Posted on 01/31/2012 3:37:09 PM PST by VinL
Fresh on the heels of announcing January fundraising numbers in excess of $4 million, Rick Santorum's presidential campaign announced a new television ad that will begin airing Tuesday in Colorado and Nevada.
The ad attacks Newt Gingrich as being too liberal for the GOP nomination by arguing that he shares many policy positions with President Obama and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
"All three supported radical cap and trade legislation that would destroy American jobs and drive up energy costs. All three supported giving illegal aliens some form of amnesty. All three sported the government health mandates which take away our freedom and is the core of ObamaCare. And all three of these politician's supported the Wall Street bailouts that was a slap in the face to the Tea Party," the narrator says.
It goes on to refer to the trio as "cap and trade loving, bailout supporting, soft on immigration, big-government mandating politicians."
The commercial is a sharp indictment of Gingrich, with whom Santorum has split more conservative voters in early primary contests. But the ad does little to attack Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican front-runner who is expected to lead in Nevada polling.
"Rick Santorum for President: he doesn't just talk a good conservative game, he lives it," the narrator says.
Nevada will caucus Feb. 4, with Colorado voters gathering 3 days later at caucus sites across that state.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
I only learned about Santorum being a Romney man in the last half hour.
It explains why so many of our romneybots have so fiercely jumped on his band wagon.
Using Santorum as their beard, they can attack Newt, and serve Romney at the same time.
Deceptive campaign tactics often never “catch up” to the candidate.
Do you think Gingrich is going to suffer at all from his Robocalls which claimed that Romney forced Holocaust survivors to eat non-Kosher meals? There was no truth at all to that one, but it will be forgotten.
Is Santorum vulnerable to negative Ads? Maybe, maybe not. If it was that easy, no candidate would ever win. Some candidates are less effected by negative advertising. We’ll know if it happens.
In any case, if the claim is that while Gingrich has been destroyed by negative ads, so we can’t switch to Santorum because he could have the same thing happen to him, it’s not much comfort.
In Florida, if every Santorum voter voted for Gingrich, Gingrich would still lose. Santorum didn’t cost Gingrich Florida, Gingrich just couldn’t get enough votes.
Maybe Gingrich will come back, and if he does, there may be a time it is clear Gingrich can win and then the Santorum supporters may accept that. Arguing after a drubbing in Florida that Santorum has to quit for Gingrich, or trying to win Santorum freepers by slandering their candidate, don’t seem like winning lines of argument.
Give it a few days. See how things shake out. There’s a couple of caucuses this weekend, lets see who wins those. Lets see how Santorum does in the Missouri primary. Lets see if Paul can steal Maine from Romney. Lets see if Gingrich does better in the next few contests.
Is there a lie in the advertisement? Nobody has pointed that out yet. Just that it is negative.
Ricky boy is pious self righteous hypocrite.
If he was running against Mitt he’d be treated just like Newt is now.
Ricky boy is pious self righteous hypocrite.
If he was running against Mitt he’d be treated just like Newt is now.
To help napscoordinater with a Gingrich suporter making a stupid argument.
Nothing any of us say in this thread will “help Santorum”, “hurt Gingrich”, or make any real difference in the race.
Gingrich and Santorum are national presidential candidates, with millions of dollars, dozens if not hundreds of paid employees, campaigns staffed with career coordinators and leaders who know how to run and win elections.
Neither of them need my help. And what I said isn’t to “help” santorum, or hurt gingrich — it’s an observation of facts, of information that people can use to make informed decisions.
I didn’t show up — I’ve been here all along.
Last point — In 2008, Jim Demint endorsed Mitt Romney for President. In 2012, a robocall was used which played audio of Jim DeMint endorsing Romney in 2008. Freepers, including myself, denounced that, claiming it was despicable to pretend that support from 2008 meant you supported the same person in 2012.
Sweet, still defending Romney and anything that will help him.
I am stunned that Santorum running as the super Holy guy, would endorse something closer to Satan, a man who has devoted much of his life to destroying Christian souls, to promoting and mainstreaming abortion and homosexual activities and agendas.
A leader in a cult, it is amazing.
I'd ridicule you for that, but I have to admit I just learned that myself.
Of course, in 2008 Herman Cain endorsed Mitt Romney, and I don't remember that being an issue for Herman Cain supporters, most of which are now Gingrich supporters.
Santorum endorsed Romney in February of 2008 -- exactly the same time Herman Cain endorsed Romney.
Maybe you attacked Cain supporters because he had endorsed Romney -- if so, you are consistant, although I haven't found any such reference.
I’m not speaking about any ad but Santorum himself. He has lied about Newt during the debates and the interviews afterwards.
Cover for him all you want - someone are just attracted to evil.
There’s not much comfort to be had when the entire party establishment, most of the conservative media, and the biggest Wall Street money around is backing Romney. Probably the only way Romney can be beaten is if the conservative side presents a united front. Santorum doesn’t have an argument for staying IN the race. He’s had enough chances now in enough different kinds of states and he’s shown that if he isn’t able to handshake every voter in a state, he can’t place above 3rd. If he stays in, he hands the nomination to Mitt. If he gets out, Newt has a solid chance. Not a guarantee, but Newt probably has NO chance if Santorum stays in, considering how favorable all of the “winner-take-all” states are to Mitt.
I don’t think all of Newt’s ads have been good. As I understand it they’ve disavowed that one. Since it was a low-profile ad, he won’t suffer much for it. Romney’s lies were out in front and spoken by him.
Newt’s campaign definitely needs work. Last weekend I e-mailed their web sites and told them not to back off the Bain stuff, because my analysis of the exit polls in SC showed that the Bain ad campaign was a major factor in Newt’s decisive victory there. The FL ad campaign painting Mitt as a moderate seems to have backfired, since Mitt decisively won the moderate and liberal Republican vote, and there appears to be far more of them in FL than I would have guessed.
The first step to beating back Mitt’s lies is to respond to them, which they seem unwilling to do over the air waves in actual ads. I e-mailed their web sites today to say they need to come up with a “biography” of Newt, maybe like that 15-minute Bain mini-movie. He’s got a great history as a Republican leader and clearly people don’t know about it since Romney’s lies were swallowed by so many.
Jim DeMint endorsed Romney in 2008. Rush Limbaugh told people to vote for Romney in 2008 to stop McCain.
I think Newt is going to help Romney more than Santorum ever could, but I might be wrong. What I do see is that Santorum beat Romney in Iowa, and Gingrich beat Romney in South Carolina, but couldn’t keep the momentum in Florida.
If Gingrich had won Florida, there wouldn’t be a problem — Santorum would likely be dropping out.
But Gingrich couldn’t beat Romney in Florida. There are two polls in Missouri and Ohio showing that Santorum easily beats Romney one-on-one, while Gingrich is statistically tied with Romney in one-on-one matchups.
In Florida, according to the last polls, if Santorum had dropped out, half his support would have gone to Romney, meaning Romney would have gotten over 50%. You think Romney is getting good press with 46%, imagine if he had won with a majority. But even if every Santorum supporter voted Gingrich, Gingrich would still have lost. That doesn’t bode well for those who argue that Gingrich can beat Romney.
Maybe he can, but you aren’t helping by attacking Santorum, the only other conservative left in the race who could beat Romney if Gingrich has burnt out.
But you know that, and the only argument you have is to scream “Romney Romney Romney” and hope nobody notices.
As freerepublic’s most dedicated romneybot, you have managed to bring in DeMint, and now Cain in behalf of Romney.
Like I said, Santorum is the beard that gives romneybots an avenue to pursue their agenda.
Santorum the Holy man of politics endorsing a cult leader, a cult built on using deceit to convert Christians to non-Christianity, even baptizing them out of it in their estimation, the radical promoter of abortion and the homosexaul agenda, Mitt Romney.
if the logic is Santorum can carry PA....they might ought to look at his last try
he got his ass handed to him
That is a hypothesis, but it has no facts to support it. Multiple polls show that Santorum in Florida took more votes from Romney than Gingrich, so he actually helped -- not that it mattered, even if every Santorum voter voted Gingrich Gingrich would still have lost.
I've explained elsewhere how it could well be that Newt can't get above a certain support level, so he'll never win, but his presence makes it impossible for people to consider Santorum as the alternative.
Then two polls came out, in Missouri and Ohio, that illustrated the point. In Missouri, the poll was (from memory) Gingrich 26, Santorum 24, Romney 20. But Gingrich-Romney was only +1 (Romney got 5% closer with Santorum out), while Santorum-Romney was +13 for Santorum. So while Gingrich is nominally in the lead, it's only because Santorum is there. Remove Santorum, it's a toss-up. Remove Gingrich, and Santorum runs away with it. In Ohio, similar results. Gingrich-26, Romney-25, Santorum-22(?). In Ohio, if Santorum quits, Gingrich is ahead by +3, so he benefits marginally by Santorum dropping out, but is still within the margin of error. But if Gingrich, in the lead, drops out, Santorum beats Romney by +8, and easy win. So there is two cases, yes just polls, but which illustrate how if the 1st-place guy quits, the 3rd-place guy beats the 2nd-place guy by much more than the 1st-place guy does if the 3rd-place guy drops out. I'm not telling Gingrich people not to support Gingrich, or telling Gingrich to drop out. I'm saying there is no evidence that Santorum dropping out will help Gingrich, and a lot of polling data to suggest both that it would HURT Gingrich, and that Gingrich can't beat Romney. Then there are the national polls which show that while Santorum is within single digits of Obama, Gingrich loses to Obama by 14 points. Again, it's a poll, not fact, but polls are all we have to argue that Gingrich is the "best candidate". I just don't see Gingrich proving himself the best candidate. In the past month, he's made at least 3 left-wing attacks, yes against Romney, which we like, but from the left, not the right. He has been criticized TWICE by the Club for Growth. He had to pull an ad after being criticized by Marco Rubio. He's been attacked harshly and unfairly, but whether fair or not, it has hurt him, his negatives are high, his support is weakened. Can he recover? I hope so, or I hope he falls flat and Santorum can pick up the pieces.
I’m back on the ledge here. **** it, throw it to Paul if Newt can’t end Mittens.
Paul would be good for one term at most, enough time for Fed overhaul but not enough to seriously damage foreign policy.
I was referring to paid ads, not debate dribble, which almost no one will remember.
Thanks. That answers my question, although that ad came out in mid-January.
Seems to me that he'd be running that ad, instead of the new one attacking Newt, if he really means to fight for our cause.
It's a good ad - right up until the end, when they show Rick at a campaign rally. The man looks stressed out and unhappy. Not like a winner at all. Very uninspiring. A little unsettling, even.
I think that Gingrich and Romney know the true effect of Santorum on the race.
Romney wants him in, and Gingrich want him out.
“bring in”? Yes, like nobody knew about Cain and DeMint until I mentioned it. Easier for you to make that stupid argument than explain why Santorum’s endorsement in 2008 was disqualifying, while Cain was the darling of conservatives while having the exact same endorsement history.
But feel free. I don’t think freepers need me to point out the absurdity of your argument.
Do you really find that Santorum is supported by former Romney supporters, more than Mitt? I know you and others cared a whole lot more about keeping an enemy’s list than I ever did trying to keep track of which freeper ever supported a candidate.
I remember a similar argument made about Perry supporters. I was much closer to being a Perry supporter than I am now to being a Santorum supporter, although I haven’t really thrown my “support” to anybody yet. I might well end up a Newt guy, if I can be convinced he can beat Romney. Until then, I’m going to point out the flaws in arguments against Santorum.
You can “say” anything you want, but without some facts, your imaginings aren’t all that useful in making informed decisions. Several polls show that Santorum is helping Gingrich, by taking votes from Romney. If Santorum took your advice and dropped out in Florida, Romney would have won a majority. Gingrich couldn’t win florida even with ALL of Santorum’s votes. So your opinion that Santorum’s very existance helps Romney isn’t worth much.
For a political person posting in a political forum, your grasp of political reality also seems very tenous at best.
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