he would have won the nominatoin, and probably the race, if the economic collapse was in Feb 08 and not Sept 08.
he was (or pretended to be) a hard right conservative in the 2008 primary just like he was in the 2012 primaries
he was against bailing out the auto companies, probably not in favor of bailing out fannie/freedie, against any kind of foreclosure mitigation programs, etc...
and, he couldn't even come close to winning a primary in 2008
if the economic collapse happened in Feb 08 it wouldn't have made a bit of difference