Townhall has an article today musing about Romney for 2012 nomination. The article does a good job of quickly weighing such factors as name recognition and party demographics. Here is one example:

The former businessman and one-time Massachusetts governor invested $47 million of his family fortune in this year's failed race, undercut by those wary of his Mormon religion and skeptics who questioned whether Romney's conversion to conservatism was genuine. Both points were highlighted by Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor and Southern Baptist preacher who beat Romney in the Iowa caucuses and occupied the same political terrain since overtaken by Palin.

"While (Palin) may not be popular with the winning majority that Barack Obama put together, she's enormously popular with the losing minority that John McCain put together _ and that pretty closely mirrors Republican primary voters," said Rich Bond, former chairman of the Republican National Committee.

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I am kind of wondering...

...sources close to the CEO-turned-politician say he’s very much uncertain about whether he’ll run for elective office again and is keeping a close eye on what direction the party takes in the months ahead, especially with regard to Palin.

Romney is extraordinarily close to members of his family, and most are opposed to another run.

He is, though, likely to stay involved at least at a policy level.

“What I’d say is he’s keeping his options open for now,” said one source close to Romney.

Add to that, this quote from before the elections from his spokesperson,

“Gov. Romney had his shot at the White House, and he lost fair and square,” Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said. “That opportunity is unlikely to come along again. Gov. Romney is pouring all his energy into electing McCain-Palin and other Republicans, and that has been his single focus since leaving the presidential race.”

...and this one from Romney himself...

Romney, who sought the Republican presidential nomination earlier this year, said he will not be on the 2012 ballot.

“I think it’s unlikely that I’ll be running again,” Romney said.

Romney compared a run for the White House to a window opening offering the right timing and the right opportunity.

Of course, these were prior to the election day, and he could have been talking this way simply because he felt John McCain would win, and that would make things unlikely. But then again, at that point who really thought McCain would win?

Romney has some reasons not to win. The big two I can think of are his family vetoing it (more importantly his wife) and the success of Barack Obama. At this point, I think the GOP has more of an opportunity to paint Congress as a bastion of idiots, than paint Obama as a screw up. I could be wrong, but we hear so often that Obama will probably be the next Jimmy Carter, but what if he is not? What if he becomes the Dems Regan? At that point whoever runs in 2012 as the GOP nominee will be a martyr for the cause, and our best bets (including Romney and Jindal) will be better off to wait until 2016.