Mitt Romney looks like the Republican Party's 2012 presidential nominee.

The Iowa primary finished off Ron Paul as a serious contender. But he never was in the running for the GOP's presidential nomination because he is more of an Obama Democrat on foreign policy issues than a Republican. He's being labeled as a "dangerous man", and he won't be able to shake that label. 
 
If you take Ron Paul and his naive pacifists and isolationists, anti-drug laws and gold bugs supporters out of last night's results because few of his backers will vote against Obama, Mitt Romney won 31.365% of the caucus votes. Santorum won 31.357% and Gingrich won 16.982%.  
 
That is, 79.7% Iowa caucus goers who are real conservatives and Republicans voted for candidates who they think are qualified to be president of the United States.  
 
I think that Romney's supporters voted for him because he would be a strong president who shares their very conservative values. Compared with Obama and Gingrich, Romney radiates integrity and trust. And he has a chance of beating Candidate Obama even though Intrade gives Obama a 52% chance of re-election. 
 
Santorum is a policy wonk. He works hard, but he lost the money primaries because he didn't impress smart people who have spent their lives hiring, firing and evaluating people. While his showing in Iowa will bring some social issues Big Money to his campaign, the real Big Money is committed to and will stay with the most likely next president, Romney. I doubt much Perry contributors' money would go to Santorum. More likely it would go to Romney, if anywhere. 
 
While strong candidates have won without winning money primaries, the successful ones raised enough early in their campaigns to be competitive. That's not Santorum. 
 
Romney's huge advantage is that his Super Pac is running ads that are devastating because they educate voters about the incredible weaknesses of Gingrich. In his own ways, Santorum's voting records and comments make him almost as vulnerable to the Super Pac's ads as Gingrich. 
 
Bloggers, commentators and the media will hit Santorum on his totalitarian, immoral positions on abortion and gay marriage. 
 
Santorum's support for Bush's Big Intrusive Government actions against Teri Schiavo's husband who finally won his fight to let her die with some sort of dignity started the anti-GOP movement that cost the party the 2006 election. 
 
Santorum has flatly stated that Americans are not entitled to privacy in their bedrooms or at their death beds. That's a killer position in a general election, and it helped cost Santorum his re-election bid in 2006. 
 
But the real killer for Santorum, which Romney won't attack but others will, is that he last week declared that he would attack Iran to keep it from getting nuclear bombs. While I don't totally disagree with him on this, America is weary of war and scared to death of being attacked by some Iranian agent's brief case nuclear weapon or some other weapon of mass destruction. This issue alone would make Santorum unelectable as the GOP's nominee, I think.