Feb 29 2012
Stuck With Mitt – For Now
Mitt Romney pulled out a weak win in Michigan last night. So that means we are stuck with him as the GOP candidate against Obama.
I don’t need to emphasize how underwhelmed I am. I was happier with the McCain selection in 2008 – and I was not thrilled then either.
Mitt has no more Mulligans. None.
I repeat: He has no more Mulligans.
One misstep and many independents, tea partiers and others will determine that a neutered Obama facing a GOP controlled Congress (with subpoena power) is far more preferable than a big-government Romney.
Here is the list of Must Not Do’s Romney has to abide from here on out or he will lose to Obama:
- Never give an inch to the human-created Global Warming nonsense. Promise to over turn all the regulations calling CO2 a pollutant, close down CO2 exchanges, end all Green subsidies and tell the EU no US company is paying their stupid green taxes.
- Open up all areas of the US to oil and gas exploration and production. Hold companies to those environmental laws that make sure exploiting our resources do not harm are national treasures, overly impact animals and plants or do harm to humans. We have these rules already so this should not be a challenge.
- Overturn ObamaCare. If you want to keep some pieces force them to be revoted into existence. Make sure we now the pros and cons of any holdovers.
- Cut spending now (not in 5-10 years). And no net tax increases anywhere. No new revenues unless it is 100% offset by closing down existing streams. Government may only shrink – not grow.
These are his 4 weakest areas and the ones I doubt the man can hold to. But he must abide by these boundaries to win. They are also non-negotiable. He best stop rationalizing and excusing. This is what he must promise.
If he slides even a fraction on any of them, or hints at any wiggle room or gray area, or appears to be just giving lip service so he can explore beyond these boundaries when elected, he will not be elected. I promise you that.
It will be far better and easier to block a President Obama on all fronts with a GOP Congress (and real investigations into his administration’s screw ups) than to have Romney come in, give a blanket amnesty to the prior President’s sins and then demand fealty from HIS GOP Congress. Our Imperial President needs to be Imperial only when cutting the size of government and doing The People’s bidding. No playing with government. He needs to oppose out of control government on every front.
Government has to be the solution of last resort. Closing down useless, wasteful and corrupt government can take the time required to minimize or avoid hurting those simply doing their jobs or those who need to break their government support addiction (those who truly need it will always be covered). But a GOP president in this day and age cannot slip up and start imposing his warped version of government intrusion using the powers that now exist.
And there better not be a hint of crony capitalism and lining of pockets. None.
If he remains true to these conditions he will win. He steps one inch out of line he will lose.
I’ll point out that J. Edgar ‘controlled’ many more presidents than any congress ever did. And it was all because of what dirt he had and who he had it on.
Let me weigh in on objections to Romney. I’m not enthused with any of the current candidates for either party, but: If Romney gets elected and the Senate becomes Repub and the House remains Repub, then that means the Repubs get EVERYTHING they want. No controls on spending, no incentives to reduce taxes. Now why would that be the case with Romney and not Gingrich or Santorum? First, Romney has already shown a proclivity to want to do what the liberals want, but do it first, For example, the Dims in Mass wanted MassCare but Romney published his plan, made it bigger and tried to head off all the problems with the Dim plan. So his objection wasn’t to government health care, it was just that he wanted ‘his’ plan. The correct plan would more likely have been ‘no’ plan. Every segment of it should have had to be done over his veto. Now, it is said that he ‘reduced’ taxes. Really? “During his single term as governor, Mitt Romney raised taxes 5 percent” His cuts to local governments forced them to increase property taxes to the highest level in a generation. He hid them by calling them “fees” and boasted that he never raised taxes,” Now, if I have 5%less to spend, and the government now gets that 5% to spend, I’m gonna call that a tax increase. I don’t see where putting it all on property owners is a solution to anything. So Gingrich and Santorum are a little more unknown quantity, Mitt is too well known. He has proven to be a leader in big spending, big government. There would be no safety valve. (I’m certainly not saying I want Obama as a safety valve)
RT:
Really? As the Governor of his State he was supposed to lead. The people of his state wanted something done about health care and the Legislature was preparing a gianitc government solution. So he took the best solution at the time, a conservative solution as put forward by the Heritage Foundation and backed by people like…wait for it… Newt Gingrich, and ran with it. Didn’t work out as nice as he would have liked. Once he was gone the Dems added things like Botox, plastic surgery, and such to the list of “required” coverage. In the big picture it was probably a mistake, but a mistake the Constitution allows States to make at the State level.
And he balance the budget. Fine! You don’t like the way he did it. But he did it. Give him a Republican House and Senate to actually pass a budget and he’ll sign it. Let;s actually get a real budget and see what happens. Romney was the very first to embrace CUT, cap, and balance.
But that’s not good enough… is it? Let’s keep Obama!
RT:
Really? As the Governor of his State he was supposed to lead. The people of his state wanted something done about health care and the Legislature was preparing a gianitc government solution. So he took the best solution at the time, a conservative solution as put forward by the Heritage Foundation and backed by people like…wait for it… Newt Gingrich, and ran with it. Didn’t work out as nice as he would have liked. Once he was gone the Dems added things like Botox, plastic surgery, and such to the list of “required” coverage. In the big picture it was probably a mistake, but a mistake the Constitution allows States to make at the State level.
And he balance the budget. Fine! You don’t like the way he did it. But he did it. Give him a Republican House and Senate to actually pass a budget and he’ll sign it. Let;s actually get a real budget and see what happens. Romney was the very first to embrace CUT, cap, and balance.
But that’s not good enough… is it? Let’s keep Obama!
Layman, I’m not for keeping obama under any circumstances. I wish we had some better choices running.
I’m not for balancing the budget ‘any way you can’ only the correct way. and raising taxes 5% is NOT the way. Yes, he got the Dims in Mass to go along with a 5% increase, that’s what Dims do. And we do know that he balanced the budget BECAUSE he was REQUIRED to do so by law. The President is NOT REQUIRED to do so.
I don’t see how anyone can take an unnecessary bloated gigantic health care bill and put it into law and FEEL GOOD about it.
this statement: “The people of his state wanted something done about health care” and his solution was to get a huge, massive, government controlled system and force everyone to buy it? That’s leadership? He saw a pack headed in a direction, ran and got in front of it, and said, ‘look, I’m the Leader’ His next step was over a cliff..
I’ll tell ya why I don’t like Flip Flopney whom I voted for over McCain.
He and his team play dirtier than a Dem when it comes to fellow Repunks, but he has said as did McCain he won’t go after OBLahBLah.
At least McCain waited until he had won the nomination before he unilaterally surrendered.
I live in Iowa and witnessed first hand the dirty, low down smear machine duo of Mitt Romney and Ron Paul.
The snake Romney always has someone doing his dirty work for him while he tries to pretend to be above the fray.
If you have not had your chance to vote yet your turn is coming and I guarantee the full two minute commercial breaks will be filled with nonstop bashing of whomever the conservative currently threatening the establishments sacrificial lamb is at the moment.
There is a reason his opponents go into virtually every primary state leading in the weeks running up to it and then Mittens miraculously pulls out a win at the end.
It is called Millions upon millions of dollars worth of slander against conservative opposition and never once has FlipFlopney denounced it.
Oh, yea, his useful idiot McCain has and will, but points his fingers at Mitts opponents rather than ask his buddy to knock it off. Maybe the useful idiot McCain can pass another unconstitutional bill that eliminates opposition to his candidate of choice while exempting them from same.
I harbor no ill will toward Mormons, as religious ideology bears no weight with me, but I will guarantee ya should Flipflopney get the nomination we will receive an education on the evils of Mormonism the likes of which you have never seen.
I will look forward to the docudramas about the sins of Warren Jeffs and the weird beliefs of the “cult” of Mormonism!
I personally don’t care what the hell a persons religion is, but I have “friends” who astonished me last time around, EVANGELICALS who categorically stated they would NOT vote for a Mormon.
I was naive, as I didn’t think “Christians” would harbor such bigotry against other religions.
Sadly many do.
So now we have premature announcements of victory from Flipflopney and his Presstitutes in IOWA, MAINE, and maybe MICHIGAN.
Once or twice may be chalked up to error, three times, well three times is a pattern!
This thing is a long way from over and between give FlipFlopney talking points last night on Fox illustrated that should Mittens win all the north and western states he would have 100 delegates more than needed.
I for one hope this thing goes to the convention undecided and then we shall find out EXACTLY who the Establishment wants as did Hillary after multiple dirty low down double dealing tricks were pulled in Primaries and caucuses against her.
RIP Andrew Breitbart!
dhunter, it is certainly true that McCain surrendered as soon as he had the nomination wrapped up. There was not a moment after that, that I felt as if he had any chance at all. Remember when he actually suspended his campaign right in the final weeks? obama didn’t..
It certainly is even more distressing that Romney has agreed to the same basic surrender terms, even before winning the nomination. This is not a good time….
Have you heard what Romney actually says about Obama and his poilicies. He IS going right after him. He’s just not going to call him a raicst, or a Muslim, or a communist. He has called him: inexperienced, in over his head, failed, having failed policies, attacking religious freedom, irresponsible, foolish…etc.
I heard Rush yesterday say that Romney was attacking the base when he said that you can get a bump in the polls by saying outrageous, incindiary things. Sorry Rush – you’re wrong. There’s about 20% of the base that wants the red meat. Its not good enough to day that Obama is foolish, or misguided, or in over his head, or has no experience. If you’re not willing to say that Obama is a socialist/communist/muslim then your not a true conservative.
That’s the 20% that AJ is always railing against… yet in this case he’s aligned with them. RDS on display. Go figure?
As they say, “the devil is in the details,” along with the real truth of an event. In the case of MA health care, it was not something that Romney came into office as a campaign promise to be realized. It was one of those issues that was thrust into his governorship, and he had to make choices and concessions based upon the circumstances around him.
The federal government was threatening to cut off $385 million in medicaid funding if he did not find a way to give more people health care access. Also, there was a coalition of religious leaders and advocates who had collected enough signatures to put a much more liberal measure on the ballot for universal health care. Basically it was not a matter of ‘if’ but ‘when’ some kind of health care was going to pass. And, Romney tried to buffer the more radical ones being put forth by devising a less liberal one of his own.
Like Layman1 explained, the new ideas in his plan were ones condoned by conservative think tanks. But, like anything, no one knows how a policy is to play out until it is in place. While Romney had little choice in creating a health care policy for MA., he did try to use his influence to reign it in as much as possible, The perimeters of not being like Hillarycare and not raising taxes were met. However, other aspects, like not putting burdens on small businesses with fees was vetoed, as were 7 other parts of the initial bill that was put together.
Romney’s statement about this healthcare plan was:
And, much like Reagan worked with Tip O’Neil, so did Romney work with democratic political power brokers, like Kennedy, to coordinate the best possible solution for MA.
It’s always easier to look back and criticize someone for not doing more. However, if Romney had done nothing the health care system in MA looks like it would have been far worse.
a point about the relationship of taxes and the deficit. IF raising taxes would do what they said it would do, it would be something to consider. BUT – the actual effect would be much different.
Here is why I believe raising taxes now would be very bad policy, and I also believe it is very important for any candidate and any proponent of good government to tell people this over and over: Raising taxes is actually going to DECREASE revenue, and thus make the deficit worse.
The problem is that this sounds counterintuitive, but England has just has to learn this lesson again the hard way. Here’s how it works: we remain on the edge of a very nasty recession/depression, all the happy talk about a “glorious recovery” notwithstanding. AJ has been documenting the employment situation, which remains bad. A general tax increase of 5% (or any other number) is going to pull revenue directly out of the private sector, and since the goal is to reduce the deficit this money is not going to be replaced in the public sector. (which would be an inefficient use of resources anyway, but that’s a different post) Yanking money out of the private sector and just paying off debt with it obvious leads to an instantaneous drop of GDP, and when combined with the shaky economic situation that means immediate recession.
And total government revenues ALWAYS fall sharply in a recession; you can’t raise taxes faster than income falls. Funny, it’s almost like there’s some cause and effect relationship there, imagine that.
SO why am I opposed to raising taxes to pay off the deficit – and why should everyone be? Because raising taxes is going to drop overall revenue and make the deficit WORSE!!!
it’s astounding how so many supposedly “smart” people in government can’t figure this out.
In thinking about Romney’s choices in approaching the health care demands of MA, I suppose he could have saved himself a ton of criticism if he had done nothing, allowing MA to strangle itself in a monstrous alternative liberal plan. He could have sat on his hands, been a pious conservative, wagging his finger afterwards, saying “I told you so.” Just think of the conservative accolades he could have received for taking this posture and doing nothing! But, is that really being a good leader? Are we looking for a leader who says, “Do it my way, or I’m not going to play with you!” Is that how Reagan managed to get an agenda through Congress, by playing ball with no democrat?
Also, is it being a good leader to now condemn a state plan that was created from all the best options available, in a given circumstance, a plan that still enjoys a high favorable rating from both the people and physicians using it? Is pandering to the base a sign of integrity and expressions of true convictions?
I’m just wondering what kind of realistic expectations are guiding people in their republican primary choices, and how much of that guidance is based on fact or emotional talking points.
jan, some interesting points. “I suppose he could have saved himself a ton of criticism if he had done nothing,”
I’d say so. sometimes being a good leader means not choosing to lead people over a cliff. you can stop a step short. Just because the leachers of Mass decided to raid the state treasury to provide them with free health care didn’t mean the Republican governor should come up with a ‘better plan to accomplish that’. you’ll note that one of the ‘reasons’ for this was because state was gonna lose millions in Federal money for Medicaid. So this wasn’t even really just a ‘state plan’ it was a state plan for the other states to pump even more free money into Mass. While it may be primarily his responsibility to look out for the citizens of Mass, it is not by expecting others to pay for it. A good leader would have found a better way to insure everyone had at least basic care without bankrupting the state. I know the budget is balanced (they say) but they are spending massively more on medical care than they were so that means they are spending less somewhere else, or taxes are 5% higher. I don’t feel that medical care is a ‘right’ in America, I think it is a privilege and we should extend that privilege as far as we can afford to extend it. But someone that is not even looking for a job and has 8 kids is not entitled to the same level of care that someone that works and can afford to pay for it, is entitled.
I guess I’m different, but I don’t admire a rich guy just for attaching his name to something like the olympics and claiming a ‘success’ for having them. Every 4 years, two countries host olympics and I’ve never seen another ‘rich’ guy claim to be the reason for the games success in any of those countries. They are successful because they are the olympics. I guess what I’m saying is, the reason I don’t support Romney is because he has, contrarily to the common myth, proven to be a failure at his ‘public life’. didn’t get elected in the 90’s, more deeply imbedded dimocratic health care onto his people, failed in his run in ’08. I’ve not studied his activities with Bain enough to know if he was successful or not (but that is his private life)
I’m just not feeling good about having a proven loser as my candidate.
Redteam
As has been the case in the past, I respect your opinions, even though I may not agree with all of them. In reading your post above, it occurred to me that we are looking at Romney through two different perspectives. I am taking the “cup is half full” philosophy in focusing on what I perceive and believe to be Romney’s strengths, as they apply to our country’s financial weaknesses today. You, OTOH, are focused on and turned off by what you perceive as his weaknesses, the half empty part of the cup, which are either tied into policies you view unfavorably he has been entwined with, or simply a case of his extreme wealth.
The silver spoon part of Romney’s existence, even though he created most of it himself, is just one of those obstacles people can’t seem to get past. For instance, even though it was a volunteer effort on Romney’s part to financially revive the Olympics, a global athletic institution, not taking a dime for his time, it will be construed by many as simply some “rich guy” trying to garner some acclamation for himself, rather than a gesture of service to his country.
Sometimes, you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t….
I’m going to change the subject:
Sheriff Joe: ‘Probable cause’ Obama certificate a fraud —
Asking Arpaio to elevate to criminal probe, person of interest ID’d
http://www.wnd.com/2012/03/sheriff-joes-posse-probable-cause-obama-certificate-a-fraud/
excerpt:
The Cold Case Posse advised Arpaio that they believe forgers committed two crimes. First, they say it appears the White House fraudulently created a forgery that it characterized as an officially produced governmental birth record. Second, the White House fraudulently presented to the residents of Maricopa County and to the American public at large a forgery represented as “proof positive” of President Obama’s authentic 1961 Hawaii long-form birth certificate.
“A continuing investigation is needed to identify the identity of the person or persons involved in creating the alleged birth certificate forgery and to determine who, if anyone, in the White House or the state of Hawaii may have authorized the forgery,” Arpaio said.
Frogg, I’m glad they did that exhaustive research to prove without a doubt that it is a forgery. Strange, back on the day it was released, I knew within about 10 minutes that it was clearly a forgery. I can think of no logical reason for the president to release a forged birth certificate. But it does raise the question of: since it is fake, what is the truth. oh well.
Jan. It is obvious that it is only human nature to write from the perspective of where you want the truth to be. You clearly see Romney as a ‘self made, very successful person’ I think I see him as the son of a wealthy guy that took full advantage of the benefits of being from a wealthy privileged family to enhance that position. I have no doubt he has values and worked hard. I can’t even imagine how much work it took to get an MBA and a Law degree from Harvard simultaneously. I admire him for doing that. (well, I can understand a little because I got two degrees within 6 months of each other, one being an engineering degree.) Romney has stated many times, he didn’t inherit but it turns out that after he was already wealthy that he did, in fact, inherit from his family and he gave that money to charity (because it was minimal compared to what he already had) I’m not belittling his charity. I think that’s great. I don’t really think Romney does what he does because he is rich. I think that since he has always been rich that it causes him to think as a rich person and sees distributing the wealth more along the lines that obama seems to rather than as an average person would (my distinction with obama’s vision of distributing wealth is from the eyes of an indoctrinated, socialist communist) The most telling thing about both of their philosophies is that they never see themselves as the beneficiaries of having wealth distributed to them, only to those ‘other’ people. They both just assume they will remain rich. and it’s always those other people’s money they are discussing redistributing, not their own. As I said, I don’t consider Romney to have been successful in his public life, I don’t know what makes anyone think that electing him president will suddenly make him begin to be successful. Why wouldn’t he continue to be a failure? isn’t there at least a 50-50 chance of that?
Oh no, I put in the ‘s-o-c-i-a-l-i-s-t word and it triggered moderation… So Jan you may have to wait a little while til it clears…
ABC News has the four minute intro by Sheriff Arapaio video up:
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/arizona-sheriff-obama-birth-certificate-forged-15828337?tab=9482931§ion=2808950&playlist=2808979
I did not watch the livestream of the entire press conference; but, I’ve read that it will be reposted tomorrow.
Frogg, wording is critical: “The Cold Case Posse advised Arpaio that they believe forgers committed two crimes. First, they say it appears the White House fraudulently created a forgery that it characterized as an officially produced governmental birth record. ”
in fact they were very careful to say that they are NOT saying who created the forgery. They clearly stated that they were NOT saying the white house did it. They did say the White House ‘released’ the document.
They did say that they have a ‘person of interest’ as the creator, that they know precisely which computer it was created on and precisely when it was uploaded to the White House.(20 minutes prior to the White House releasing it) They did not say when or if they will release this info.
nothing will come of this, nobody cares that we have a foreigner occupying the white house.
Redteam
….unless, of course, if he/she were a republican.
Well, Redteam, if no one cares that the President’s Birth Certificate released by the White House is probably a forgery…..I guess they won’t care about this either:
Albequerque dog becomes registered voter
http://www.kob.com/article/stories/S2518479.shtml?cat=500
I have three dogs…..I guess I better get their voter registration cards sent in.