Romney and Huckabee compared to McCain

[Landslide Lyndon]

     Option three. McCain really was the best candidate the GOP had. Considering how badly he was ravaged in the campaign, imagine what would have happened to Romney or Huckabee.

That was the CW back then. But it can be debatable now.

For all his cons, Romney wouldn't have been drowned by Obama's money machine. He could speak with authority about the economy, even while the Democrats would criticise him for his CEO past.
He would have run a much more organised and disciplined campaign. And of course he wouldn't have botched so badly his vice-presidential choice.

Same with Huckabee. He would have mobilised the religious base, while at the same time he was still a likable figure for everyone else. And his populist rhetoric would allow him to denounce the bailout and Wall Street more forcefully and convincingly than McCain (not to mention of course that he wouldn't be burdened by the vote for it), thus hitting Obama from the left on the economic front.

I think that both of them would have started way more behind than were McCain started his GE campaign last March. But in the end they would have ended with pretty much the same votes like him.     

[Landslide Lyndon]

     Option three. McCain really was the best candidate the GOP had. Considering how badly he was ravaged in the campaign, imagine what would have happened to Romney or Huckabee.

That was the CW back then. But it can be debatable now.

For all his cons, Romney wouldn't have been drowned by Obama's money machine. He could speak with authority about the economy, even while the Democrats would criticise him for his CEO past.
He would have run a much more organised and disciplined campaign. And of course he wouldn't have botched so badly his vice-presidential choice.

Same with Huckabee. He would have mobilised the religious base, while at the same time he was still a likable figure for everyone else. And his populist rhetoric would allow him to denounce the bailout and Wall Street more forcefully and convincingly than McCain (not to mention of course that he wouldn't be burdened by the vote for it), thus hitting Obama from the left on the economic front.

I think that both of them would have started way more behind than were McCain started his GE campaign last March. But in the end they would have ended with pretty much the same votes like him.     

     I think that Romney would have been obliterated due to appearing too corporate, so to speak (especially after the credit crunch). My opinion of him as improved a lot since then though, so I'm not so sure of that anymore.

     Huckabee's likability could only carry him so far. We saw in the primaries that it carried him to victory in Iowa. Once people learned what his views were like things started to change.

I agree with you, but I can't say for sure that Romney's corporatism would turn off the voters worse than McCain's cluelessness and erratic behavior. And the media seemed to be awfully deferent to Romney and his ''economic expertise'' back in September.

Huckabee's problem wasn't his ideas but the fact that he split the conservative, evangelical vote with Thompson in South Carolina. Had he won there, he would have a real shot at the nomination.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Romney's economic policies wouldn't exactly have endeared him to Ohio....no way he carries it in 2008.

His credibility on economic issues would've pushed him over the top. McCain only lost there by 2 points.

McCain lost by FOUR points. And that's because he was an appealing choice culturally to those Appalachians, working class whites.
I doubt they would had behaved the same if Obama's alternative was a Massachusets multimillionaire whose whole presence screamed ''FAKE''.