It feels less guaranteed every day that rank-and-file Republicans would vote for their nominee in huge numbers no matter what. Who wants four more years of this Obama crap. Everybody knows Obama is over his head. And the economy is all Obama’s, the whole screwed up pile.
Mitt Romney is the most improbable of presidential candidates: a weak juggernaut. He is poised to sweep every primary contest — a first for a non-incumbent. And yet, in Republican ranks there’s an abiding sense that he should be beatable — and beaten.
It’s not that Romney doesn’t have fans. His events here in New Hampshire are packed to the rafters and feel like general election rallies. He’s surging in polls in South Carolina and Florida.
And yet the non-Mitt mood just won’t go away. Indeed, it’s intensifying. One reason is that people are starting to doubt whether he is in fact the best candidate to beat President Obama. For instance, you hear conservatives wondering more and more whether all of the attention from the White House is a head fake. Romney certainly makes a convenient foil for a presidential campaign already in populist overdrive.
I think that’s overdone. Romney has his faults, but he’s non-threatening. He seems more like the super-helpful manager at a rental car company than a Bible thumper. The White House would love the opportunity to run against a culture warrior. It seems many in the media would like the same thing. Hence the absurd grilling of the candidates in Saturday night’s ABC/Yahoo/WMUR-TV debate.
