Posted on 08/30/2012 2:31:29 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
TAMPA, Fla. — The Texas delegation at the Republican National Convention is, for the most part, backing the candidacy of Mitt Romney.
But that doesn't mean everyone here is enthusiastic about the former Massachusetts governor.
Romney, who is expected to accept the nomination tonight, was not the first choice for many members of the Texas delegation, several delegates said this week.
Gov. Rick Perry, former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum each sent their backers to Romney after they dropped out of the race.
And like good party soldiers, the converted supporters see Team Romney as the best option to oust President Barack Obama.
"I think we're seeing the delegation coming together. ... It's the way the system is supposed to work," U.S. Rep. Blake Farenthold of Corpus Christi said Wednesday.
Still, not every Texan attending the convention is sporting a Romney pin on his or her white cowboy hat. Many are suspicious of his conservative bona fides because he enacted a health insurance mandated when he was governor of Massachusetts.
The civil liberty-loving, government waste-hating supporters of U.S. Rep. Ron Paul tend to feel the same way as their leader, who hasn't endorsed Romney. And Paul is popular with a good chunk of Texas' 155 delegates, 20 of whom voted to nominate Paul on Tuesday.
In Texas, it doesn't matter much that there is fractured support for Romney, said University of Texas professor James Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project. There's plenty of animosity toward Obama for Romney to win the state.
"Nationally, it becomes more important," Henson said. "A big part of both campaigns is mobilizing the base."
The fact that Romney is not enthusiastically supported by core voters in his own party is a problem, especially in battleground states, where the winner will be decided by a narrow margin, Henson said. The danger for Romney is that Republican voters simply won't show up to cast ballots, he added.
Don Zimmerman, a delegate from Bee Cave and Paul fan, joked about Romney's support among the Texans. "There's evidence that the Romney team is going to return manufacturing to America because they are manufacturing unity at the national convention," Zimmerman said. Come November, Zimmerman said he will probably vote for Romney, though he won't like it.
"I'm going to vote against Obama," said Zimmerman, a self-described anti-establishment voter and cynic. "Obama is a powerful motivator to drive you to Romney."
Jeff Milburn, a 46-year-old alternate from Dallas and another subscriber to Paul's philosophies, said there is dissension in the delegation over Romney.
The liberty-minded Milburn said he's still not sure if he will vote for Romney in November.
"He would not be my first choice," Milburn said. "I have been hearing the words ‘vote for lesser of two evils' since the mid-'80s. ... It's very disheartening."
Milburn said he and other Paul supporters remain suspicious of Romney and his pledges of small government and reform. "You don't know much about what he really stands for," Milburn said. "Is he going to make cuts that are going to piss people off? I don't think so."
One encouraging component of the Romney campaign is his running mate, Milburn said. U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan brings credibility to the ticket because of his fiscal conservatism, he said.
Mark Boldger, an alternate delegate from a small town near College Station, says he's a Romney supporter now. He agreed that Ryan satisfies the need for fiscal conservatism called for by both Paul backers and fiscal conservatives. Boldger didn't back the Massachusetts governor originally. He supported Gingrich in the early days of the race and had worries about Romney's Massachusetts health care plan. Boldger has since come around, and these days he focuses on Romney's positive traits. "I believe it's going to take a businessman to balance this budget," said Boldger, a retired financial adviser. "I think it is going to take running this country like a business."
Most factions of the Texas party seem to have dutifully jumped on the Romney wagon.
Following the lead of Santorum, perhaps the most socially conservative candidate in the presidential primary, Texas' religious conservatives are generally behind Romney. Santorum, who addressed the Texas delegation Wednesday, said that he is sometimes asked why he threw his support to Romney after such a bitter campaign. Shrugging, he told the crowd that he always answers by saying: It's easy. Obama is on the ticket, and he must be defeated.
For tea party-affiliated members of the Texas delegation, the reasoning is similar. Rosemary Graber, 20, a delegate from Yoakum, said she cannot cast a ballot that could lead to Obama's return to the White House. "If I vote for a third party, my vote is lost," she said.
Okay.
CHARLOTTE, NC. — The Texas delegation at the Republican National Convention is, for the most part, backing the candidacy of President Obama.
But that doesn't mean everyone here is enthusiastic about the president.
Obama, who is expected to accept the nomination tonight, was not the first choice for many members of the Texas delegation, several delegates said this week.
On November 7th I start scoping out his replacement in 2016.
You don’t like Ryan?
“There’s plenty of animosity toward Obama for Romney to win the state.”
That describes me.
people are willing to take the risk.
As long as people are actively working against Obama, the rest is just details.
Indeed. While they still have a choice.
You don't leave the commander that's leading you over the cliff in charge. Tactically, it's suicide.
Best guess is that you meant to say
You don't follow the commander that's leading you over the cliff in charge...
I'm sure I speak for many here and throughout the fruited plain, that that is the feelings of most of us and as he was not our 1st or even 5th choice, he is never the less the ONLY thing that stands between the survival (and no, that is not hyperbole or fear mongering, but FACT) of our great Republic as we know it.
Whatever faults Romney has (and he has many) I have yet to see where through words or deeds, he hates America like Dear Reader does nor has any intent on harming, if not destroying the United States of America, which we know, Barack Hussein Obama WILL if reelected.
Like it or not, we don't have any other choices; it is either vote for Mitt or some 3rd party candidate which is the same thing as pisssssing away our vote and helping reelect the most evil, nefarious, dangerous, corrupt, man this country has ever had the misfortune of pretending to be our President.
Learn it, love it, live it!
“Texans might pull lever for Romney, but many will be voting against Obama”......
It won’t just be in Texas. There are millions who will vote agains’t Obummer, no matter who would be running agains/’t him.
My comment is clear.
If you please, make your own position clear.
Don't reframe mine.
1. Voting against Obama.
2. If he steals the election, hope the next vote cast is for Texas secession.
....”Since the ascension of Thatcher to Downing Street in 1979, the Tories had been presented as a nasty, evil party that wanted to destroy communities in their war against the miners, gut health care, and take money from the poor to give to the rich via the poll tax [i]. Does this sound familiar to any Americans at all?
.....the Shy Tory Factor are present in America in 2012. According to the mainstream media, the Republicans want to deny people health care, throw Granny off a cliff, and generally reduce the country to a Dickensian nightmare when the rich get richer, and do so by pulling bread out of the mouths of the hungry. Mixed with the aforementioned labeling of Republicans and Tea Partiers as racist, this is quite a suppressive combination.
While this blend of the Bradley effect and Shy Tory Factor may not affect voters in red states, in purple states it is not difficult to see why those intending to vote Republican may not wish to publicly identify as so, even to a pollster promising anonymity, in fear of being judged as the new Jim Crow.
The other note worth mentioning is that, in the Shy Tory Factor, the only person who knew of its existence before the election was the leader, whose internal polling is usually more accurate. Could this be why Obama’s team seems to have gone into panic in recent weeks? Do they know something the polling companies don’t?
The Bradley effect has been influential, if at all, only by a few overall percentage points. But if it is wrapped up with an American version of the much more powerful “Shy Tory Factor,” we conservatives may be in for a treat in the form of a massive landslide come the first Tuesday in November.”
http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/08/how_the_shy_republican_could_be_masking_a_landslide.html
I am more worried about voters than delegates at the moment.
When you vote for someone in a tweo party race you are by definition voting against someone else.
Just another hit piece on Romney saying he’s not popular (despite over 90% of Republicans backing him now).
I will give him a real chance.
If he sticks to the economic stuff and turns things around, while not getting in the way of conservative legislation, we can have a nice working relationship here.
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