An increasingly despairing Erick Erickson goes there:
I think it is time to move beyond wishful thinking and take seriously the idea of having a brokered convention with someone other than the current crop of candidates becoming the nominee...The candidates in this race are good people, but none of them are proving to be of a caliber of conservative leader we should be putting on the field to take on the socialist in the White House.
The odds of a brokered convention are slim to none now. But I think we might need to have a conversation about it. The soft support so many primary voters have for their candidates and the number of undecided voters out there suggests there is room for a better person.
And it isn't just a lone conservative blogger who's getting down about a Republican field in disarray. New from Gallup:
Republicans' enthusiasm about voting in the election for president next year has decreased, with 49% of Republicans and independents who lean Republican now saying they are more enthusiastic than usual about voting, down from 58% in September. This narrows the gap between them and Democrats, 44% of whom are more enthusiastic than usual, essentially the same as in September.
Who knows, the regretful Tim Pawlenty might get his second chance yet, while having spared himself a lot of debates and rubber chicken dinners in the process.