The Contender Mitt Romney Could’ve Been

July 19 (Bloomberg) -- Last week, a friend put the U.S.presidential race in depressingly clear terms: This election isa choice between a Democratic president who voters don’t thinkis able to solve our economic problems and a Republicancandidate who voters think is committed to the same doctrinesand institutions that helped produce them.

So who do you want, America? The guy who can’t seem to getus out of this mess, or the party that helped get us into it?But there’s a candidate out there who could have made thiselection something very different -- a candidate perfectlysuited to this unusual moment in American politics. Thatcandidate? Mitt Romney.