Mitt Romney Will Be Endorsing Has Endorsed John McCain

Laura Ingraham’s “conservatives’ conservative” is set to endorse John McCain this afternoon for the GOP nomination:

Republican campaign dropout Mitt Romney agreed Thursday to endorse Sen. John McCain and asked his national convention delegates to swing behind the party front-runner, according to officials familiar with the decision.

Romney collected 280 delegates during his run through the early primaries and caucuses. If enough of them switch, McCain could quickly reach the total of 1,191 needed to clinch the nomination.

The officials who disclosed Romney’s plans did so on condition of anonymity. A formal announcement was expected later in the day.

The former Massachusetts governor dropped out of the race last week after it became apparent that toppling McCain would be near impossible given his lead in the hunt for convention delegates.

Excuse me, AP: Romney suspended his campaign, he didn’t technically drop out (see, I can be fair to Objectively Unfit Mitt when it’s called for :–>).

Those with reality-based knowledge of Mitt Romney’s record, and the willingness to acknowledge his worse-than-Bob-Taft record, are justifiably concerned that Romney’s endorsement, and especially any active involvement he might have in the McCain campaign, will move the Arizona Senator even further to the left. This would EXclude pundit Ann Coulter, who still indulges in the fantasy that Romney is a “strong conservative”; talkers including but not limited to Ingraham, Rush, Sean Hannity, and Mark Levin; a host of others who should know better; and a host of still others who do know better.

Let’s hope that the real Romnian influence is minimal, or, even better, zero.

Hold the line, and then tack right, John. That would be in the opposite direction of what Mitt Romney has done, as the historical record shows that what Romney has publicly said in the interest of getting elected is of little import.

You can always bone up on the real Romney record here at BizzyBlog, starting at “The Pre-Super Tuesday Comprehensive Objectively Unfit Mitt Romney Index.” Enjoy.

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UPDATE: More needs to be said about this, and it appears that this is the last opportune time.

Hannity claims at the top of every hour that his show is “the best and most comprehensive election coverage on your radio dial,” or something very close to that. Levin likes to say that he “bats cleanup” — that is, he supposedly covers the important topics other hosts have neglected or haven’t gotten around to.

Neither of these gentlemen did anything that I know of to criticize the ongoing implosion of Mitt RomneyCare in Massachusetts and to lay the blame for it solely at the former governor’s feet where it belongs. I believe the closest Hannity got was to read from a Wall Street Journal editorial, while studiously avoiding sentences that referred to Romney’s authorship (I only caught the last 2/3 or so of his riff on this, so I’m not absolutely sure). I don’t think Levin touched on it at all, though I obviously didn’t catch every hour of his program. If someone can show me otherwise, I’m open to getting contrary info.

I saw this coming in October (not that it too any special prescience to see it) — The RomneyCare crackup is a huge story that would have sunk a Romney presidential campaign as surely as the fall-apart of Michael Dukakis’s “Massachusetts Miracle” did in 1988. If we had listened to the two usually distinguished gentlemen just noted, we’d have faced an electoral disaster of Goldwater proportions — with no “in your heart, you know he’s right” consolation. It also should sink any crazy-talk of a McCain-Romney ticket.

This was neither gentleman’s finest hour. May they return to a grip on reality.

UPDATE 2, 9:45 p.m.: Ann Coulter doesn’t plan on returning to reality any time soon. The idea that a John McCain would govern more liberally than Hillary has no basis, and tons of contradictory evidence.

UPDATE 3, 10:00 p.m.: Michelle Malkin committed a rare unforced error yesterday in connection with all of this when she acted as if conservative talk radio in general is under assault.

First of all, Mark Helprin should have spared us the insults, and he frankly owes a few people an apology. Beyond that, his “conservatives, get a grip” message was pretty accurate.

It’s absolutely jaw-dropping to see the same talkers who have been wailing against HillaryCare and socialized medicine for the past 15-16 years totally ignore the fact that Mitt Romney actually put it into place in Massachusetts. Then they lionized the guy as a conservative. That’s pure horse manure, and as I said above, not their finest hour. They need to be called out when they’ve screwed up, Michelle, and they screwed up bigtime with their “McCain bad, Romney good” schtick.

UPDATE 4: Here’s the beginning of the report on Romney’s endorsement of McCain —

Republican campaign dropout Mitt Romney endorsed John McCain for the party’s presidential nomination and asked his national convention delegates to swing behind the likely nominee.

“Even when the contest was close and our disagreements were debated, the caliber of the man was apparent,” the former Massachusetts governor said, standing alongside his one-time rival at his now-defunct campaign’s headquarters. “This is a man capable of leading our country at a dangerous hour.”

Will McCain’s critics give an inch based on Romney’s endorsement?