Mitt Romney as the Nominee: Conservatism Dies and Barack Obama Wins

(By Erick Erickson, RedState) - Mitt Romney will not go on 'Special Report with Brett Baier' to answer the tough questions as the other candidates have done. No worries. Conservatives will bitch and moan for a few days and Romney will claim it was a scheduling issue, he’d always meant to go on, and he will go on.

Should Mitt Romney win the Presidency, conservatives will find this pattern play out repeatedly. Romney will head in a direction conservatives do not like and they will bitch and moan repeatedly and maybe, just maybe, he’ll part his hair in their direction.

We’ve seen this play out over and over. Jon Huntsman comes up with the best economic plan of all the candidates, Herman Cain follows up with 999, Perry comes out with a flat tax, and Romney refuses to do anything. Until he does something.

Mitt Romney is not the George W. Bush of 2012 — he is the Harriet Miers of 2012, only conservative because a few conservative grand pooh-bahs tell us Mitt Romney is conservative and for no other reason.