Romney can win the Texas primary and Texas in the general election against any Democrat, should it come to that. He can certainly sweep the south against HRC, and it wouldnt hurt to have Haley Barbour on the ticket to nail that down tight.
As for Feb 5, it hinges on Florida. If Romney wins Florida, he will be competitive in any southern state which has voters who oppose McCain’s amnesty bill.
The only wrinkle is that Huckabee pulls enough social conservatives to give McCain plurality wins and may do so on Feb 5th even if he comes in 4th or 5th in Florida. (Huck’s pretty much done.)
Huckabee has been McCain’s god send, by splitting the fiscal cons from the social cons. McCain is able to win with lower total votes than he got in 2000, but today he is running against Huck and Romney, while in 2000 G W Bush united the Romney and Huck voting pools to defeat McCain. If Huckabee were truly out of the picture, then Romney could and would be competitive everywhere in the south against McCain on feb 5th, and would beat HRC everywhere there as well.
You are absolutely correct. Mitt is so organized and smart that it is a pleasure to watch. He is taking everything one step at a time. He has competed in every state so far and done well. When he needed to win, like in Michigan, he pulled his ads everywhere else concentrated and won by nine points. He pulled out of SC and let the others bankrupt themselves while he went to Nevada and picked up a bunch of delegates. Now Fred is out, Huck and Rudy are broke and McCain is falling like a rock in Florida. He is concentrating all his effort in Florida. Did you see the list of people in Florida that are endorsing Mitt. That was lined up last year I would bet. Long before the rest of them even thought about running. I bet he has done the same thing in the other states he will need.