Des Moines Register Poll out Romney 24 Paul 22 Santorum 15

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11. It depends

If we assume that Romney never cracks 30% anywhere then he will not get the nomination.

Whether he could win outright if he becomes a real frontrunner is another question. Some of the biggest delegate states have winner take all if you get 50%. (Including CA and NY late in the cycle) Others have a mix of congressional district delegates and at-large delegates that have proportional elements but still favor the state winner. (The winner of a state should tend to win the large delegates and several congressional districts.) It looks like many states wanted to avoid the McCain style getting all the delegates with 35%, but are not strictly proportional.

(Perry is screwed. Texas is truly proportionate.)

So if Romney became a majority candidate he would lock the thing up well before the convention. And even as a 40% candidate he would be getting well over 40% of the delegates, and probably easily over 50%.

And if he is a 30% candidate he will not get the nomination in any scenario, of course. But even in that scenario it still doesn't mean a convention with no majority is certain. If a non-Romney really caught on then he could conceivably win with a lot less than 50% of the overall national vote.