It's also hard to imagine Romney winning the nom if he continues to bumble and stumble as he did the past week.

HERE

would that be a veiled threat to run as an independent if they shove him out in the convention or whatever?

He is crazed, true.

But Obama is so used to four years of expressing timid bromides and having them accepted as profound rhetoric that I wonder how he would look next to Newt in a debate.

And, as I have mentioned, they are on the same page (expressed or veiled) with some of the most reprehensible assaults on our civil liberties. I would imagine that they are also on the same page (expressed or veiled) with respect to the continuation of rendition, keeping Gitmo open, aggression toward Iran, drug busts, the ordered assassination of an American citizen accused of supporting terrorism, the indefinite detention of American citizens without charge or trial --- etc.

Personally, I don't trust Obama to make truly enlightened decisions with respect to new Justices of the S.C. either. But I would have to admit that Newt would probably pick someone much, much lower on the evolutionary scale. And if Roe is the issue, I have yet to read something forthright and totally unambiguous from Obama about guaranteeing a woman's right to choose whether or not to bring a child to term.

But, that having been said, I think we make a mistake cheering and dropping balloons at the prospect of Newt being the Republican nominee. I think a contest with Obama would be fierce. At this time, I think Romney, who is a nothing, would easily be brushed aside. This is contrary to accepted wisdom, I realize.