Oh dear. reasonable, objective analysis. Prepare to get flamed.
I will say that when people look back at this time, the diarrhea of press verbiage about a "brokered convention" will be perceived as perhaps the dumbest non-story in political history.
Agree that with the current mix of candidates, Romney appears headed for the nomination. But with the four becoming three or two...maybe that would change? Or not.
It is beginning to look that way, and it may be too late to alter the trend. Had either Santorum or Gingrich dropped out and thrown their support to the other, the anti-Romney vote would have carried Ohio tonight.
A couple of observations that may be unpopular. :) I note that Santroum nearly won Michigan and will come in second in Ohio by a very slim margin; I believe his social conservatism is helping him, not hurting him, with GOP voters in the Midwest, and that he is much more appealing to blue collar GOP voters than Newt (but I'm not sure why, he just is). Also, I thought Santorum would win Ohio outright, and Romney's strength here was a bit surprising, given how close Michigan was last week. One more: I think Romney, if nominated, will have strong appeal to independent and Democrat voters (those that aren't bat-crap crazy libs) in November. People are looking for an excuse to ditch Obama, and even a weak conservative like Romney will benefit from that. Remember, McCain was leading the polls in Ohio until his disastrous response to the financial panic of September, 2008.
The unadulterated good news of the evening is that GOP turnout was significantly higher than in 2008, which has to be depressing to the Socialists.
California is not winner-take-all this year.
There are **MAJOR** opportunities in some of the heavily Democratic congressional districts, where Republican voters are almost entirely Asian or Hispanic businessmen and evangelical or Roman Catholic church members, to have a major win for Santorum if he can get his organizational skills up where they need to be.
The agricultural Central Valley also presents possibilities for traditional white conservative voters.
Several weeks ago on Free Republic, I outlined a potential plan to reach Korean voters in the major urban areas. Very similar plans could be used to reach Hispanic evangelicals and Hispanic Catholics.
Gingrich probably could do something similar by organizing anti-Communist sentiments among Vietnamese and Korean voters, and among Hispanic businessmen.
If that doesn't happen, Romney's money will likely dominate the state due to the very expensive cost for media buys. But that does not need to happen.