We know that Sen. Ayotte is one of about 15 people who will be considered should Romney capture the nomination:
Presidential candidate Mitt Romney has been pretty quiet about who he might pick as a running mate if he wins the nomination, but Monday said New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte is on the list.
He said if he becomes the nominee, then he’ll start thinking about it, but he has gathered about 15 names.
“[T]here are terrific Republicans in the Senate, in the House, in governors’ offices. You’ve got extraordinary men and women. We have a very deep bench,” Romney said on Fox’s Hannity Monday night.
Romney added that he didn’t think that was always the case.
“I don’t know that we’ve always felt that way. This year is really exceptional and whoever our nominee is will be able to choose a remarkable, superb person to become the vice presidential contender,” he said.
He made the appearance on set with Ayotte, a freshman Senator from the key political state of New Hampshire, who endorsed Romney over the weekend.
Ayotte’s backing was a coveted one with her political star rising and popularity in conservative circles.
Post your “Dream Ticket” (and your rationale) in the comments.
Full story here.
Hat-tip: Ozzy
The whispers are that Ron Paul will be shown tied with Newt Gingrich for first place in Iowa in a poll (with a very large sample size) to be released tomorrow by veteran 18-year pollster TeleResearch. The whispers are also that the survey was commissioned by a PAC friendly to Dr. Paul. Still, a scientific poll is a scientific poll, and Paul’s surge in Iowa as of late is by no means imaginary. How far will Paul go in Iowa, and will a lot of average voters quickly warm up to him if a splintered evangelical vote allows him to snag first place in the first caucus state?
Race 4 2012′s CNN/Heritage/AEI Debate Open Forum will go live at 7:30pm EST. The debate will be televised on CNN and streamed live on CNN.com.
ARG New Hampshire 2012 GOP Primary Poll
- Mitt Romney 33%
- Newt Gingrich 22%
- Ron Paul 12%
- Herman Cain 9%
- Jon Huntsman 8%
- Michele Bachmann 2%
- Rick Perry 2%
- Rick Santorum 1%
- Buddy Roemer 1%
- Gary Johnson 1%
- Undecided 9%
Quinnipiac National Republican Primary
- Gingrich – 26% (10)
- Romney – 22% (23)
- Cain – 14% (30)
- Paul – 6% (7)
- Perry – 6% (8)
- Bachmann – 4% (4)
- Huntsman – 2% (2)
- Santorum – 2% (1)
- Undecided – 19% (16)
If the choice was between Romney and Cain:
- Romney – 50% (39)
- Cain – 37% (47)
If the choice was between Romney and Gingrich:
- Gingrich – 49%
- Romney – 39%
General Election Matchups:
- Obama – 45% (47)
- Romney – 44% (42)
- Obama – 50% (50)
- Cain – 37% (40)
- Obama – 49% (52)
- Gingrich – 40% (37)
Favorability Ratings Among All Voters
- Romney – 36/31
- Obama – 47/46
- Gingrich – 30/42
- Cain – 26/44
Survey of 1,039 Republican voters (+/-3% MoE) and 2,552 registered voters (+/-1.9%) was conducted Nov 14-20. Numbers in parentheses are from the Quinnipiac poll ending Nov 2.
I’m sure most of the people here on this blog are already familiar with what Chris “I get a thrill up my leg” Matthews said last Saturday about Obama wanting a second term. Here is a piece of the video for those who may have missed it, or might wish to relive it:
His, “There’s nothing to root for. What are we trying to do in this administration? Why does he want a second term? Would he tell us? What’s he going to do in his second term, more of this? Is this it? Is this as good as it gets? Where are we going?”, really struck a chord with me. It was déjà vu all over again.
More than twenty years ago in 1990, President George H. W. Bush led the nation and the world in driving out Iraq out of Kuwait. When it was all over, his approval ratings were sky-high. A number of polls placed him north of 90 percent — a truly astounding number. The man was on top of the world. He could have done anything. But what did he do with those high numbers? Nothing.
Republican after Republican came to his office. Senators, Governors, and other bigwigs begged him to do something, anything with all that political capital. He would listen to them politely, thank them for their input, and then with a smile show them out. He then would turn to his advisers who urged caution. “Don’t rock the boat”, they told him. “Your reelection is in the bag”, they said. “Don’t do anything that might jeopardize it.”
That is what he wanted to hear. It fit exactly with his style.
George H. W. Bush was really not that good of an executive leader. He was more of an executive manager. He was not Ulysses S. Grant. He was more George Meade. Meade won the defensive Battle of Gettysburg, but did little else with the Army of the Potomac after that. He showed little initiative. But when Grant took command of the Union armies, he found Meade to be an effective subordinate commander. Give Meade an order and he was superb at carrying it out. Just don’t ask him to come up with any of his own ideas, much less act upon them. Such was George H. W. Bush.
Even with Bush’s greatest triumph, the first gulf war, he had to be goaded into doing it. While he was dithering, wondering what to do about the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, Margaret Thatcher flew over for a visit. She gave him a swift kick to the seat of the pants. “This is NOT the time to go wobbly, George”, the Iron Lady told him. If Lady Thatcher had not paid that visit to the White House, it is doubtful that the first gulf war would have been fought.
For nearly two years after, Bush basked in the glow of his high poll numbers. He sat on his hands and did little. By the time the election of 1992 came around, people were asking, “What is the point of reelecting Bush? If he didn’t do a blamed thing when his polls were sky-high, what exactly is he going to accomplish in the next four years when his polls are at earthly levels? In the campaign, the only reason Bush could give the nation to vote for him was to keep the Democrat out of office.
He lost.
Flash forward twenty years. Once again we have a president that really doesn’t know how to lead. Once again we have a president whose own party is having difficulty finding a reason to vote him back in. The last time that happened was twenty years ago with Bush 41.
That also happens to be the last time we had a one-term president.
Suffolk University New Hampshire 2012 Republican Primary
- Romney – 41% (41)
- Gingrich – 14% (4)
- Paul – 14% (14)
- Huntsman – 9% (10)
- Cain – 8% (1)
- Santorum – 3% (1)
- Perry – 2% (8)
- Bachmann – 1% (5)
Survey of 400 likely primary voters was conducted Nov 16-20 and has a margin of error of +/-4.9%. Numbers in parentheses are from the last Suffolk poll conducted Sept 18-20.
Inside the numbers:
“Every Republican candidate that surges in the national polls hits a firewall in New Hampshire,” said David Paleologos, director of Suffolk University’s Political Research Center. “We’ve seen this with surges from Bachmann, Perry, Cain and now Gingrich. A Romney loss here is highly improbable, and Romney’s best insurance policy in New Hampshire is Ron Paul, whose fixed support takes 14 percent off the table.”
When likely GOP voters were asked which Republican candidate would do best against Barack Obama in a debate, Gingrich tied Romney with 34 percent. And Romney (83 percent) and Gingrich (52 percent) were the only two seen as “presidential.”
I entered this cycle truly hoping that Mike Huckabee would run for President, but in May it became clear that wouldn’t happen.
I’ve considered several candidates since then: Herman Cain, Tim Pawlenty, Rick Perry, and Michelle Bachmann. I’ve remained on the fence until now. I’m firmly on the Herman Cain train.
I laid out what I was looking for in a Presidential candidate in this column and what I believed a Republican Candidate: political courage, character, the confidence of the base in his intentions, and the ability to inspire optomism in Americans. Herman Cain is the man who best represents this ideal.
When I look at other main contenders, their courage to address tough issues is definitely in question. Cain’s is not.
The issue of character is one that some might contest given the recent sexual harassment rumors. However, none of these rumors have had any evidence other than heresay to support them. It’s reasonable to expect a candidate’s known and proven conduct be exemplary. It’s not reasonable to expect he be invulnerable flimsy baseless allegations.
Optomism is also important. We Americans have been beaten down by events. Since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, our own image of America has taken a relentless beating. And really our economy is suffering as much from our pessimissism about the future as the current problems. We desperately need to feel good about our country. Herman Cain best exudes that Reaganesque confidence in America that instills that good feeling that can restore our national self-confidence.
There are many criticisms of Mr. Cain, including his lack of foreign policy expertise, his mis-statements on some issues, and his campaign staff.
I won’t deny that Cain hasn’t had some facepalm moments, but being president is not merely a matter of being the master of political trivia. It’s about leadership and the willingness to take on hard problems. While I may question some of his staff decisions, it must be admitted that: 1) the quality of staff was affected by the shoestring budget that afflicted the campaign until this quarter and 2) whatever the complaints about Mr. Block, had Cain taken the advice of most pundits and bloggers instead of Block’s, he would have been out of this race three months ago and never become a national contender.
Others make a dubious comparison between Mr. Cain and President Obama. “In 2008, we elected a charismatic guy with no experience, do we really want to do that again?” The argument assumes that the problem with the last three years has been that Obama didn’t have a long enough political resume. The problem with the last three years has been that Obama’s been has been pushing harmful policies, not because of inexperience, but because he believes in bad ideology and political philosophy. It is decades of political experience that has produced the two biggest job killers in this term, Obamacare and Dodd-Frank (named after two members of Congress with more than 30 years in office.) Unlike Obama, Cain will bring executive experience and the one clear failure of executive leadership that we have (the BP oil spill) would never have occurred if Herman were president.
Americans are tired of politics as usual, of men who think up clever answers to everything and take a bunch of positions on issues that they have to reverse themselves on once in office because they didn’t fully understand the situation.
Herman Cain does have staying power beyond the “Flavor of the Month” phenomena. Even after the last few weeks, he remains competitive in national polls and in Iowa. I think he can come back and win this particularly as more intention is put on Newt Gingrich’s past record.
In the Fall, I will support whoever the Republican nominee is against Obama. In this primary election campaign, I’ll support the candidate I think will be best for America. That’s why this morning I put a Cain bumper sticker on my car and I hope to caucus for Mr. Cain on Super Tuesday.
CNN/ORC 2012 GOP Nomination Poll
- Newt Gingrich 24%
- Mitt Romney 20%
- Herman Cain 17%
- Rick Perry 11%
- Ron Paul 9%
- Michele Bachmann 5%
- Rick Santorum 4%
- Jon Huntsman 3%
- Someone else (vol.) 0%
- None/No one (vol.) 3%
- No opinion 2%
The latest topic of analysis around the blogosphere (including here at Race) is the new “Romney Unleashed” sketch on SNL — how it differed compared to caricatures of other candidates, what it means to Romney’s electability, and other such issues. Why? Because in all good humor lies a kernel of truth. Oftentimes, humor is a powerful way to get a point across.
I follow comedian Andy Borowitz on Twitter. He is liberal. Waaay liberal, as a matter of fact. I don’t line up with his politics at all. But when it comes to humor, the guy’s got a gift. He’s not only funny, he’s influential – clocking in at over 133,000 followers and constantly on the Top Tweets board… which is why I find it interesting to watch how he jokes about the current crop of GOP candidates.
Here’s a sampling of the jokes he’s tweeted throughout this campaign:
Rick Perry
Michele Bachmann
Herman Cain
It is quite revealing, then, that the best he could come up with for Mitt Romney were these:
Again, just as we saw with the SNL sketches, there is a measurable difference in the flaws of all the other candidates in comparison to Mitt Romney. Romney gets attacked as dull, and with class warfare lines. And that’s about it. Even a liberal comedian like Andy Borowitz who takes joy in how unqualified all the GOP candidates are stops to take note that Romney is “totally qualified” to be President.
Romney gives no fodder to the comedians, which must drive them nuts. But from my perspective – I started following politics in 1999 – I’m looking forward to having someone lead and represent the GOP who doesn’t make me wince every time they open their mouth.
I’m not one to swoon over candidates. I think the cult of personality is probably one of the most destructive trends in modern American politics (see Obama, Barack for further guidance). My endorsement process in this election cycle has been a very deliberate one. All the candidates have their strengths and weaknesses. Tim Pawlenty was my clear preferred candidate from day 1, but he dropped out (too early in my view). Rick Perry looked promising initially; a rock-ribbed conservative who was more moderate on immigration, he seemed ideologically pitch-perfect on first glance. Unfortunately, the reality of the candidate failed to live up to these expectations, from consistent charges of crony-capitalism to his continued stumbles as a candidate. Jon Huntsman’s resume, on paper, looked pitch-perfect, but, like Perry, his campaign has been underwhelming, and to overcome the handicap of having worked for Obama and governed fairly moderately in a deep red state, it needed to be stellar. Bachmann and Paul were always non-starters for me, both as house members and, in Paul’s case, because of my radically different foreign policy views. If anything, Gary Johnson, as a pro-choice social liberal, is even less ideologically simpatico with me than Paul, and in any case, will be lucky to come in third in any primary this cycle. I was quite impressed initially with the unconventional Herman Cain, but he not only failed to shake sexual harassment allegations (which are inexcusable if true), but he also never developed a clear, consistent foreign policy of any kind. Cain’s first foreign policy flub was back in June; since that time, he’s had ample time to study up on the issue, and he doesn’t seem to have improved at all. I’ve always liked Rick Santorum, and his Roman Catholic-informed conservative view of a more just and compassionate society resonates with me, to a degree. But Santorum’s “more conservative than thou” campaign hasn’t been impressive, and, as others have mentioned, he faces serious electability issues.
This leaves the two front-runners of the moment: Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney. Gingrich is undoubtedly one of the smartest guys in politics (and his alternate history novels are both interesting and entertaining), but his strengths are matched with commensurately large flaws. Gingrich, like many very intelligent politicians, has in the past displayed a worrying trend of viewing himself as “above the law”. One sometimes gets the impression that Newt believes the rules of conduct and decency he espouses for others don’t really apply to him in the same way. Additionally, Gingrich, again like many extremely intelligent politicians, seems to be enamored with the bright shiny new idea in his head, which has often led him to take ideological positions which are quite mind-boggling. To summarize these flaws in one phrase, Newt completely lacks discipline. And we will need a candidate with discipline to beat Obama.
Mitt Romney is far from perfect. He has not been the ideologically consistent conservative warrior for whom many in the Republican base habitually pine. He does pander at times, a flaw particularly pronounced in 2008, on issues from social conservatism to immigration. While no doubt a very principle-driven man, Romney is a free-market-oriented technocrat at his core, which may lead some to question just how hard he will push for the deep, systemic conservative reform we need. Yet, for all these imperfections, Romney has some strengths lacking from the rest of the current field. First, Romney seems to have learned from his 2008 run; Romney 2012 is disciplined, focused, low-key, and has aimed all of his attacks squarely at President Obama.
Second, Romney has won election in the bluest state in the union, and ought to know how to speak to the suburban moderates we will need to win in November. Ideologically, Romney believes passionately in American exceptionalism, the true cin qua non of any President. He has been a reasonably consistent hawk on foreign policy, and many of his departures from conservative orthodoxy can be at least partially explained by his environment. I’ve read No Appology–the earlier version–and came away more impressed than not. Mitt Romney understands the serious problems the United States is likely to face in the next ten years, and he has some pretty solid and well-thought-out plans to solve them, which draw on free market and, to an extent, traditionalist principals.
I’m skeptical of the notion that Obamacare = Romneycare. First, there’s the obvious distinction that Massachusetts is a state, not the federal government. What might be legal and constitutional for one state is not necessarily within the perview of Washington. And, as both Romney and Rick Perry have clearly stated in their respective books, states are laboratories of democracy, where ideas are tried and accepted or discarded based on how well they work. I also suspect a lot of the “I got my ideas from Romney” line of attack is President Obama playing politics in the Republican primary, and being too cute by half. It was no secret that Republicans wanted to face Howard Dean in 2004. To my mind, it’s equally no secret that the Obama campaign is most worried about facing either Romney or Huntsman. This is not to say that they are correct in thinking that Mitt and Jon are the two most serious threats to the President’s reelection, but I think we can take some of the claims of paternity made by Obamacare defenders with a certain campaign-spin-flavored grain of salt. I do not think Romney will be a culture warrior, nor do I expect him to be perfect on life issues. There are two enormously beneficial things he could do on life about which I am more confident however: reinstate the Mexico City Policy and appoint strict constructionist judges to the bench. Originalists like Robert Bork and Roman Catholic legal heavy-weights like Marianne Glendon wouldn’t be endorsing Romney if they thought him likely to go wobbly on judges, and from a pro-life perspective, this is the single most important thing a President can do.
There is one final reason to prefer Mitt Romney to all of his competition. The most pressing issue facing the average American voter in 2012 is very clearly jobs and the economy. I think a large reason for John McCain’s 2008 loss was his self-confessed ignorance on economic issues. Mitt Romney understands the economy, and the importance of increasing productivity and fostering a climate where jobs are created. Working with a Republican congress, I think Romney could very possibly not only undue some of President Obama’s more catastrophic mistakes, but could also set policies in place which will help transform the American economy moving forward. The old notion of an industrial-era command-and-control-style economy, and government for that matter, is increasingly outdated. I think Romney gets that, not just ideologically like the other candidates, but on a personal level.
In short, I am supporting Mitt Romney because: he can win, he believes wholeheartedly in American exceptionalism and dynamism, he has both extensive knowledge and experience on the most pressing issue facing the country, he knows how to govern, and even on issues where he’s weaker than I’d like, he’ll be light-years better than Barack Obama. I’m not so attached to Romney that I’ll refuse to vote or even campaign for another candidate if he or she is the nominee. But, if we want to win in 2012 and move the country in the right direction, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s going to be with Mitt.
Mitt Romney has deftly avoided the withering spotlight of the press this time around – in part because he weathered that gauntlet during the 2008 elections.
The other part of the equation is strategic: Team Romney has purposely stepped back allowing newbies to fumble around until the real test candidate is found and then take him (or her) straight on in the final stretch to Iowa and onto New Hampshire.
Does Romney have weaknesses? Yes, but they are also his strengths.
Beyond the constant haranguing about flip-flops is the charge that Romney is somehow “boring”. I think the real adjective critics are grasping for is “cautious” or “rigid.” But riddle me this: can you name the last flub, gaffe, fumble, or misstep from Team Romney? Boring, yes… strategically sound – absolutely.
Yes, at times, he can be too cautious – like in Ohio some weeks ago when he dodged a question about supporting an initiative which he had already endorsed.
Romney avoids throwing the low hanging red meat which gets him in trouble with the base but it also allows him to avoid the inevitable pitfalls of “extremism” which the MSM is so eager to pin on conservatives. Perry found out the hard way a few weeks back flirting with the Birther issue even in jest.
But the real test is one of experience. (more…)
Two interesting opinions emanating from the leftists this morning…
First, Patrick Caddell and Doug Schoen, Democratic Party consultants / pollsters, pen an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal calling for Barack Obama to not run for re-election. They want to see Hillary Clinton be the Democratic nominee:
When Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson accepted the reality that they could not effectively govern the nation if they sought re-election to the White House, both men took the moral high ground and decided against running for a new term as president. President Obama is facing a similar reality—and he must reach the same conclusion.
He should abandon his candidacy for re-election in favor of a clear alternative, one capable not only of saving the Democratic Party, but more important, of governing effectively and in a way that preserves the most important of the president’s accomplishments. He should step aside for the one candidate who would become, by acclamation, the nominee of the Democratic Party: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Never before has there been such an obvious potential successor—one who has been a loyal and effective member of the president’s administration, who has the stature to take on the office, and who is the only leader capable of uniting the country around a bipartisan economic and foreign policy.
Stoke that Democratic angst, gentlemen. Nice work…
Meanwhile, former (Bill) Clinton advisor and Carville partner Paul Begala writes an op-ed explaining why he’s praying for Newt Gingrich will be the GOP nominee:
And so, like MacArthur, Newt has returned. I, for one, could not be happier—but then again, I’m a Democrat, so I have to take my political pleasures where I can find them. I seriously doubt Newt will be the GOP nominee. But a guy can dream, can’t he? …
But Newt was a godsend: within weeks of the 1994 GOP landslide—before he’d even taken the speaker’s gavel—Newsweek’s cover dubbed him “The Gingrich Who Stole Christmas.” When he whined about his seat on Air Force One coming home from the funeral of the assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, the New York Daily News’s cover featured Newt in a diaper with the headline “Cry Baby!”
While Dole was looking for ways to avoid a government shutdown, Newt was looking for ways to cause one. He overplayed his hand so terribly that Clinton was able to draw a line in the sand like Col. William Barret Travis. Newt’s intransigence allowed Clinton to show resolve, and the Comeback Kid was reelected by relentlessly attacking what his ads called “Dole-Gingrich.”
I fear the dream won’t last, alas.
Begala, of course, doesn’t have many nice things to say about Romney, but I agree agree with his final analysis: “at some point Republicans will wise up” and nominate Romney as our strongest candidate. If Begala could get a few more of his Democrat friends to publicly pine for Gingrich, that would sure speed up the process…
Rasmussen 2012 Presidential Survey
- Barack Obama 46% (50%) {44%} [49%] (48%) {49%} [47%]
- Newt Gingrich 40% (38%) {38%} [34%] (30%) {37%} [39%]
Survey of 1,000 likely voters was conducted November 19-20, 2011. The margin of error is +/- 3 percentage points. Results from the poll conducted November 11-12, 2011 are in parentheses. Results from the poll conducted November 3-4, 2011 are in curly brackets. Results from the poll conducted October 12-13, 2011 are in square brackets. Results from the polls conducted June 24-25, 2011 are in parentheses. Results from the poll conducted March 18-19, 2011 are in curly brackets. Results from the poll conducted January 15-16, 2011 are in square brackets.
–Data compilation and analysis courtesy of The Argo Journal
USA Today/Gallup National Republican Primary
- Gingrich – 22% (12)
- Romney – 21% (21)
- Cain – 16% (21)
- Paul – 9% (8)
- Perry – 8% (11)
- Bachmann – 4% (3)
- Huntsman – 1% (1)
- Santorum – 1% (2)
- Undecided – 18% (21)
Results for this USA Today/Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted Nov. 13-17, 2011. For results based on the total sample of 946 Republicans and Republican leaners who are registered to vote, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points. Numbers in parentheses are from the survey conducted Nov 2-6.
USA Today’s blog notes that this represents the sixth candidate this primary season who has been in first place in one of their national primary polls. (And a check of the RCP history shows that while other candidates continue to rise and fall, Romney has come in either first or second in every Gallup poll.)
Politico reports Mike Huckabee telling the members of our party that are grumbling about Mitt Romney that we need to get past that unless we want four more years of Obama in the White House:
It would be real tragic if they stayed out. Mitt Romney may not be their first choice, but Mitt Romney every day of the week and twice on Sunday is going to be a much more effective president for issues that they care about than Barack Obama.
I think sometimes there is this anxiety within the Republican Party of who is the perfect candidate. The answer is there isn’t one.
And so, what you find is you have to decide who can survive that process. And whoever that is, if it’s Mitt Romney, then I think Republicans and conservatives and the tea party need to get behind him and say, ‘You may not be our first choice, but between you and Obama, I’ll vote forty times to get you elected.’
As a veteran of the 2008 GOP wars, I find Huck’s attitude fascinating. He was, after all, one of the leaders in the ABR fight that kept John McCain from choosing Mitt Romney as his VP running mate. Mike wrote letters, gave speeches, and declared in interviews what a disaster having Mitt on the ticket would be. He also filled page after page after page of his book about the 2008 race with excruciating details about every slight real or imagined that he suffered from the hands of Mitt Romney during the campaign. Yet here we see him supporting Mitt short of an endorsement. The Mike Huckabee I watched in 2008 would still be in there fighting trying to prop up some candidate or the other as the Mitt-alternative.
So what’s happened to Mike Huckabee?
Charlie Bass, one of New Hampshire’s two Republican U.S. Representatives has endorsed Mitt Romney Romney this morning. Politico has the details of just how dominant Romney is in New Hampshire at the moment:
The Bass and Ayotte endorsements leave only Rep. Frank Guinta, the former Manchester mayor elected to Congress last fall, as a neutral member of New Hampshire’s federal delegation. Bass (the son of former New Hampshire Rep. Perkins Bass) is also the third New Hampshire political dynast to get behind Romney, along with Judd Gregg (son of former Gov. Hugh Gregg) and John H. Sununu (father of former Sen. John E. Sununu).
I would add that Romney has the support of over 40 of the state senators and representatives in New Hampshire as well.
Mitt Romney didn’t mince words in New Hampshire Sunday when he laid the blame for the so-called supercommittee’s collapse squarely squarely around Obama’s shoulders. From the Wall Street Journal:
NASHUA, N.H. — Republican White House hopeful Mitt Romney criticized President Barack Obama on Sunday for refusing to intervene in congressional talks to cut the deficit.
With the so-called supercommittee at an impasse ahead of Wednesday’s deadline, Mr. Romney blamed the president for the apparent failure of the bipartisan panel, which was tasked with finding savings in excess of $1.2 trillion. He also called on Mr. Obama to introduce legislation to restore $600 billion in defense spending that will be cut automatically if the panel fails to offer alternatives.
“He hasn’t had any role,” Mr. Romney told roughly 200 supporters outside the city hall building in Nashua, where he appeared for a campaign event with Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte. “He’s done nothing. It’s another example of failed leadership.”
…
“He has not taken personal responsibility to get this supercommittee to find ways to balance our budget to cut spending,” Mr. Romney said Sunday. “Instead, he set up a trap: He said we’re going to cut military spending by $600 billion.”
…
Once again we see where Obama has delegated away responsibility for any unpleasant decisions. And if he can’t delegate it, he kicks the decision can down the road.
Witness the delay last week in approving the Keystone XL pipeline. It would provide thousands and thousands of private sector jobs and increase significantly the amount of energy available to the Gulf Coast refiners. Yet because the environmentalists object, he is delaying any decision until after the 2012 election. In the meantime, where is that oil going to go? The world is hunger for energy. It will find a buyer. I’ve seen China mentioned as a likely home. And once the infrastructure supporting that is in place, who needs an expensive pipeline to the United States?
Barack Obama keeps reminding us almost daily what a weak and debilitating leader he truly is.
EPIC-MRA Michigan 2012 Presidential Survey
- Mitt Romney 46% {45%} [46%] (46%)
- Barack Obama 41% {43%} [41%] (41%)
- Barack Obama 45%
- Newt Gingrich 40%
- Barack Obama 50%
- Herman Cain 36%
Favorable / Unfavorable {Net}
- Mitt Romney 39% (40%) / 35% (34%) {+4%}
- Rick Santorum 15% / 21% {-6%}
- Newt Gingrich 37% / 44% {-7%}
- Jon Huntsman 13% / 22% {-9%}
- Ron Paul 27% / 38% {-11%}
- Herman Cain 28% / 45% {-17%}
- Michele Bachmann 25% / 44% {-19%}
- Rick Perry 19% (22%) / 47% (34%) {-28%}
How has Obama done as president?
- Excellent 9% (9%)
- Pretty good 28% (29%)
- Just fair 25% (26%)
- Poor 37% (35%)
Survey of 600 likely voters was conducted November 13-16, 2011. The margin of error is +/- 4 percentage points. Results from the poll conducted October 1-4, 2011 are in parentheses. Results from the poll conducted August 13-16, 2011 are in curly brackets. Results from the poll conducted July 9-11, 2011 are in square brackets. Results from the poll conducted February 12-17, 2011 are in parentheses.
–Data compilation and analysis courtesy of The Argo Journal
As Anthony Dalke pointed out, Santorum released his own economics plan. Frankly, there’s a lot to like for conservatives, even if it does still need a few more details. Here’s the details from Santorum’s website. Here are some of the bullet points:
Thoughts are welcome and, in fact, encouraged. For me? I kind of like this plan and would like to see more details. Also, I’d like to know what exactly he wants to replace Obamacare with and what the following exactly means:
_______________________________________________________
-Matt Newman is a conservative blogger from Maryland who blogs at Old Line Elephant / Pundit Leagueand Tweets far too often.
Perhaps seeking to capture attention and enthusiasm similar to what Herman Cain received when he released his 9-9-9 Plan, Rick Santorum has produced a more comprehensive version of his economic proposals:
As some of his GOP rivals sell their plans with catchy names – such as Herman Cain’s “9-9-9″ plan or Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s “Cut, Balance and Grow” – Santorum has simply titled his, “Made in America.”
…”This is the kind of plan that works. This is the kind of plan that makes sense,” Santorum added. “This is the kind of plan that will be able to transform America economically, will be able to revitalize our manufacturing sector and stop all the jobs going overseas and bring a lot of those jobs back and have ‘Made in America’ stamped on things again.”
Among the plan’s proposals: reducing the nation’s personal income tax rates to just two: 10% and 28%; eliminating both the Alternative Minimum Tax and the estate tax that conservatives deride as the “death tax;” dropping capital gains and dividend tax rates down to 12%; cutting corporate taxes from 35% to 17.5%; and eliminating corporate taxes for manufacturers.
Santorum also proposes a measure that many conservatives favor: passing a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
…The candidate – who bests his GOP rivals by having visited all of the Hawkeye State’s 99 counties – told the crowd his plan “focused on some of the things that I’ve learned as I’ve traveled around Iowa.”
“One of the things I’ve learned is that most of the small towns in Iowa … there was some sort of manufacturing or processing facility that was the reason for the town to exist in the first place, or it was a railroad hub or some sort of center of commerce.”
…Any economic proposal, Santorum said, should not “focus all of our growth and energy on the big cities and service industries and financial services.”
As the article notes, Santorum has made an extremely hard push in Iowa, visiting all 99 counties and unabashedly touting his social conservative credentials in an effort to seize the as-yet-unclaimed evangelical vote. He has firmly staked his hopes on becoming the conservative alternative to Romney just in time for the Caucuses.
Now, Santorum’s brashness and strident crusader-like rhetoric provide legitimate cause for concern with respect to electability, but he deserves credit for becoming the only Republican candidate to regularly discuss income mobility and poverty from a conservative perspective. Furthermore, his laser-like focus on manufacturing strikes both political and economic gold, as America desperately needs to move away from a debt-financed, consumer- and financial services-driven economy and toward one centered more on wealth-creating sectors like manufacturing and energy.
The rapid swings in the fate of the non-Romney candidates in the GOP Race for 2012 is something that I have not seen in my nearly 40 years of following US presidential politics and specifically Republican Party politics. In past election cycles, and even in the last one—the Race for 2008—support for various candidates rose and fell over a period of months as opposed to weeks and even days as we have experienced this time around. Take a look at the graphical illustrations showing levels of support over time of the various candidates in Josiah Schmidt’s posting earlier today. Sharp rises followed by sharp declines usually within a 30-day period. So what’s going on? Why is this happening? There are probably several factors:
1) Romney, the steady-state candidate and the beneficiary of the GOP’s obsession with the Law of Primogeniture (which in the end seems stronger than its more recent obsession with Southern Evangelicals), while quite acceptable to a majority of Republicans is not exactly the most exciting candidate.
2) Many Baby Boomer conservatives are still quite frustrated over having allowed themselves to be punked by Bush in 2000 and again in 2004 and are still seeking some form of closure.
3) A lot of those who will ultimately vote in the primaries, even the early contests, have not yet focused on their decision that much and, when polled, are responding more in accordance with the “news of the day” or who they hear being talked about the most on Fox News or by the talk show impresarios.
In the world of finance and financial rackets, there is a concept known as “pump and dump” which involves an organized effort by unscrupulous stock brokers and financial racketeers, often operating in boiler-rooms, who hype some penny stock to naive investors seeking to get rich quick and who may feel that “the system” is rigged against them. The pitch usually incorporates themes such as “this company has discovered an amazing new source of energy and when this becomes known this stock will increase 10,000 percent, etc., etc., this is a can’t miss deal….” Over the course of a few weeks, maybe a couple of months, they pump up the stock through hype, then dump it and keep the profits for themselves, then move on to the next “can’t miss” penny stock. Sound familiar? It should.
Substitute the right wing political carnival barkers and their assorted adjutants, for the boiler-room stock brokers and you have the political form of “pump and dump.” While the unscrupulous stock brokers are motivated by personal financial profit, the political stock brokers—the carny barkers—are motivated by personal ego, and who knows, maybe even a little profit too. In the world of finance and investment, one is advised to read the prospectus carefully. In the world of politics and the GOP nomination process, one should be advised to read the prospectus—in this case the candidates track-record, executive ability, credibility, depth, and electability—very carefully before deciding to buy. Oh, and one other thing, it might be equally wise to examine the “prospectus”—the history and track-record—of those hyping the candidate du jour. You may find that some years ago, those same barkers sold you on a certain candidate-president that did not turn out so well. Something to think about.
O.K., we’re only six weeks from the Iowa Caucus and the first actual votes in the 2012 Republican presidential campaign. The configuration of the probable two finalists for the GOP nomination was only half predictable a mere 90 days ago (just after Michele Bachmann won the Iowa Straw Poll, Tim Pawlenty withdrew, Rick Perry had just entered the race, and Herman Cain had not yet made his move).
It was generally understood that Mitt Romney would be one of the finalists. After all, he had been the s0-called “frontrunner” most of the past year, and his poll numbers had held steady through the ebb and flow of the pre-primary/caucus period. But Newt Gingrich? Gingrich had earlier made a huge gaffe by criticizing congressional leader and Tea Party favorite Paul Ryan. This had sent his poll numbers down and almost off the charts. And then there was Newt’s “baggage.” Finally, most of Newt’s top campaign staff quit, complaining he was not campaigning in the conventional way. Most importantly, perhaps, his funds dried up, and he was reportedly $1 million in debt, with very little coming in. It was, of course, hopeless.
The 2012 campaign had thus seemed to pass Newt Gingrich by. He did not, however, have the decency to quit, as Pawlenty had. He declared he would run an unconventional campaign. He moved long-time staff from his private organizations into his campaign. And he waited.
But Gingrich was not “waiting for Godot.” He was waiting for the inevitable debates between the candidates. And he was lucky, too. There were not a few debates scheduled. There were lots of debates in August, September and November. Most of them were nationally televised debates. He knew he was, by far, the best political debater in his party, probably the best in any party, perhaps the best in modern times.
Meanwhile, most of the major announced candidates, and a few who did not announce, took their turns in poll-driven “bubbles.” Donald Trump, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, and then Herman Cain. None of these bubbles lasted more than a political nanosecond, but they did catch public the public’s attention. Perhaps not all of these bubbles featured political heavyweights, but they were interesting characters, and included a woman, a black man, and a tycoon with a hairstyle to match his braggadocio. The interaction between them became a blood sport, with audiences, egged on by the media, expecting confrontations, exposes and face-to-face combat.
Two of the eight-to-ten major candidates did not seem to participate in the blood sport. They were rarely criticized. Only one of them even mildly criticized the others. The also-rans alternated between bravado and whining, i.e., they did get enough air time in the debates, only they had always stood for true conservative principles, and so on and so on.
Of course, surprises can still happen, but it would seem that the political pennant race is now between Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. As he knew it would happen, the media’s long knives are now out for Newt’s hide. President Obama’s operatives, storing up their ammunition for Mr. Romney, now have to think twice about who they will face in November. The Old Media, having done in Mr. Cain (after much “digging”), now think they have an easy task with Mr Gingrich whose “baggage” is well-known and plentiful. You can already hear MSNBC, The Washington Post, The New York Times and the liberal pundits, licking their collective lips. Poor Newt Gingrich! He doesn’t have a chance, does he?
This all remains to be seen. Mr. Gingrich is not only a superlative debater, he is, after three decades, one of the masters (along with Bill Clinton) in dealing with the media. It wasn’t always so. Mr. Gingrich’s thin skin used to be legendary, as was his public temper.
The outcome remains to be seen and experienced. Mr. Romney, if he can unexpectedly win Iowa, expectedly win New Hampshire, do very well in South Carolina and then win Florida, will be the nominee. But if Mr. Gingrich somehow wins Iowa, comes close in New Hampshire, and then wins South Carolina (now plausible), could be on his way to the November presidential world series.
I have written consistently over the past three months that the race is Mr. Romney’s to lose, and I still think this is mostly the case. I think he may now have to go all out in Iowa to block Mr. Gingrich from breaking out. Mr. Gingrich will have to maintain unprecedented (for him) self-discipline and self-control.
I have known Newt Gingrich for 27 years now, and seen him up close. Like John McCain in 2008, he has come from far behind. An army “brat” born in Harrisburg, PA, Gingrich is a true expert in military strategy, a bona fide historian, and in spite of his intellectual prowess, a political “gut fighter” as well. The odds were long against him, and even now, do not favor him. He has more political warts than any major presidential candidate in memory. But, as I once told him, conditions in 2012 could become so extreme, so dire, that anything is possible. With the United States in an extraordinarily long period of unemployment and lack of business confidence, our military strength and influence waning, China and India rising, petty dictators in Venezuela, North Korea and Iran threatening, Europe seeming on the edge of economic collapse, a widespread grass roots conservative “Tea Party” movement emerging to change American politics, a radical left “Occupy” movement erupting with tents and sleeping bags in many American urban parks, and the American public (and its political center) more unsettled than since the inflationary political paralysis of the late 1970′s, might we say that 2012 fits the category of an “extreme” time?
Can anything happen?
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Please visit Mr. Casselman’s personal site.
Sensing the opportunity to put the nomination away early, Romney opens his first Iowa campaign office:
The answer to one of the great lingering questions about the Republican presidential race has suddenly turned up here along Ingersoll Avenue, where Mitt Romney’s Iowa campaign headquarters is opening for business.
Mr. Romney, who has been cautiously calibrating expectations about his chances in a state full of social conservatives, is now playing to win the Iowa caucuses. Television commercials are on the way, volunteers are arriving and a stealth operation is ready to burst into view in the weeks leading up to the caucuses, the first Republican nominating contest, on Jan. 3.
The escalation of his effort in Iowa, along with a more aggressive schedule in New Hampshire and an expanding presence in South Carolina, is the strongest indication yet that Mr. Romney is shifting from a defensive, make-no-mistakes crouch to an assertive offensive strategy. If he can take command in the three early-voting states, he could make the nominating battle a swift one.
“There is a lot of wisdom in trying to deliver a knockout punch,” said Matt Schultz, the Iowa secretary of state, who supported Mr. Romney four years ago but is unaligned now. “If he came and won Iowa and New Hampshire, it would be all over.”
The campaign is trying to capitalize on what Republicans perceive as a new opening in a state that has spooked Mr. Romney since a $10 million investment in 2008 led to a second-place finish. Yet the structure of this race is different, with the absence of a single alternative candidate and only a hint from opponents of the rigorous voter identification and turnout operations that are a hallmark of the caucuses.
Be sure to read the whole story here.
2012 Republican Presidential Nomination
| Poll | Average | Pew Research | FOX News | CNN / ORC | PPP |
| Date | 11/9 – 11/15 | 11/9 – 11/14 | 11/13 – 11/15 | 11/11 – 11/13 | 11/10 – 11/13 |
| Gingrich | 22.25 | 16 | 23 | 22 | 28 |
| Romney | 21.75 | 23 | 22 | 24 | 18 |
| Cain | 19.00 | 22 | 15 | 14 | 25 |
| Perry | 8.25 | 8 | 7 | 12 | 6 |
| Paul | 7.25 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 5 |
| Bachmann | 5.50 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 5 |
| Huntsman | 2.50 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 3 |
| Santorum | 2.00 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 1 |
| Johnson | 0.75 | 0.5 | 1 |
2o12 Iowa Republican Caucus
| Poll | Average | Rasmussen | ISU / Gazette / KCRG | The Polling Company | Bloomberg / Selzer & Co. |
| Date | 11/1 – 11/15 | 11/15 – 11/15 | 11/1 – 11/13 | 11/11 – 11/13 | 11/10 – 11/12 |
| Cain | 19.38 | 13 | 24.5 | 20 | 20 |
| Gingrich | 18.20 | 32 | 4.8 | 19 | 17 |
| Romney | 16.83 | 19 | 16.3 | 14 | 18 |
| Paul | 14.85 | 10 | 20.4 | 10 | 19 |
| Bachmann | 7.15 | 6 | 7.6 | 10 | 5 |
| Perry | 6.48 | 6 | 7.9 | 5 | 7 |
| Santorum | 4.18 | 5 | 4.7 | 4 | 3 |
| Huntsman | 1.25 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 1 |
| Johnson | 1.00 | 1 |
2012 New Hampshire Republican Primary
| Poll | Average | NH Journal / Magellan Strategies | Bloomberg / Selzer | Rasmussen |
| Date | 10/26 – 11/16 | 11/15 – 11/16 | 11/10 – 11/12 | 10/26 – 10/26 |
| Romney | 36.50 | 28.5 | 40 | 41 |
| Gingrich | 15.37 | 27.1 | 11 | 8 |
| Paul | 14.53 | 15.6 | 17 | 11 |
| Cain | 11.60 | 9.8 | 8 | 17 |
| Huntsman | 7.30 | 7.9 | 7 | 7 |
| Perry | 2.90 | 1.7 | 3 | 4 |
| Bachmann | 2.33 | 2 | 2 | 3 |
| Santorum | 1.65 | 1.3 | 1 | 1 |
New Hampshire – Not Displaying Romney
Today, Kelly Ayotte became the first early state senator to wade into the endorsement game, throwing her support to Mitt:
First, it is imperative that Republicans nominate our strongest candidate to face President Obama. Mitt Romney has proven not only through his prior experience as a successful businessman and governor, but also through his solid campaign and excellent debate performances, that he is that candidate. We cannot afford another four years of a president who continues to bankrupt America and whose policies hurt the very job creators who can get our economy growing again. We can no longer sit on the sidelines and continue to listen to divisive rhetoric which divides our nation. Mitt Romney will be a strong leader who will unite America. With his strong qualifications and executive leadership experience, he will put America on the path to fiscal responsibility to make sure that we don’t continue to crush our children with mountains of debt. Mitt Romney not only eliminated a $3 billion deficit as Massachusetts Governor, he also cut taxes 19 times. And unlike President Obama, Governor Romney has spent most of his career in the private sector and knows how to create good jobs.
Second, Mitt Romney is not only committed to building a stronger economy, but he also believes, as I do, in stronger American leadership abroad. He will remain vigilant in the fight against al Qaeda and Islamist terrorists, and his national security decisions will be based on advice from our military commanders – not political polls. With a rising China and persistent nuclear threats from rogue nations, we need Governor Romney’s strong, steady leadership to vigorously protect American interests. I trust Mitt Romney to keep our country safe in a dangerous world.
Third, I believe Governor Romney will run a campaign against President Obama that is serious, substantive, and one we can be proud of.
The endorsement itself should not come as a surprise, as Romney backed Ayotte in her 2010 Senate campaign (although, I may note, Rick Santorum also endorsed her in that race). However, the fact that Ayotte’s predecessor, Judd Gregg, has already aligned himself with Romney and the relatively early timing of this announcement warrant attention. Gov. Romney continues to construct a formative campaign infrastructure in the Granite State.
One of the topics that often comes up regarding the GOP’s attempt to take back the White House, both here at Race and in my offline conversations with fellow political junkies, is just what the next Republican electoral map will look like. While newcomers to politics often obsess over the red/blue divide of the 2000s, the reality is that the electoral map of the past decade or so looks nothing like any of its predecessors, and is actually something that no serious political observer would have predicted coming into being as late as 1996, when Bill Clinton easily won several Southern states for the second time. All of that begs the question as to how next year’s Electoral College math will shake out, and whether the red/blue map of the Bush years will be replaced with a new sort of template.
Indeed, one could argue that a few Electoral College surprises next year, in the event of a GOP victory, would not be the exception, but the rule concerning turnover of the White House from one party to the other. As one of the site’s contributors pointed out to me in a recent conversation offline, pretty much every new president wins the White House by creating a coalition of his very own, not by piggybacking into office on the coalition of his predecessors. While this rule doesn’t necessarily apply to a vice president who ascends to the presidency as an extension of his former boss, a la Bush 41, it does seem to fit most presidents who snatch the White House away from the opposing party. It was true of President Obama. No one anticipated that he’d win North Carolina, Virginia, or Indiana last time around. And it was true of Bill Clinton, whose easy victories in places like California transformed the electoral map forever. Doesn’t it reason, then, that such a trend will continue if the GOP wins the White House next year?
Given that Gov. Romney is pretty much the de facto nominee at this point, I’m not going to waste any time going over the possible changes to the electoral map in the event of a Gingrich or Cain nomination. The reality is that we’re looking at a Romney/Obama race next year, with a very real shot at victory on the part of Gov. Romney. So what might a Romney electoral map look like? Is Mitt really going to win the White House the same way as “Dubya,” with massive margins in the South and Appalachia, while narrowly taking the Lower Midwest and the Rockies? Or should we be prepared for something a bit different than all of that? Up until now, I’ve been expecting a Romney electoral map to look similar to that of Bush, with perhaps narrower margins in the South, and with several purple Northern states turning red, such as New Hampshire, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. But it’s entirely possible that the electoral map will change in ways that none of us can predict at the moment due to the contours of the general election campaign between Romney and Obama, which will be a campaign in which Romney re-frames the Republican message in a way that comports with his personality and his image.
I am probably one of the few people in the world who remembers an interview with Dick Morris in the days prior to the 2000 election, in which Morris predicted that New Jersey — yes, midnight blue New Jersey — would become the state at the fulcrum of American presidential politics following the results of the Bush/Gore race. Morris fully expected New Jersey to be the state that Florida turned out to be. And then there was Team Bush’s confidence that California was in play on Election Eve. While Bush 43 is largely remembered as the evangelical president who wanted to free the Middle East from Islamism and tin-pot despots, his initial run for the presidency in 2000 was as a nuts-and-bolts Texas governor who was opposed to nation building and whose approach to abortion was to focus on “hearts and minds.” The Bush campaign was designed to appeal to isolationist Yankee voters and socially moderate soccer moms, all of whom the GOP had wanted to steal back from Bill Clinton’s Democratic Party. Therefore it made perfect sense that Bush would win states like California, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania (a state that the Bushes expressly refused to concede when interviewed on Election Night in 2000), while Gore was expected to win Tennessee and a few other Southern states. No one would have predicted that the country was poised to split along cultural lines, along Mason-Dixon and the Ohio River.
All of that makes me wonder whether the country will be divided along entirely new battle lines next year. Could Romney end up being the president of the “big states,” finding his base in large purple states with populous urban centers, such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Florida? These are the states with strong economic concerns and with the sorts of socially moderate suburban voters that might actually be inclined to vote for a Republican like Romney. Given that a Romney/Obama race will be about one issue — the economy — it wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect Romney to win states like these, and maybe even find his base among voters from such areas. Or, to ask the question another way, does anyone really expect a candidate like Romney to build a base centered around the culture, demographics, and politics of Charleston, South Carolina?
