Surprising absolutely no one, Romney to endorse Rubio

I suppose I should preface all of this with a "grain of salt warning." If any website is less qualified to discuss the inner workings of GOP politics than the Huffington Post... well, I suppose it would be Salon or the Daily Kos. Since HuffPo is not quite that bad, we'll pass this along. Allegedly, they have sources indicating that Mitt Romney will endorse Marco Rubio sometime tomorrow.

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In a major development in the Republican presidential race, 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney will endorse Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) for president, The Huffington Post has learned from two Republican sources Details of Romney's endorsement were still being worked out as of Sunday morning. The sources said that the former Massachusetts governor had been eager to provide his backing to Rubio for days but had hesitated, due to his respect for former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R), who suspended his campaign on Saturday night following his dismal fourth-place showing in the South Carolina primary. Romney spent the day in Utah on Saturday and could potentially be in position to bestow his blessing upon Rubio before Tuesday's Nevada Republican caucuses--a contest that Romney won easily in both 2008 and 2012.

A cursory glance at the political corners of the interwebs would have you believing that this is a yuuuge deal. It isn't. Here's why: 1. While it may hold some weight in Utah and (possibly) Massachusetts, Romney's endorsement will mean little elsewhere. While we heard rumblings of a "draft Mitt" movement last year, Romney's political capital is - to be blunt - negligible. He has small pockets of support, and he's a prominent name, but he's not some kind of kingmaker. Yes Obama's failures have been proving him right ever since 2012, but that doesn't really translate into influence.

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Marco is about to learn that "prominent" and "influential" aren't synonyms. 2. Romney is the ultimate establishment guy in an anti-establishment year. If there's one thing we know to be true, it's that people on both sides of the aisle are flat-out sick of their party's power brokers. Romney, as recently as last month, was being floated as an establishment to the entire GOP field. 3. He already lost. When you're the party out of power, there's a bit of pageantry surrounding the previous nominee's endorsement. But that's all it really is. A previous loser is not someone who can do much to rally his party - particularly when he was soundly rejected by the base. Everyone around here regards Mitt Romney as a good man. He would have been an infinitely better President than Obama. However, he feels a lot like Jeb Bush in that he's a guy whose time has simply passed. His endorsement may generate headlines at mainstream or left-wing websites, but it won't generate votes - at least not in meaningful quantities. UPDATE: Supposedly, this is going to happen tomorrow. According to reports, it would have happened earlier, but Romney didn't want to upset Jeb. Also supposedly, Rubio is denying that Romney supports him - maybe because of the three reasons mentioned above. Sounds like there may be some "please don't" jockeying going on behind the scenes. We shall see....

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