Barrett: Pelosi, Romney and others who are 'better than Obama'

Chewing glass. Euthanizing unwanted puppies. Watching "Diff'rent Strokes" reruns.

Ask a lot of GOP voters, and those or similar activities are what they're apt to tell you they equate with the prospect of making Mitt Romney their standard bearer in 2012.

Yes, I know Romney has held the lead in polls more than any other GOP candidate has over the past few months. But he's nowhere near the 50 percent mark, and a chunk of voters are still undecided. So assuming you don't count Jon Huntsman -- and why would you? -- Romney is benefiting from being the only guy to the left of a heavily populated, divided conservative field.

And that's evidently a shaky place to be.

A number of the other GOP candidates -- one after another, in one way or another -- have leapt ahead of him at least briefly. Michele Bachmann won the Iowa straw poll, and Ron Paul was a close second. Rick Perry soared past Romney just days after entering the race, then faltered in debates.

Now Herman Cain is burning up the polls. He beat Obama in a head-to-head match-up and is tying or surpassing Romney in the all-skate that makes up the GOP contest at the moment.

So far as I can tell, Cain has solid conservative credentials on major issues. He hasn't called people heartless for rejecting illegal immigration (Perry). He doesn't have scary views on national defense (Paul). He doesn't have to claim ownership of the health reform on which ObamaCare was modeled (Romney). And he's not a former Obama administration official (Huntsman).

Cain's general avoidance of things that make conservatives irritable dovetails with his embodiment of the best traits of his GOP opponents.

Romney all but admits that Cain is his match in business experience. Issue for issue, Cain is as conservative as Bachmann. He is every bit as willing as Perry to articulate the danger of runaway entitlement costs. He can go toe to toe with Paul in denouncing Washington's attempt to be all things to everyone. And while Cain isn't quite a Gingrich-class destroyer in posing an argument, he can talk trapezoids around most of the Republicans in the fruit basket turnovers that pass for debates this season.

Romney, by contrast, is the ponderous, "it's-my-turn," establishment candidate -- think Bob Dole with less charisma. He is Bush 1 in a time when we need Coolidge. Little in his record as governor of Massachusetts -- least of all budget-frying RomneyCare -- demonstrates boldness about cutting the size of government.

Romney's electoral trouble is his passing resemblance to boiled cabbage. If you're starving, you'll eat it. But you'd prefer pork chops or even a decent burger -- and that ain't Romney.

He's a go-along-to-get-along, conventional candidate who has the misfortune of seeking the White House in unconventional times, when there is a good reason why people are not getting along: They have a profound disagreement not just about the means to reach common goals, but about what the goals themselves ought to be. Will we grow government or will we be a free people? We cannot do both, and there's a limit to how much getting along can be gotten by people whose views on that subject are well nigh mutually exclusive.

It pains me to acknowledge the obvious: that Romney would be an improvement on Obama. But replace "Romney" in that sentence with virtually any name in the phone book and it would still be true. It's not that Romney is appealing; it's that Obama is just so bad. The expansive universe of "better than Obama" might, in the right light, include Nancy Pelosi and Jiminy Cricket.

That's why conservatives abandon Romney in droves every time one of the other Republican hopefuls develops a pulse. It's why they were swooning for Chris Christie before they knew anything about him. And it's why they're now pinning big hopes on Cain. They want somebody -- anybody -- besides Romney.

And they may get it.

If candidates such as Gingrich and Bachmann start dropping out, it's hard to imagine their supporters slouching leftward to Romney. Enough early departures from the field could doom him fast, as primary voters coalesce around whichever conservative candidates remain.

Those survivors may or may not include Cain. But the air of inevitability that Romney is trying to create is suspiciously premature -- and in direct proportion to the wobbliness of his candidacy.

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