The Long Game: Mitt Vs. Huck in 2012

The race for the 2012 Republican nomination is on, with the two early leaders—Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee—using this year’s campaign, in very different ways, to position themselves for what many in the party privately believe will be an open nomination.

Granted, it’s somewhat premature to discuss the 2012 race when John McCain, who is now the presumptive nominee, actually leads Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama (slightly) in some polls. If McCain wins in the fall (and seeks a second term at age 76) then there probably won’t be any room for Mr. Romney or Mr. Huckabee or anyone else four years from now.

But the same was true back in 1996, when Lamar Alexander and Steve Forbes came up short in the primaries and immediately started laying the groundwork for follow-up bids in 2000—even while publicly professing that they expected Bob Dole to be running for reelection that year.

Both Mr. Romney and Mr. Huckabee are well aware of the G.O.P.’s tendency to nominate the candidate whose “turn” it is, a pattern that—in a very roundabout way—has reaffirmed itself with the success of Mr. McCain, the second-place candidate from the last open Republican contest. In fact, George W. Bush is the only non-incumbent Republican since Barry Goldwater to win the presidential nomination on his first try.

And with Mr. McCain emerging as the nominee and quite possibly facing defeat in the fall, the race between Mr. Huckabee and Mr. Romney seems to be on to play the next-in-line role in 2012.

There was no accident in the setting Mitt Romney chose to end his 2008 presidential bid. In front of some of the right’s truest believers at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, he presented his withdrawal as a patriotic act of self-sacrifice, sparing his party a protracted nomination fight and freeing Republicans to unite against the Democrats and “a surrender to terror.”

He might just as well have announced his ‘12 candidacy on the spot. The CPAC attendees represent the conservative activists who Mr. Romney tried mightily to unite behind his candidacy this year. He had some success, but not quite enough. Now he has four years to try again.

“I will continue to stand for conservative principles,” he told the crowd. “I will fight alongside you for all the things we believe in.”

Mr. Romney’s introduction to national Republicans this past year was rough, the result of endless revelations about the decidedly nonconservative positions he took and rhetoric he used for a decade in Massachusetts that undercut his efforts to sell himself as an ideologically pure conservative. While this prevented him from unifying the right, it is a testament to the power of his appearance and style that so many conservatives did flock to him and willingly rationalized his voluminous inconsistencies.

The good news for Mr. Romney is that the charges of flagrant and disingenuous opportunism that haunted him for the past year will be old news by 2011 and 2012. To retain his viability, he doesn’t have to turn around and run for office in liberal Massachusetts again or hold any public office, thus sparing him from having to make uncomfortable decisions that could put him at odds with the conservative base—like the hundreds of millions of dollars in increased “fees” he used to balance the Massachusetts budget in 2003.

Mr. Romney is now a household name to national Republicans. He can spend the next four years sounding as conservative as he wants, only making it easier for the party base to forget about his Massachusetts liberalism. Rest assured, he’ll be at every CPAC meeting between now and 2012. And you can expect to see him on Fox News as often as they’ll have him and to be a favorite talk radio guest.

Starting about two years ago, Mr. Romney modulated his tone to synch up with conservatives opinion on literally every subject. When conservatives learned how dramatically different his new style was from his old one, some grew suspicious. To them, Mr. Romney may sound more consistent and credible come 2012.

Right now, Mr. Romney’s main competition for the “next in line” distinction is Mr. Huckabee, who vowed to stay in the race even as the media declared the contest over upon Mr. Romney’s exit.

Huckabee knows that this year’s presidential nomination is out of reach. But the vice presidential slot on Mr. McCain’s ticket is not. A spot on the national ticket would offer Mr. Huckabee an invaluable opportunity to expand his name recognition and political base and to repudiate the notion that his appeal is limited to Christian conservatives.

No doubt, Mr. Huckabee is aware of the example of Lloyd Bentsen, whose immortal put-down of Dan Quayle in the 1988 vice presidential debate turned him into a hero to Democrats across the country. Bentsen, who had failed miserably in a 1976 presidential bid, could have mounted a credible bid for the 1992 nomination had he chosen to.

Mr. Romney would surely love to be this year’s V.P. pick as well, but that role for him is out of the question, given Mr. McCain’s scornful view of him. By contrast, Mr. McCain seems to think very highly of Mr. Huckabee, with whom he forged an informal and enduring alliance just before the Iowa caucuses—an alliance that directly contributed to Romney’s failures in Iowa, New Hampshire and Florida, and across the South on Super Tuesday.

Even though Mr. Huckabee is technically his opponent now, it’s unlikely that Mr. McCain will exert much pressure on him to drop out immediately, since Mr. Huckabee poses no threat to Mr. McCain’s nomination and isn’t about to launch an even remotely negative campaign against the presumptive nominee.

In fact, if Mr. McCain does want to put Mr. Huckabee on the ticket, it might be best for Mr. Huckabee to stay in the race longer. That’s because elements of the conservative establishment regard Mr. Huckabee as disloyal because of his populist economic views. But if Mr. Huckabee can draw sizable support in the upcoming primaries—Virginia and Texas offer potential opportunities for him—then Mr. McCain could make the case that he has to put Mr. Huckabee on the ticket in order to keep Christian conservatives motivated.

Right now, Mr. Huckabee has proven only that he can attract support in the South and in states where born-again Christian voters hold disproportionate sway. Mr. Romney has demonstrated at least the potential to build a broader coalition. If Mr. Huckabee can finagle the No. 2 slot on this year’s ticket, he could alter those perceptions. If he can‘t, then Mr. Romney probably enters 2012 with an edge over him.

Unless, of course, John McCain wins this fall.