Romney ran a state - a very liberal state at that - and had to deal with legislatures and budgets. A governor trumps Senators and Congressmen in as far as experience. But I agree that Romney was not any more influential than Huckabee and far less influential than Rush or Palin.
Romney was a poor Governor. Romney got a "C" rating from CATO. And that was BEFORE
Romney's Socialized medicine and coverup of the BIGdig kicked in. So the RomneyBOTs try to "spin history".
Note also that Romney also betrayed President Bush as Governor
(predicting what TeamROMNEY would do later in Election2008 to Gov. Palin, and then the GOP - i.e. Spoiler Romney-backstabbing),
because Romney was also against the conservative tax cuts. Here are the facts from CATO.
"As U.S. real output grew 13 percent between 2002 and 2006, Massachusetts trailed at 9 percent.
* Manufacturing employment fell 7 percent nationwide those years, but sank 14 percent under Romney, placing Massachusetts 48th among the states.
* Between fall 2003 and autumn 2006, U.S. job growth averaged 5.4 percent, nearly three times Massachusetts' anemic 1.9 percent pace.
* While 8 million Americans over age 16 found work between 2002 and 2006, the number of employed Massachusetts residents actually declined by 8,500 during those years.
"Massachusetts was the only state to have failed to post any gain in its pool of employed residents," professors Sum and McLaughlin concluded.
In an April 2003 meeting with the Massachusetts congressional delegation in Washington, Romney failed to endorse President Bush's $726 billion tax-cut proposal."
[Cato Institute annual Fiscal Policy Report Card - America's Governors, 2004.]