Tim Pawlenty Should Have Stuck Around

Tim Pawlenty, the GOP voters turn their lonely eyes to you.  From Jonah Goldberg:

Looking back on the events of 2011, who do you think has more regrets for his bad decisions, Hosni Mubarak or former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty? . . .

All Pawlenty did was blow his entirely plausible shot at the presidency. . . .

Let's hop into the way-back machine. Pawlenty's plan was to be the alternative to Mitt Romney. He launched a huge political operation, perhaps to scare off other candidates, which required an equally huge fundraising effort to sustain it.

In order to justify the money he was asking of donors, he had to do well in the Iowa straw poll in August. He came in third to Reps. Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul. Pawlenty quit the race the next day.

Tactically, Pawlenty's mistakes are too numerous to count. But strategically, Pawlenty had the right idea: Be the most electable candidate to the right of Romney.

If T-Paw had stuck it out he'd probably be getting a lot of good attention these days. I thought he'd be a pretty good candidate against Obama and was kind of surprised when he bailed from the race so early.