"Mitt quits" or "The Great Conservative Implosion of 2008?"

After losing badly in Super Tuesday's primaries, Mitt Romney announced on Thursday that he was suspending his campaign.

Although Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul are still in the race, John McCain has more or less won the nomination.


Given the events of the day, McCain's appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference could not have had more interesting timing.

CPAC, the annual gathering of conservative leaders in D.C. is sort of the Lollapalooza of the rightwing.

To give you an idea of the atmosphere, last year's conference, attended by most of the political candidates was best known for Ann Coulter's use of a homophobic slur to refer to John Edwards (to which she received loud applause and laughs). Fearing a repeat media frenzy, Coulter was disinvited by the event's organizers this year.

Following several early speeches from commentators like Laura Ingraham attacking McCain and advocating for Romney, Mitt stunned the gathering Thursday by announcing he was dropping out.

McCain, already scheduled to speak to a group he was largely unpopular with, was no longer addressing the convention as a mere candidate, but the de facto nominee.

CPAC organizers, fearing a public relations disaster for the party, actually had to ask the audience in advance not to boo McCain.

During registration last night at the Omni Shoreham a registrant was asking to upgrade his CPAC package and then proceeded to ask what time GOP front-runner John McCain was going to speak today. “Oh good,” he said to the response — answer: 3 p.m. today — “I hope they boo him out of the room.”

“No, no no no no” came the reply from the person registering him. “We’ve been instructed to tell participants not to boo McCain.”

McCain's success in spite of conservative opposition is due, in large part, to the failure of the movement's leaders to solidify behind a single candidate.

It really began in 2006.

Sen. George Allen of Virginia was widely considered by the right to be the heir apparent to Bush. Yet after slipping on a "Macaca," his presidential aspirations were gone along with his Senate career.

The same election brought an end to the aspirations of another conservative leader, Pennsylvania's Sen. Rick Santorum, who was beaten in a wide margin by his Democratic opponent.

Left without their two leading lights, conservatives looked elsewhere for a candidate. They considered Newt Gingrich, but he decided against a run. Fred Thompson, touted as the Great Conservative Hope, seemed to forget the part about campaigning after announcing his run and fizzled.

Rudy Giuliani and Romney were always odd fits for the movement, given their former positions as social liberals. Mitt tried to run away from his stances and became anti-choice overnight, while Rudy tried to deflect criticism with a promise of conservative judges.

Giuliani flopped after his personal scandals came to life. By this point, McCain had momentum with wins in New Hampshire and Florida.

The right tired to make a stand by "putting it all on Mitt," but by then it was too late. The all-out assault on McCain by talk radio bombed. The last minute surge for Romney didn't happen and now Limbaugh, Hannity and company are left with the two candidates they wanted least: McCain and Huckabee.

But before you get the wrong idea, the rise of McCain and the defeat of Romney isn't the transformative moment in the party one would think.

While McCain isn't a member of the segment of the rightwing coalition that came to power with the Gingrich Congress, was championed by talk radio and reached its peak under the first 6 years of the Bush administration, media attempts to refer to him as a reformer or moderate are not entirely accurate.

In fact, McCain has always been far more conservative than either his supporters or detractors acknowledge. In 2004 he earned a perfect 100 percent rating from Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum and a 0 percent from NARAL. Citizens Against Government Waste dubs him a "taxpayer hero." He has opposed extension of the assault-weapons ban, federal hate crimes legislation and the International Criminal Court. He has supported school vouchers, a missile defense shield and private accounts for Social Security. Well before 9/11 McCain advocated a new Reagan Doctrine of "rogue-state rollback."

Incidentally, CPAC's organizers weren't able to stop the crowd. McCain got booed anyway.

(Photo: Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney, gets a hug from author Laura Ingraham prior to a speech before the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, Thursday, Feb. 7, 2008. The Associated Press)