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Even worse for Republicans, consider some of the candidates who lost pretty close races in ’02 or ’03: Matt Salmon in Arizona, Bill Simon in California, Jim Ryan in Illinois, Bobby Jindal in Louisiana, Dick Posthumus in Michigan, Steve Largent in Oklahoma and Scott McCallum in Wisconsin. I tend to believe that had they won in 2002, been re-elected in 2006 (and avoided scandal), most of these candidates would be in the presidential mix right now.

The class of 2004 was a small one, so we can dispense with it fairly quickly. Mitch Daniels of Indiana took a pass on running for president, apparently due to personal issues arising in the 1990s; Matt Blunt of Missouri chose not to run in 2008 due to exceedingly low popularity; John Hoeven of North Dakota was just elected to the Senate; and Utah’s Jon Huntsman is running.

Let’s move on to 2005/2006/2007. Here are the winners, again sorted by category:

1) Running for President/Ran in ’08 (Tim Pawlenty, Minnesota; Rick Perry, Texas);

2) Lost in 2010 (Jim Gibbons, Nevada);

3) Term ended in jail and/or major scandal (Mark Sanford, South Carolina);

4) Too darned liberal (Arnold Schwarzenegger, California -- though he could also be placed in the “scandal” category and a “constitutionally ineligible to serve” category; Jodi Rell, Connecticut; Don Carcieri, Rhode Island; Jim Douglas, Vermont);

5) Others: (Bob Riley, Alabama; Sarah Palin, Alaska; Charlie Crist; Florida; Sonny Perdue, Georgia; Linda Lingle, Hawaii; Butch Otter, Idaho; Bobby Jindal, Louisiana; Dave Heineman, Nebraska; Mike Rounds, South Dakota).

This list is shorter, demonstrating what a brutal year 2006 was for Republicans. But once again we see that the classes of 2005-2007 were very weak. In the “other” category are the usual assortment of small-state governors who were probably destined never to be more than just that. The three exceptions are Palin, Jindal and Crist. Palin was probably rendered unelectable by her ’08 vice presidential run and decision not to complete her term; Jindal had to run for re-election last year; and Crist is no longer a Republican (if he’d avoided his 2010 Senate run and hadn’t said such nice things about Barack Obama, there’s a good chance he could be the nominee).

And there was a pretty good group of potential nominees who I think would have been broadly acceptable to conservatives and competitive for the nomination had they won election: Bob Beauprez in Colorado; Jim Nussle in Iowa; Ken Blackwell in Ohio; Mark Green in Wisconsin. To this list you probably have to add Virginia’s George Allen, who would probably have been the nominee in either 2008 or 2012 had he not imploded in 2006.

In 2008, only three Republican governors won: Daniels, Hoeven and Huntsman.

All this has really been the key to Romney’s success. Due to some historical accidents and bad luck for Republicans, their bench is incredibly weak. To be sure, some promising young governors and senators were elected in 2009 and 2010, but this gives the GOP a solid vice-presidential bench, not a particularly strong presidential one (something of the inverse of 2008, when everyone was scratching their heads over whom McCain could pick).

So, to paraphrase Jay Cost (and the great Stealers Wheel), Romney was left in 2012 with no one to the left of him and jokers to the right. The GOP appears to be stuck in the middle with him. 

Update:  Readers write in with two notes.  First, though I knew Carcieri was pro-life, I didn't realize just how conservative he was on both fiscal and social issues.  He probably belongs more in the small state/boring category.  Second, Gov. Guinn died in 2010.  This would likely complicate any run in 2012, setting aside the problems mentioned above.