The three spoilers

Dick Morris gets one right:

The big problem in finding a conservative challenger to run for the GOP nomination is not the absence of a genuine constituency, nor is it even enthusiasm for ex-New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Right-wingers who would pass the litmus test — guys like former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback, Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo, California Rep. Duncan Hunter, former Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson, or even ex-Tennessee Sen. and famous actor Fred Thompson — face the need to climb over the political corpses of former Speaker New Gingrich (Ga.) and ex-Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney to make their case.

The purist pro-life, pro-gun, anti-gay believers who used to dominate the Republican primary are still so focused on other candidates that they can’t turn their attention to one of their own. They lament Sen. John McCain’s (Ariz.) apostasy on issues like taxes, campaign-finance reform, global warming, and terrorist interrogation and can’t concentrate on supporting an alternative.

Romney, who is panting after their support, is a political duck decoy, distracting onlookers from focusing their gaze on the real conservatives who might run. He can’t win. He can’t get nominated or even become the consensus candidate of the right wing. He’s too Mormon (it shouldn’t be an issue, but it is) and flip-flop-flipped from pro-life to pro-choice and back again. These problems, combined with his flip-flops on gay rights and stem cell research, make him incapable of becoming the right-wing candidate to oppose Giuliani.

Newt Gingrich still sends thrills down Republican spines but won’t say whether or not he’s running until the fall of 2007. By that time, Rudy will probably have $40 million or $50 million in the bank and will be en route to triple digits. Newt is a bright guy who must know that the convergence of primaries on Feb. 5 makes a late entry politically unfeasible. So I don’t think he’s running.

But neither McCain, as he fades, nor Romney, as he sputters, nor Gingrich, as he waits, are getting out of the way to let right-wingers attract support. These three well-known candidates are standing in the way, blocking one of the lesser-known candidates from emerging.

It's not been that long since Morris was saying that only McCain could win, then it was only Rudy who could win. But this time he's correct.

Romney has no chance, and it isn't because he's a Mormon. It is because he has one too many perfectly timed flip-flops to ever be seen as credible. McCain by this time realizes that he is never going to be president, but will stay in the race till the bitter (and it will be very bitter) end so that he can gain a measure of revenge against conservatives by being a spoiler. As for Newt, he is living in a fantasy world in which a tidal wave of support will materialize and sweep him into the White House by acclamation (sort of like what Mrs. Bill Clinton was expecting).

Of course this isn't going to happen. On the other hand Newt may be maneuvering for a VP slot. In that case it would pay Thompson to pick up the phone ASAP.