To paraphrase Reagan, here we go again.

In shades of the Dole and McCain campaigns, conservatives are going to be left out in the cold with the Republican nominee once again. Only a month away from the first primary, we have Newt and Mitt in the putative lead for the Party nomination, neither of which are solid conservatives. Intangible Soul chronicles the issues with Mitt:

In his own words posted here, Mitt Romney seals his fate in my book:

“I’m standing by what I did in Massachusetts,” Romney said on Fox News Channel’s Special Report with Bret Baier. “I’m not trying to dust it aside. I’m absolutely firm that it was the right thing for our state. I’ll defend that and I understand it has political implications.  And if it keeps me from winning a primary, so be it. But that happens to be the truth.”

Even though he stated he is against the mandate for health insurance on the Federal level, the fact that he would even stand by it at the State level is very troubling.  If Romney is elected President, there is no doubt in my mind that he will not repeal Obamacare.  I don’t believe he will  since he supports it so much on the state level.  Romney is just another talking head and should not be trusted.

IS also has a litany of Mitt flip flops.

The FOX interview with Bret Baier was a disaster. Says John Podhoretz:

If Romney loses the nomination, this interview will mark the moment at which the slow-motion collapse began.

Newt isn’t the conservative firebrand that he was in 1994. Ron Paul hits him hard from the right:

Who is left? Whether or not he is actually guilty of any of the allegations, Cain has been rendered unelectable by a media hit squad who can find every woman that he ever winked at and yet someone like Obama’s pastor for 20 years, Jeremiah Wright, is completely invisible to. I’ve been vocal about electability, so now that Cain doesn’t have it, I have to consign his candidacy to the dust bin of history. It was great in concept but his amateurish campaign simply was ineffective in combating the sheer volume of allegations of sexual hijinks. I still think that the media pulled a Mandingo strategy on him – and apparently it worked.

Perry and Bachmann are toast by their own self inflicted wounds, Ron Paul is a perennial presidential gadfly who is never seriously considered by a majority. The others are just chaff.

It is down to Mitt and Newt.

No matter how much both talk it down, they are both members of the Republican “establishment”, both have foibles and vulnerabilities but both are electable, a quality that the rest of the field now lacks.

Romney is the darling of the RINO media pundits and will likely skip harsh treatment until the general election. Gingrich is the one-loss BCS bowl buster, having taken his losses very early in his campaign and coming back to finish the season strong to play in the national championship game.

One comforting point – any of the people on the Republican stage would be better than what we have now. Period. Even a whiff of free market policies, smaller government, less governmental interference and low taxes is better than what Obama proposes.

We are crashing headlong to a decision point. There WILL be a nominee. Time will run out. There will be an end to all of this. For me, if it is really a two horse race, I have to choose the one who is least likely to “grow” in office and change his policies after the election.

For me, that appears to be Newt.