Mitt Romney is giving his speech right now, after it’s become clear that, as MIke Huckabee just said, if the GOP race is a two-man field, it’s McCain and Huck, not McCain and Romney.

I’ve never seen Romney looking so exhausted and worn. But his words are surprisingly energetic, as he rails against the possibility that the United States could become a “second rate power.” It’s the Romney melange of populist economics, anti-immigrant ranting, and even promises to work on alternative energy.

And now we know that it doesn’t really resonate with Republican voters.

—Dana Goldstein

Dana Goldstein, a former associate editor and writer at the Prospect, comes from a family of public-school educators. She received the Spencer Fellowship in Education Journalism, a Schwarz Fellowship at the New America Foundation, and a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellowship at the Nation Institute. Her journalism is regularly featured in Slate, The Atlantic, The Nation, The Daily Beast, and other publications, and she is a staff writer at the Marshall Project.