Jay Cost of the Weekly Standard thinks that Mitt Romney’s frontrunner status is a matter of “dumb luck.” The reason Romney stumbled into the lead in the GOP nomination race is that there very few other possibilities, given the types of people who, historically, have won the nomination — i.e., senators, governors, and high-ranking administration officials. In fact, Cost narrows the pool of Republicans who fit the traditional criteria of nominees to just a handful, most of whom declined to run:
In other words, Cost is arguing, Romney looks like he will win the GOP nomination simply because no one else was around to take it (other than Perry, who’s been unable to mount an effective campaign against Romney so far).
