It was because Mitt Romney is a gentleman, doncha know, and gentlemen do not accuse others of base behavior.
The biggest, and most glaring failure, was that Mitt did not keep his base together. A number of the more conservative voters, that turned out for Sarah Palin in 2008, either stayed home or undervoted on the ballot when it came to a Presidential preference.
Paul Ryan probably kept Romney from being thrown into an even greater rout, but he couldn’t carry the freight by himself.
There are eight states (Deleware, Georgia, Louisiana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming) that have finished counting ballots.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2012
In ALL of those states but Vermont, Romney got more votes than McCain.
How is that possible if significant numbers of voters stayed home because Palin wasn’t on the ballot?
And if anyone thinks that the total dropped in Vermont because of that, rather than Vermont simply becoming more fanatically socialist, then I have a bridge to sell you.