I think the failure of Romney's "Project Orca" had an impact on the results, but let's not get carried away with how large that impact was.

Had Project Orca rivaled Google for robustness, scalability, and user-friendliness -- okay, that last one may not be much of a stretch; Google often sets a fairly low bar -- I don't believe it would've made a material difference in the outcome. Romney did not inspire devotion among the goober base ("he wasn't conservative enough") nor independents, whereas the GOP agenda in general certainly inspired a lot of repugnance in among Democrats and many independents.

Romney lost because of Romney and the party he ran for, not because of Hurricane Sandy, Project Orca, or any other single "event".

--FY