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Romney thus far has won 52% of the delegates. If he continues on that track, he will win the nomination.

Respectfully, you are incorrect.

1. Currently he needs 46% of the remaining delagates to win the nomination outright.
2. As he loses more and more of the remaining non-Winner-Take-All states or simply wins in the 20% to 30% range, that number will climb to close to 60%
3. There are only 8 winner-take-all state primaries left with only 388 delegates combined.
4. As the false perception that Romney is both inevitable and the only one that can win wears off, and it is wearing off with his string of recent losses, this will put pressure on his ability to win big in the rest of the races.
5. Both Newt and Rick need to stay in the race in order to ensure that all delegates that can be taken away from Mitt can be taken away. Additionally, Newt needs to stay in the race to ensure that Rick does not pre-maturely give up and throw the election to Mitt.

Romney can't win, not outright, he'll have to convince everyone at a brokered convention.

Your numbers are correct: I wish I agreed entirely with your analysis, and I stress I very much hope you’re right in it!

My perception is a little more negative, however: California is key, and it’s (a) the biggest state in terms of delegate numbers (b) winner-take-all and (c) strongly favorable to Romney, as things stand.

If he DOES win California’s 172 delegates, he needs only 39% of the remaining delegates from all other outstanding contests, to take the nomination outright: doable, unfortunately, especially with the conservative vote as split as it is.

If, on the other hand, he DOESN’T take CA (irrespective of who else does), he then needs 55% of all other remaining delegates to take the nomination outright: which is a tall order and one he’s unlikely to meet.