Somehow You Knew They'd Get Around To This

Mitt Romney went into his oppo research bag of tricks and found this obvious nugget:

Republican Mitt Romney took aim at John McCain Monday over reports he once considered signing on to John Kerry’s presidential ticket, the latest effort by the Massachusetts Republican to paint his chief rival as an inconsistent and unpredictable conservative.

“I do recall a story that he was thinking about being John Kerry’s running mate — he gave that some thought,” Romney said at an early-morning rally in West Palm Beach. “Had someone asked me that question, there would not have been a nanosecond of thought about it — It would’ve been an immediate laugh. And of course, if someone asked him if he would consider me as a running mate, he would have also laughed immediately.”

“So, we are different,” Romney continued. “I’m conservative.”

I know that everything St. McCain has done immediately goes down the media memory hole, but in 2001 he was openly talking about leaving the Republican Party, and in 2004 McCain actually approached Kerry about joining the ticket as the Vice Presidential nominee.

Romney is obviously pulling out all the stops, because in recent days McCain has regained momentum in Florida, due in part to endorsements from Senator Mel Martinez and the popular governor Charlie Crist. But it is a closed Republican primary, and this re-hash of McCain's past flirtations with the Democratic Party can be combined with this column alleging that McCain would never nominate an open partisan like Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court to confirm the suspicions many Republicans have about the Arizona Senator.

Fund wrote that “Mr. McCain has told conservatives he would be happy to appoint the likes of Chief Justice John Roberts to the Supreme Court. But he indicated he might draw the line on a Samuel Alito, because 'he wore his conservatism on his sleeve.'"

Commenters at conservative blogs such as the The Corner on National Review Online have been churning all morning:

McCain has got to explain himself to conservatives now, on Alito for sure, and on much else as well. While I’m unquestionably concerned about what a McCain nomination might mean for the Republican coalition, I’m not one of those who feels it would necessarily be disastrous. On the contrary, I can see scenarios where McCain and conservatives could patch things up rather well. But this Alito thing is serious. It bugs me, and I need to know more, quickly. McCain needs to forthrightly address conservatives concerns on this and other issues, and he needs to do it before Super Tuesday.

It seems to me that this all is coming a bit late. The winner in Florida is going to absolutely have a leg up going into Super Tuesday, and the time for Romney to stop McCain's momentum was a few days earlier.