This could happen, but the die-hard Romney haters will have to wake up. Please don’t ban me again for telling the truth.
Actually, there is no "middle" since the American electorate can be described as laid out along a bi-modal saddle.
You are either part of the two broad coalition groups ~ variously described as parties, or you are part of a thin fringe out there in the wilderness around those two large groups, or modes!
Barry Goldwater came up with this discovery, but he was not able to exercise it. Instead Lyndon Baines Johnson listened carefully and used it to carve his way to a landslide.
Barry did know what hit him!
Later Richard NIxon used it twice, as did Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton.
The deal is YOU HOLD YOUR BASE while peeling off a coalition partner from the other mode or "Pole".
If you make a dive for the middle, there's nobody there to start with, and your own base will stay home!
It's highly probable that with Romney running against Obama that both of these guys will dive for the middle ~ find nobody there, and then chase everybody home. I expect the fewest number of presidential votes in the last 125 years!
The rest of the race may go along as usual and Republicans should pick up the Senate while keeping the House. But that Presidential thing has to do with who loses the fewest votes from the base, not at all about attracting more votes from the other guy's base.
I think this signals the destruction of the Presidency as a viable office. It's an antiquated 18th century theory no longer of much utility.
So,now you don't just want Obama out, you want Romney to have a landslide mandate?