Jon Huntsman: a campaign that never found its voice

His advisers were obliged to present his withdrawal as a grown-up decision not to obstruct Mr Romney’s path to the nomination. Given that he was polling at five per cent in South Carolina it is conceivable that he could have prevented a Romney victory there.

In Florida, the next stop, he was polling at one or two per cent, and simply did not have the campaign infrastructure in place to continue beyond that into Super-Tuesday on March 6 when ten states vote.

Romney will be boosted by his departure from the race, but he would have been fine without it.