Romney has managed to weather the debates unscathed. However, the brittleness he showed when confronted with the kind of informed follow-up questions that Bret Baier tossed his way Tuesday on Fox’s “Special Report” — the kind of scrutiny one doesn’t get in multiplayer debates — suggests that Romney may become increasingly vulnerable as the field narrows.

Moreover, Romney has profited from the temporary rise and spontaneous combustion of Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and Herman Cain. No exertion required on Romney’s part.

Enter Gingrich, the current vessel for anti-Romney forces — and likely the final one. Gingrich’s obvious weakness is a history of flip-flops, zigzags and mind changes even more extensive than Romney’s — on climate change, the health-care mandate, cap-and-trade, Libya, the Ryan Medicare plan, etc.

The list is long. But what distinguishes Gingrich from Romney — and mitigates these heresies in the eyes of conservatives — is that he authored a historic conservative triumph: the 1994 Republican takeover of the House after 40 years of Democratic control.

Which means that Gingrich’s apostasies are seen as deviations from his conservative core — while Romney’s flip-flops are seen as deviations from . . . nothing. Romney has no signature achievement, legislation or manifesto that identifies him as a core conservative.

So what is he? A center-right, classic Northeastern Republican who, over time, has adopted a specific, quite bold, thoroughly conservative platform. His entitlement reform, for example, is more courageous than that of any candidate, including Barack Obama. Nevertheless, the party base, ostentatiously pursuing serial suitors-of-the-month, considers him ideologically unreliable. Hence the current ardor for Gingrich.

Gingrich has his own vulnerabilities. The first is often overlooked because it is characterological rather than ideological: his own unreliability. Gingrich has a self-regard so immense that it rivals Obama’s — but, unlike Obama’s, is untamed by self-discipline.

Take that ad Gingrich did with Nancy Pelosi on global warming, advocating urgent government action. He laughs it off today with “that is probably the dumbest single thing I’ve done in recent years. It is inexplicable.”

This will not do. He was obviously thinking something. What was it? Thinking of himself as a grand world-historical figure, attuned to the latest intellectual trend (preferably one with a tinge of futurism and science, like global warming), demonstrating his own incomparable depth and farsightedness. Made even more profound and fundamental — his favorite adjectives — if done in collaboration with a Nancy Pelosi, Patrick Kennedy or even Al Sharpton, offering yet more evidence of transcendent, trans-partisan uniqueness.

Two ideologically problematic finalists: One is a man of center-right temperament who has of late adopted a conservative agenda. The other is a man more conservative by nature but possessed of an unbounded need for grand display that has already led him to unconservative places even he is at a loss to explain, and that as president would leave him in constant search of the out-of-box experience — the confoundedly brilliant Nixon-to-China flipperoo regarding his fancy of the day, be it health care, taxes, energy, foreign policy, whatever.

The second, more obvious, Gingrich vulnerability is electability. Given his considerable service to the movement, many conservatives seem quite prepared to overlook his baggage, ideological and otherwise. This is understandable. But the independents and disaffected Democrats upon whom the general election will hinge will not be so forgiving.

They will find it harder to overlook the fact that the man who denounces Freddie Mac to the point of suggesting that those in Congress who aided and abetted it be imprisoned, took $30,000 a month from that very same parasitic federal creation. Nor will independents be so willing to believe that more than $1.5 million was paid for Gingrich’s advice as “a historian” rather than for services as an influence peddler.

Obama’s approval rating among independents is a catastrophically low 30 percent. This is a constituency disappointed in Obama but also deeply offended by the corrupt culture of the Washington insider — a distaste in no way attenuated by fond memories of the 1994 Contract with America

My own view is that Republicans would have been better served by the candidacies of Mitch Daniels, Paul Ryan or Chris Christie. Unfortunately, none is running. You play the hand you’re dealt. This is a weak Republican field with two significantly flawed front-runners contesting an immensely important election. If Obama wins, he will take the country to a place from which it will not be able to return (which is precisely his own objective for a second term).

Every conservative has thus to ask himself two questions: Who is more likely to prevent that second term? And who, if elected, is less likely to unpleasantly surprise?

Rick Perry stumbled through much of the last GOP debate, but not when speaking about immigration. He issued a clarion condemnation of critics of his state’s policy of giving the children of illegal immigrants in-state tuition to college. Such naysayers, Perry declared, lack “a heart.”

The Texas governor prides himself on his distinctness from George W. Bush, yet on this issue he sounds just like him: scolding his party for its lack of compassion for immigrants coming here to make a go of it. If Perry had wanted to avoid raising the hackles of Republicans with the imputation of heartlessness, he could have borrowed the staple Bush line: “Family values don’t stop at the Rio Grande.”

Neither, more relevantly, does the desire to find a job. What Perry portrays as the great US job machine in his state has mostly benefited people who aren’t Americans, according to a new study by the Center for Immigration Studies. This significant caveat to the Texas Miracle raises the larger question of why the country has continued to welcome millions of new immigrants during the last few years while shedding millions of jobs.

In Texas, the study finds, 81 percent of the jobs created since 2007 have gone to immigrants who arrived here since 2007. Ninety-three percent of these immigrants aren’t citizens. An estimated 50 percent are illegal immigrants. All of this may be further testament to the status of Texas as a jobs magnet, but Perry won’t be bragging about this indication of its drawing power.

In this same period, the native-born accounted for almost 70 percent of the population growth in Texas. They didn’t experience the same gains in employment, though. “The share of working-age natives holding a job in Texas declined significantly,” the study finds, “from 71 percent in 2007 to 67 percent in 2011.” In the second quarter of this year, the unemployment rate for natives in Texas, 8.1 percent, ranked 22nd in the country, and the share of natives holding a job, 66.6 percent, ranked 29th.

If providing ready employment opportunities for non-Americans seems awfully cosmopolitan for the man who is supposed to be a famous rube from Paint Creek, it’s the Texas way. The Lone Star State has always had a close relationship with its neighbor to the south. A wide-open attitude is good politics. In welcoming all comers, Perry can do the bidding of a business community that wants the immigrant labor and simultaneously appeal to the Hispanic vote. If anyone should think to complain that he’s soft on illegal immigration, well, that’s why God created the pointless gesture, isn’t it?

Perry can ostentatiously send Texas Rangers to the border and lambaste the federal government’s failures, but none of it matters if it’s relatively easy for illegals to find a job. Another border state, Arizona, implemented an e-verify system requiring employers to check the immigration status of prospective employees. It led to a dramatic reduction in the population of illegals, many of whom have, no doubt, decamped to Texas. So long as he doesn’t implement e-verify, Perry is shooting holes in the bottom of USS Enforcement and demanding that the feds bail faster.

It would be much too simplistic to say that every new immigrant employed in Texas took his job from a native. On the other hand, it would be much too Pollyannish to deny that there must be crowding out, especially of natives who don’t have college degrees. At least Texas has been creating jobs. The country has lost about 7 million jobs since the onset of the recession in 2007 and continued to import another 1 million immigrant workers a year, and 200,000-300,000 illegals on top of them. In August, monthly job growth ground to a halt, yet we’re welcoming some 100,000 immigrants a month.

Is it heartless to wonder why this makes any sense?

They did this to oppose Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s efforts to require public employees to increase contributions to their retirement and health-insurance plans, and to rein in their collective-bargaining power to negotiate for higher benefits.

President Barack Obama has joined labor’s attacks, criticizing Mr. Walker’s proposals as “an assault on unions.” According to news reports, Mr. Obama’s personal political machine, Organizing for America, was thrust into the battle, providing buses to transport striking government workers to the protests, mobilizing phone banks, and rallying protesters from nearby states.

Why is the president trying to bully the Wisconsin governor? After all, Arizona, Utah, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and West Virginia are among the states to explicitly prohibit collective bargaining for public employees, which is far beyond what Mr. Walker is seeking. The answer is found in four digits: 2012.

Unlike those states, Wisconsin is a 2012 battleground. Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, told a reporter from this newspaper last week that a union defeat in Wisconsin “can put [Mr. Obama] in some danger” of losing the next election. Labor spent $400 million to elect Mr. Obama in 2008: Mr. McEntee was sending a not-so-subtle message that unions would be unable to spend so generously on his behalf in 2012 if they continue hemorrhaging members and dues money.

And hemorrhage they have. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), last year alone 612,000 U.S. workers dropped their union memberships, each representing as much as $500 in lost dues. While labor is still powerful, its decline has been precipitous among private- sector workers. According to the BLS, just 6.9% of private-sector workers (7.1 million) are unionized, while 36.2% of public- sector workers (7.6 million) are. And the number of public-sector union members is rising.

The growth of public- employee unions has paid off handsomely for some. The BLS reports the average annual wage for a state-government employee is now $48,742, but $45,155 for a worker in the private sector. What’s more, the Bureau says the cost of benefits for state and local government workers has risen 50% more than those for private-sector employees since 2001.

This matters to taxpayers. Public-employee unions push to increase their numbers and get more benefits by expanding government’s cost and size. This often puts them at odds with the citizens who pay the bills.

Union demands have helped produce an estimated $3.5 trillion in unfunded liabilities for state and local government pension and health-care plans. They’ve also led to personnel practices that tie the hands of local elected officials, often resulting in perverse outcomes. For example, union insistence on “Last In, First Out” often means the best and brightest teachers are let go when districts downsize or schools close.

Wisconsin’s governor knows this firsthand. In 2003, during his first term as Milwaukee county executive, Mr. Walker faced a huge budget deficit. He could have either raised already astronomical property taxes or found savings in personnel costs, the biggest part of his budget. Collective bargaining tied his hands, and once unions refused concessions his only option was to fire people. He reduced the county government’s work force by 20%.

Seared by this episode, Mr. Walker now wants statewide local governments and school districts to have the management tools to avoid layoffs. Hence his proposals to limit collective-bargaining rights for benefits and to require public approval of pay raises greater than inflation.

Fortunately for Mr. Walker and others contemplating his course, there’s a lesson in the experience of Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels. Upon entering office in 2005, Mr. Daniels signed an executive order ending collective bargaining for state workers. This and other controversial actions caused his approval ratings to fall into the 30% range.

But by re-election time, Mr. Daniels’s decisions had paid off. The state’s finances were in good shape and Indiana’s economy was doing better than its neighbors’. While Mr. Obama was carrying the state in 2008, Mr. Daniels won a second term with 58%, proving that the right policies are often the right politics.

Events in Wisconsin have offered a vivid contrast between two chief executives. One (Mr. Walker) is taking meaningful steps to achieve fiscal balance. The other (Mr. Obama) is encouraging public employees to violate their contracts while his policies cause record deficits and reckless spending.

Let’s hope the differences between the two won’t be lost on Badger State residents or the rest of America.

Faith is often defined as having confidence or trust in a person or thing. In this case, though, faith means adding another $35 billion in unemployment benefits to the infinite intergenerational tab — sometimes referred to as the budget — and mailing out as many checks as possible before Election Day.

Yet, the jab is revealing in other ways. To begin with, what mysterious brand of public policy has Obama employed that exemplifies this sacred trust between public officials and the common citizen?

Was it the administration’s faith in the wisdom of the American parent that persuaded it to shut down the voucher program in Washington, D.C., and continue the left’s decades- long campaign denying school choice for kids and parents? Or was that just faith in public-sector unions?

Was faith in American industry behind the Democrats’ support of a stimulus bill that was almost entirely predicated on preserving swollen government spending at the expense of private-sector growth?

Is this hallowed faith in the citizenry also what compels the administration to dictate what kind of car we will be driving in the future, what kind of energy we will be filling these “cars” with and what amounts of that energy will be acceptable?

Is faith in American know-how why Washington funnels billions of tax dollars each year to its handpicked industry favorites rather than allowing the best and brightest to — please pardon the pun — organically figure out what the most sensible energy policy is, as we have in every other sector?

It must be that deep confidence in conscientious Americans that persuades the left to fight against the rights of gun owners who most often want nothing more than to defend life and property.

The same faith in Americans surely precipitates the administration’s defense of censorship (even book banning) to ensure that the citizenry is protected from the despicable reach of political ads funded by corporations. People, you see, are too gullible and too uninformed to withstand the force of Fox News — much less Wal-Mart.

Similarly, that faith has led to the 20-year explosion of paternalistic regulations (often with the help of Republicans) that propose to regulate everything from the size of candy to tanning salons to fast-food restaurants to the pressure in your showerhead. A faith that the American citizen has the self-control of a deprived toddler.

It was faith in the American people that led to health-care legislation that denies you the right to buy insurance outside of state lines, or to have any useful portability, or even enjoy the same tax break that corporations are afforded. The left has so much faith in Americans that it has to force you to purchase a government-approved plan.

One only needs to propose the idea that citizens be allowed to allocate a portion of their Social Security retirement funds — extracted from their paychecks and deposited in a faith-based government account — to witness the level of faith many on the left have in your decision-making abilities.

Republicans may not have faith in the American people, but in this instance, Obama is probably confusing faith in people with faith in power. Because as hard as one tries, it is difficult to find any instances of choices expanding under this administration. That’s the true test of confidence in the citizenry.

Then again, progressives regard government as a moral enterprise. And in church, you gotta have faith.

People who remember the old comic strip “Peanuts” will recall an often repeated situation where Lucy offers to hold a football for Charlie Brown to kick. Then, as Charlie comes running up to kick it, Lucy snatches away the ball and Charlie Brown loses his balance and goes crashing on his backside.

The reason this same scene remained funny, despite how often it was repeated, is that in the later repetitions Charlie Brown would express suspicion at Lucy, recalling how she had tricked him before. She would then come up with some claim that she wasn’t going to do that any more— and of course she did.

There is a similar routine that has been repeated many times in Washington, over the years, with the Democrats playing Lucy and Republicans playing Charlie Brown.

It goes like this: Democrats start spending money wildly, handing out goodies to a wide range of people who they want to vote for them, while Republicans complain about deficits and the national debt. Then, when the public becomes alarmed about the debts that are piling up, the Democrats get the Republicans to vote for higher taxes to deal with the debt crisis, in the name of “fiscal responsibility.”

Sometimes the deal is sweetened by the Democrats promising to make spending cuts if the Republicans vote for higher taxes, so that there can be one of those “bipartisan” solutions so beloved by the media. But, after the Republicans vote for the tax increases, and come running up to find the spending cuts, the Democrats snatch away the spending cuts and the Republicans fall right on their backsides, just like Charlie Brown.

This old trick is now being unveiled by the Obama administration, like so many other old political tricks used in this “change” administration.

In one of President Obama’s many prissy little sermonettes, complete with finger wagging, he has declared: “Next year when I start presenting some very difficult choices to the country, I hope some of these folks who are hollering about deficits step up. Because I’m calling their bluff.”

There is already a bipartisan commission set to provide political cover for the Democrats’ wild spending that has increased the national debt from 63 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product in 2004 to 83 percent in 2009— and official estimates of more than 90 percent this year, with more increases in sight.

Why Republicans join such transparent attempts to rescue the Democrats from the political consequences of their own actions is one of the many unsolved mysteries of human nature in general and the Republican Party in particular.

What this political game boils down to is that Democrats get all the political benefits of playing Santa Claus to all sorts of groups and special interests, while Republicans who vote to raise taxes to pay for all this are cast in the role of Frank Nitti, the enforcer for the mob.

Many elections have confirmed that Santa Claus is more popular than Frank Nitti, surprising as that may be to some people.

Republicans are not the only suckers in this game.

The voting public’s willingness to believe fancy rhetoric and ignore hard facts is a crucial part of this scam.

When the Obama administration said that it could provide health insurance to millions of additional people without increasing the national debt, shouldn’t common sense have told you that somebody was just insulting your intelligence?

When the two thousand page bill was rushed through Congress too fast for anybody to read it, shouldn’t that have made you realize that you were being played for a sucker?

When this bill that was passed with lightning speed was scheduled to take effect only after the 2012 election, didn’t that suggest that they didn’t want you to find out how it works in practice in time to turn against Obama when he is up for reelection?

Recent polls show that a lot of people are against ObamaCare. But there are still a lot of other people, though not as many, who are for it.

Even more amazingly, there are still Republicans lured by the siren song of “bipartisanship” and apparently unaware of the difference in popularity between Santa Claus and Frank Nitti.

The most important indicator is the president’s job approval. In the Real Clear Politics average of the last two weeks’ polls, President Obama has a 48% approval and 47% disapproval rating. This points to deep Democratic losses. The president’s approval rating last November was 54% when his party was trounced in New Jersey and Virginia.

On the economy, a mid-June AP poll reported that Mr. Obama has 45% approval, 50% disapproval. That’s a dangerous place for any president when jobs are issue No. 1.

The problem is worse in swing areas. Last week’s National Public Radio (NPR) poll of the 60 Democratic House seats most at risk this year showed just 37% of voters in these districts agreed Mr. Obama’s “economic policies helped avert an even worse crisis and are laying a foundation for our eventual economic recovery”; 57% believed they “have run up a record federal deficit while failing to end the recession or slow the record pace of job losses.”

Mr. Obama also suffers because his handling of the catastrophic Gulf oil leak has undermined perceptions of his competence. Both national and Louisiana polls rate Mr. Obama’s handling worse than the Bush administration’s Katrina response, widely viewed as a tipping point in that presidency.

Mr. Obama’s failures mean he can’t lift his party by campaigning. A Public Policy Poll earlier this month reported that 48% said an Obama endorsement would make them less likely to vote for the candidate receiving it, while only one-third said they would be more likely to vote for a candidate endorsed by the president.

Republicans jumped into the lead last November in Gallup’s party generic ballot match-ups among all voters, and since March the GOP has led or been tied every single week except one. In the Rasmussen Poll’s tracking among likely voters, Republicans have been ahead by an average of seven points, 44% to 37%, since March. This reflects a significant political development—independents breaking for the GOP.

Then there is the intensity gap, which is particularly important in midterms. In Gallup, 45% of Republicans are “very enthusiastic” about voting this fall versus 24% of Democrats. This staggering 22-point gap is the largest so far this election year. And in the NPR survey of 60 swing Democratic districts, 62% of Republicans rated their likelihood of voting as 10, the highest. Only 37% of Democrats were similarly excited.

All these trends are influencing individual races. Though twice as many Republican Senate seats are being contested in November, state-by-state surveys show if the election were today, 49 Democrats and 43 Republicans are poised to win. Eight races are too close to call, but Republicans lead in five.

House races are historically much more difficult to predict. But the NPR survey found in the 30 Democrat seats considered most at risk, the GOP leads 48% to 39%. This nine-point margin points to Republican winning virtually all 30 seats. In the next tier of most vulnerable Democratic districts, Republicans lead 47% to 45%, meaning the GOP could take many of those 30 seats. By comparison, in the 10 Republican districts thought at risk, Republicans lead 53% to 37%. Republicans should hold virtually all of those.

It will take a net of 10 Senate and 40 House seats for the GOP to win control of the legislative branches. These are big numbers—but they are within reach.

Democrats do have some advantages. Unlike 1994, they wouldn’t be caught unprepared. And they’ve stockpiled money. The Center for Responsive Politics reports the average Democratic Senate candidate has $2.1 million on hand to the average Republican’s $1.4 million; in the House, Democrats average $504,000 to Republicans’ $239,000.

But cash won’t save the Democrats. Complex combinations of factors decide elections, and this year the driving forces are the president’s low standing, his mishandling of the economy, his failure to respond to the oil spill, and the interconnected issues of jobs, spending, deficits and ObamaCare.

It is an explosive mix for Democrats. All these measures—from his job approval to handling the economy and the Gulf oil leak to the generic ballot to intensity—will remain roughly where they are unless a dramatic event causes a shift. That’s unlikely: The president can do little to radically improve the landscape.

It has taken a year and a half of bad policies to put Mr. Obama and Congressional Democrats in their precarious position. As voters hold them accountable for misdeeds, mistakes and misjudgments, Democrats will endure a beating this year they are not likely to forget soon.