent midgets (thus far) Romney has the chance to present himself as the only grown-up in the room. Since the GOP, unless it changes the rules, awards delegates on a winner-takes-all basis, Romney only needs a plurality of voters to prevail. When push comes to shove, the Republican party will decide against lobotomising itself.
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If the heiarchy likes being 2nd, or wants to go the way of the Wig Party, they better get two things straight: one, stay out of state selection of candidates (i.e., Crist in Florida and the congressional race in New York. There are more than that of course, but you get the idea).
Second, stick with the conservative stance on fiscal policy. Those moderates elected from 1998 to 2006 became rino's once in office.
I quit contributing to the party when it decided McCain was the guy in Florida. When the party's heiarchy made that choice, I vowed that, unless the party changed its format and left it to the most votes wins, then I, along with hundreds of people I know, will not support the GOP anymore. It should not be a winner take all, but an aggregate of all states. Oh, and lose the super Tuesday gimmick, otherwise I may never see another republican president in my time.