A Brokered Convention

Now that he's won the last three primaries, Rick Santorum is certainly not going to drop out of the Republican race any time soon. Having won South Carolina and still doing well in the national polls, neither, I expect, is Newt Gingrich.  Paul and Romney have the money and organization to stay in until the end no matter what.

This could mean nobody has a majority of delegates by the convention. And if this happens, if my memory serves, delegates are released from their pledge to a given candidate after the first ballot. The possibility opens for the convention to turn to a candidate who has not run in the primaries. moreover, there would be a certain obvious logic to doing so--a general dissatisfaction with the present field seems to be fuelling the voter indecision.

I suspect Romney has blown his chance to be the nominee by going too negative. Negative campaigning does have a tendency to blow up the author as well as the target. Romney was rather unloved by fellow Republicans before this all started; his extremely harsh attacks on Gingrich, added to that, may have made it impossible for the party to unite behind him.