Not to put a damper on your obviously building temper tantrum, but did you know that Mitt Romney was a registered Independent who voted for Paul Tsongas in the 1992 Democrat primary?
"Look, I was an independent during the time of Reagan-Bush. I'm not trying to take us back to Reagan-Bush." - Mitt Romney, during the 1994 Senate race in Massachusetts.
We'd still have gotten in Cucinelli ~
Then, in the 2012 Virginia primary Romney would have probably pulled between 11% to 15% of the vote clearly identifying him as a weak handmaiden best consigned to a subcabinet post ~ or maybe to Department of Commerce.