He sees that Ryan is far more conservative than he, and having Ryan as a competing influence in Washington, in his current role as one-man think tank for the House republicans, would be problematic for a Romney presidency; much like Tip O’Neal and Ted Kennedy were for President Carter.

A President Romney would be pushing an agenda far short of the conservatism that a Rep. Ryan would push, so Romney invited the wolf in and would now be able to hunt for his votes with the assistance of what would have been his greatest adversary.

A Rep. Ryan would have won votes for his positions among Tea Party reps, and others would have feared going home to face constituents for having voted with Romney.

A VP Ryan will either adopt more moderate stances or be removed to the pen, where VPs usually go to lament their new career choice. And a VP Ryan, unless he relents, would stand about as much chance of moving up the totem pole in eight years as what’s his name, Bush’s VP.

Of course, Romney may very well lose this election because, among other things, his choice in a running mate. But better for Romney to lose in November than to lose a multitude of battles to his own party, in the House, throughout a tumultuous presidency.

It’s hard to imagine that the first governor to bring about mandated health care and who ordered that marriage licenses be issued to gays would actually change his beliefs so much as to implement the Ryan Plan as president. (And yes I know that he made the order in compliance with the order of the Mass. court, but he did it after the court had given plenty of time for the legislature to adopt laws banning gay marriage; he did it without fighting for those new laws.)

Maybe Romney has decided to either win with Ryan out his way in the future, or go ahead and lose now with Ryan scaring seniors to vote for the President. That’s genius.