Jennifer Rubin calls on Marco Rubio and other Florida Republicans to save the day:

What is the man most able to reach all segments of the GOP and who is regarded as the future of the party, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), to do to make sure there is a viable GOP to lead one day?

There is no shame in backing a candidate who eventually loses.

Think about this for a moment. Marco Rubio won his Senate seat after launching what at first appeared to be a hopeless, long-shot challenge against Crist. The NRSC threw its weight behind Crist in a bid to undermine any primary challengers Crist faced. Rubio steadily chipped away Crist’s large lead, upset the presumptive, inevitable nominee, and then went on to defeat him in the general election after Crist bolted to run as an independent. Which candidate in the presidential race most resembles Crist? Obviously, it’s Romney. So why would Rubio be remotely interested in aligning himself with the perceived establishment candidate against his challengers? If Rubio abandons his neutrality, what makes Rubin think that he would choose Romney? After all, he might choose Santorum as the conviction politician who shares his fear of Venezuela.

There may be no “shame” in backing a losing candidate, but there are risks in choosing either one. One danger for Rubio is that he might endorse Romney, and then Romney wins Florida. In that case, Rubio will be tied to Romney and his campaign, and he might be given disproportionate credit/blame for securing Romney’s win (whether it is true or not). If Rubio backs another candidate and Romney loses Florida but goes on to win the nomination anyway, Rubio will have created many enemies in the party for no good reason. If Rubio actually shares this delusional vision of being “the future of the party,” he is hardly going to risk that in a nominating contest just a year after he entered office. Even if he doesn’t have such grand ambitions, there is no incentive for him to take a gamble on any of these candidates.