What if Romney managaed to defeat John McCain, say by winning any one of the primaries or caucuses he lost before Super Tuesday? Presuming he faces Obama and loses, what would be the effects? How bad would the loss be? Would the Democrats have bigger or samller congressional majorities, and how would this effect the Obama presidency, say either allowing for a public option or causing Obamacare to fail to pass? Who would run in 2012 and who would be the GOP nominee in 2012? How would the alternate 2012 go? What if?
Mittens the Romneybot had a lot of problems in ’08. He had low name recognition and there was the ‘Mormon problem’, which subsequently evaporated in ’12. He out-spent Huckacluck in Iowa by a factor of about five, but still only came second, so I’m not sure how he could have done any better. – and he needed to, as he had banked on coming first in both Iowa and New Hampshire. He then lost to McCain in NH by five points and after that the writing was kind of on the wall for him. He won Michigan by trading off his father’s name and also Nevada, partly from the Mormon thing, but then lost South Carolina by a lot (he came fourth) and then lost Florida to McCain, who became the front runner thereafter.
If there had been a scandal involving Huckacluck before Iowa then maybe, just maybe, he might have scraped home, but I’m not sure what else it would have taken. I did hear that all the other candidates hated him. As for a running mate I don’t think that he would have gambled on Caribou Barbie, but gone for someone boring, like Pawlenty perhaps.
I think that the Democratic candidate would still have been Obama and I also think that he would have walloped the Romneybot as easily as he walloped McCain – the economy is still going to fall apart in September-October, there’s still going to be the need to pass TARP. However, perhaps Mittens wouldn’t have unwittingly uncorked the poison and hate that McCain did from the lower regions of the GOP base.