Posted on 07/17/2007 6:41:56 AM PDT by RightPhalanx
Politico's Jonathan Martin reports on Mitt Romney's newest campaign commercial, "Ocean." The new ad comes amid many reports of how much money Romney and all the other campaigns are spending. The breathlessness of the reporting doesn't allow the key questions to be asked: "What are the candidates getting for their dollars?" and "Is the campaign hitting its targets in contributions and expenditures?" In Romney's case we know he's patiently built a small lead in Iowa and New Hampshire, and from "Ocean" we get evidence that he's implementing a new step in a carefully conceived plan and doing so with the sort of innovative appeal that those who have observed his business life expected from the first day of the campaign.
"Ocean" is interesting on a number of levels. First, its substance --a concern for the degraded culture in which American children grow up-- is powerful, and not just for Republican primary voters, but for all parents and people who love kids. Second, its visual approach is unique for the cycle. Over the decades the presidential television spot has become more and more direct, and less and less interesting. "Ocean's" got a chance at being memorable in the way very very few ads turn out to be. Finally, the ad reminds people that among Romney's achievements is a wonderful family, and that he truly does believe the words he speaks.
The ad appears two days before Romney speaks at the Lincoln Day Dinner in El Paso County, Colorado. El Paso County is home to, among other groups, James Dobson's Focus on the Family and Young Life, two of the region's many evangelical organizations. The message of "Ocean" is one that every evangelical can agree with and applaud. Martin speculates that "this ad is yet more evidence of Romney trying to 'close the deal' with social conservatives," but while it certainly helps remind conservative voters of Romney's core values, I expect this theme to remain front and center throughout the general campaign if Romney is the nominee. The argument about the culture's decline and its impact on children is one that media elites regularly hoot at but which always resonates with soccer moms and coaching dads. Romney's putting out a notice that this will be an issue for his campaign, and seeing their agenda as part of the roll out of Romney's agenda is very reassuring to many social conservatives.
As is the sense that this campaign has a plan. Visit the Romney website if you haven't done so recently. Along with Rudy's, Hillary's and Obama's, it is quite obviously the product of a campaign that understands the virtual campaign as central to success in 2008. (Fred Thompson's unofficial campaign has a clunky site that underscores the disadvantage of not being a full fledged candidate in a race that has been full fledged since January.) A presidential primary campaign is not a bus ride with reporters along or a series of press conferences, but a short-lived $100 million dollar sprint which is already about half over. Iowa voters caucus on Monday, January 14, 2008 and by midnight on Super Duper Tuesday, February 5, both parties will have their nominees. To get to the nomination, the candidates have to have built and implemented a complex and comprehensive plan, and Romney's team gives every indication of having done just that. When Romney loaned himself $6.5 million in Q2, I assumed it was because that's what the plan called for to have met its goals, and that his personal financial commitment is to assure that the plan is implemented at every stage. Reviewing the ruins of the McCain campaign and you read accounts of successive blueprints drawn up and torn up in a sort of a carnival of lousy planning. (Here's another article from Martin on that subject.) All you hear coming out of Team Romney is the message, from the candidate or his many surrrogates. That's the sound of a campaign running on all its cylinders.
Last week a friend in Colorado, a very successful businessman long active in Rocky Mountain politics, e-mailed me that after close study he was going to send money to Romney as the best chance the GOP had in 2008. I suspect that is happening again and again as the Fred boomlet begins to flatten against the realities of what is necessary in 2008 --energy and extraordinary discipline. The Rudy-Romney race is far from over, and Thompson still could show the sort of planning a campaign in the new millennium requires, but the time for the Tennessee senator to get in and get organized is very short.
Why? Consider that when Florida changed its primary to January 29, in reality it announced that absentee ballots would be available long before that, and that "early voting" in the Sunshine State would get underway on January 15 --the day after the Iowa caucus results are in. California's absentee ballots will be available from early January forward, and 47% of the ballots cast in the last California primary --June, 2006-- were by absentee. Building an absentee ballot "chase" program is expensive, and all of those ballots in all of those states will be greatly impacted by the results in Iowa and New Hampshire, which increases the importance of those states beyond their already high value in the 2004 cycle.
All of which suggests that the strategic contributor --the donor who held back to see what happened early on and which candidate put together the best team and rolled out the most coherent plan while demonstrating in the early debates the stage presence and the early commercials the innovation that would be necessary to get to the main event-- might still pick Rudy on the basis of the national polls, but the donor who is really interested in making one contribution to the one candidate who will get the nomination and possibly the White House is looking very hard at the very professionally run Romney campaign.
I see you are quoting massresistance now.. I guess you will believe any accusation that a discredited group makes against a republican candidate.
from your post:
“Romney described an administrative regulation as a “law”, and used it to force Catholic Charities to accept homosexual couples for adoption.”
from Deseret News (see my previous post):
“The Republican governor recently filed a bill that would allow a Catholic social service agency to deny adoptions to gay couples.”
Someone is lying. It’s the word of your fringe group against an accredited news source.
We saw what not spending big bucks can do for the little-known, second-tier candidate competing against internationally known figures, former presidential candidates and Hollywood stars ---> it keeps them in the second tier.
David Brody makes a good point here:
The campaign is clearly sending the message that if you want a wholesome, morally straight leader who cares deeply about kids and families then look no further. That shot at the end where Romney holds up the child is priceless.
Let's be real here. Mitt Romney has the family and the scandal-free resume to pull it off. You won't find Romney's name next to David Vitter's on the Madame's list. Campaign ads like this can distinguish him from the field with social conservatives. This seems to be a step in the right direction. ~~ David Brody The Brody File on the "Ocean" ad
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/195633.aspx
I see you are quoting massresistance now.. I guess you will believe any accusation that a discredited group makes against a republican candidate.
from your post:
“Romney described an administrative regulation as a “law”, and used it to force Catholic Charities to accept homosexual couples for adoption.”
from Deseret News (see my previous post):
“The Republican governor recently filed a bill that would allow a Catholic social service agency to deny adoptions to gay couples.”
Someone is lying. It’s the word of your fringe group against my accredited news source.
Cogent response.
:-D
Family values apparently don't matter to Mr. Romney when he's sitting a BOD for the Marriot Hotels.
Family Values vs Bottom Line...Gee, which is more important?
Which I've experienced first-hand with "two-faced" Christians, and "faithful" Mormon's.
This is David French's rebuttal to the 28-page document circulated by MassResistance called "The Mitt Romney Deception" which is a collection of old statements, half-truths, and completely false or misreported stories. If you have been spammed by an anti-Romney troll with "The Mitt Romney Deception", this should be your very next article to read.
Mitt Romney "Chose" Gay Marriage?
This is David French's scholarly rebuttal to the bizarre and silly assertion from MassResistance, et al, that Mitt Romney "instituted" same-sex marriage because, these critics contend, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) did not actually mandate same-sex marriage in the Goodridge v. Dept. of Public Health ruling. Read this article to dispel this ridiculous assertion resulting from an incorrect reading of the SJC's decision. David French, a leading constitutional attorney, clearly explains the correct reading of the decision; a reading that is the accepted interpretation of the Goodridge decision and a reading which has never been successfully challenged in any court action since the Goodridge case.
In fact, most of the anti-Romney critics in the same-sex marriage issue base their criticism and arguments on: 1) an illogical reading of the Goodridge decision, and/or 2) incomplete knowledge of the legal powers granted to the office of Governor in Massachusetts as compared to other states in the U.S. (see opinions of attorneys Jay Sekulow and David French).
So a future god who uses the White House as a stepping stone to his own planet is "no goofier?" (That's a goofy statement)
The fact is, at last count, there were about 16,000 motels/hotels who are porn-free & in fact bill themselves as such.
He has the weight of the degenerate state of MA around his neck. Not a good legacy at all. if he is the nominee I will stay home.
I disagree. Seems like a bit of overreaction on your part. The ad specifically discusses children. He’s talking about protecting kids and raising the country’s moral conscience, not infringing on any adult’s private life. It can only help to have a leader in the WH who raises the country’s discourse on family values and common decency. It cannot hurt to be uplifted by a good and decent family man whose record matches his rhetoric. I think setting the bar higher is always a good thing.
Yeah, now he' done profiting form porn, he has no use for it. Take the dog off the roof of your car, Mittens.
As I recall one of the polls on our very own FR also predicted GOP wins in 2006.
My impression is that you were simply comparing the various campaigns' viability. Hence the numbers you use for comparision should be what is most meaningful, not necessarily what not dictated by campaign accounting rules. It's just like the numbers stock analysts use for comparison aren't necessarily numbers dictated by accounding standards. For example, accounting standards say Good Will amortization should be subtracted from a firm's earnings, but most analysts will add it back when comparing different firms' profitability. That's because earnings before amortization are a more meaningful number.
I agree that when gauging a candidate's appeal, you should subtract campaign debt owed to the candidate.
However, when you're gauging the resources at its disposal to run commercials, do mailings, etc, and comparing it to the others, you probably shouldn't. That's because the campaign can indefinitely delay the repayment of such debt, so it won't hamper its efforts to promote the candidate.
I was under the impression that you were trying to do the latter.
I agree that Thompson is, for the time being, siphoning some of Romney's support. I'm not worried about this in the long-run, though, because I don't think he's going to run.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.