These people are delusional.
This year, I don’t think they are delusional.
It looks like we’re going to have (from a conservative standpoint) the worst-case-scenario comming out of Iowa/NH. Romney vs a split conservative field of 2-3 (maybe even 4) conservatives. Given the proportional assigning of delegats instead of winnner take all, and (2) Romney will probably be stuck in the mid-20’s all the anti-Romneys are likely to stay in the race for a long time.
With the Dem cross-over vote, and Libertarians voting in the GOP primary (GA for example, has a solid 5% Libertarian party voting block), Ron Paul could easily end up with 20-30% of the vote in many states. Certainly enough to give Romney a run.
Of course, this only works if the conservative/anti-Romney vote remains split. At the moment, I see Gingrich, Santorum, Perry, and Bachmann all staying in the race at least through super Tuesday—guaranteeing a split conservative vote.