Oh, dry up.
Altura, I am not sure how you can maintain that we are “all sick of the vision thing” when we haven’t had a taste of it for so long.
Neither Bush had it. Dole and McCain didn’t have it.
The vision thing is what makes a political philosophy coherent.
Now, would I settle for a candidate who didn’t have the vision thing, but had reasonably conservative emotions or instincts (e.g. Perry)? Yes. But it is settling.
Romney has consistently behaved as if we are the ones to be managed. He is the one most likely to go Charlie Crist on us, but more likely to take the party with him, if he is POTUS.
Brushing off Santorum as a “loser” when he won a very large northeast state two times out of three and sticking around for a credible challenge on almost no resources means that we will continually accept only pre-screened establishment candidates. That might be okay with you. It might have been okay in the era of Eisenhower. It is not okay now. Too much is at stake. I cannot really consider Romney a winner as he didn’t even stick around for a re-election, which he almost certainly would have lost. He won as a William Weld Republican, he will govern as a William Weld Republican.
You do realize that Romney on the ticket will only depress turnout over the large portion of the country where down ballot Republicans actually win elections. Even now, the talk is that Romney fits the profile of the candidate that will make it closer, but not all that close in the liberal northeast, and will do worse in the rustbelt and the heartland than almost any other candidate (e.g. Santorum, Pawlenty). He’ll get votes because he’s not Obama, but so would Cain and Bachmann.
So, on this discussion site, instead of telling Blackelk to dry up, perhaps because he is reiterating points made before, that remain largely unrebutted, you might actually engage.
No Romney. No Obama. I don’t plan on drying up, either.