A while a year ago I thought any conservative, including Palin, could beat Obama, over the last six mints talking with OH voters, there is no way other candidates could have pulled this off.
First---and this is critical in he cases of Palin, Santorum, and Newt---none of them has anywhere near the managerial skill or organization to do this. I know people close to both Newt and Palin---friends and very tight confidents--- who have gone on at length about their poor organizational and staffing skills.
I know some don't like hearing this but I know that decision akin in Palin's early organization was horrifically sluggish because she simply wouldn't delegate---everything had to be her call alone. Well, sorry, NO successful organization works lie that. In Newt's case, he constantly had four or five balls in the air and couldn't focus on a campaign.
Whatever one think of his ideological shortcomings Mitt figured out Obama's game and beat him with his on GOTV strategies. I think, given the fact at he DOESN'T have that charismatic Reagan-Clinton-Palin quality, it makes the rallies e's holding all he more amazing. A year later, think he is the only person who could have won.