Posted on 09/08/2007 5:05:33 AM PDT by shrinkermd
Far be it from me to start trouble, but former Tennessee Republican senator Fred Thompson, the presidential candidate who portrays himself as a conservative outsider capable of reforming Washington, is playing down his kinship with this town. Thompson may campaign as a steadfast son of the South, but he is really one of us.
In fact, no other White House hopeful, Republican or Democrat, can come close to matching Thompson's insider credentials. He alone among the contenders has managed to reach the pinnacle of Washington influence: the presidency of the Federal City Council, a powerful, behind-the-scenes group comprising a who's who of this city's top business, professional and civic leaders. The Federal City Council is synonymous with the Washington establishment, and Thompson was its chosen leader from 2003 to 2005.
The list of former council presidents reads like a roster of the city's famous heavy hitters. Thompson succeeded former Senate majority leader Bob Dole. Former House speaker Tom Foley preceded Dole...
...Which gets us to Thompson's lasting, and most tangible, contribution to our nation's capital: the Department of Homeland Security.
Thompson should raise his hand if that mammoth federal institution, home to more than 200,000 workers and 22 agencies -- the largest bureaucratic merger since the creation of Defense Department in 1947 -- is ever asked, "Who's your daddy?" Or at least he should admit to having had something to do with its birth.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
RUDY can’t rally the BASE!
The $300,000 is in less than a day only on the website, not total campaign contributions. Websites never generate more than a small fraction of total campaign contributions.
The truth will rarely be found in MSM reports.
What you describe IS money trouble. He'll never catch up with the tens of millions Mrs. Clinton has tucked away to buy TV commercials and staff and and and.....
“Few months?” Since early in March he began to indicate interest and desire to run. That is 6 months. Not a good example of a “decisive leader.”
By the way, why did it take 6 months to decide?
In other words, you're saying Fred Thompson has executive experience?
Why exactly was a decision immediately necessary? I think you’ll find that good leaders are good at making decisions after gathering the necessary information as opposed to pure optimism or dreams.
Good leaders make decisions based on benefits vrs costs. Benefits of deciding early? Marginalization along with “the rest” of the candidates. Benifits of waiting? More time to plan, strategized, free advertizing, etc.
Finally, I think he was being very decisive. Seems to me that he decided to let the other candidates battle it out and wear each other down, while he enjoyed overwhelmingly positive press. Now he can jump in ahead of everyone else.
Seems like good leadership to me.
Well, since he's only been able to start raising serious money in the last 48 hours, the lack of millions isn't a big worry for me. In fact, I think I read he collected donations of over $300K in the first 24 hrs. just from the Internet. Doesn't sound too shabby to me.
Now you know why the Old Grey Lady and the Washington Compost don't like him.
I don't think he'll have any problems with raising money.
No, I am saying with his insider resume’, raising money should be easy. He actually has been collecting money for six months not 48 hours.
Perhaps his problem is the same as McCain’s—they both strongly supported campaign finance reform. Now they both have trouble raising money. It seems those who usually donate are hesitant to commit funds to either McCain or FT.
See #20. Don’t forget he has been raising money since early or mid March. He anticipated 5 million but got 3 million and so forth. Also see my previous post. I think he has trouble with donors who do not appreciate Campaign Finance Reform. (He and McCain pushed it through)
You know, the chattering classes kept saying this, but I don't remember Fred or anyone from his staff actually saying it. He seemed to have had plenty of money to do his 'testing the waters', so if he 'only' raised 3.5 million, I'd say it was enough.
As far as Campaign Finance Reform is concerned, it doesn't affect donors who are giving individual amounts, except to the point that the legislation actually RAISED individual limits. Fred had a point to make with CFR. He was tired of the corruption he was seeing with groups giving large amounts of money directly to the candidates, because this was separating the individual voters from the situation, and increasing the skepticism folks had for the election process.
how’s Fred’s health?
I don’t know. Neither does anyone else without his raw, personal health data and records.
LOL....dont ya know the Dems are allowed to be insiders?
I have to laugh at the things they are trying to make out to be bad about Fred. If he didnt know all those people or do all those things they would be saying he was an inexperienced actor... but since that wont work...lets try...ooooooooooooooo
hes an insider...oh the horror....gasps.
Do you? Really?
That’s an appealing picture of the two cops with Fred. Nice photo.
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