I don’t know how the author figures Romney plans to ‘save the country’ if he doesn’t become president. Not that I have as low an opinion of Romney as you do.
I don’t know how anyone could think that Romney - the Romney who was elected governor of Massachusetts - could save the country even if he gets elected president. I see Romney as Herbert Hoover, and Obama as FDR. In historical fact, Hoover was POTUS before FDR, and he reacted to the depression - "depression” was still a euphemism for hard economic times - with socialistic policies. It didn’t work. FDR ran against Hoover's economic failure, and won - then did more of the things that didn’t work when Hoover tried them. And blamed Hoover for having fouled things up so badly that nobody could fix it.
This time “FDR” is in office, and blaming his predecessor, and now the Republicans have nominated “Hoover." The question is, will “Hoover” learn from “FDR’s” mistakes, and reverse course - or will he follow his own predilections and run us well and truly into the ditch?The selection of Ryan is cause for hope that he has learned from recent history. No guarantees, just hope.