Law Students For Romney

Thoughts About Florida

2008-01-30T10:04:00.000-05:00

There are a lot of things that one might point to in trying to explain Mitt Romney's loss in Florida yesterday, including, perhaps, the fact that he really seemed to find his voice on economic issues a little too late to continue surging in Florida, some savvy campaigning by John McCain (including some pretty low-ball (and somewhat hypocritical) tactics by McCain's camp this past week), the late-coming Crist and Martinez endorsements, as well as lingering doubts among some about Romney's authenticity. The big disappointment for a lot of Romney supporters seems to be that this loss comes at a time when Romney truly appeared to be coming into his own on the sorts of economic issues that really define who he is. Romney now faces a pretty tough map on Super Tuesday. There are a slew of winner-take-all states that seem safely in McCain's corner now. At this point, what approach to next week's primaries gives Romney the best chance? He's a sure bet in a few states (e.g., Utah and Idaho), but where else should he choose to lay his chips?

One side-note about Florida. It appears as though Romney's hard line on immigration has really hampered his support among Republican Hispanics, with both candidates who are on record for a pathway to citizenship besting him by large margins yesterday:

The Hispanic numbers were even more striking for McCain: 51 percent of Hispanics backed him, with 15 percent supporting Mitt Romney, who came in a close second statewide, and 25 percent for Rudy Giuliani.

Would it have made a difference had Romney not taken such a hard line? Would any potential support he may have gained been canceled out (or more) by other conservative voters who might have supported another candidate as a result? What other competitive candidate could have benefited? Assuming Romney still finds a way to win the candidacy, does this lack of Hispanic support hurt him in a general election?

The Governator?

2008-01-22T08:19:00.001-05:00

The New Comeback Kid...

2008-01-16T00:12:00.000-05:00

Romney scores a coup in Michigan, winning by an impressive 80,000 vote margin. Big question is... how much of a bump does this give him in Nevada and South Carolina, where he's trailed several candidates in recent polls? South Carolina may be a long-shot for Romney, but he has a natural base in Nevada, which has a significant Mormon population. Regardless of how he fares in those states, this win keeps Romney viable for Florida and Tsunami Tuesday. At a time when several other campaigns are rumored to be cash-strapped, is this where his fundraising prowess and personal wealth will help make the difference for him? One thing is for sure, Mitt's win means there will be no coronation of John McCain (or any other candidate) any time soon. This race is wide open.

New Hampshire Predictions

2008-01-07T12:56:00.000-05:00

Since no one has gone out on a limb posted any predictions (as requested by my last post), I thought I might. Before Romney's strong performance at last night's Fox Forum, I would have said McCain had a clear leg up, but now I'm doubly unsure. McCain clearly had momentum coming into this weekend and, in my view, Saturday nights debate did nothing really to blunt it (even if McCain might have come off as petty to some with his several personal shots at Mitt).

Last night's debate, however, gave Romney a much needed shot in the arm. He did very, very well and was helped even more by the fact that Chris Wallace seemed to needle the other candidates on past statements and positions, McCain and Huckabee in particular, a little more than he did Romney. I think Republicans in New Hampshire will tend to think Romney came out on top in his tax and immigration exchanges with both Huckabee and McCain. And while McCain did less to hurt himself than Huckabee (whose answers sometimes bordered on incomprehensible), any support Huckabee loses would seem to indirectly hurt McCain.

The question is whether this was too little too late. How many people in New Hampshire saw his performance and how much play can it really get in one day? Romney can't like the fact that it was on cable television the night after a double-header debate on network television (a debate which was re-aired by CNN opposite last night's Fox Forum no less). Plus, it almost seems like the slew of polls yesterday showing McCain on top of Romney have drowned out discussion of the debate some.

So... on to my prediction. I'm REALLY unsure, but in my gut I still think McCain may edge out Romney by a percentage point or two. The closer it is, however, the better for Romney because it will allow him to hang on for a win in Michigan. The big development from last night's debate, in my mind, is that it gave Romney's candidacy renewed life even in the face of a possible New Hampshire loss. A bad performance at last night's debate could have finished Romney off, instead, he gets more longevity.

Who disagrees with me here? Was Romney's performance last night and McCain's failure to truly shine in either of the debates good enough to give him the bounce he needs to win tomorrow? Or does Romney need to find a way to somehow remain competitive in the face of another bruising loss?

[Update: I'm feeling less and less sure about my prediction... this Obama'mania may end up costing McCain the primary. His most likely voters may be drawn to vote in the big attraction. And Mitt's not taking this lying down... he seems to have been everywhere today. It's a complete toss-up in my mind.]

Thoughts on Iowa and New Hampshire

2008-01-04T12:42:00.000-05:00

With Mitt Romney's surprisingly large defeat in the Iowa Caucus now in the rearview mirror, what lies ahead for him in New Hampshire? I think it's a must win primary for Romney. If he loses to John McCain in four days, he may choose to continue on in the race, but I think any real shot he had at winning disappears. That said, there are some big questions hovering over the New Hampshire primary.

Since Mike Huckabee relied largely on Iowa's significant evangelical base for his caucus victory, I think its impact on his campaign in New Hampshire is unclear. Huckabee doesn't have a realistic shot at taking New Hampshire, so the best case scenario for him is simply a strong showing. Given how weak he's polled here over the past year, the only place he has to go is up. The $64,000 question is how much traction his Iowa win gives him. Does he steal the few evangelical votes that there are to be had in New Hampshire from Romney? Does he win over any fence-sitters?

One thing Huckabee's win almost certainly does is make the recently tightened race between McCain and Romney there even tighter. McCain's fourth place showing in Iowa doesn't really give him the momentum that a strong third-place showing would have, but with Romney losing by so much to Huckabee, I don't think it matters. Romney's loss in Iowa after investing the significant resources he did there has the potential to raise doubts that push wayward Romney supporters to McCain.

To win out New Hampshire, Romney has to find a way to prevent any hemorrhaging from his Iowa defeat. He needs to stop Huckabee from stealing any votes (since Huckabee is more likely to steal votes from Romney supporters than those backing McCain) and he needs to try and stop McCain's surge in New Hampshire by reminding voters there why they've preferred him over McCain for most of this past year. Not an easy task when it appears that the negative advertisements and mailings Romney has employed over the past few weeks seem to have actually hurt him in Iowa and, possibly, New Hampshire. Romney needs to go negative without appearing to attack, a tough balancing act that he's struggled with at times. The good news for Romney is that if he tops McCain, it's likely the death kneel of McCain's candidacy, especially if he tops him by a significant margin.

The big wild card in all of this is McCain's most natural New Hampshire constituency, independents. He can't afford to lose indies who would otherwise vote for him but who choose to vote for Barack Obama in the Democratic Primary. In that sense, McCain and Obama are each other's own worst enemy in New Hampshire. In retrospect, the Iowa caucus results haven't settled much of anything except to underscore the fact that we still have a wide-open GOP race on our hands. With that said, what are everyone's predictions?

Tancredo leaves and endorses Romney, for better or worse

2007-12-20T21:39:00.000-05:00

Will his endorsement lift Romney?

I'm more curious about what your analysis is than in giving my own. As yet, I am equivical about the effect, but I do think it is a nod towards Romney's repute with the party mainstream.

Thoughts?

Reject the Fair Tax

2007-12-18T20:19:00.000-05:00

I want to disclaim at the beginning that I am no tax policy expert. Yet, I think that the concepts argued for and against the “fair tax” as proposed by Mike Huckabee are simple enough that most people should be able to understand them.

Mike Huckabee describes on his campaign web site his version of the Fair Tax:

When the FairTax becomes law, it will be like waving a magic wand releasing us from pain and unfairness.

The FairTax will replace the Internal Revenue Code with a consumption tax, like the taxes on retail sales forty-five states and the District of Columbia have now. All of us will get a monthly rebate that will reimburse us for taxes on purchases up to the poverty line, so that we're not taxed on necessities. That means people below the poverty line won't be taxed at all. We'll be taxed on what we decide to buy, not what we happen to earn. We won't be taxed on what we choose to save or the interest those savings earn. The tax will apply only to new goods, so we can reduce our taxes further by buying a used car or computer.

Our current progressive tax system penalizes us for working harder and becoming more successful. As we climb the ladder, the government lurks on each rung, hungry for a bigger bite out of our earnings. The FairTax is also progressive, but it doesn't punish the American dream of success, or the old-fashioned virtues of hard work and thrift, it rewards and encourages them. The FairTax isn't intended to raise any more or less money for the federal government to spend - it is revenue neutral.

There are a lot of different points to be made. Easily dismissed is the claim that the Fair Tax will release us from pain and unfairness. Such a silly claim gets at the unseriousness of the Huckabee campaign in general. More substantively, only six countries have ever adopted retail sales taxes at rates of 10% or more; none do now. 58 Fla. L. Rev. 1043, 1048; Joel Slemrod, Presentation to the President's Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform: The Costs of Tax Complexity (Mar. 3, 2005), available at http://www.taxreformpanel.gov/meetings/ docs/slemrod 03032005.ppt.

Huckabee next says that all will get a monthly rebate for purchases up to the poverty line. This argues against one of the main points that he promotes in arguing for the Fair Tax: administrative ease. Huckabee has argued for abolishing the IRS, but it seems that he would have to replace it with some other agency by which to mail out every American’s monthly rebate check. The type of money being passed through the mail would also invite all sorts of criminal behavior (remember how well the debit cards went after Katrina?).

Huckebee also says that the Fair Tax will create positive incentives for saving. That is probably true. Through a combination of zero tax on savings and the dramatic increase of goods after the Fair Tax is enacted, people are likely to refrain from spending. The Fair Tax creates the incentive to withhold income from being put back into the economy. How this will affect the economy only an economist could predict, but the incentives seem to lead to a slowing of the economy as people withhold their dollars from the marketplace. However, eventually, even savings will be taxed as they are spent. The savings argument is misleading because it really only marks a delay in taxation, not an abolition of the tax on savings.

Huckabee argues that both taxes are progressive. However, the Fair Tax is difficult to make progressive. Since the tax applies to all at the point of sale, regardless of economic status, it would generally appear to be either a flat or regressive tax. The single rate of taxation on purchases hits low-income people harder than high-income people because the purchases are a larger proportion of the low-income person’s wealth. Higher income people are able to save a larger portion of their earnings. Thus, even with the rebates he proposes, for anyone above the poverty line, the tax is regressive. To make it progressive, Congress would have to add in additional complexity Graduated tax rates, differential rates, or higher rates all would lead to increasingly complex taxpayer behavior and legislative and administrative responses. 88 Calif. L. Rev. 2095, 2141.

In sum, and these certainly aren’t all the points to be made about the Fair Tax system, the Fair Tax likely does little to improve the current tax system and likely does harm. It does little to improve the complexity or administrative burden. It only shifts the time of taxation from when it was produced to when it was consumed. Finally, it likely dulls economic growth by creating a disincentive to spend.

Beyond its inherent political impracticability, the Fair Tax should be rejected. The better alternative, and the more realistic one, is the one Mitt Romney has proposed: lower marginal rates, end the death tax, end taxes on savings, and lower corporate taxes. These things combined will do more for the economy and the nation than the enactment of the Fair Tax.

National Review Endorsement

2007-12-12T10:21:00.000-05:00

It seems like this news has been buried in the wake of The Speech but yesterday the National Review announced its endorsement of Mitt Romney.

"More than the other primary candidates, Romney has President Bush’s virtues and avoids his flaws. His moral positions, and his instincts on taxes and foreign policy, are the same. But he is less inclined to federal activism, less tolerant of overspending, better able to defend conservative positions in debate, and more likely to demand performance from his subordinates. A winning combination, by our lights. In this most fluid and unpredictable Republican field, we vote for Mitt Romney."

National Review editor Rich Lowry talks to Hugh Hewitt about it here.

Excerpts From "The Speech"

2007-12-06T10:02:00.000-05:00

There's less than thirty minutes until The Speech. The campaign has released some excerpts ahead of time. Read along if you like.

Update: The Wall Street Journal has posted the entire text of the speech.

Update II: Let's try this again. Here it is from NRO.

Thoughts?

Mistake Or Masterstroke?

2007-12-04T08:33:00.000-05:00

As Dillon's last post shows, a good number of people wonder whether the "Mormon speech" is necessary (this while a good number have also been pounding the speech drum). While it could pay dividends, I think the speech is a risky move. It's anyone's guess how it will turn out. Over at the Atlantic Monthly, Mark Ambinder outlines what he sees as the pros and cons of such a speech, while Ross Douthat makes the case for why he thinks the speech is a mistake:

Put me down in the "it's a big mistake" camp. The speech should have been given at the very beginning of the primary season, or after Romney won the nomination; it doesn't make sense to give it in response to Mike Huckabee's rise in the polls. Huckabee is vulnerable on all sorts of issues, and Romney has the money and the infrastructure to make sure that every GOP primary voter in America - let alone Iowa and South Carolina - knows all about the tax increases and the ethics complaints and the softness on illegal immigration and all the rest of it. Going after Huckabee on these issues probably wouldn't prevent the Arkansas governor from consolidating his current level of support, but the right line of attack should be able to stall his momentum in states like New Hampshire and Michigan and South Carolina, where Romney is well-positioned even if he loses Iowa.
But instead of making the conversation about issues where Huckabee is vulnerable and Romney isn't, the Romney campaign has guaranteed that for the next two weeks at least and probably beyond, the media conversation will be about, well, Mormonism. If there were more time before the actual voting begins, that might not be the worst thing in the world; they could get the wave of coverage out of the way, inoculate themselves to some extent, and then shift gears and start hammering Huckabee on taxes and immigration and so forth. But there isn't time: Christmas is coming, there's a very narrow window in which to define Mike Huckabee as a Mexican-loving crypto-liberal, and the Romney campaign has just ensured that everyone will be talking about the Urim and the Thummim instead of the Arkansas gas tax. Unless Romney gives the best speech in the history of speeches, I just don't see how that helps him win - in Iowa, New Hampshire, or anywhere.

So here's the question for our readers, is the speech a mistake or a sage political move? Why?

One Huckabee Burger With Cheese Please

2007-12-04T02:26:00.000-05:00

It's amazing how fast you can get into the spotlight; but once your there you better be ready to take the heat. Everybody has been talking about how Huckabee is putting the heat on Romney; but it looks like Huck is enduring some heat of his own. An interview today on the Laura Ingraham show (linked below) was a perfect example.

After various debates many of my friends came away with a rather favorable impression of Huckabee. I explained to my friends that I understand their propensity to be attracted to Huck's smooth style, charm, and compassionate speak. Then I started to point out his faults.

While Huckabee was a 3rd tier candidate he had the luxury of hiding his past behind his charm and obscurity. As the primary comes closer and voters feel a "conservative gap" in the field they have begun to look elsewhere. These forces combined with the main stream media's hunger for a new story, and tight race, have propelled Huckabee to the 1st tier of candidates. This has significantly altered the debate and has seemingly encouraged Romney to make his infamous "Mormon Speech" Thursday.

Personally I think Romney could have just waited this out. A comparison of today's headlines with those of the past week or two explain why.

For the last couple of weeks the big story was that Huckabee was rising because Christians were becoming more wary of Romney's Mormonism and Giuliani's sketchy financial and moral dealings as governor. Now that Romney has announced he won't make the speech until Thursday and Giuliani's past is in investigatory limbo, the press and conservatives alike are passing their time investigating their new top tier candidate.

Like a new item on the Wendy's Dollar Menu, Huckabee will not last long.

Here is a taste:

http://www.evangelicalsformitt.org/front_page/ingraham_huckabee_big_loser_on.php

Can you say indigestion?

Huckabee Finn and Fred Sawyer

2007-12-03T22:13:00.000-05:00

An astute reader sent along a link to this column by Ann Coulter. Coulter, ever the wordsmith (blunt as she may be sometimes), denounces the tendency for some conservatives to default into supporting Huckabee Finn and Fred? Sawyer:

On illegal immigration, Huckabee makes George Bush sound like Tom Tancredo. He has compared illegal aliens to slaves brought here in chains from Africa, saying, "I think frankly the Lord is giving us a second chance to do better than we did before."

Toward that end, when an Arkansas legislator introduced a bill that would prevent illegal aliens from voting and receiving state benefits, Huckabee denounced the bill, saying it would rile up "those who are racist and bigots."

In 1999, Sen. Fred Thompson joined legal giants like Sens. Jim Jeffords, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins to vote against removing Bill Clinton from office for perjury.
Thompson, whom President Nixon once called "dumb as hell," claimed to have carefully studied the Constitution and determined that perjury by the president of the United States did not constitute "high crimes and misdemeanors." He must have been looking at one of those living, breathing Constitutions we've heard so much about.

Jimmy Carter redux

2007-12-03T22:11:00.000-05:00

Oh the wonderful 70's, time before time (or at least before some of us, ahem, were born). It was a magical time when gas was in short supply, evironmentalists were telling us that the world was in for another ice age, and we were ending our involvement in a long war. Stagflation was all the rage and America looked weak and vulnerable. Of course we have have many people to thank for those blissful times. Prominent on that list was a southern governor named Jimmy Carter. Jimmy was a nice enough fellow, but incompetent and misguided. Of course, that's become more apparent as time has gone by, and the decision to elect him looks foolish now.

I generally don't like to make comparisons of candidates to former presidents. Most of the time the comparisons are unfair and superficial. However, the more I look at the potential presidency of Mike Huckabee, the more I am persuaded that his presidency would look like Jimmy Carter's.

It's funny how we forget as time passes at how bad the national financial situation was back then, with the gas lines and stagflation at the top of the list. The environmental movement was coming of age, also, making it particularly difficult to fix the energy and monetary problems. The Carter administration, through populist economic policies and sympathy towards environmental restrictions, did nothing to help. The nation, still sour over the Vietnam war, saw gloom and doom in a self-perpetuating negativity cycle, furthering the despair.

This, to me, is where a Huckabee presidency would take us. His populist economic policies would do nothing to help problem areas in the economy. Indeed, it is likely that they would further deepen the problem. Likewise Huckabee's affinity towards environmental restrictions would make our energy problems worse, not better. All this would add to a nation in a sour mood over our involvement in Iraq. Huckabee, like Carter at the time, is a nice guy, but misguided and capable of serious harm to the country.

I also think that we now underestimate the importance of Reagan's economic policies in turning around the national mood and healing the wounds of past national hurts. Time has dimmed the memory of how important it was to get our finances in order and the resulting confidence, in all facets of life, that it gave the nation. Mitt Romney could do for the economy what Reagan, in his time, did. He would breath new life into an overstuffed government, and allow the citizens of this great nation to feel confident once again about themselves and their country. Commitment to conservative economic policies, both for spending and taxes, is one of Mitt's hallmarks.

Imagine what Reagan could have done had he been elected in 1976 instead of Jimmy Carter. We have a similar choice again this time around. Being pro-life is simply not a sufficient condition to be president, especially when coupled with a populist economic ideology. We need a president who can lead us to economic success once again. Mitt Romney is the man that can do that.

Romney To Give "Mormon" Speech This Week

2007-12-02T19:07:00.000-05:00

Kevin Madden early today:

"Governor Romney has made a decision to deliver a speech titled “Faith in America." The governor has been invited to The George Bush Presidential Library in College Station, Texas to deliver this address on Thursday, December 6. This speech is an opportunity for Governor Romney to share his views on religious liberty, the grand tradition religious tolerance has played in the progress of our nation and how the governor’s own faith would inform his Presidency if he were elected. Governor Romney understands that faith is an important issue to many Americans, and he personally feels this moment is the right moment for him to share his views with the nation. Governor Romney personally made the decision to deliver this speech sometime last week. While identifying a venue for this address, the campaign consulted with President George H.W. Bush’s office last week about Governor Romney’s decision. President Bush was gracious enough to extend an invitation to deliver the speech at the presidential library. The invitation to speak at the presidential library is not an endorsement of Governor Romney’s campaign."

A quick overview of the initial media reaction: CNN, NY Times, Politico I, Time, Townhall I, Townhall II, NRO, CBS, Reuters, ABC News (this is a particularly good one), Globe, Politico II, SL Trib, USA Today, Atlantic Monthly I, Atlantic Monthly II

One good thing about this is that it should finally stop the chorus call of articles and op-eds calling for Romney to give the speech. No doubt Huckabee's rise in Iowa helped Romney decide that if he was ever going to give a speech addressing his religion, now was the time for it. As for what effect it will have, I think it's anyone's guess. Your thoughts?

Romney's Competition is Evolving

2007-11-29T23:55:00.000-05:00

A fellow columnist recently commented that although the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries are only around the corner, we are light-years away in terms of how much things may change in the interim. This past week proved exactly that. The primary had seemed destined to be a duel between Romney and Giuliani, but it’s shaping up to be a four or five man race.

As I mentioned earlier this month, Huckabee has been making significant progress in Iowa and causing worry for Team Romney. Romney is dominating in New Hampshire, but with the Iowa contest being moved up to five days before New Hampshire’s primary, a Huckabee win could devastate Mitt’s early primary momentum. Such events are clearly more of a boon to Giuliani than to Huckabee; by weakening Romney it propels Giuliani to the February 5^th victory he’s shooting for (unless Huckabee can continue his new momentum into other states), but Giuliani has some problems of his own.

While Romney and others have been hammering at Giuliani for his close relationship with Bernie Kerik, Ben Smith of The Politico uncovered some more potentially damning information about Giuliani just hours before yesterday’s three-ring circus YouTube/CNN Debate. Smith discovered records which have been recently released under the Freedom of Information Act that reveal how during the months leading up to 9/11 Rudy had been allocating tens of thousands of New York City tax payer dollars to finance his security detail during weekend trysts to the Hamptons.

Smith admits he lacks any concrete evidence to demonstrate these trips were specifically related to Giuliani’s affair with Ms. Nathan (his current wife), but the inference is fairly strong considering the proximity of her residence to the hotels he and his security detail stayed at, and the frequency of his trips to the area during this time. The most troubling part about these allegations is not that he spent the money on the security (New York’s mayors are allowed to have 24 hour security), it is that the expenses were split up between different city departments even though it had nothing to do with these departments or their functions.

Of course when this was brought up by Cooper Anderson at the YouTube/CNN debate Rudy insisted there was no wrongdoing and “as far as he knew” everything was accounted for correctly. This didn’t come up again in the debate and Rudy got a pass. The other candidates will likely wait for the media to hash this out before they get in the mix; this story is not going away without a fight.

Speaking of the debate, what a circus! Where do I begin? Anyone who watched the Democratic YouTube debate remembers how silly and ridiculous the debate was; but the Republican debate takes the cake. After suspecting foul play concerning a openly-gay brigadier-general’s political associations, the head editor of The Politico did a quick Google search and found out that not only was he a member of Veteran’s for Kerry, but currently sits on Hillary’s steering committee for LGBT issues. The general’s question about the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell' policy was obviously not aimed to foster conversation between the Republican candidates, but purely an effort to make them all look uncompassionate and bigoted. The media and blogosphere are on fire debating whether this is another Hillary ‘plant’ and whether YouTube and or CNN knew anything about it. There is no question CNN knew about this; you really think they would fly this guy out to Florida and hand him a microphone without looking into who he was. If you have any doubts, I remind you that it only took a short Google search to see who he supported and in what capacity.

Bloggers have also discovered (with little investigatory effort) that several other questioners from the debate were Democrats who openly support Democratic candidates. It isn’t necessarily a bad thing to have Democrats or moderates involved in the debate process; but these debates are for the party electorate. The partisan bashing has its place in the general election. This is a time for Republicans to hear the candidate talk about the issues they care about, otherwise it is really a waste of their time.

On the bright side, the quirky themes and questions kept the candidates on their toes and highlighted some weaknesses and strengths previously unnoticed within more conventional venues. Fred Thompson demonstrated his more serious side by looking fairly displeased about the debate throughout. As a contributor to the Weekly Standard noted, “My cheers went to a listless Fred Thompson who easily qualified himself to be president in my book by looking all night like he would cheerfully trade his left arm for an early exit off the stage to a waiting Scotch and good Cuban cigar.” It might have been even more impressive if one the candidates had confidently came out and called the debate what it was.

Instead, most of the candidates were in a rush to malign each other face to face. Romney and Giuliani went at it over immigration, Huckabee and Romney over immigration, and McCain and Romney over waterboarding (see a pattern developing?). Thompson went decidedly negative with his YouTube commercial by airing the only attack ad of the bunch. His video consisted of footage from Mitt’s younger liberal times at a Massachusetts debate against Ted Kennedy 13 years ago and another clip from Huckabee’s earlier tax hiking and portly days. Not surprising, Rudy was laughing harder than ever, escaping unscathed. Maybe Thompson has given up running for number one and is hoping Giuliani will pick him for number two. Just a thought.

The candidate who seemed surprisingly presidential was John McCain. Even though many conservatives tend to disagree with his views on immigration and interrogation techniques, his calm and rational approach to the questions and accusations raised seem to place him on the moral high ground. It’s hard to debate interrogation and torture with a guy who spent years in the Hanoi Hilton; but that doesn’t mean he’s always right.

Depending on the criteria (as winners and losers are hard to identify and for what reasons), the candidate who seemed to benefit most from the debate was Huckabee. With the hype surrounding him this past week he needed to step up to the plate and show he can play hardball with the big boys, and that is what he did. He didn’t necessarily come off as the best of the bunch, but he showed he can compete. Mitt fared well considering the beating he was taking from all sides, but there were times during the debate when he seemed frustrated. Thompson did fine, but ‘fine’ doesn’t win elections; it can win you a position as a running mate though. McCain did okay too, but nothing worthy of a significant shift in popularity. Giuliani got trampled; while he successfully eluded the expense report questions for the time being, they are sure to return. His exchanges with Romney further highlighted his weaknesses on conservative issues, and mere promises of constructivist judges will no longer placate conservatives after what they have seen Bush do with non-military government spending despite his constructionist nominations.

If an asterisk candidate were to be mentioned it would be Ron Paul. Paul did a fine job with what I thought would be a devastating question to his campaign. He was asked whether he believed all the conspiracy theories about the Council on Foreign Relations and the North American Union his supporters frequently mention. Most mainstream Republicans see Paul as a wild eyed extremist libertarian, but Paul’s answer came off as sincere and logical.

Paul replied that most of these theories are not conspiracy theories, but competing ideologies. He pointed to the well known fact that the CFR is real, and that there have been significant steps taken toward the formation of a North American Union through NAFTA and the prospect of the guest worker program. He compared the current state of affairs to the formation of the European Union, recognizing that its formation was incremental, not fully conceived from the start.

Paul’s message should resonate with many conservatives who are uncomfortable with losing our national sovereignty under globalist policies on immigration, our U.N. involvement, and a potential major international highway being built from Mexico City to Montreal. By framing his candidacy as an ongoing dialogue between those who favor national sovereignty over the rising tide of globalization, Paul did his movement a favor and got the message out to mainstream Republicans to consider.

As I tell many of my friends and colleagues who are surprised at my lack of disdain for the Texas congressman, to me, Ron Paul’s ideas are just a hundred steps too far in the right direction. His rejection of government intervention and spending are conservative principles, but it isn’t practical to do away with the Federal Reserve, IRS, and foreign deployment of troops overnight; but scaling down incrementally is.

In the end I think Ron Paul realizes this. He knows he’s not going to win. Not long ago I saw him in Manchester, NH at a well attended rally. As always he expressed his amazement at the support he is receiving. He never intended on winning; only to help shake up the debate. I hope he continues to do so.

So what does this all mean for Romney? That all will depend on how well Huckabee can keep up his current momentum in Iowa and whether Giuliani can weather the attacks currents against him. In my humble opinion, things are looking pretty good.

Off the beaten path...

2007-11-27T13:29:00.000-05:00

I know this is a little off the beaten path, but I thought this tidbit might be interesting. My dad forwarded me an email and some pictures of Mitt "caught" helping clean up after the fire in San Diego. The catch? No press, no campaign, and no signs. His son, who apparently lives in the area, took his dad along to help some people in their local congregation. They didn't even know he was coming. Visit my site to see the story and pictures.

What Are These Endorsements Based On Anyway?

2007-11-16T13:24:00.000-05:00

Marc Ambinder of The Atlantic blogged one of the funniest exchanges I have seen this primary season. The exchange was during an interview between radio host and Romney defender Hugh Hewitt and the executive director of National Right to Life, David O’Steen about NRTL’s endorsement of Fred Thompson. Although Hewitt supports Romney, he brought to light the absence of logic behind some of these strange endorsements we’re seeing.

HH: Well, that’s the same…David, David, this audience is very sophisticated. They don’t like double talk. He’s not where Huckabee is, he’s not where Romney is endorsing the amendment. What I’m trying to get to is why do you guys not care about that?

DO’S: Well, wait a minute, I didn’t want to talk about other candidates specifically.

HH: Well, come on.

DO’S: Look at the history of other candidates. I said he’s had a consistent pro-life position.

HH: Are you saying Huckabee’s not consistently pro-life?

DO’S: What did you say?

HH: Are you saying Huckabee’s not consistently pro-life?

DO’S: No, I’m not saying…I wasn’t talking about Huckabee. You were mentioning other candidates. I mean, you…

HH: But Huckabee is…

DO’S: Huckabee has been pro-life, yes. He’s pro-life.

HH: And he’s for the amendment. So why would you guys not go with him?

DO’S: Well, I’ll tell you, we’re also looking at what we view as electability.

HH: You don’t think Mike Huckabee is electable?

DO’S: Well, in the polls we’ve been watching, in the national polls, Fred Thompson has in the majority of them run second, Mike Huckabee hasn’t.

HH: David, have you been watching…David O’Steen is my guest from the National Right To Life Committee. Have you been watching the recent polls? Fred Thompson’s falling like a rock.

DO’S: Well, he’s running strong in South Carolina. The last national Real Clear Politics average I saw showed him running second to Rudy Giuliani.

HH: He’s got 6% in Iowa, and less than that, I think, in New Hampshire in the CBS poll released yesterday.

DO’S: But he’s running strong in Nevada and South Carolina. As I said, you know, everyone can look at polls, and the last Real Clear Politics average I saw, he was running second to Rudy Giuliani.

This interview brings up two important questions. First, who is more electable, Huckabee or Thompson? Second, what are these endorsements based on anyway?

Looking at the national RCP average can be very misleading; Thompson is doing quite well in the national polls compared to Huckabee, but Huckabee is better positioned to possibly win some early primary states. The RCP averages for Iowa show that Huckabee is quickly turning things around there while Thompson’s numbers have been stagnant since April when he wasn’t even an official candidate. Huckabee’s momentum could quite possibly give him an Iowa win and change his fortunes in the subsequent primaries.

Unfortunately for Thompson there is no similar prospect in sight. In New Hampshire, both Thompson and Huckabee are in the single digits after Thompson’s 11-12% showing in mid-October shriveled to 5% this month. Huckabee’s 7% may be small, but at least he’s moving up, and if the Iowa caucus takes place before the New Hampshire primary and he wins, he could take advantage of his low expectations by making a second or third place showing in New Hampshire and really shake the campaign up.

O’Steen argues that Thompson is doing well in South Carolina (16.8%) and Nevada (15%), but Thompson is hemorrhaging support in South Carolina (down from 23% in October) and in Nevada he can’t seem to gain any ground. In Florida his numbers are dropping like a roller coaster (from 22% in October to14% now), so count that state out.

Giuliani is playing a dangerous game banking on a February 5^th victory in the delegate rich states, but at least he is leading in these states by wide margins. In California alone Giuliani has 32% while Thompson is sitting at 12%. Unless Thompson can pick up the pace in either the early states or put some heat on Giuliani in the latter, Thomson is in big trouble.

So why would NRTL endorse a candidate who clearly isn’t positioned to win when there are other pro-life candidates who are?

Paul Weyrich, the well known evangelical leader who recently endorsed Romney, suggested to the Washington Times that there was some financial dealing involved. The Thompson campaign of course responded with their own mud slinging saying that Romney tries to spread his money around wherever he can and that they would have endorsed him except for the fact he was pro-choice two years earlier. While this response explains why Romney wasn’t endorsed NRTL, it still isn’t clear why they would support Huckabee over Thompson.

Whatever their motivation is, it’s obviously not viability.

Dick Morris Is Wrong About Mitt, Again

2007-11-15T14:46:00.000-05:00

Dick Morris, former adviser to President Clinton and now mortal enemy of Hillary Clinton, loves to make predictions about election outcomes. Over the course of the year I have been following his columns concerning the Republican primary because his opinions are usually so conclusive and certain you would think he had successfully discovered time travel. To prove he hasn’t made such a discovery, I pieced together a few of his predictions over the year to demonstrate how wrong this guy who thinks he’s always right is.

“Romney, who is panting after their (conservatives) support, is a political duck decoy, distracting onlookers from focusing their gaze on the real conservatives who might run. He can't win. He can't get nominated or even become the consensus candidate of the right wing. He's too Mormon (it shouldn't be an issue, but it is) and flip-flop-flipped from pro-life to pro-choice and back again. These problems, combined with his flip-flops on gay rights and stem cell research, make him incapable of becoming the right-wing candidate to oppose Giuliani.” – March 15, 2007

And yesterday…

“Even as he continues to hold a convincing lead in the national race, Rudy Giuliani may be riding for a big fall in Iowa and the other early state primaries. Mitt Romney, despite his anemic national showing, could sweep Iowa, New Hampshire and Michigan, a trifecta that could give him such momentum as to sweep him to the nomination.

The numbers are scary for Giuliani (and since Mitt doesn't have a prayer in hell of beating Hillary in a general election, scary for us all). While he holds a lead in the national polls (Giuliani 30, Thompson 17, McCain 15, Romney 12, Huckabee 9 -- all data is from the average of the past five polls posted on www.realclearpolitics.com), he is trailing badly in all the early states.

…But if Romney wins in Iowa, he will certainly win in New Hampshire -- where he already leads -- and in Michigan, where his father was governor and he has been working hard. Coming into Florida with that kind of momentum will make it very hard for Giuliani to come back.” -November 14, 2007 – The Hill

What is so humorous about this transition from Dick saying Romney doesn’t have a chance against Giuliani to him being in position to win, is that now Dick is certain ( I’m assuming that is what he meant by saying “Mitt doesn't have a prayer in hell”) Romney can’t win the general election against Hillary. Maybe Dick would be better served betting on the impossible.

Dick assumes Giuliani should win against Romney as long as he runs a traditional aggressive advertising campaign much the same way Romney is. This just isn’t he case. Giuliani himself is his campaign’s liability, not his campaign strategy. Dick said:

“Rudy has brought this crisis on himself by foolishly running no television ads in any of the early primary or caucus states while Romney has advertised for six to eight months. In a classic hare-versus-tortoise scenario, Giuliani waited so long to show his colors on television that Romney may have built up an insurmountable lead in the interim.”

Dick mistakenly assumes that it is in Giuliani’s best interest for the public to learn more about him. This just isn’t the case. Everybody already knows who Giuliani is. People know him as the New York mayor who made some good stump speeches following 9/11. What they generally don't know is that he's been divorced multiple times, lived with two gay friends, and fought for public funding for abortions.

Now everyone is starting to find out about his corrupt bedfellows such as the recently indicted Bernard Kerik, who Giuliani recommended to the Bush administration to lead the Department of Homeland Security. If Giuliani runs too many adds, or attracts too much attention to himself through other means, the negative issues will spread in the news like chickenpox in a preschool. Unfortunately for him, it looks like it is already happening.

Conversely, the Romney campaign has demonstrated a powerful correlation between advertising and an increase in support. His ads have been extremely successful in the early primary states, and there’s no evidence to suggest this won’t work throughout the rest of the country. While some believe the “Mormon” issue is the 5-ton elephant in the room, it hasn’t been impossible to overcome thus far, especially as evidenced by Romney’s drastically improved numbers in South Carolina. It will be interesting to see how this issue plays out as the campaign spreads west.

One thing is clear – Romney benefits by putting himself in the public spotlight whereas Rudy does not. There has been some dispute among Romney’s campaign advisers concerning whether they should start showing negative ads about Giuliani because the mud might come back their way. For now, with the Kerik and Regan/News Corp. headlines, Romney has no need to get his own hands muddy.

More, more, more...

2007-11-05T20:18:00.001-05:00

...endorsements. The latest endorsement is from Paul Weyrich, chairman of the Free Congress Foundation and one of the founders back in the day of the Moral Majority. The NY Times' Caucus has the details:

Mr. Weyrich, who has been described as the father of the religious right and also founded the Heritage Foundation, had been critical of talk that broke out earlier this year among Christian conservatives about bolting the Republican Party if Rudolph W. Giuliani, a supporter of abortion rights, is the nominee and backing a third-party candidate.

So now it appears he is backing up that criticism with action, lining up behind Mr. Romney, despite questions many Christian conservatives continue to harbor about his relatively recent conversation from supporter of abortion rights to opponent and his Mormon faith.

Yeah, it's practically unbelievable that Christians could get over their doubts. It's almost as if they had faith in Mitt Romney.

I'm just giving Luo, the author of the story (who I generally like for his fair reporting), a hard time. Indeed, Luo lines up the list of names of prominent social conservatives backing Romney:

Mr. Romney had lined up a host of social conservative endorsements up to this point, including James Bopp Jr., a major anti-abortion activist; Jay Sekulow, another prominent Christian conservative; and Bob Jones III, chancellor of Bob Jones University, most recently. But he had lacked one of the scions of the religious right, which Mr. Weyrich unquestionably remains.

Of course there's a much longer list than just those names. One important point to remember is that if these people were just looking for someone to advance their doctrinal beliefs, they would have chosen a different candidate. As Mitt has coined, neither he no anyone else is running for Pastor-in-Chief. If they were, there would be no question that the former pastor in the race would be the consensus candidate. Mitt represents not only a socially conservative voice, but a proven leader and executive.

Jump on the band wagon, Rudy!

2007-10-25T11:42:00.001-04:00

Apparently, the promise of the Presidency is enough to lead Rudy to abandon his beloved Yankees for arch-rival Boston Red Sox. And what has brought about this sudden change of heart?

New Hampshire is Red Sox territory. Giuliani has been campaigning there, recently. Despite telling a reporter, last year, that even a deal with the devil to put him in the White House could not pull him from the Yankees, Rudy is claiming to be a Sox fan because he's rooting for the American league. Right. Is that what we are calling political expediency, now days?

I can't help but ask myself: would Mitt become a Yankee fan if they had won the ALCS?

You can't make up fiction this good!

2007-10-18T15:26:00.000-04:00

A lot of my friends are what I call "closet supporters" of Mitt. Given that I live in Utah, it's a sure bet that they would like to see Romney, a Mormon and local hero due to the 2002 Winter Olympic Games, in the White House. They would love to see him win, but they don't have the confidence to suggest that he can do it. They seem to think that the Giuliani steam engine is so strong it can't be beat. Without even knowing where I stand, they say "How's Romney going to beat Rudy?" They can't reconcile Rudy's social policies with his fiscal policies. He's pro-gay rights, pro-gun control, and pro-abortion; Mitt is anything but these.

And their worries are legit. The race, due to dynamics unique to this election cycle, will be touch and go all the way down the line.

This year’s unique factors—no vice-president running for his boss's office, lots of candidates, primaries moving up to December and constantly in flux, Super Tuesday, huge amounts of cash, a viable black candidate, a more than viable female candidate and wife of a very popular former president, a very unpopular war, tons of money (did I already mention that?), neither party with any real direction, etc, etc, etc—make for a very high amount of unpredictability. I like what one commentator said when he compared it to trying to predict who will win the World Series in May; October is so far away, how can anyone guess the winner at this point?

It used to be that if a candidate won in New Hampshire and/or Iowa, it would be a good bet to he would win the whole nomination (and that's certainly been Mitt's strategy; he's spent multiple fortunes and practically moved to Iowa and New Hampshire). Today's race, however, with Democratic candidates not even campaigning in Michigan and Florida, and the voting demographics in South Carolina a polar distance from New Hampshire, is anyone's guess.

It doesn’t make it any easier that the GOP is at sea without a rudder. Rudy is an opportunist dressed in fiscal conservative clothes, yet he's still winning the betting donor's cash. Yet, with more in common with Hillary and Obama than with Mitt, Mike (Huckabee), and John, conservatives who are paying attention have reason to pause before giving the New Yorker their vote. The most dramatic indicia of this was the endorsement yesterday of Mitt Romney by an influential evangelist who traditionally shows anti-Mormon films. It’s a well known adage that politics makes strange bedfellows, but who would have ever thought that the list of choices would be so difficult that an evangelist would pass over a Tennessee native (Law and Order's Fred Thompson) in order to endorse a Mormon for the highest political office in the country?

You can’t write fiction this good! No matter what happens in the next few months, voters will need to make some careful analysis of what they want out of the next Presidency. The potential differences in administration between the candidates could not be more significant, and that's without even leaving the Republican party. Don't ask me what happens if a Democrat is November's winner in '08.

Why Mitt

2007-10-04T19:15:00.001-04:00

Sometimes I get caught up in pointing out the weaknesses of other candidates (which admittedly is the easy part of my job here) that I forget to make the positive case for Mitt. Therefore, let me make a few points for why Mitt is the right candidate, not through comparison to other candidates, but independent of them.

A complete approach to the presidency
One of the things that has impressed me most about Romney's candidacy as it has developed has been his complete approach to the presidency. It indicates to me that he understands the full range of roles and responsibilities that the president undertakes: Commander in chief, chief executive of the largest bureaucracy, chief domestic policy advocate, nominator of federal judges, role model, etc. All of these are hats that the president must wear while in office. Recent history has given us presidents that have abdicated or neglected one or more of these roles. Mitt, on the other hand, addresses all of these roles. He does not excuse himself in one area by trying to compensate in another. Indeed, I strongly believe that Mitt tenure in office would restore much of the lost feeling and confidence in the presidency. No longer would there be gaping sores on the office of the president for immorality or incompetence. Mitt could heal those wounds felt by the American people. This is the kind of person I want leading the country.

Facts drive the analysis
I talked a little bit about this a couple of weeks ago after the last debate. Perhaps this I'm alone in this, but this is something that has been increasingly important to me as I go through law school. One of the things that undermines an advocate most is to have the facts wrong or to abuse their interpretation. On the other hand, advocacy based on solid facts and rigorous reasoning persuades in a way that neither alone can accomplish.

Mitt is an ideal advocate. As can be documented through those that have worked with him, Mitt requires two things when he approaches a problem: mountains of data and vivid debate. This is the most consistent and reliable method by which to find the right solutions. This is what the great Abraham Lincoln did in his time, not surrounding himself with "yes-men", but with both dissenting and concurring voices. Additionally, when Mitt has resolved upon a solution, he has the ideal basis by which to persuade. He is backed by facts and reasoning. He is essentially the antithesis of an ideologue. This is the kind of person that I want running my country.

Previous success indicates future success
This was the first thing that I (and probably other people) noticed about Mitt: he has excelled at everything he's done; in education at BYU, Harvard Business, Harvard Law; in the private sector at Bain Consulting, Bain Capital, the 2002 Winter Olympics; in the public sector as Governor. (Of course, on some level, this inspires a small amount of jealousy at his perpetual success.) Recent history of has given us presidents with a mixed bag of pre-presidency successes or presidents who have been successful in a narrow field. Mitt's success is broad and extensive. This type of sucess leads to a very optimistic projection of his ability to succeed in governing the nation. This is the kind of person that I want running my country.

News Round-up

2007-10-02T20:13:00.001-04:00

From the Politico: Fred? Thompson is not a believer in Reagan's 11th commandment:

“I am more of a 12th Commandment man: Don’t speak ill of them until they speak ill of me. And then really speak ill of them.”

Hard to believe that religious leaders aren't flocking to him.

From KJL at NRO: Ann Romney has an amazing life story to tell and is doing her part to advance the cause of MS victims:

“Helping raise awareness” about MS, money, and helping find a cure are unsurprisingly a big part of her charity work. As First Lady, she also intends to continue her work with “at risk youth,” which includes groups like Elayne Bennett’s Best Friends Foundation, whose mission it is to help kids make “smart choices.”

From RCPblog: ARG's Dick Bennet defends the poll showing Romney is leading in South Carolina:

"There is always the possibility that it is the sample, but the interviewers alerted me on Wednesday night that Romney was way up in SC so I added some follow-up questions and it is tied almost exclusively to recall of Romney's TV advertising. We saw the same thing in IA and NH."

From The Corner: Rudy is causing an uprising among social conservative leaders:

[Tony Perkins:] "But I think, Chris, there comes a point where you draw a line on principle. And I think this — this is the principal issue, the issue of life. We are not going to sit down at a table and negotiate away the protection of human life and shake hands and get up and go forward. That's not going to happen on my watch."

Rudy and the Second Amendment

2007-09-25T14:50:00.000-04:00

Near the end of my second year finals this last spring, I read the recently released D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals case of Parker v. District of Columbia. My Constitutional Law class hadn’t covered the second amendment and so it was intriguing to me. Judge Silberman does an extensive treatment of the text of the 2nd Amendment, parsing through its tangle of clauses. Notably there is little Supreme Court precedent on the subject. Judge Silberman concludes:

[T]he Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms. That right existed prior to the formation of the new government under the Constitution and was premised on the private use of arms for activities such as hunting and self-defense, the latter being understood as resistance to either private lawlessness or the depredations of a tyrannical government (or a threat from abroad).

Parker v. District of Columbia, 478 F.3d 370, 395 (D.C. Cir. 2007). In Rudy’s speech to the NRA (as reported by Marc Ambinder), Rudy refers to Parker v. District of Columbia as a source of persuasion in finding more utility for an individual right to bear arms. Yet, Rudy does some subtle hedging on his conversion:

"Your right to bear arms is based on a reasonable degree of safety," he said.

He indicated that he would oppose new efforts to tighten national gun laws.

"I believe that law enforcement should focus on enforcing the laws that exist on the books as opposed to passing new extensions of laws," he said.

Rudy concludes that the right to bear arms is, interestingly enough, not based on a constitutional provision, but on a reasonable degree of safety. When you think about it, that’s a pretty remarkable shift. Not based on independent (and constitutional) principles, Rudy believes that your right to bear arms is relative to your safety. That’s like saying your right to free speech is relative to your viewpoint.

Rudy also references that he would oppose any new laws restricting gun ownership, not because those laws are wrong, but because there are enough laws on the books as it is. Is this really a rationale that we are comfortable with? Nor does Rudy say that he would deregulate guns in anyway. Indeed, Rudy’s stance has not truly changed, but he has reframed his issues around policy judgments like safety and enforceability, not constitutional principles, making gun-owner rights still relative to his judgments.

A defining Moment

2007-09-25T12:39:00.001-04:00

Mitt's op-ed over at NRO about Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:

The world is looking to our leaders to meet the challenge of a rogue nation, bent on obtaining nuclear weapons. Failure to do so would diminish the legacy of those who fought and died in World War II and of all victims of genocide and terror. We are long past the time for political correctness and accommodation of Ahmadinejad’s outrageous rhetoric. It is time to speak clearly and frankly, to strengthen alliances and build new ones, and to act with unity and decisiveness against a ruler who threatens to reintroduced the world to the horrors of nuclear devastation and holocaust.

Dobson's Checklist: Not to Fred

2007-09-20T12:21:00.000-04:00

As Justin Hart reported over at MyManMitt, James Dobson will not be endorsing Fred. Independently, this may be not so earth shattering. Fred has not given any reason for voters to vote for him. His appeal largely stems from fortuitous similarities to the most beloved conservative leader of the century. Actor? Check. Political career? Check. Yet, the prima facie similarities end there, which is what Dobson is pointing out (even going to the extreme of using the dreaded exclamation point at the end of his last sentence).

The interesting part, at least to us Mitt supporters, is this: Dobson has ruled out every other first tier candidate except Mitt. As the New York Times story states:

Earlier this year, Dobson said he wouldn't back John McCain because of the Arizona senator's opposition to a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

Later, Dobson wrote on a conservative news Web site that he wouldn't support former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani should he win the Republican nomination. Dobson called Giuliani an ''unapologetic supporter of abortion on demand'' and criticized him for signing a bill in 1997 creating domestic-partnership benefits in New York City.

Some are speculating an endorsement of Mike Huckabee, but Huckabee's longshot status means Dobson will be support almost a sure loser. Such an endorsement would mean diminish Dobson's political power with the potential nominee. But there's still another option. Could it be that Dobson is going to put theological differences aside and endorse Mitt? Consider this from back in May:

Transcript from above audio:

Laura Ingraham: Any thoughts on Romney? He's now winning in Iowa and looks like he's winning in some polls in New Hampshire.

Dr. Dobson: Since I talked to you, I've spent an hour and a half with him and I liked him. He's very presidential and he's got the right answers to many, many things. I haven't made a decision yet, but let's just say he's still on the list.

A change...

2007-09-19T22:30:00.000-04:00

...would do you good, to quote the talented, but politically misguided Sheryl Crow. Only replace "you" with "Republicans" and "good" with......... uh............"good". You get the idea.

Romney's Master Plan

2007-09-13T22:55:00.000-04:00

This opinion piece from David Broder sums up nicely some of the great challenges that Governor Romney will face as the endless election drags on. It introduces nothing new, but is a nice summary of Romney's larger challenges nonetheless. It specifically mentions his flip-flopping and charges that he will say or do anything to win. I am curious to see how Romney's campaign will respond once the attack ads run regarding his flip-flopping because I have no idea how or if such ads will be countered.

Ames Speech

2007-08-11T18:44:00.000-04:00

McWhorter's Romney Problem

2007-08-09T16:53:00.000-04:00

Browsing the internet today, as I normally do to bring you all the riveting content and commentary that spews forth from my humble laptop, I came upon this article in the New York Sun. In it, John McWhorter describes the conflict and angst of two Mormons that he knew were gay, but who decided to follow Church doctrines rather than their sexual orientation. He then goes on to describe LDS doctrines against homosexuality. McWhorter makes his point:

What I cannot abide is Mormonism's starkly official revulsion at the simple fact that some humans are sexually attracted to other humans of the same gender.

He then continues by tying Romney to this discussion in a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” way:

How could someone proposing himself as the steward of our great nation concur, in 2007, with views on homosexuality which in the future will look as blinkered as witch hunting does now?

If Mr. Romney does not concur with this primitivism but lets it pass, I see this as thoroughly ugly as well.

I bring this up not just because McWhorter’s stance is incredibly silly, but to educate supposedly educated people, like McWhorter, about the mental necessity of separating Church and State in the presidential politics of the day. Hugh Hewitt and others have tried to do the same, to little avail, and so I don’t expect much in the way of success in convincing others.

The United States government is a secular instrument. Its nature and function are secular. Its origins are secular. The executive of that government, the President, performs secular duties. His responsibilities include such things as providing for the common defense, promoting general welfare, and defending the Constitution. None of these things require a theology. They can be performed ably by someone without religious beliefs or by a deeply religious person. Because the duties are secular, the Constitution is indifferent as to the religion of the person performing them.

There is, however, a tension in our presidential politics. The electorate wants a person of faith. This is not so because we wish them to believe in a particular theology. Such a proposition would make it impossible to elect a President with any sort of majority of Americans. The multiplicity of religions in America would fracture the vote. Not only would it make a national election difficult once the candidate’s religion was known and the specific tenants examined, but it is the kind of thing that our pluralistic founding fathers sought to avoid. No, America understands that it is not a religion that is desired in our elected officials, but faith.

We desire faith because it is a desirable quality in and of itself. Despite the advance of science and the scientific method, which has certainly been a benefit for society, there still comes a point of the unknown or unknowable. It is at that point that science and logic alone are deficient. Faith provides direction and understanding where science and logic cannot. Indeed, it would seem unreasonable for someone to rely purely on logic and science where those cannot provide the answers. Thus, as voters, we desire a leader who has faith when reason alone does not provide guidance.

Faith should not be confused for religion in electoral politics. Many people make the mistake of using the two words interchangeably when they really mean one or the other. Indeed, it has become common usage to call religion faith and faith religion. In presidential politics, the two should not be confused. To do so is to cynically confuse the hearer or reader.

Despite this, the prevailing way to look at Romney (and it has been especially apparent of late) has been to look at his religion, not his faith. This is an invidious way to present Romney. McWhorter is especially explicit about it. He notes that in spite of the glowing reports he hears about Romney, he doesn’t like him because of a policy of the church Romney belongs to. This makes the argument about the church policy and not about Romney. It is not Romney’s individual faith that is being discussed but the tenants of his religious affiliation. It is identity politics. No longer is it important who Romney is or what he believes, but what group we label him into. That’s why so many of the pundits of the day have come to the same conclusion as McWhorter “damned if he is, damned if he isn’t” because they’ve given him a label and they can’t get beyond it. That’s why in the radio interview, the host claimed better knowledge of Mitt’s beliefs than Mitt himself did. The host had labeled him and wouldn’t budge.

For those of us with more sense, we realize that it is faith, not a particular religion, that is the desireable quality in a president. Thus, the endless crowing about LDS doctrines serve not a bit to enlighten the hearers about Mitt Romney anymore than having LDS missionaries in your home would. The nation has gotten that message. Somehow it is the press that hasn't.

Fred Thompson, waiting too long?

2007-08-07T13:04:00.000-04:00

News round-up

2007-08-03T14:17:00.000-04:00

There are a few things out there today:

First, countdown to the Ames Straw Poll: 8 days

Second, Michael Gerson has an op-ed in the Washington Post today discussing whether Romney should make a Kennedy-like speech. His conclusion:

Romney, however, should not make Kennedy's mistake and assert that all religious beliefs are unrelated to politics. What Mormonism shares with other religious traditions is a strong commitment to the value and dignity of human beings, including the unborn, the disabled and the poor. This conviction is unavoidably political, because it leads men and women to act in the cause of justice, not in order to impose their religion, but to protect the weak.

I tend to agree with Gerson. I wrote back in March:

I believe, however, that Romney is better off not making a speech about the role of religion in his candidacy. While Wilson makes the point that religion is central to character and should therefore be explored, I think that character is inferred from the way that a candidate speaks and acts. The religious principles that underlie that behavior and speech are less important than the result. By injecting religion into character, Romney runs the significant risk of having the LDS standards of behavior (as much as I believe in them) become more important than Romney’s actual behavior. No, I think that emphasizing the commonalities that Romney has with people of other faiths is the right direction. It gives voters the more palatable choice of accepting Romney alone without having to swallow the entire LDS Church as a whole. I think that making a Kennedy-like speech forces voters to make a much bigger leap than Romney alone presents.

Third, there was some debate over at the Corner about Romney’s comments about Hezbollah’s tactics in gaining political legitimacy. Lisa Schiffren had this to say:

So it is really horrifying to think that a man of Mr. Romney's intelligence would make the a serious diplomatic mistake of citing a radical terrorist group as a model for U.S. policy. This is where being a techno-guy, without any real foreign policy experience, (or ear) begins to matter.

KJL posted the Romney campaign’s response. Then Andrew Stuttaford gave this rebuttal to Schiffren:

Lisa, Romney was not (of course) praising or in any way endorsing Hamas or Hezbollah. All he was saying is that, judging by their experience, the provision of some form of social services is not a bad way to win support. He's right (of course it's not a particularly novel insight: I believe there's something called the Peace Corps that was founded on pretty much the same idea), and it's an encouraging sign that he is taking a serious look at what has worked politically in a region where US policy has not, recently, been marked by a great deal of success. There's such a thing as learning from the enemy (in fact it's a hallmark of many successful counter-insurgencies). Romney has just given a sign that he is smart enough to do that. Good for him.

Fourth, there will be a televised debate on Sunday on ABC.

Fifth, Brownback and Huckabee are having a little exchange over religion. After Jason’s nice summation of the Brownback campaign, it’s nice to know that others are seeing the same. Huckabee’s campaign manager Chip Saltsman said the following:

It’s time for Sam Brownback to stop whining and start showing some of the Christian character he seems to always find lacking in others.

Some news

2007-07-18T11:14:00.000-04:00

Romney continues to surge in NH:

CNN/WMUR/UNH poll.
Romney: 33
Giuliani: 18
F. Thompson: 13
McCain: 12

Also, Marc Ambinder does an in-depth look at Romney's media team and the competition he has fostered.

Sabato, the field, 2006, and 2008

2007-07-14T19:42:00.000-04:00

Not having a background in electoral politics, I look to experts to fill me in. One who seems almost universally respected and looked to is Larry Sabato, who runs the University of Virginia's Center for Politics. In his latest assessment of the Republican field, Sabato said this (among other things) about each of the top candidates:

Only a year or so ago in front-page banner headlines, Senator John McCain was touted as the likely frontrunner, partly because he had corralled many of George W. Bush's 2000 fund-raising "Pioneers." This extraordinarily superficial analysis ignored the GOP base's rather intense dislike of McCain--a mistrust that had been built by the press' closeness to him in 2000 as well as his positions on campaign finance, immigration, and other topics. McCain's support in money and many polls is now so weak--single digits in Iowa and some other places--that his nomination would rank as one of the biggest upsets in modern American political history.

As of his entry into the GOP field in February 2007, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani became co-frontrunner with McCain. While his campaign has fared much better than McCain's, mainly because of his enduring 9/11 image, Giuliani has drifted down in the polls nationally and in many individual states as the focus shifts to his Achilles heel--his liberal positions on abortion, gay rights and gun control.

The surprise candidate of the GOP field has clearly been former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney. Strong fundraising, an attractive image and family and good positioning on the issues has enabled Romney to partly overcome his own negatives...Romney is now a leading player, apparently ahead in Iowa and New Hampshire, with a decent chance to capture the GOP standard in St. Paul next summer.

About equal with Romney is the certain-but-not-yet-announced candidacy of former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson. Sensing that McCain was failing some time ago, this Hollywood star revived GOP memories of another figure from Tinseltown: Ronald Reagan. (As we've said many times, the Democrats keep looking for another John F. Kennedy and the Republicans continue to search for a second Ronald Reagan; neither party will ever find its man.)

Sabato also handicaps the general election:

We have heard and seen more than a few Republican leaders brighten up about their 2008 prospects by saying, "2006 was the worst of it, and 2008 will have to be better." They are dreaming. Not only can 2008 be as bad as 2006 for the GOP, it can be a good deal worse. Something we've learned from studying the 220 years of our Republic's elections: the political party that is found whistling past the graveyard usually ends up six feet under.

There is a great deal of truth to this. If the party ignores or downplays the losses in 2006 and fails to learn its lessons, there will be widespread revolts in Republican districts. That's not to say that the party shouldn't be optimistic. We have seen time and again that conservative principles (military strength, fiscal responsibility, and family values) coupled with competence are favored by Americans. 2006 represented the abandonment of those two keys: spending was out of control, our military looked weak, our elected officials looked like hypocrites for engaging in unbecoming (and sometimes criminal) behavior while giving lip service to values, and, despite majorities in both houses, accomplished little.

Which brings us to why Mitt should be our choice for 2008. Mitt embodies the lessons learned from 2006: an unquestionably competent executive who has and can get things done, a strong record on fiscal restraint and lower taxes, innovative ideas for strengthening our military, and personal behavior that matches his rhetoric on families and values. No other candidate fully represents these learned lessons from 2006. In one way or another, each of the other Republican candidates falls short, and thus represents something that Americans rejected so recently. Mitt does not and, thus, should be the choice for both Republicans and Americans.

What Else Have I Missed?

2007-07-11T13:58:00.000-04:00

The latest National Journal rankings have Romney in 2nd place with "No One" in first. I don't think seven months ago he could have asked to be in a better position. There are worse things in a presidential campaign than expectations, as I heard someone recently say.

But reading the rundown of his campaign by National Journal, I realize that I have not been paying attention.

He has a solid claim to No. 2 because of his strength in Iowa and New Hampshire and his solid bank account. But he's not the front-runner because he hasn't demonstrated he can be competitive in a general election yet, either -- message-wise or poll-wise -- based on message or polls. On the surface, he's had a rough month -- Garrity-Gate, stem cells, dog on top of the car -- but the net effect of this isn't that terrible. Basically, the press thinks Romney is the weirdest candidate. The dog-on-the-roof story only adds to the Clark Griswold weirdness.

Dog on top of the car? Where have I been?

One Question for Rudy

2007-06-27T23:30:00.000-04:00

I want to start off by saying that I am generally satisfied with the Republican candidates for president. They are people with whom I find a lot of common ground and would vote for long before any of the Democratic contenders.

Still, there are issues that trouble me about each candidate. I've talked before about some of my qualms about McCain, most recently in discussing McCain-Feingold. Today, there is one question that still plagues me about Rudy Giuliani: How?

Giuliani's position on abortion has been well documented and I have explained the fallacy of his constitutional reasoning for supporting taxpayer funding of abortions. More recently Giuliani has argued that he will increase adoptions and decrease abortions. It is one of his now famous "twelve commitments". Giuliani has repeated the statistics from his tenure as mayor evidencing that phenomenon in New York.

Which brings me back to my question: How? What is it that will accomplish these two goals? What policies resulted in the success in New York? Or was it purely coincidence that took place during Giuliani's How will that work on the national stage? I assume that Giuliani will explain as he gets through fleshing out his twelve commitments, but count me skeptical right now.

Mostly I find myself skeptical because the two issues do not necessarily correlate. Increasing adoptions does not necessarily decrease abortions. Conversely decreasing abortions does not necessarily translate into more adoptions. Thus, trying to merge the two issues confuses the listener.

Which brings me to a reason why I support Mitt. We have seen Mitt defend life. He understands the role that a strong executive can play in reducing abortions. It's not just through strict constructionist judges. It's not just through personal opposition. It is through the full exercise of executive powers. Right now Mitt understands and advocates that. Rudy does not.

FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life

2007-06-26T19:16:00.000-04:00

First off, I want to encourage our readers to read the actual opinion. If you want to get a good idea about the arguments involved in the campaign finance reform issue, the majority opinion, concurrences, and dissent all provide a good representation of the different sides of the argument.

Here’s a little about the case. It is a follow-up case to McConnell v. FEC. McConnell decided that McCain-Feingold was valid just from a reading of the language, but left open the question of whether in actual application it would still be constitutional (or in legal terms, an “as applied challenge”). FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life resolves the question of the as applied challenge. Chief Justice Roberts, the majority author, decided that McCain Feingold is unconstitutional as applied to the issue ads by WRTL without reversing McConnell. Justice Alito concurred, noting that he would be open to overruling McConnell depending on the effect of the WRTL case’s effect. Justices Scalia, Thomas, and Kennedy concurred in the result, but stated that McConnell should be overruled. Justices Souter, Stevens, Breyer, and Ginsburg dissented.

In a sense this is both a small and a big win for free speech. It’s a small win because the actual outcome is fairly narrow. This follows the general judicial philosophy of Justices Roberts and Alito, who generally have been deciding cases on narrow grounds rather than making grander pronouncements. Roberts’ declination to overrule McConnell makes this holding of this case fairly narrow, dealing only with what is and what isn’t an issue ad. Much like the partial-birth abortion case, Gonzales v. Carhart, the narrow grounds upon which the case was decided tempers the ability of the winning side to make any grand pronouncements as to the effect of the case.

On the other hand, this is a big win for McCain-Feingold’s opponents. The test set forth by Roberts is exacting. It will make McCain-Feingold essentially toothless for any political ad other than those expressly advocating the election or defeat of a candidate. Additionally, WRTL paves the way for further erosion and the possible overturning of McCain-Feingold in its entirety. Three Justices already openly advocate it. Alito signaled that he could be convinced to do so. Roberts is more cryptic, but it seems likely at the least that he would also be willing to overturn it. Such a reversal would be a huge win for such a conservative cause as the First Amendment. (Note that usually the first amendment is a clarion call for liberals defending the worst human behavior – i.e. “bong hits for Jesus - while suppressing its intended purpose of promoting political speech).

McCain (and possibly Fred Thompson) should be embarrassed for supporting such a blatant infringement of the First Amendment. While his concern with political corruption is laudable, silencing political speech is directly prohibited by the First Amendment, and certainly is not the method to avoid corruption. That McCain would choose to sacrifice free speech for the sake of political candidates is indefensible. Roberts’ judicious approach to the law leaves McCain-Feingold still alive but on life-support. Had Justice Scalia been writing the majority opinion, he would have left nothing of McCain-Feingold’s restrictions on speech. Indeed, as Scalia notes in his concurrence:

There is wondrous irony to be found in both the genesis and the consequences of [McCain-Feingold]. In the fact that the institutions it was designed to muzzle—unions and nearly all manner of corporations—for all the “corrosive and distorting effects” of their “immense aggregations of wealth,” were utterly impotent to prevent the passage of this legislation that forbids them to criticize candidates (including incumbents). In fact the effect of [McCain-Feingold] has been to concentrate more political power in the hands of the country’s wealthiest individuals and their so-called 527organizations, unregulated by §203. (In the 2004 election cycle, a mere 24 individuals contributed an astounding total of $142 million to 527s.) And, in fact, while these wealthy individuals dominate political discourse, it is this small, grass-roots organization of Wisconsin Right to Life that is muzzled.

Score this a win for free speech and Romney.

Iowa withdrawal

2007-06-08T11:49:00.000-04:00

I could be a little confused here, but Rudy and McCain are conceding Iowa? An editorial by Pat Buchanan says that they are smart to avoid Romney in Iowa and should bank on New Hampshire. However, Buchanan sums up the essence of what this means for both Iowa and New Hampshire:

But in running Rudy and John out of Ames, Romney has shown real strength, and must now be the favorite to take Iowa in January and probably is the man to beat in New Hampshire.

To me it really is stunning that Rudy and McCain so early and readily conceded Iowa. Less than two months ago Romney was down by double digits to Rudy, McCain, or both. Now Romney is the favorite having taken the lead in most polls with some showing a double digit lead. Many analysts have explained that Romney is the only one on the airwaves, but if this were the only reason wouldn’t the answer be to just combat Romney’s advertising with advertising of your own? As Jason has explained, this is expensive, but aren’t you running a campaign to win? If it’s not worth the money to you to win, then what are you doing campaigning and fundraising?

As unlikely to outsiders as it may have seemed after the first quarter fundraising numbers came in, Romney’s fundraising is a manifestation of the support widespread support that Romney has garnered as people have met him and embraced his message. As silly as the explanations of predominantly Mormon supporters or wealthy fat-cats were and are, analysts and detractors can’t explain Romney’s Iowa surge on a narrow base of fawning Mormons or former business partners. It seems more and more to me that the first quarter fundraising numbers were indicative of things to come. Unfortunately for Rudy and McCain, there comes a time where you have to perform. You don’t always get to explain away your defeat as resulting from a “late start” or whatever other excuses there might be.

It’s also interesting to me that Rudy and McCain would bank on New Hampshire. Romney has a bigger lead there than in Iowa. Or maybe they will also back out of New Hampshire to bank on South Carolina or Michigan or Nevada or Florida. But by that time how many wins does Romney have? No, by that time it will be more than apparent that Republicans are with Romney. Perhaps they feel more comfortable with the poll numbers in Florida which look like the Iowa numbers from two months ago. How long will those numbers stay like that? I wouldn’t feel too comfortable if I were Rudy or McCain.

Admittedly, there’s a lot of time in between then and now and certainly strange things can happen, but this is a win for Romney. One of many to come.

Brownback's ideas...

2007-06-01T11:13:00.000-04:00

...on evolution are on display here, although I'm not sure what the pressing need to address evolution was. Perhaps he's still thinking about the first debate all those weeks ago. I guess he was of the mindset, "Better sooner than later."

Perhaps next he could address his thoughts on Bush v. Gore or the fall of the Berlin wall.

McCain and Religion

2007-06-01T10:58:00.000-04:00

Check out this post from EFM about McCain's religious outreach problems.

Time: Romney's "disappointing" campaign

2007-05-31T11:59:00.000-04:00

Time’s Joe Klein writes today about how “disappointing” Romney’s campaign is.

But there isn't the slightest hint of courage or conviction in his stump act. It's a candidacy for the era before 2001, before things got serious. And his success or failure will be a reflection of how serious the electorate is in 2008.

Apparently Klein admits the unseriousness (if that’s a word) of a particular presidential era prior to 2001. Now, however, we need a “serious” candidate – someone dark, brooding, and most of all angry. This isn’t the time for someone with optimism and a sense of humor. We need someone who will agitate and irritate, yell and scream, and generally follow the Al Sharpton/Howard Dean school of politics. No, Klein, I think the American people have rejected that type of candidate again and again – even in the Democratic party.

But what about Romney’s courage and conviction? It’s certainly a hard thing to quantify and is a qualitative assessment. So, I would ask, what do the people who are seeing him think? About the only indicators I know of are polls and endorsements. As people have become acquainted with Romney his poll numbers have increased. Romney also is not lacking for endorsements (although always willing to accept more). So what is it that Klein sees that so many others do not? He faults Romney for being too light on substance and heavy on style, making a jab at Romney audiences: “And because he doesn't dwell on [policy], his audiences don't.” But it’s hard to see how that is so when Romney has been so forthcoming on policy proposals (the most recent found here on MMM). Such criticism is not founded on fact, but on fantasy.

"I know more about this stuff than anybody in this room!"

2007-05-19T16:47:00.001-04:00

The NY Post has the details on McCain's angry, profanity-laced tirade at fellow Republican senator John Cornyn of Texas over the immigration bill.

Romney eclipsing Rudy...

2007-05-18T18:13:00.000-04:00

...that's what the Virginia Federalist says.

Wondering...

2007-05-18T15:42:00.001-04:00

...how Erick Ericson feels about his McCain endorsement after the latest immigration bill?

Redstate Editor Rescinds Support For Romney

2007-05-10T16:25:00.000-04:00

With law school wrapping up and the bar on the horizon, I haven't been posting much these past couple of months (no one else seems to have been either). Whenever I come across something that catches my eye, I have to fight a hankering to post on it to avoid getting sucked back in (e.g., the entire Romney-Sharpton episode this past week).

I feel like this development is pretty noteworthy though. Erick Erickson, the Editor of Redstate and former Romney supporter, has jumped ship for McCain. Any thoughts about the implication of this? Is this news, along with Time's new cover, just a bump in the road or is it signaling more troublesome problems with the perception of Mitt among the public and news media? By all accounts, he had a strong performance at the debate (outside repeating his response twice verbatim to the follow question about his shift on abortion, I think his performance was near flawless), but he still seems dogged by questions of authenticity. Will he battle this his entire campaign?

New Time Cover

2007-05-10T13:59:00.001-04:00

Romney and L. Ron Hubbard

2007-05-01T16:22:00.000-04:00

This from the Caucus:
"When asked his favorite novel in an interview shown yesterday on the Fox News Channel, Mitt Romney pointed to “Battlefield Earth,” a novel by L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology. That book was turned into a film by John Travolta, a Scientologist. A spokesman said later it was one of Mr. Romney’s favorite novels. “I’m not in favor of his religion by any means,” Mr. Romney, a Mormon, said. “But he wrote a book called ‘Battlefield Earth’ that was a very fun science-fiction book.” Asked about his favorite book, Mr. Romney cited the Bible."

Romney Conference Call

2007-04-26T18:55:00.000-04:00

I was forwarded along an invitation I thought I would post:

"Want to hear how the Romney campaign is going? Join a live conference call with Mitt on Friday, Apr 27 at 3:00 PM. To join call 1-866-213-1962, participant code number 6936235."

Romney's Deputy Campaign Manager Resigns

2007-04-25T09:13:00.000-04:00

Jason Roe, who joined Romney's campaign in early March of this year, is resigning citing "familial obligations." Roe had formerly served as Rep. Tom Feeney's Chief of Staff and the St. Petersburg Times reported Monday that the FBI had asked it about an email Roe had written the paper last year regarding his Congressman's interactions with convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Given the recent Abramoff-related indictments and raids this month, did Roe resign from his post so quickly after being hired to avoid giving Romney any taint of association with Abramoff. If Feeney or any of his staff is likely to end up in hot water, it's probably a smart move. I wonder then if this is a voluntary resignation by Roe or a prompted one.

Romney Providing Cover For Rudy?

2007-04-24T02:10:00.000-04:00

Chuck Todd at MSNBC's First Read raised an interesting thought today:

When Romney was "evolving" from a moderate to conservative, every move he made was chronicled and ridiculed (by McCain’s folks?) to the point where the flip-flop label stuck to him. Giuliani's conservative evolution of late has been just as stark on some recent issues (guns, immigration, and partial-birth abortion), but his foes haven't attacked him directly yet. Did Romney actually provide Rudy cover?

This has nothing to do with Mitt Romney, but...

2007-04-23T15:32:00.000-04:00

But it does at least have something to do with an old post. In February 2006 I asked if anyone had seen the Cheers episode where Rebecca mentions that she wishes that more men could send flowers and Sam says,"Mormons can't send flowers?! I knew they couldn't dance."

Well through the miracle of YouTube, I bring you that clip.

Romney Outlines National Energy Policy

2007-04-18T01:24:00.000-04:00

Here's Mitt from a town hall meeting in Massachusetts and posted in the Hill yesterday.

New Hampshire numbers

2007-04-04T18:40:00.000-04:00

WMUR in New Hampshire is reporting the results of a University of New Hampshire poll.
Interviews with 306 respondents who say they plan to vote in the Republican presidential primary, conducted by telephone on March 27-April 3, 2007. The margin of sampling error for results based on Republican primary voters is plus or minus 5.6 percentage points.

Hotline TV: Wow Mitt

2007-04-04T17:36:00.000-04:00

Hotline does a pretty good job breaking down what Mitt's 1st Quarter fundraising number mean:

Why Romney's Right

2007-04-04T14:29:00.000-04:00

The Boston Globe and others are reporting Romney’s remarks about Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Syria:

Romney brought up Pelosi's trip twice, both times unprompted.

"Frankly, the decision of Nancy Pelosi to go to meet with Assad in Syria is one which I find outrageous," Romney said, the second time.

Defying Bush, Pelosi, D-Calif., met with the Syrian president Wednesday in an attempt to pressure the Bush administration to open a direct dialogue with the Middle Eastern country. Democrats say the administration's attempts to isolate Syria have failed to force the Assad government to change its policies.

Certainly there will be outcry against Romney for his denouncement of Pelosi and whether this is a politically popular move is yet to be decided, but…

Romney is correct.

The President is the sole foreign policy organ under the constitution. This was understood early on in the history of the nation. In 1816, the Senate Committee of Foreign Relations stated:

The President is the constitutional representative of the United States with regard to foreign nations. He manages our concerns with foreign nations and must necessarily be most competent to determine when, how, and upon what subjects negotiation may be urged with the greatest prospect of success.

(U.S. Senate, Reports, Committee on Foreign Relations, vol. 8, p. 24.). The Supreme Court has reaffirmed this principle by stating that “[i]n this vast external realm, with its important, complicated, delicate and manifold problems, the President alone has the power to speak or listen as a representative of the nation.” (U.S. v. Curtiss-Wright, 299 U.S. 304, 319 (1936); Goldwater v. Carter, 444 U.S. 996 (1979)(concur. J. Powell)). Pelosi’s visit is, thus, patently unconstitutional so long as it conflicts with the President’s foreign policy.

Beyond the constitutional issues, the practical effect of the Pelosi visit is to present the United States as schizophrenic or bi-polar. One day nations are dealing with Bush-America, the next day nations are dealing with Pelosi-America. Neither schizophrenia nor bi-polarism is a healthy state for a person. Similarly neither is a healthy state for a nation. Which one is the one to deal with? Certainly the opposing viewpoints have their preferred representative, but that does little to solve the problem. Indeed it encourages similar behavior from other nations.

So Romney is right. He should be outraged that congressional representatives have acted outside the scope of their power and encouraged disregard for the Constitution itself.

Iowa Poll

2007-04-03T18:15:00.000-04:00

The good news keeps coming. The University of Iowa is reporting the latest poll (still holding to my feeling about polls generally). Here’s the results:

The margin of error was +/- 4.5 percent. Poll was conducted March 19-31 (i.e. post Thompson announcement).

Sounds to me like Romney's picking up steam. Any other explanations?

Romney's Results Trend

2007-04-03T17:09:00.000-04:00

I’ve been trying to peg down a thought of late and I think that this is it: Romney has been extremely effective, if not victorious, in every “hard-primary” so far. By “hard-primary” I mean the firm, measurable contests between the candidates. Hear me out. See if you see a trend here:

SLRC
CPAC
1Q fundraising

What I see is that when it comes down to people making a firm choice, Romney has a knack for coming out ahead. I realize that grouping these three is particularly advantageous for my theory, but I think there is some substance there. Romney’s whole life has been about results when it mattered. Having lived his whole life in the results oriented world of business, Romney has been held accountable for producing measurable results at a certain deadline. At those times and places where Romney has been able to focus his attention, Romney has produced surprising results. SLRC. CPAC. 1Q fundraising. (I would distinguish the regular media polls from SLRC and CPAC because of the expectation going into the event: that there would be a vote for between the candidates that meant something. Thus the attendees were able to prepare themselves and vote in an informed way. Polls are less likely to select people who have informed themselves and there is little expectation that the poll has true significance from the polled person’s perspective.)

Some might argue (and several people did after CPAC) that this is not a political asset. However, it seems hard to make the case that Romney’s results-oriented nature is NOT something that we should encourage or look for in a presidential candidate. Indeed results should be THE dominant attribute we look for in a candidate. Otherwise we get someone who “talks the talk” but does not “walk the walk”. Indeed the cliché is most forcefully applicable to Romney that he has “put his money where his mouth is”. The office of president is not primarily a job of motivational speaking or popularity in the polls (although those are also nice and have their place). It is a position of doing and acting. This is where Romney excels and has shown his strong ability to produce results.

Now, there are certainly those who would disagree with me and cite polls and such, but I still think that the theory (still fledgling I admit) holds. Romney produces results when it matters.

Of course we’ll see just how well it holds over the next few months.

Money and Wives

2007-04-03T12:21:00.000-04:00

So many good things to talk about today.

After NewsMax’s glowing article about Mitt over the weekend, NewsMax has another positive take on Romney’s big number yesterday:

When early polls showed him trailing Rudy Giuliani and John McCain, Mitt Romney urged all listeners to watch his presidential campaign blossom over the long election season.

On Monday, it burst into full glory after just three months.

The results not only cemented Romney's status as a first-tier competitor, but they also threatened to further erode support from McCain's already-flagging campaign, and to dry up funding for other lagging candidates.

I’ve been saying for a long while that the long election cycle favors Romney more than a short cycle would because he needs name recognition and time to persuade conservatives that he truly belongs with them. Both of these tasks are more easily accomplished over a longer period of time. The money primary is one of the first steps in that process, as described by NewsMax. Romney get to trumpet a win, get some more name recognition, and get a fresh look from previously skeptical voters.

In response to my prediction that the hedging on Romney’s numbers would start quickly, the New York Times has an article describing Romney’s support as mainly “Wall Street and the Mormon Church”. MyManMitt has a good response, so I won’t fully address the article here.

Noted Romney enthusiast Kathryn Jean Lopez at NRO has gushing article about Ann Romney's speech to the NFRW. KJL ends with this contrast of Ann Romney and Judi Giuliani:

A wife isn’t going to make or break a campaign. But she is a reflection of the candidate and his character. And there, in the wives’ stories, the contrasts are no small thing. Even with the occasional she-hates-puppies headlines, Judith Giuliani is already being humanized from the New York tabloid image many, especially in New York, probably have of her. But the contrast of glamour shots of a third wife on her husband’s lap (a husband who was someone else’s husband when she started dating him) with a couple that’s been married for 37 years and still clearly in love is no small thing. It’s no small thing, especially, considering conservatives are being asked to compromise on both the character and policy fronts. Sure, Republicans have had personal issues before — but when they ask us to give in on important policy matters as well, the personal can’t help becoming even more political.

Finally, there is a new Rasmussen Poll out and there is good and not so good news. Important to note is that the polling took place from March 26-29, 2007. This means that the news about Romney’s fundraising was still unknown. First, the good news: Romney’s support remains steady from the last Rasmussen poll and Giuliani falls by 9 points to 26%, his first dip below 30% in 7 weeks. The not so good news is that Thompson, Fred Thompson, is ahead of Romney 14% to 8%. I think that the polling will continue to show a narrowing of the numbers so that there is a very close and competitive field. Also important is that this is the second poll where Thompson's numbers have largely come at Giuliani's expense. My question still is: Does Thompson, assuming he declares, have staying power?

Romney's Big Number

2007-04-02T20:30:00.000-04:00

Obviously the big news today is Romney’s 1st quarter fundraising totals. Other candidates also reporting fundraising totals today

$23 Million – Romney
$17 Million – Giuliani
$12.5 Million – McCain
$2 Million – Brownback
$500 K – Huckabee

What do the numbers mean? Here’s a few takes:

Captain’s Quarters: “What's encouraging is that both Rudy and Mitt look very competitive against Hillary. For Rudy, that has been a given. For Mitt, it might be a revelation -- and it might be enough to propel his numbers sharply upward.”

KJL at The Corner: “Now....this is just money, but money matters. I think you'll be seeing people give Romney a second look in the coming days of this still-early point in the whole process. People who hadn't really may start thinking — or thinking again: "Hey, maybe this dude could beat Hillary."

Jonathan Martin at The Politico: “So the Big News, said this person, is: "Romney surprises by topping the Republican side and coming close to Hillary despite having low name i.d., low poll numbers and not having done this before." Or, put more concisely: "Rookie Overcomes Veterans." Or better: "Where would we be at 15percent?"

Dean Barnett at Townhall: “Most of the money raised by all the top campaigns flowed in because rich guys vigorously twisted a lot of arms. In order to twist the arms of your friends to give money to a political candidate, you have to really believe in that candidate. That’s the main reason that today is a good day for Romney and a disappointment for McCain. Mitt’s strongest supporters are passionate. McCain’s support is tepid; six years of sticking your thumb in your party’s eye will have that effect.”

Personally, I’m thrilled with some needed good news. I’m sure there will be some hedging when the break down of the numbers comes out on April 15th, but it’s hard to take anything away from Romney when he clearly outdistances the other candidates in the money primary. I think that voters will start taking more notice of Romney, as KJL suggests. Certainly he still has some obstacles in proving his authenticity, but it would be hard to suggest that the Romney campaign is anything but legitimate and in it for the long haul.

National Journal Rankings: Giuliani First, Romney Third

2007-03-29T18:50:00.000-04:00

The new National Journal Rankings have Rudy Giuliani in first place and Romney in third. Romney has been in third place for a few months now, but the news is that McCain has relinquished the top spot. This is obviously just one organization's opinion, but they do get a lot of respect.

Endorsements and polls

2007-03-29T13:51:00.000-04:00

In honor of my esteemed collegue, Marc, I give you a news update:

Mitt Romney hits the jackpot: “Romney's campaign announced Wednesday that S. Craig Lindner, co-president of American Financial Group and CEO of Great American Financial Resources, will be co-chair of Romney's Ohio fundraising effort, along with Ames Travel Service president Nancy Donovan…Locking down the Lindners is a pretty big score for the Romney campaign, since there are untold numbers of other corporate-types in this part of the world who generally follow the Lindner family's lead when it comes to campaign contributions.”

Beauprez endorses Romney for president: “Former U.S. Rep. Bob Beauprez of Colorado endorsed fellow Republican Mitt Romney for president Wednesday…Beauprez, in a mass e-mail, said Romney had the right "political philosophy" as well as the experience and leadership skills necessary to be president.”

Finally, the New York Sun reports the results of the latest Zogby poll. The Sun notes a choice that the poll made:

In this Zogby poll, we can't look at Mr. Gingrich's support for a simple reason: They decided to take Mr. Gingrich (and Condi Rice) out of their polls on the assumption that neither is running for president. While, with Condi, I think that makes sense, it's not terribly helpful to have Mr. Gingrich out of the mix.

While the rise of Thompson has had some interesting effects on the polls, most of these early numbers will be aberrational. Essentially Thompson is the flavor of the week and the polls reflect that. Slate describes it this way:

Thompson's chief appeal is emotional…Authenticity and star power conjure visions of Ronald Reagan. But Reagan had genuine experience running something—namely the state of California. Thompson's résumé is thin—an undistinguished eight years in the Senate, an acting career, and a youthful turn as co-counsel in the Watergate hearings. Supporters try to pump up his résumé by boasting that he shepherded John Roberts through his confirmation hearings—but that was the legal equivalent of walking Michael Jordan onto the court.

Update: The DeMoines Register is also reporting the Zogby poll numbers for Iowa:

25% Giuliani
19% McCain
11% Romney
7% F. Thompson

I don't want to make too much of this and the national poll by Zogby, but it seems like Romney has more staying power than the Thompson crowd has given him credit for. We'll see how the polls trend for the next few weeks to see, but it would be very premature to abandon the Romney campaign.

Romney to pay commission to student fundraisers

2007-03-28T11:43:00.000-04:00

From a recent Salt Lake Tribune article, "He's offering to pay a percentage-based commission to students collecting cash for his White House bid."

"'It's legal but considered by professional fundraisers to be unethical,' says Paul Ryan, who heads the Federal Elections Commission program at the Washington-based Campaign Legal Center."

My question is not rhetorical: what makes a commission to students any less ethical than the set salary that the GOP pays Ken Mehlman the RNC Chairman in what is largely, albeit nowhere near exclusively, a fundraising capacity?

A 15 minute speech

2007-03-27T17:47:00.000-04:00

The American Thinker blog has a posting entitled “Mitt Romney Is a Big Government Conservative”. What does Steven M. Warshawsky give as evidence? After citing an example of Romney making government more efficient, Warshawsky says:

But instead of returning the saved money to the taxpayers, Romney stated that they were able to use the money for other, more important services. As Romney explained, "efficiency is desperately needed" -- not that the size of government needs to be reduced.

Warshawsky continues that somehow congressional gridlock will prevent Romney from managing effectively:

Perhaps he will be a better manager than President Bush but he will have to contend with a hostile and intransigent Congress and bureaucracy that will oppose any serious effort to bring "business management principles" to the operations of government.

Apparently Warshawsky feels that the Massachusetts legislature was friendlier to Romney and his “business management principles.” Warshawsky then proceeds to criticize Romney for the order of points he talked about and for not mentioning others.

Competition with China: “But the message I came away with is of a top-down, government-led effort in these areas.”

Fighting jihadists: “How this could be a lesser priority than economic competition from China, I don't understand, and Romney did not explain.”

Energy independence: “Frankly, either Romney has forgotten his basic economics or he is pandering on environmental issues.”

Immigration and Health Care: “Incredibly, Romney did not address the immigration problem, or the seemingly inexorably slide towards socialized medicine.”

All this might seem to be a serious indictment of Romney’s speech until you realize that earlier in the post Warshawsky says that “Romney spoke for about 15 minutes.” I guess that Warshawsky has high expectations for a 15 minute speech and how detailed the proposals can be. Warshawsky has some substantive critiques of Romney’s proposals which I will address in subsequent posts.

McCain on McCain-Feingold

2007-03-27T14:04:00.000-04:00

Assessing Fred

2007-03-27T13:28:00.000-04:00

Much has been made of the still unannounced candidacy of Fred Thompson and its effect on the Romney campaign. Certainly there is a compelling case for Fred Thompson to run, as with several candidates. Still, the buzz around the candidates is mostly name recognition at this point. USA Today states it this way:

One reason for Thompson's fast start is name identification, says Republican strategist Rich Galen. "More people watch him every week on TV than will vote in total next Feb. 5," he says, the day of primaries in about a dozen states.

Galen also notes, however, that neither Giuliani nor Clinton can yet claim the allegiance of a majority. "In both parties, at least two-thirds of the members are looking for alternatives or at least options," he says. That provides an opening for contenders such as Thompson or Gore who aren't running — at least so far.

So other than name recognition, what does Thompson bring to the table? The Fix’s Chris Cillizza sums it up like this:

Combine Thompson's capacity for fundraising in his home state with his starpower and his acceptability to social conservatives and you have a package that no other candidate in the field offers.

Perhaps it is a unique thing to be able to raise funds in Tennessee, but it is hardly defining of potential presidents to be able to raise funds in their home state. That leaves Thompson’s star power and acceptability to social conservatives. But how acceptable to social conservatives is Thompson? Chris Cillizza lists this collection of positions:

Thompson -- along with McCain -- was one of the main backers of campaign finance reform legislation that is roundly despised by social conservatives.

And when he ran for the Senate in 1994, Thompson was routinely described as a supporter of abortion rights. (Confirmed here, here, and here, although his record appears consistently pro-life)

Whether conservatives will give him a pass on these issues is unclear, but Thompson’s candidacy certainly raises some of the same questions on the issues that Romney’s does.

Lastly, Thompson’s star power. Certainly, as stated by USA Today, Thompson has more exposure than almost any candidate through his TV role. Despite this, Thompson seems to lack a fire for the grind of campaigning. Chris Cillizza again states:

Two factors make a bid by Thompson an ill-advised proposition -- the incredibly early start of the 2008 campaign and the former senator's well-known distaste for the nuts and bolts of campaigning.

Thompson's slow start is not insurmountable, but given his reputation as a less-than-enthusiastic campaigner, the lead he's spotted the front-runners makes more of a difference. This reputation also begs the question: If Thompson doesn't rise to the challenge of campaigning, how can we expect him to rise to the challenge of governing and managing the nation's beauracracy? There is no question that Mitt Romney has the ability and capacity to do both.

Ultimately, Thompson's flirtation seems more a phenomenon of celebrity than of substance. Personally I like Fred Thompson, but more for his role on Law and Order than his politics (which is by no means a knock on his politics). Right now the polls indicate that conservatives are still searching for their ideal candidate. I think this is more a function of the loss of the last election than anything. They’re looking for that person to knock it out of the park instead of looking at the consistent producers already in the line-up. Mitt Romney's ability is what distinguishes him from Thompson, in my mind. Romney has consistently produced great results wherever he has been. Regardless of previous statements, Romney's record of accomplishment stands alone.

Should Romney follow Kennedy’s speech?

2007-03-22T14:01:00.000-04:00

Bruce Wilson thinks so. Wilson, previously a self described protestant and now a converted Mormon, writes in the Baltimore Sun that Romney should follow JFK’s speech proclaiming separation of church and personal politics:

If a candidate truly believes in a church, its principles are likely to be the most fundamental building blocks of that person's character. And personal character is always one of the key attributes voters should consider when electing a president. Thus, it seems obvious that voters should try to ascertain both the depth of a candidate's faith and the primary principles of that faith.

But as Mr. Kennedy discovered in 1960, members of other faiths who have an ax to grind are more than willing to fill the vacuum, turning theological molehills into mountains of misconception…Mr. Romney should guard against misinformation defining his faith by speaking openly about it when asked.

The topic of whether Romney should make a grand pronouncement of independence from his church on the subject of national politics has been one that has perplexed me. As Wilson describes, there is a lot of bad information about the LDS Church out there and it will certainly play a role in Romney’s campaign. On the other hand, talking openly, as Wilson advocates, about Romney’s faith invites more questions and emphasis to be put on religious theology than political philosophy.

So what are the benefits versus the detriments of making such a Kennedyan speech? The expected benefit of such a speech is that the religious obstacle will be removed for voters who would not otherwise consider Romney. This argument assumes that the religious barrier for Romney is the same as it was for Kennedy. While not being an expert in the Kennedy campaign or politics at the time, the obstacle for Kennedy was that he would not exercise independence from Catholic leadership. This seems a different point than the one that confronts Romney. It is not his independence that is questioned (while there have been traces of that), but the substance of LDS religious practices and doctrines. To overcome the charge facing Kennedy he proclaimed independence in the political sphere. How does Romney overcome fears about LDS doctrines? He cannot easily proclaim independence from them as Kennedy could quell fears about political independence. Perhaps I have mis-framed the issue, but it seems a tough speech to make.

On the other hand, it could be that by making a speech like Kennedy, Romney would end the questions asked to him about his faith. This would be a significant benefit to Romney by being able to focus on the political issues. He would be freer to quickly direct religious questions to church leaders and focus his message on politics.

I believe, however, that Romney is better off not making a speech about the role of religion in his candidacy. While Wilson makes the point that religion is central to character and should therefore be explored, I think that character is inferred from the way that a candidate speaks and acts. The religious principles that underlie that behavior and speech are less important than the result. By injecting religion into character Romney runs the significant risk of having the LDS standards of behavior (as much as I believe in them) become more important than Romney’s actual behavior. No, I think that emphasizing the commonalities that Romney has with people of other faiths is the right direction. It gives voters the more palatable choice of accepting Romney alone without having to swallow the entire LDS Church as a whole. I think that making a Kennedy-like speech forces voters to make a much bigger leap than Romney alone presents.

In sum, I think that Romney has chosen the right path so far, emphasizing the things that he has in common with voters and allowing them to make their judgment of him be based on politics and not religion. Indeed, it allows Romney to sell his personal accomplishments and qualities, which I believe are presidential.

Romney pulls close in polls

2007-03-21T22:18:00.000-04:00

It seems like the Romney campaign is picking up some steam. In New Hampshire and Michigan Romney is making the Republican nomination very competitive. In New Hampshire, Franklin Pierce College polled 400 likely Republican primary voters:

In Michigan, an EPIC-MRA poll shows similar results:

Hatch On Board

2007-03-19T16:36:00.000-04:00

It's official... "Sen. Orrin Hatch is backing Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's presidential candidacy, the Romney campaign announced Monday" (SL Trib).

Romney News Round Up

2007-03-17T13:33:00.000-04:00

Kyle already threw up the LKL videos, but here are a few other nuggets from the press worth looking over:

Swift Boat Money Man Raising $ For Romney (Washington Post) - Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post is reporting that one of primary financiers of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth 527 (he donated $4.5 million to the group) has signed on to raise money for Mitt Romney. Cillizza points out why he thinks this is meaningful:

First, it likely means a significant financial windfall for Romney's campaign.... Second, the Romney team is likely to paint Perry's decision as a slap in the face to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).... Third is the symbolism of Romney linking himself to Perry. No single person is more closely identified with the Swift Boat Veterans and their controversial campaign to discredit John Kerry than Perry.

Romney's Stratified Fundraising System (Washington Post): The same article above also notes that "Romney has created a stratified bundling system based on the "Rangers" and "Pioneers" model employed by Bush in 2000 and 2004. To be a "Founder," an individual must raise $250,000 for the campaign; a "Statesman" is charged with collecting $100,000, and a "Patriot" $50,000."

Book Says Romney Is Able To Overcome (Deseret News): The Deseret News takes a look at conservative pundit and blogger Hugh Hewitt and his book A Mormon in the White House? 10 Things Every American Should Know about Mitt Romney. Hewitt boils down concerns about an LDS president to three general issues:

First, some worry that an LDS president would be controlled by church leaders in Salt Lake City. "That is the easiest of the objections to dismiss," Hewitt said.... The second objection may be the toughest for Romney, Hewitt said. It comes from some evangelical conservatives who worry that a Mormon president "would greater legitimize Mormon missionary work abroad and lead to more converts".... The third objection is that Mormonism is "just too weird," and anyone who believes in such "fantasy" should not be elected.

Romney's Words Grow Hard On Immigration (Boston Globe): The Globe reports, with audio included, on how Romney's rhetoric on immigration and the McCain-Kennedy immigration bill has changed markedly over the past two years. The audio clips are from 2005 (he made similar comments to the Lowell Sun last March).

In a November 2005 interview with the Globe, Romney described immigration proposals by McCain and others as "quite different" from amnesty, because they required illegal immigrants to register with the government, work for years, pay taxes, not take public benefits, and pay a fine before applying for citizenship.
"That's very different than amnesty, where you literally say, 'OK, everybody here gets to stay,' " Romney said in the interview. "It's saying you could work your way into becoming a legal resident of the country by working here without taking benefits and then applying and then paying a fine."

Mitt Romney Scrambles To Raise Cash For White House Campaign (AP): The AP reports on Romney's fundraising push this month:

The former Massachusetts governor had scheduled 20 fundraising events this month, all in advance of an end-of-the-month deadline that will give the first true look at the fundraising prowess of all the 2008 presidential contenders. Reports detailing how much money was raised by March 31, as well as how it was spent, will become public by April 15. The first total is especially important for Romney, who has been trying to elevate his name recognition nationally after placing a distant third behind former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., in several national polls gauging the GOP candidates. "What he's trying to do is establish himself as a leading candidate by being able to compete financially with Giuliani and McCain," said Anthony Corrado, a government professor at Colby College who specializes in presidential campaign finance. "If he were to beat one of those guys, that would be a news story."

These fundraising efforts include stops in places that range from unorthodox, like Boise and Southern Utah, to standard fare like Orange County.

Mitt Romney's Son On Dad's 2008 White House Run (Fox News): Tagg Romney was on the Big Story Thursday night talking about his dad's presidential run.

LDS Faith Makes Him Better, Romney Says (Deseret News): The Deseret News reported on Romney's Larry King Live experience, noting in particular his comments on the role of his LDS faith in his campaign and life:

"I have a better marriage because of my faith. My children are better because of my faith. I'm a better person because of my faith," he said. "I think the American public would like to have a person of faith lead the country."

Campaign Additions (Press Releases): Nothing groundbreaking, but a few campaign additions to note:

In California this week, Romney announced the co-chairs of his California Finance Committee.
In Iowa, Romney announced the chairs of his campaign in Iowa County and also named former Senate Majority Leader Stewart Iverson as an adviser to his presidential campaign efforts in Iowa.

Romney on Larry King - II

2007-03-16T16:26:00.000-04:00

Romney on Larry King

2007-03-16T16:24:00.001-04:00

One man's switch to Romney

2007-03-16T15:43:00.000-04:00

There’s an interesting op-ed in the New Hampshire Union Leader by Michael Moffett, a professor at NHTI-Concord and McCain 2000 supporter. He says that while he supported McCain in 2000 and holds a deep respect for McCain, he feels that Romney is the man that should be president:

The reasons are many, and they include the impressive analysis of the international situation that Romney articulated after his trip to Asia earlier this year…No prospective President can come close to offering the diverse record of executive leadership that Romney can…Our Republican standard bearer should be someone who remains true to our important principles of limited government while celebrating individual responsibility and personal liberty.

Mitt Romney is such a person.

Why the shift from McCain to Romney? Moffett has several reasons ranging from lack of executive experience to ideological differences over McCain-Kennedy and McCain-Feingold.

One notable absence from Moffett’s reasoning: traditional social issues. Moffett does not take the opportunity to distinguish McCain from Romney on social issues. Certainly there are differences, but it is interesting that McCain-Kennedy and McCain-Feingold have become so prominent in conservative circles, even to the point of perhaps eclipsing traditionally prominent social issues like abortion and gay rights. Indeed some of the loudest applause that Romney got in his CPAC speech was for his opposition to McCain-Kennedy and McCain-Feingold. Is this due to the stances of the top-tier candidates on traditional social issues, or is a more significant realignment occurring on conservatives’ priority list?

Romney "Youtubed" Again

2007-03-15T03:16:00.000-04:00

After being distracted by Giuliani for awhile, Youtube has once again turned its gaze back to Romney... this time with Ann and Mitt teaming up on abortion in a 2002 interview:

Reporter Attacks On The Horizon?

2007-03-15T03:05:00.000-04:00

The Hill had an interesting story yesterday on Mitt Romney and the expected Evangelical attacks on his faith that haven't really materialized. GOP Pollster David Hill has a prediction... since Evangelicals haven't attacked, reporters will be the ones that end up attacking:

The Romney campaign has been expecting a torrent of “anti-Mormon prejudice.” But it hasn’t happened. Mitt has mostly been left alone. Most unexpectedly, Evangelical Christians have been reluctant to say much. While my own reading of polls leads me to guess that Evangelicals are evenly split on accepting a Mormon as president, they are united in their silence on the matter.
This is a key development because the liberal mainstream media will now feel free to go after Romney. Most journalists were initially anticipating a Religious Right attack on the former Massachusetts governor. So the press held back from scrutinizing Romney’s faith. In a fight between James Dobson or Jerry Falwell and Mitt Romney, most reporters would have taken the candidate’s side. But barring a situation where “the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” Romney is soon going to be fair game for enterprising reporters.

The Primary Balancing Act

2007-03-15T01:54:00.000-04:00

Every presidential primary season candidates face the challenge of reaching out to the party base without painting themselves into a corner by alienating the independents and centrist voters that are required to win a general election. It's a balancing act that successful candidates must master. I'm curious as to how people think Romney is doing in this regard. Two issues in particular have jumped out at me over the past couple of days as I think about Romney and this "balancing act" are immigration and the right to life.

Immigration: Of the GOP front-runners, Romney clearly has the most conservative position on illegal immigration. It makes sense considering it's an issue that many of the conservatives Romney is trying to court feel pretty passionate about. I wonder how his tough talk on "amnesty" will go over in a general election. Hardline stances on immigration purportedly helped to sink a few Republican election bids in the House this past fall and many heavy weights that have influence in the Republican party advocate a much more moderate stance (President Bush, RNC Chair Mel Martinez, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, etc.). There are areas of the country where Romney's hardline clearly doesn't go over well. Florida for instance. This past weekend during his visit there, Romney avoided talking about the issue as much as possible, but still got bruised in the Florida press over it. Yesterday in Arizona, however, he made an effort to emphasize his position, even suggesting state and local police agencies make "deals with the federal government to have their officers trained in enforcing elements of federal immigration law." It doesn't seem to help that this is another issue he seems to have shifted positions on. Just last year he seemed to support what he now lambasts as "amnesty," telling the Lowell Sun that he didn't "believe in rounding up 11 million people and forcing them at gunpoint from our country. With these 11 million people, let’s have them registered, know who they are. Those who’ve been arrested or convicted of crimes shouldn’t be here; those that are here paying taxes and not taking government benefits should begin a process toward application for citizenship, as they would from their home country." Ultimately, I think this is a tough issue for Romney, because he needs the support of the part of the base that feels most strongly about this issue, and yet his position is destined to alienate many who might support him (for example, there is no way anyone who advocates such a hardline on immigration will pick up anywhere near the 41% of the Hispanic vote that Bush picked up in 2004).

Right to Life: Romney's come a long way this past year in his efforts to reassure social conservatives about his position on right-to-life issues. He touts his opposition to abortion and certain forms of stem-cell research at nearly every campaign stop and has brought well-known pro-life advocates like James Bopp onto his campaign. Certainly, this is something that most concede he must do if he wants to burnish his credentials as the "real" conservative in the race and remain competitive in the GOP primaries next year. This past weekend, however, he seemed to push back against social conservatives just a little as he spoke out against the government intervention in the Terri Schiavo case a couple of years ago. Even though this position places him safely with most of the American public, it hurts him among the pro-life base he is currently reaching out to. Many pro-life blogs were quick to denounce his position and Schiavo's brother promptly endorsed Sam Brownback. Add to this Romney's balancing act on stem cell research (opposing somatic cell nuclear transfer (i.e. "therapeutic cloning"), but generally supporting the use of frozen embryos from IVF clinics that would otherwise be discarded. These deviations, again, put him in the mainstream of popular opinion, but they could potentially hurt him in his push for the nomination. He's gone out of his way to brand himself as being with social conservatives on all of these issues, to be contrasted with deviants like McCain and Giuliani.

While the balancing act is a challenge for most politicians, I think it is a particularly difficult one for Romney in this election because he doesn't seem well-positioned to garner the more independent-leaning conservatives who appear to be flocking to Giuliani and McCain at this point. He NEEDS the social conservative voters who are disenchanted with Giuliani and McCain's more moderate positions on a host of issues. Part of me feels like Romney almost has to put off worrying about how he will cast himself as a general election candidate and just focus on the primaries. It may cause a few problems for him image-wise in a general election campaign, but I think he'd prefer to have to deal with those sorts of problems than be watching from the sidelines.

Romney News Round Up

2007-03-13T20:38:00.000-04:00

I've been out of commission for almost the past week studying for and taking the MPRE and catching up in school... so I've got a lot of Romney newsclips that I've bookmarked to post. Be prepared for one hell of a news round up:

You Gotta' Have Faith, Mitt (March 7th, Boston Globe): The Globe ran a faux piece on Mitt last week that can at best be described as a pretty pathetic attempt at humor last week. "It was a conversion experience on the road to Des Moines. 'We were driving along in a blizzard and there came a bright beam out of the swirling snow, and then this booming voice,' Mitt Romney says in an imaginary - ah, extraordinary - webcast describing the event. Then, as the former Massachusetts governor recounts things, an authoritative voice intoned: 'You've lost your way. You'd better turn back before it's too late. Follow my light and I'll lead you to the right road.' And so, in that webcast, entitled ''Mitt's First Video Letter to the South Carolinians,' Romney, a Mormon, announces that he is leaving his longtime religion in search of a new faith...."

The Presidential Money Race Is On (March 8th, McClatchy): "[T]he top three Republicans -- Giuliani of New York, McCain and Romney of Massachusetts-- could raise about $25 million this quarter."

Romney Bets On Tax Cuts To Win (March 8th, Washington Times): The Wash Times notes that "After his well-received speech before the Conservative Political Action Conference here last week, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney met with two key leaders in the Reagan Revolution of the 1980s. Mr. Romney's dinner guests were Jack Kemp, the architect of the Reagan tax cuts that lifted the economy out of a deep recession, and former Rep. Vin Weber of Minnesota, a key leader in the Opportunity Society band of House warriors who fought for lower tax rates to spur economic growth and entrepreneurial expansion." Speaking of the emphasis that Romney has put on conservative economic policies, the paper says "You can tell a lot about politicians by the people around them, and that is especially true in presidential politics. Mr. Romney has already put together a stellar team of economic heavyweights...."

W. Va.'s Coal Part Of Romney's Vision For America (March 9th, Charleston Daily): "Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney included West Virginia coal in his vision of an energy-independent U.S., during the Mountain State's first taste of an already busy 2008 campaign season. Romney advocated coal-to-liquid and coal-to-gas efforts along with other energy sources such as biodiesel fuel and wind, solar and nuclear power." Coinciding with his visit to West Virginia, Romney also released a policy briefing on supporting cleaner coal technologies.

Oops! I'm Where? (March 9th, Cabinet Press): On a recent trip to New Hampshire, Romney seemed to forget where he was mistakenly referring to the town he was in as Hollis, Massachusetts. The local paper reported that the crowd "laughed and forgave him." Romney ended up winning over many in the crowd, even one liberal leaning attendee who said he thought Romney was “honest, intelligent and moral.”

History May Repeat Itself With Romney (March 9th, Deseret News): Columnist Lee Benson discusses the recent Romney-JFK comparisons and concludes that a religion barrier may again be broken.

Mitt Stirs Up Old Caffeine Controversy (March 9th, SL Trib): SL Trib humorist Robert Kirby writes on what concerns him about Romney's run for president... the inevitable focus on caffeine. "For example, several weeks ago the Boston Globe reported that Mitt is strictly prohibited by Mormonism from drinking alcohol, coffee, tea and soft drinks containing caffeine. I winced when I read this. Not for Mitt's sake, but rather my own. It's been a while since the last big (and pointless) caffeine-and-Mormons debate."

Miami Cool To Romney's Stance (March 9th, Miami Herald): The Miami Herald is reporting that Romney's position on immigration might be a problem in Florida. "After the speech, when reporters asked him about his immigration policy, Romney said he advocates tighter border control and ''employment identification cards'' so businesses don't hire illegal immigrants. Some Republican leaders at the event said his positions could alienate Miami-Dade's influential Hispanic population. 'He's going to have problems in South Florida,' said Miami-Dade County Commissioner Jose "Pepe'' Diaz, who was part of a group of elected officials that met with Romney before the event." On the 8th, Republican consultant Ann Navarro wrote an op-ed in the Miami Herald declaring Romney to be "wrong on immigration."

Can You Translate A Flip-Flop (March 9th, Boston Herald): The Boston Herald takes aim at Romney for running ads in Spanish just a week after saying "English needs to be the language that is spoken in America. We cannot be a bilingual nation like Canada."

Right Jabs Floors Mitt: Mass. Repubs. Rip Flip-Flopping Mitt (March 9th, Boston Herald): "A Web-based “truth” squad is poised to chase Mitt Romney in an effort to trip him up on the presidential campaign trail - and its members are Republicans from his very own Bay State. Founded by GOP consultants Holly Robichaud and Ron Vining, the Mass Republicans for Truth plans to launch a nationwide attack on the former governor’s record - including radio and TV ads. he group will post “The Romney Report” on its website on Monday, vowing to expose his flip-flops on a host of key issues, from abortion to taxes to gay rights. Calling its mission “educational,” the group is one of the controversial political action committees labeled “527s” named after the federal tax exemption that allows them to exist primarily as vehicles to influence elections."

The Mitt I Know (March 10th, Tampa Tribune): Over the weekend, Florida's former Lt. Governor Toni Jennings wrote an op-ed that gushed over Romney's candidacy. "I have been very fortunate to get to know Mitt Romney and his wife, Ann, on a personal level. Mitt and Ann live their private lives in exactly the same way they live their public lives - with compassion, honesty, faithfulness, and an optimistic and hopeful belief in the strength of the American people. I look forward to telling Floridians about Romney, and why they should believe in him - because I know that Mitt Romney is the strong conservative leader right for the job."

Mitt Romney Courts South Florida Voters (March 10th, AP): "Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney courted South Florida voters Friday, calling Cuban leaders Fidel Castro and his brother Raul, 'Cuban monsters.'" He went on to say "I look forward to the day when the stain of Castro is finally washed from the soil of Cuba...."

Florida Is Key In Romney Campaign (March 10th, AP): "Regardless of whether Florida moves up its primary, the state will remain critical in the presidential election, presidential hopeful Mitt Romney told reporters after delivering a speech to Republican activists on Saturday.... Romney knows the state is important, and the professor went so far as to call Florida 'the cornerstone to his campaign.' If Romney can pull ahead in Florida, other southern, more fundamental states may follow...."

Romney Launches Early Florida Push (March 10th, Palm Beach Post): The Post's Crowley describes how a push for a Florida straw poll in October might have been scuttled by Florida Governor Charlie Crist largely because Romney was in a position to win. "Romney built an organization in Florida so quickly that his top Republican rivals, U.S. Sen. McCain of Arizona and former New York Mayor Giuliani, have been forced to step up their efforts in the Sunshine State.... Romney strategists were carefully laying out plans for recruiting delegates, organizing rallies and using the convention vote, which would be eagerly watched by the national media, to demonstrate that Romney would be a better party nominee than McCain or Giuliani. 'It is a very big deal that he lost having the straw ballot,' said a McCain adviser who has worked on several presidential campaigns. 'If anyone doesn't think so, they are not seeing the forest for the trees.'"

Mitt Camp Fires Back At Critics; Romney Foes Claim Threat By GOP Brass (March 10th, Boston Herald): "Mitt Romney’s campaign blasted a pair of Massachusetts Republicans bent on "exposing" the ex-governor’s record in his race for the White House, while the duo said they were threatened by a top Bay State GOP official. Romney campaign spokesman Kevin Madden lashed out at the founders of MassRepublicans for Truth - GOP strategists Holly Robichaud and Ron Vining - calling them "disgruntled political operatives.'"

In Romney's Bid, His Wallet Opens To The Right (March 11th, NY Times): "In the months before announcing his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts contributed tens of thousands of dollars of his personal fortune to several conservative groups in a position to influence his image on the right."

Romney Birthday Shows GOP Age Spread (March 11th, AP): "Mitt Romney turns 60 on Monday, a personal milestone but also a line of demarcation in the unfolding race for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination. While the birthday moves the former Massachusetts governor closer to the senior set, it leaves him a relative fountain of youth compared to another leading contender for the GOP nomination [... the 70-year-old John McCain]."

Romney Says Government Wrong in Schaivo Case (March 11th, St. Petersburg Times): In a move possibly calculated to show some independence on Romney's part, he says he opposed government intervention in the Terri Schaivo case: "He's campaigning hard for support from Republican social conservatives, but presidential candidate Mitt Romney said Saturday he disagreed with the government's intervention in the Terri Schiavo case. 'I think it's probably best to leave these kinds of matters in the hands of the courts,' Romney said in a television interview airing today." A day after Romney's comments, Terri Schaivo's brother Bobby Schindler endorsed Sam Brownback and some conservative bloggers claimed it cut against Romney's pro-life creds.

Romney Isn't The First To Flip On Abortion (March 11th, LA Times): Jan Hook looks at the many candidates who have flipped on abortion with varying degrees of success (Kucinich, H.W. Bush, Gore, Reagan, Gephardt, among others): "This year, Republicans are trying to come to grips with the 180-degree turn on abortion executed by Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who has become a top-tier presidential contender and the favorite of many GOP conservatives.... As the history of abortion maneuvers shows, voters have come to accept some changes of heart as sincere and durable." The conservative news source Newsmax ran a similar story this weekend touting Reagan's conversion on abortion.

Romney Places Focus On Family (March 11th, Boston Globe): "At major recent appearances, Romney has gone out of his way to showcase his wife, Ann, their 38-year marriage, and the Rockwell-esque family -- five sons, five daughters-in-law, 10 grandchildren -- it has produced. 'I came in with my sweetheart, who's here in the front row, I think, somewhere,' he said at last weekend's Conservative Political Action Committee conference in Washington. 'Ann, would you come on up and just say hi? Here comes my sweetheart, Ann Romney.' She laid it on thick, too, expressing excitement at their 38th anniversary this month. ('Glad you reminded me!' Romney rejoined.) Such displays of marital bliss may appear warm and spontaneous, but underneath lies a shrewd political calculation. The couple's message is unmistakable: Romney is the lone leading GOP presidential candidate or prospective candidate still on his first marriage. More important , perhaps, he's the only one who isn't an admitted adulterer. With 'family values' a defining principle for many primary voters and competitors' past foibles making headlines, Romney is clearly trumpeting an aspect of his candidacy that none of his top-tier rivals can match, observers say.

Romney's Faith Divides GOP (March 12th, Greenville News): Dan Hoover examines how Romney's is dividing religious conservatives in South Carolina. Some have been won over, others don't seem like they ever could be. Hoover quotes the clairvoyant Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics, saying "When this eternal campaign began, I thought that Romney could overcome the Mormonism problem with a JFK-like speech about religious tolerance... Now I am not so sure. The polls have stunned me. People seem to have little hesitation about voting for a black, a woman, a Jew, a twice-divorced person -- everyone except a Mormon. The polygamy angle is hurting Romney. Ironically, he's one of the few top candidates in the family values GOP who has only had one wife."

Romney's Right On Second Amendment (March 12th, Idaho State Journal): US Senator Larry Craig pens an op-ed defending Romney's position on gun rights: "Fact is, if Romney just talked about his support for the Second Amendment and the rights of gun owners, that would be welcome. But Romney has been doing more than talking — he has been taking action for several years, and his approach would be a welcome addition to the gun debates in Washington, D.C."

Blogger Spotlight: Evangelicals For Mitt (March 12th, Hotline): Hotline inteviewed blogger Nancy French. One soundbite: "We started EvangelicalsforMitt in June of 2006, after we saw first hand the excitement that many Southern Christian voters had about Gov. Romney. He placed second at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference’s straw poll held in Memphis (after only Tennessee’s own son Bill Frist, meaning he beat every current candidate). We thought it’d be interesting to explore his candidacy through the lens of our faith."

Intermittent Republican With A Loose Grip On His Ideology (March 13th, Indianapolis Star): Conservative Fellow Deroy Murdock takes a critical look at Romney's past donations to and support of Democratic candidates: "By itself, Romney's spell as a Democratic donor shouldn't panic Republicans. But given his multifarious inconsistencies elsewhere, this news reinforces concerns that Romney is an ideological construction site, constantly growing into a structure still unseen and perhaps unenvisioned."

"Pink Taco" Publicist Is Romney's Arizona Director (March 13th, Arizona Republic): The Arizona Republic's political reporter highlights the fact that Romney's Arizona Director has some ties with some questionable ties: "Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican presidential candidate who will visit Arizona today, has tapped Jason Rose as his state director here. Rose is the local public relations consultant who last year helped generate national buzz for the provocative Pink Taco restaurant in Scottsdale."

Will Mormon Faith Hurt Bid For White House? (March 13th, USA Today): USA Today explores Romney's faith and the question of whether it will hurt his bid for the White House. I think it's a fair article that has some interesting soundbites: "[BYU Professor David] Magleby and [Boston College Professor Alan] Wolfe say Romney should heed Arizona Sen. John McCain's experience in South Carolina's 2000 primary. McCain was accused, among other things, of having illegitimate children, betraying veterans and being brainwashed while a prisoner of war in Vietnam. Magleby predicts polygamy will be "a major attack point below the radar and maybe above." Wolfe says such attacks will start "the minute you get into the Republican primaries and somebody gets desperate."

The Conservative Right Matures (March 13th, The Citizen): Conservative Pundit Cal Thomas writes "Conservative Evangelical Christian voters have come a long way in a short time. From their nearly unanimous condemnation of Bill Clinton for his extramarital affairs, a growing number of these “pro-family” voters appear ready to accept several Republican presidential candidates who do not share their ideal of marriage and faith." This certainly seems to open the field up for a candidate like Romney, who in the past would have been a hard sell for the religious right. "While “character issues” can overlap with other concerns when considering for whom to vote, conservative evangelicals are beginning to see them as less important than who can meet the multiple challenges faced by the nation."

And Lastly, Some Endorsements and Campaign Additions:

Last Wednesday, March 7th, US Congressman Mike Conaway from Texas endorsed Romney. Conaway is the 24th Representative to endorse Romney.

Last Thursday, Romney announced his women's leadership team in South Carolina.

Last Friday, Romney announced that Alicia Gonzalez, President of Media Relations Group, would serve as Romney's Florida Hispanic Media Adviser.

This weekend, former Nevada Governor Kenny Guinn endorsed Romney. Romney also announced his Nevada Steering Committee.

Yesterday, Rhode Island Governor Don Carcieri announced his support for Romney.

Muddled GOP Primary Getting More Muddled

2007-03-13T20:30:00.000-04:00

The Republican primary field grew this past week with Congressman Ron Paul announcing his intentions to run for president. In light of a recent NY Times poll showing 6 in 10 Republicans unsatisfied with the current crop of candidates, it seems almost certain that more GOP presidential hopefuls will decide to throw dice as well in the coming months. Expressions of interest coupled with non-announcements on the parts of Former Senator Fred Thompson, Senator Chuck Hagel, and Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich have gotten a lot of press and they make the present field murkier than ever.

Another emerging wildcard in the race is the growing number of states that are moving their primaries up to earlier February. “This primary season is turning into the most challenging Rubik’s Cube that we’ve faced in our lifetime,” said Benjamin L. Ginsberg, Romney's legal counsel. The New York Times highlighted the difficulties this poses for the candidates, especially lesser known candidates like Romney, in a recent article:

The trickle of states moving their 2008 presidential primaries to Feb. 5 has turned into an avalanche, forcing all the presidential campaigns to reconsider every aspect of their nominating strategy — where to compete, how to spend money, when to start television advertising — as they gird for the prospect of a 20-state national primary day.... There is near-universal agreement among officials of both parties that the new calendar will give a huge advantage to well-known candidates, in particular Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Giuliani, Mr. McCain and Mr. Obama. Beyond that, California and New Jersey are likely to be more receptive to Mr. Giuliani than are Iowa and South Carolina, with their many conservative voters.

Acknowledging these challenges, Romney seems to be trying to position himself as the only acceptable alternative to the current frontrunners, Giulaini and McCain. If no other formidable candidates enter the race, I think it is a sound strategy. I think Romney is going to have a tough time if a Newt Gingrich jumps in on the action though.

A few notes of interest on a handful of GOP candidates:

Fred Thompson

Former Tennessee Senator and current Law & Order star Fred Thompson hinted over the weekend that he might be interested in throwing his hat into the presidential race. Initial reactions among most conservatives were incredibly positive... Which begs the question, who would this hurt most? At this point I'd have to say Romney. Thompson's dive into presidential politics might result in a Gingrich-like effect, spurring defections from Romney's current cache of congressional endorsements and potentially split the key constituency he is courting in the Republican primaries. Yesterday, Congressman John J. Duncan said he would withdraw his support for Romney were Thompson to run while Bill Frist openly urged Thompson to run on his VOLPAC blog.

Newt Gingrich

The Wall Street Journal had a run-down on Newt on Saturday that discussed the shadow Newt is currently casting over the Republican nomination: "Whether he runs or not, the very notion of a Gingrich candidacy says as much about the glum mood among Republicans and the seeming weakness of the current crop of candidates as it does about Mr. Gingrich." Gingrich's recent revelation to James Dobson of marital infidelity during the Clinton impeachment is viewed by some pundits as a "tactical move in an unfolding strategy" toward an ultimate run for president.

Chuck Hagel

Hagel announced he's not announcing... yet. Is he waiting for conservative dissatisfaction with the current candidates to foment and its unease with Bush and the war in Iraq to solidify in order to pad his candidacy?

John McCain

Lindsey Graham touting McCain (...I think): "'THIS IS NOT Luke Skywalker here,' said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), discussing his friend and Senate colleague John McCain's second run for the presidency. 'This is a totally different campaign.'"

Rudy Giuliani

Giuliani gets "Youtubed" again... The AP is reporting though that Giuliani's moderate stances are not hindering his candidacy. Interestingly, some conservatives seem more unsettled with Giuliani's multiple marriages than his liberal social views. Senator David Vitter, meanwhile, explains his choice to support Giuliani.

Mike Huckabee

In an interview with the Salt Lake Tribune last week, Mike Huckabee, a one-time Baptist pastor, said he thinks a candidate's religion is relevant: "'I think its fair game to ask a person about his or her faith... I mean, I'm asked about mine all the time. I don't find that offensive.' Asked whether Romney's faith is fair game, Huckabee said candidates who say they are religious should speak out about their faith. 'I find that very important because my faith will let people know what my judgments are based on, what my values system is about and where it comes from.' Huckabee said. 'It's a good predictor of how I would likely make decisions and what I think are the important factors in that.'"

Miscellaneous

I wasn't sure where to throw this, but Time magazine had an interesting article last week on the Republican search for a candidate:

For the G.O.P., 2008 looks like a daunting year. It's hard for one party to win three straight Presidential elections even in the best of times. (It's only happened once in the last 50 years). And the radical unpopularity of the Bush Administration and the Iraq war will make it harder still. So conservatives should be thrilled they have candidates like McCain, Giuliani and Romney, with proven appeal to Democrats and independents. And they should understand that, given the dismal image of the Washington G.O.P., a Republican Presidential nominee must maintain a maverick or outsider image to have any shot at victory. Instead, even as McCain, Giuliani and Romney move frantically in their ideological direction, conservative activists are raising the bar and threatening to stay home next fall.

Hewitt on Hannity and Colmes

2007-03-13T12:15:00.000-04:00

Also from last night right after the Romney interview

Romney on Hannity and Colmes

2007-03-13T12:07:00.000-04:00

From last night

The Nation v. National Review on Romney's Riches

2007-03-12T12:45:00.000-04:00

The Nation and National Review are bickering over Romney’s money. Max Blumenthal at The Nation says that Romney has been buying off conservatives in his run for the presidency. Blumenthal insinuates that the National Review gave Romney some positive press from Kathryn Jean Lopez in response to some Romney donations:

As I reported in the Nation last November, Lopez was given a private reception by Romney last October. The visit yielded a fawning blog post and a softball interview in which NR editors acknowledged that KLo "has some pro-Romney tendencies." What the National Review failed to acknowledge was that Romney donated $10,000 to its in-house think tank, the National Review Institute, right before declaring his presidential candidacy.

NRO’s Lopez takes Blumenthal to task over his version of the story:

If my — or NRO/NR's — pro-life creds could be bought for $5,000, I suspect candidates would be whipping out their checkbooks much more frequently. The contention that my view of Romney was somehow transformed in October because of the NRI donation is laughable, as any Google search or click on my NRO archive would suggest. My first friendly-to-Romney piece was posted in early February 2005 — as he was taking on Harvard on cloning.

You can read Lopez’s full retort here. Blumenthal, however, does not single out NRO. He goes on to suggest that the Federalist Society, Focus on the Family, and Grover Norquist have been bought off. Blumenthal also notably scathes Jay Sekulow who has endorsed Romney and serves as an advisor to the campaign:

Sekulow happens to be one of the biggest hucksters in American politics: through his 501 c-3, the American Center for Law and Justice, he solicits millions in small donations from little old ladies, then uses it to pay his family, finance his two mansions, private jet, and himself -- Sekulow "earns" over $600,000, an unheard of salary for the director of a non-profit group. Sekulow should feel at home on the mercenary-minded Romney campaign.

Blumenthal suffers from the same prejudices as Daniel Gross from Slate, as outlined here. Blumenthal takes the opportunity to tie together several of his own dislikes, namely Romney, political money, corporate America, and even gratuitously throwing out Jack Abramoff’s name though there is no discernible tie between him and Romney in the article.

Blumenthal is throwing out insinuations that have little to do with Romney and his campaign. Does Romney donate money that he’s raised to causes he supports? Certainly. Does that mean that he’s buying them off? I doubt it, unless national organizations such as the Federalist Society, NRO, and Focus on the Family are so easily bought off. Of course that would seem to be in line with Blumenthal’s world view.

Update: Talk show host and blogger Hugh Hewitt concurs with my analysis and scathes the NY Times article that underlies the Blumenthal article:

If you total the donations "uncovered" by the Times for this article, they total less than $150,000 --hardly chump change, but so small compared to the budgets
of the organizations involved as to mock the premise of the article. The article fails to indicate the number of dry holes Kilpatrick dug and doesn't provide background on the "critics" it cites. Mr. Kilpatrick was personable, and certainly skilled. But this isn't objective journalism. It is agenda journalism.

Newt's Divulgence

2007-03-09T13:00:00.000-05:00

Newt Gingrich’s announcement that he was having an affair while pursuing President Clinton for the Lewinsky affair certainly comes at an interesting time. Why now? What purpose is there in announcing? Does this have any presidential impact? Hotair’s Allahpundit has this take:

If anyone benefits from this announcement, I’d say it’s Romney. The more the public finds out about Giuliani’s and Gingrich’s peccadilloes, the more comparatively attractive Mitt becomes. If his camp’s willing to play dirty, I’d expect them to go after McCain’s indiscretions and make the case even clearer to morals voters that there’s only one choice for them among the major candidates.

Do personal indiscretions disqualify someone from representing morals voters? That probably is the question for republican voters in 2008. All three candidates ahead of Romney (I’m lumping in Gingrich even though he hasn’t announced) have had their problems with personal morality. Personally, at this point, I’m not sure how much these types of stories will help Romney. Most notably for Giuliani, voters polled have been willing to overlook the personal lives of candidates. Plus, focusing on the personal past of other candidates opens the door for other candidates to more closely scrutinize Romney’s political past, something that has not been a strong point for him so far.

Romney's numbers on the rise?

2007-03-08T19:44:00.000-05:00

So Romney won the straw poll. What does it mean? Will anything change? Well, the new Gallup numbers show a nice change for Romney:

Not all that impressed? Gallup explains the numbers this way:

Mitt Romney stands out as the candidate who is significantly less well known than the others. Over half of Republicans say they don't know enough about Romney to be able to rate him. His image among those Republicans who do know him is quite positive. This suggests the possibility that if Romney maintains his net positive image among Republicans as the campaign progresses, he could be in a position to become more of a factor in the presidential nomination picture.

Admittedly these numbers were taken the same weekend as CPAC and so they likely don’t reflect the increased press received from the straw poll win. However, as Jonathan Martin at the Politico points out, Romney’s numbers have improved since February when he had 27% favorable and 13% unfavorable ratings. The new numbers show a net gain of 12% in favorable versus unfavorable rating.

Hotline TV on Romney's Win at CPAC

2007-03-08T16:45:00.000-05:00

George Will on Romney

2007-03-08T13:02:00.000-05:00

In the Washington Post today, George Will argues in behalf of all three GOP frontrunners, quoting an old axiom: "The perfect is the enemy of the good. In politics this means that insisting on perfection in a candidate interferes with selecting a satisfactory one."

In defense of Mitt Romney, Will writes:

At CPAC, Romney gave the most polished speech, touching all the conservative movement's erogenous zones, pointedly denouncing the "McCain-Kennedy" immigration bill and promising to seek repeal of the McCain-Feingold law regulating campaign speech. Romney, however, is criticized by many conservatives for what they consider multiple conversions of convenience -- on abortion, stem cell research, gay rights, gun control. But if Romney is now locked into positions that these conservatives like, why do they care so much about whether political calculation or moral epiphany moved him there?

All three candidates aside, I say there's no one I like to hear talk about "erogenous zones" more than George Will.

Get Your Romney Campaign Strategy Here

2007-03-08T02:59:00.001-05:00

I've been meaning to write a post about this all day, but kept putting it off. Romney's campaign appears to have suffered another "leak" of some sort. The Politico had an interesting article yesterday that discussed Romney's campaign strategy for the next few months. A number of the points it makes, however, seem somewhat obvious. Briefly, he plans to:

"Game the system. Romney intends to take advantage of the various and complicated rules governing the primaries." (e.g., target specific districts in California's new "winner-take-all by congressional district" system

"Feel the burn. While Romney expects to raise significant amounts of money, his "burn rate," or expenses, will be high.... Romney says he'll spend his money wisely."

"Make clear both explicitly and implicitly the differences between himself, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain, whether on issues or on lifestyle.... Romney intends to exploit what he perceives as two of McCain's great vulnerabilities in the Republican primaries: the McCain-Feingold law, which restricts campaign contributions, and the McCain-Kennedy bill, which would change immigration laws and allow for a guest-worker program. And while Romney disagrees explicitly with Giuliani on issues such as abortion, gun control and gay rights, he implicitly draws distinctions between Giuliani's rather turbulent personal life -- he has been married three times -- and Romney's own marriage of nearly 38 years."

"Make a splash. Romney intends to make a big effort at the splashiest event on the primary calendar: the straw poll in Ames, Iowa, on Aug. 11. The straw poll is the "American Idol" of political events".... Failure at Ames can end candidacies, because campaign contributions can dry up for those who do not do well.

"Encourage the media to look into the background of his opponents."

"Minimize his own negatives. Romney is vulnerable to accusations of being a flip-flopper -- he admits he was not pro-life until just a few years ago, and he joined the National Rifle Association just last August -- but his biggest negative, according to the polls, is his Mormon religion."

"Mend a fence. Romney formally announced for president last month in Dearborn, Mich., at the Henry Ford Museum. Aside from being an inventor and a highly successful businessman, however, Ford was a notorious anti-Semite."

"Be funny, even if he has to borrow the jokes."

Both Ankle Biting Pundits and the NRO have reviews of the strategy and dispense their own campaign advice. Even if some of the plans are pretty expected, I wonder how good it is for Romney to have some of his detailed plans circulating about.

Romney News Round Up

2007-03-07T09:55:00.000-05:00

Here are a few interesting articles related to Mitt Romney's campaign that I've run across over the past few days:

Mitt Romney

A Mormon President? I Don't Think So (Boston Globe): The Globe asks the question "Can a Mormon be elected president in 2008?" and answers it "No." Ostensibly because "most Americans would view [Mormon doctrines and practices] as strange."

Who's The Real Mitt Romney (CBN): The Christian Broadcasting Network looks into Romney's candidacy with an extended piece that can be seen via this link.

Romney Resurrects A Passe Strategy (Boston Globe): The Globe looks into Romney's "leaked" strategy targeting France. "Romney's campaign still sees political gain in whipping up anger toward France. It's similar to Romney's decision last year to refuse State Police protection for Iran's moderate former president, who was speaking at Harvard, as a protest against Iran's current hard-line president. The common thread is that Romney seems to believe that presidential voters will respond only to the gesture, not the facts behind it."

Romneys Highlight Their "Family Values (Hearst Newspapers): "Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Friday showcased his "family values" before an influential audience of conservative Republicans by pointedly introducing his wife of 37 years just hours after thrice-married Rudolph Giuliani made a pitch for support from the same audience."

To Romney Strategist, Questions On Faith Fair Game (Boston Globe): "It's appropriate for the public to ask questions about Mitt Romney's Mormon faith as he pursues his presidential campaign, a top Romney campaign strategist said yesterday."

What Romney Could Do For Mormons (Providence Journal): Regent University President Charles Dunn writes "Can Romney do for Mormons what Kennedy did for Catholics? To do so, Romney must negate America's anti-Mormon prejudice, especially among evangelical Christians. Some parallels suggest that he could."

Romney Picks Up Jason Roe (Politico): "The Politico has learned that [Capitol Hill veteran Jason] Roe will head north to become Romney's deputy campaign manager, assisting Beth Myers, the manager, in day-to-day operations there.... Roe has been Rep. Tom Feeney's Chief of Staff since 2003, but has considerable campaign experience.

Mitt Romney Starts So. Florida Ads In Spanish (CBS4): Romney's running Spanish ads in Florida targeting Cuban-American voters. The full text of his ad is on his website.

Republican Competitors

Giuliani Doesn't Worry Romney Campaign (Standard Examiner): "Republican Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign says it is unfazed by former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s recent surge in the polls and insists there is plenty of time to catch up with such better–known rivals."

CPAC Embraces Steele, Gingrich (Washington Times): The Washington Times writes that Steele and Gingrich were CPAC's biggest stars (while barely mentioning Romney).

As Others Look Vulnerable, Brownback Gets A Look (Kansas City Star): Is Brownback "the most interesting and foolishly overlooked candidate in the crowded presidential field"?

Master of Disaster (Newsweek): Newsweek has an in depth piece this week on Giuliani and his candidacy.

Miscellaneous

An Open Letter To CPAC (American Mind): A who's who of conservative bloggers call for a Coulter boycott in the wake of her recent controversial remarks.

Romney's win suspect?

2007-03-05T14:39:00.000-05:00

Some commentors have argued that Romney’s organization at CPAC undercuts his strong showing. Matt Lewis at Townhall.com finds this reasoning faulty:

Some people will tell you that Mitt Romney didn't deserve to win (because he bussed in College Republicans to vote for him). That's like saying George W. Bush didn't deserve to win because he raised more money than his opponent. Romney's ability to organize, inspire, and transport college students to the conference is precisely why he did deserve to win! A campaign that has the organizational ability to bus in college students has the organizational ability to do a lot of other things, too. The rules allow for it, so what's wrong with Romney doing what he has to do (within the rules) to win?

Romney Distances Himself From Coulter's Remarks

2007-03-05T01:08:00.000-05:00

Mitt Romney joined Rudy Giuliani and John McCain in distancing himself from controversial remarks that Ann Coulter made on Friday at CPAC. Romney's spokesman Kevin Madden said: “It was an offensive remark. Governor Romney believes all people should be treated with dignity and respect.”

Romney Wins CPAC Straw Poll

2007-03-04T01:27:00.000-05:00

After a well-received speech at CPAC on Friday, Mitt Romney won the CPAC straw poll. It's important to note that these straw polls are not scientific and should clearly be taken with a grain of salt (especially considering the emphasis Romney put on getting out the vote), but, that said, I think it's a pretty remarkable achievement for Romney, who has had a string of pretty bad weeks on the campaign trail. What a difference a weekend makes. The final results from the CPAC straw poll (out of a total of 1,705 voters) were:

Mitt Romney - 21%
Rudy Giuliani - 17%
Sam Brownback - 15%
New Gingrich - 14%
John McCain - 12%

The press Romney has received in conservative circles since his speech has to be pretty gratifying for his camp and definitely gives him some momentum heading into March (I'm sure he's enjoying some of his headlines in the MSM as well).

In spite of losing to Romney, I think Giuliani's showing is still surprisingly strong considering the audience he was addressing. Brownback and Gingrich both fared as well as one would have expected, as did McCain (which is precisely why he didn't make time to attend). What I found surprising is Duncan Hunter's disappearance. This is an audience one would have expected him to pull a lot of support from. I have a feeling Romney might have stolen some of his thunder.

Romney's Speech

2007-03-03T18:26:00.000-05:00

This weekend has been a boon for Mitt so far. Continuing the good news is this comment from Paul at Powerline:

Readers may recall that I was disappointed by Mitt Romney's speech at National Review's conservative summit. But Mitt didn't disappoint today at CPAC. Instead, building on the theme of a unified conservative movement articulated by Ronald Reagan at the same forum 30 years ago, Romney presented a fiery defense of all three major strands of conservatism -- economic, social, and security.

In the absence of another first-tier Republican candidate with a longer track-record of up-front social conservatism, Romney is the social conservative in this race as far as I'm concerned. Indeed, one would be hard-pressed to listen to his speech of today and doubt that Romney is the most solidly conservative of the three front-runners, period.

And for those who are wondering why it is that conservatives are so excited, here are excerpts of his speech.

Update: More video here.

LA Times: Romney Lead Among Insiders

2007-03-03T12:49:00.000-05:00

The LA Times reports today that Mitt Romney has the lead among Republican insiders based on a poll it did last month of Democratic and Republican national committee members:

Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republican Mitt Romney have emerged as the leading presidential favorites among party insiders, according to a new Los Angeles Times Poll, which found deep partisan divisions over the country's direction and top issues in the 2008 campaign....

"The DNC and RNC members are not just delegates" to the national nominating conventions, said Charlie Cook, a nonpartisan campaign analyst in Washington. "They are key organizers and opinion leaders. They can help build or kill a groundswell, make a candidate's challenge in a state easier or much harder. They matter a lot"....

Among Republicans, Romney had the most backing among party insiders, with 20% support, followed by Giuliani with 14%, McCain with 10% and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia — who has said he might enter the race in the fall — with 8%....

In a potentially worrisome sign for McCain, just over 1 in 10 RNC members said they would not support him if he won the party's nomination in his second attempt. "It shows just how much resistance there is within the Republican establishment to McCain and how open the party is to candidates who either aren't very conservative, like Giuliani, or only recently minted conservatives, like Romney," [Charlie] Cook said. "McCain has worked pretty hard since 2000 to be a team player, but these numbers would suggest that there is still a problem for him."

MSM on Romney at CPAC

2007-03-03T12:24:00.000-05:00

Here's a sampling of MSM coverage of Romney's speech yesterday:

Romancing the Conservatives (Washington Times): "Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney yesterday delivered a faultlessly tailored appeal to more than 1,000 grass-roots conservative activists hungry for a renewed commitment to limited government."

Romney and Giuliani Make Pitch to Conservatives (NY Times): "Mr. Giuliani arrived to a rousing reception, as people stood up and held cameras and cell-phones to captures a photograph of the moment. But the room grew increasingly silent and restless as Mr. Giuliani’s speech stretched to 40 minutes. By contrast, Mr. Romney arrived to a much more subdued reception but left to a rousing roar of applause."

Romney, Giuliani Court Conservative Base (AP): "Seizing on issues conservatives detest, Romney assailed campaign finance reform and immigration proposals that include a guest-worker program. In a jab at his rival, he referred to the former as McCain-Feingold, for the Arizona senator and Russell Feingold, D-Wis., and the latter as McCain-Kennedy, including the liberal icon Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass. At the same time, he swiped at Giuliani's moderate social stances without naming him. As governor, Romney said, 'I stood at the center of the battlefield on every major social issue. I fought to preserve our traditional values and protect the sanctity of human life.'"

But Did Ginger Rogers Wear Flip-Flops (Washington Post): "The governor began his discussion, sensibly, with economic policy, where his conservative credentials are not questioned. But he didn't quite have his message ready for a bumper sticker. "If I am elected president, I am going to cap non-defense discretionary spending at inflation minus 1 percent!" he vowed. It was time for the social issues, and Romney wasn't holding back. "I stood at the center of the battlefield on every major social issue," said the man who once vowed to best Ted Kennedy in support of gay rights. "I fought to preserve our traditional values and to protect the sanctity of human life. . . . This isn't the time for us to shrink from conservative principles," Romney said before he departed. Indeed, for Romney, it is the time to adopt them.

Gallup Poll on Mormonism

2007-03-03T00:18:00.000-05:00

Gallup has a new opinion poll out on Mormonism that delves into the statistics showing that more than a quarter of Americans will vote for an otherwise well-qualified presidential candidate who is a Mormon. The key findings are:

Americans who are more religious (as measured by frequency of church attendance) and those who are Protestant have highly negative views of the Mormon religion. The differences in views of Mormons among groups defined by their church attendance are significant. There is a net negative view of -21 points among Americans who attend church weekly, contrasted with a net positive view of +10 among those who seldom or never attend church.
Protestants are significantly more negative in their views than Catholics, who are the most positive group by religion.
There are minor partisan differences. Republicans are slightly more negative in their views of Mormons than are either independents or Democrats.
There is a major difference by ideological group. Liberals are extremely negative in their views on a relative basis; 28% have favorable opinions and 61% unfavorable opinions. By contrast, conservatives are essentially evenly divided in their views, while moderates break to the positive side, with 48% favorable and 40% unfavorable opinions.
Opinions of Mormons are better formed in the West, where the preponderance of Mormons live, and are slightly more positive than negative. Only 3% of those living in the West have no opinion whatever of Mormons.

Opinion of the Mormon Religion by Subgroup
		Total favor- able	Total unfavor- able	Net Favor- able	Don't know/ No opinion
		%	%	pct. pts.	%
Total sample		42	46	-4	11

Region	East	41	49	-8	11
	Midwest	40	43	-3	18
	South	40	46	-6	14
	West	50	47	+3	3

Party	Republican	42	52	-10	5
	Independent	43	40	+3	18
	Democrat	43	47	-4	11

Ideology	Conservative	44	45	-1	10
	Moderate	48	40	+8	13
	Liberal	28	61	-33	11

Church attendance	Weekly	34	55	-21	11
	Nearly weekly/ Monthly	41	47	-6	12
	Seldom/ Never	49	39	+10	11

Religion	Total Christian	43	45	-2	11
	Protestant	36	52	-16	13
	Catholic	56	31	+25	12
	Non-Christian	39	46	-7	15
	None	39	46	-7	14

Spartanburg Straw Poll Results Certified

2007-03-02T20:45:00.000-05:00

The Spartanburg straw poll results were certified this earlier this evening. McCain pulled out a surprise S.C. victory. The final numbers were:

John McCain - 164
Rudy Giuliani - 162
Duncan Hunter - 158
Sam Brownback - 85
Mitt Romney - 80
Mike Huckabee - 21

Romney Delivers

2007-03-02T18:38:00.000-05:00

Apparently the Romney speech (full text) went about as well as could be hoped. Here’s some comments from people that were there:

At RedState.com, Erick Erickson lauds Romney: “The people who want a conservative have found their man, it seems. Mitt Romney was pitch perfect and willing to talk social issues -- something totally missing from Giuliani's speech. And people noticed…Mitt was followed by Ann Coulter who put the red meat conservative seal of approval on him. It was an excellent speech that should resolve all fears conservatives have about Romney.”

At the Politico, Jonathan Martin writes about ‘A New Mitt’: “Mitt's team got what they wanted: a tougher, more focused, more forward-leaning speech that was just that, a speech. Gone were the rambling anecdotes and asides (no Olympics and no Challenger) and left was a more concise message.”

At NRO, Kate O’Bierne says Romney scored: “In stringing together some of the events he faced upon taking office -- the Massachusetts court ordering gay marriage, the scientific community's support for creating embryos for research, and the blackballing of Catholic Charities over gay adoption -- he offered a potentially plausible sequence that prompted second thoughts on social issues.”

While Kathryn Jean Lopez, also at NRO, says Romney has turned it around from the NRI Summit: “Romney's addressing CPAC now and oh boy is this different than the disappointing speech he gave in late January at the NRI conservative summit…This is the speech he should have given in January at our summit. This is the speech he should have given when he launched the campaign. This speech — this is a rallying speech.” She also added: “Immediately after his speech, a social-conservative activst who was so not into him said to me "now that's more like it."”

The NY Times political blog reports: "Grover Norquist, head of the Americans for Tax Reform, said the Massachusetts governor had proven he could govern conservatively in that extremely liberal state in the way that Ginger Rogers danced – doing everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in high heels. Following that introduction, Mr. Romney said, “I’m glad to be here in high heels, walking backwards.”

The Libertarian Party blog said this: “I came back and found a massively long line leading to the now delayed 2:45 Mitt Romney speech. I mean massive. The Huckabee speech was full...packed...and it had nothing on the Romney speech. Outside of a literally packed massive ballroom, there was a line 300 yards long of a slew of Republican fans.”

Conservative Unease

2007-03-02T18:05:00.000-05:00

I'm not sure what to make of the continuing conservative unease about Mitt Romney's candidacy. Especially since none of the three leading candidates seems to be inspiring the conservative base. Consider, for instance:

Bob Novak wrote yesterday of "a void on the right."

The Politico reports on "a mood of gloom" at CPAC, and cites the dissatisfaction of grass-roots organizers like Citizens United President David Bossie (“I’m disenchanted, I’m disenfranchised, I’m just dissed") and the Eagle Forum's Phyllis Schlafly (the three GOP front-runners are "all equally unacceptable").

The New York Daily News is reporting that "Some[CPAC] attendees were handing out "Rudy McRomney" stickers with a red line through the middle - signifying conservative unease with Giuliani, Romney and Sen. John McCain."

The Washington Times is reporting that 2008 Hopeful James Gilmore will break Reagan's 11th commandment and "become the first Republican presidential contender to say publicly that the three top-ranked party candidates are phony conservatives."

Everyone seems to agree that this unrest leaves the door wide-open for a candidate with less baggage, but no one seems to know just who that might be. Newt Gingrich is the only name that keeps coming up, but he's said he won't announce his intentions until September, leaving something of a vacuum until then.

So where does this leave us? Romney's campaign seems to think this dissatisfaction gives him a prime opportunity to win over conservatives on the sincerity of his "conversion." It seems like a logical proposition, the trouble is that Romney doesn't seem to be winning that many people over. The Politico wonders whether Romney is simply a "bad fit" for the Republican party right now, citing the fact that he consistently comes in fourth behind the unannounced Gingrich in national polls, while Giuliani, who critics (myself included) contended couldn't be nominated, is building a sizeable lead among likely GOP primary voters. This in spite of the fact that more and more voters are learning of his liberal social views, something most pundits thought would be Giuliani's death kneel. Early reports are that Giuliani won the Spartanburg, South Carolina straw poll yesterday, indicating that his viability extends beyond the Northeast and West. A lot of conservatives, including George Will and Bob Novak, now say they see Giuliani and a viable primary candidate. Even staunch social conservative Rick Santorum didn't rule out supporting Giuliani (saying that he would NOT endors was McCain).

I think it's too early to draw any strong conclusions from all of this, but it seems as though many voters are signaling their willingness to vote for a candidate who is strong on security and is "electable" over a candidate who is perhaps a better ideological fit.

Romney News Round Up

2007-03-02T16:47:00.000-05:00

Here's a smattering of recent news that's relevant to the Mitt Romney campaign:

Tally In Straw Poll Resumes; McCain Even With Giuliani and Hunter (The State) - Preliminary results from yesterday's Spartanburg straw poll (with 81 of 92 precincts reporting) are: (1) Rudy Giuliani - 158 votes (2) Duncan Hunter - 152 votes (3) McCain - 116 (4) Sam Brownback - 83 votes (5) Mitt Romney - 80 votes (6) Mike Huckabee - 21 votes. The AP reported this morning that McCain had pulled even with Giuliani and Hunter when counting resumed this morning. Low turnout for the straw poll was attributed to bad weather, which could have hurt Romney's turnout. The results make me wonder if it was a mistake for Romney to push the straw poll as hard as he did though. He ran advertising in South Carolina and reportedly had his organizers heavily pushing his candidacy. That sort of emphasis can make otherwise relatively meaningless straw polls like this matter. What's more, it ends up highlighting Giulani's strong showing in the face of only light campaigning in the state on his part.

Les Mitts (Slate) - Slate has another caustic article on Romney. While I personally found Romney's leaked memo strategy to demonize Europe and France a little annoying, I think this article is absolutely terrible and reeks of religious bigotry: "But by far the best part of Romney's strategy is his campaign's primal code for Brand Mormon. As the Globe explains: 'Enmity toward France, where Romney did his Mormon mission during college, is a recurring theme of the document. The European Union, it says at one point, wants to 'drag America down to Europe's standards,' adding: 'That's where Hillary and Dems would take us. Hillary = France.' The plan even envisions 'First, not France' bumper stickers.' According to his campaign, Mormonism is not some new-fangled, outside-the-mainstream religion. It's Romney's lifelong crusade against heathen France."

McCain in Utah - McCain skipped out on CPAC and held a fundraiser in Utah yesterday at the invitation of Governor Jon Huntsman. The Deseret News reported that McCain raised over $150,000 as of last night and was expected add to that this morning. Why did McCain come to Utah? The Salt Lake Tribune quotes Utah State University professor Peter Galderisi saying "If [McCain] can get support and money in Utah, which obviously has a religious connection to Romney as well as an ideological one, it's like saying 'I'm still a contender. I can play his home turf.'"

Romney Says Media Are Focused On Him (Boston Globe) - The Globe picked up on comments Romney made in his CBN interview Wednesday which attributed the media scrutiny against him to the media seeing him as the more conservative front-running candidate.

Regent Students Upset At Romney's Choice As Speaker (Virginia-Pilot) - "Selecting presidential candidate Mitt Romney as its May commencement speaker has riled some of Regent University's students and alumni who say his Mormon faith clashes with the school's bedrock evangelical Christianity. 'What we're against is the fact that Mormonism is on the complete opposite end of the spectrum from Christian values and what we believe,' said Doug Dowdey, a Virginia Beach pastor who said he graduated from Regent's divinity school last year."

Candidate Ancestry - Romney's not the only candidate that has the press focusing on his ancestry. Various press outlets are reporting that Barack Obama's mother's ancestors purportedly owned slaves. More news, like Romney's polygamous ancestry, that's not relevant to the current presidential campaign. I believe, however, that it bolsters my argument (in the comments) that reports on Romney's polygamous ancestors were not necessarily religious bigotry or a "liberal" hit piece, but rather another example of headline grabbing sensationalistic journalism.

The Mud Is Beginning To Fly

2007-03-02T01:35:00.000-05:00

So the mud is beginning to fly... and it makes me think that when it gets bad, it's going to get pretty bad. First up, the State is reporting that Mitt Romney is getting attacked via anonymous mailings in South Carolina:

Anonymous mailings critical of GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, on the eve of what has become an all-important Spartanburg straw poll, have raised the specter of a long, nasty battle between now and the 2008 S.C. Republican primary.
One of the pieces was sent via U.S. mail Monday to several Spartanburg County Republicans. The letter, a copy of which was obtained by The State, is a six-page attack on Romney’s record on abortion, gun control, taxes and “conservative values.”
It is postmarked Columbia and headlined “Mitt Romney: Say anything to get elected.”
A second piece was sent via electronic mail from the address “upstaterepublican@gmail.com.” It said it was from “Martin W.” and attacked Romney’s faith.
The e-mail is headlined: “Mitt Romney has a family secret he doesn’t want you to know.”
It says: “Those dark suspicions you hide deep inside yourself about Mormonism are trying to tell you something. Trust your instincts! æ.æ.æ. The light of truth will burn through the smoke and mirrors of Mitt Romney’s movie star looks and crafty words!”
The e-mail includes a copy of a recent Associated Press story about how Romney’s ancestors practiced polygamy.

Next, an erroneous comment that Romney made about Giuliani is getting play too. In his interview with David Brody yesterday, Romney said Giuliani was "pro-gay marriage" (which he is not) prompting various news outlets to report that Romney was "smearing" Giuliani. A source "close to the Giuliani campaign" responded to the allegation by saying "It is sad, but unfortunately not surprising, that Mitt Romney's flailing campaign has chosen to misrepresent Rudy's positions. He can't keep his own positions straight let alone Rudy's."

Is it just me, or does it seem like the dam is starting to break on a vicious campaign cycle?

Romney's CPAC Push

2007-03-02T01:19:00.000-05:00

Mitt Romney's big push to make some headway at CPAC (which started today) is making headlines. Both the New York Times and the Politico ran articles today that highlighted Romney's concerted efforts to flood the Conference with volunteers (mostly college students) and do well in the CPAC straw poll. The Politico's article gives the false impression that Romney is paying his volunteers though ("Romney is paying dozens of college Republicans to lend him a hand"), when all he's done is simply cover the registration fees and travel costs of some of his volunteers.

Latest to be YouTube'd... Giuliani

2007-03-02T01:16:00.000-05:00