Richard Nixon was clearly a beaten man in 1962. Nobody knew that better than Nixon. A former vice president who should have walked into the California governor's mansion -- where he hoped to cool his heels for a second run at the White House -- Nixon got clobbered.

In the face of crushing defeat, the loser has two options. This ignominy can be handled with grace, based on the slim chance that there might be another campaign someday, or the broken candidate can flip his lid and burn all his bridges. Nixon took the second option.

Blaming the media for his loss, a fuming, combative Nixon growled, "You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference."

His political obituary was trumpeted. Six years later, "Tricky Dick" -- as Democrats loved to call him -- was sworn in as the 37th president of the United States.

It seemed that Nixon had mysteriously emerged from a barren wilderness, favored by the gods of political fortune. But it was no accident of fate. In the brief interlude between the agony of defeat and the thrill of victory, Nixon quietly traveled the nation and the world, doing his homework, mending fences and re-inventing himself.

Enter Rick Santorum. Like Nixon, Santorum suffered a crushing defeat when he lost his U.S. Senate seat to Democrat Bob Casey by 18 percentage points in 2006. And like Nixon, Santorum retreated to the hustings, speaking to his conservative base, quietly rallying his true believers with regular appearances on Fox News and talk radio.

Keith Schmidt, Santorum's former Senate aide, says that his old boss has been poking around in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, early primary states. Unlike the too-liberal-Republican Rudy Giuliani, who could not win the first six primaries in 2008, conservative Santorum has a legitimate shot at capturing an early lead.

If he hits the campaign trail, he will have some explaining to do. There was his famous "man on dog" reference during a debate on gay marriage and his misleading declaration that some impotent shell casings were the weapons of mass destruction that we had been looking for in Iraq.

Love him or hate him, Santorum also says some things that could resonate with voters in an age in which conservative Republican Scott Brown won Ted Kennedy's Senate seat in Massachusetts. In his book, "It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good," Santorum provides enough pro-family and pro-America material to awaken the heartland.

Truth said, with enough money, any politician can become who he needs to be. And Santorum can raise piles of money. Even in the year he lost his Senate seat, with all the polls predicting his defeat, he raised $30 million. Watch for him to test the campaign contribution waters with an exploratory committee this spring.

In spite of the daily prayers of Democrats, a Dick Cheney-Sarah Palin Republican ticket in 2012 will not happen. Mike Huckabee, an amiable fellow, has morphed from potential candidate to entertainer. Maybe Newt Gingrich or Mitt Romney can do it. But, as one political wag put it, Santorum has a "chance to put himself in a position to take advantage of an opportunity."

And here's the kicker. Just like Nixon, Santorum will have been in the political wilderness for six years come the presidential election in 2012.

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