In a recent opinion piece for The Weekly Standard, conservative commentator William Kristol writes that Mitt Romney’s nomination is “all too evitable.”
“Republicans…will be especially wary of proclamations of inevitability that come from media who do not have conservatives’ best interests at heart,” writes Kristol, pointing out that polling has never confirmed Romney to be a clear frontrunner, and that Newt Gingrich leads Romney in several recent surveys.
“And even if Gingrich fades,” writes Kristol, “let’s not assume it’s over. Bachmann and Santorum could still have a run in Iowa.”
Kristol also says that a fragmented field could pave the way for an undeclared candidate to enter the race: “If [Bachmann and Santorum] continue to trail badly, it’s not out of the question that someone else could still present himself in mid-December to the citizens of Iowa (Hi there, Mike Huckabee! Hello, Sara Palin!).”
Kristol even speculates that “Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio [could] win the January 31 Florida primary as…write-in candidate[s]” if the Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina contests “produce fragmented results.”
