Posted on 04/10/2012 1:07:36 PM PDT by SoConPubbie
If you were trying to come up with the most atrocious candidate imaginable to go toe-to-toe with Barack Obama in 2012, you couldnt do much better than Mitt Romney. He was an unpopular moderate governor who lost 2 out of the 3 major elections hes run in and whose signature issue Romneycare is an enormous failure. Moreover, hes so uninspiring that he makes Bob Dole look like Ronald Reagan and thats before you consider his incessant flip-flopping that makes it impossible to really know where he stands on any issue.
Romneys candidacy also runs counter to almost every political trend in the book right now. Hes the antithesis of everything the Tea Party stands for a moderate establishment-endorsed, principle-free Rockefeller Republican. On the other hand, hes like a bad guy straight out of central casting for the Occupy Wall Street crowd, a conscience-free 1 percenter who makes $10,000 bets and lectures the public about how corporations are people while hordes of poor and middle class Americans that he fired trail in his wake telling tales of woe about how Romney made their lives into a living hell.
At one time, I thought both Gingrich and Perry were more electable than Romney. I have, however, reassessed and now believe Gingrich, Perry, Santorum, and even Huntsman, who just left the race, are ALL more electable than Mitt. Its also worth noting that all of those candidates, including Huntsman, are more conservative than Romney. Its mind-boggling to consider the fact that if Romney wins, the conservative base will have chosen the guy behind Romneycare over the man behind the Contract with America, Americas premier social conservative, and the best job-creating governor in America, all of whom would also be more electable.
Here we are in what may be, forgive me for the cliché, the most important election of our lifetimes and the GOP may end up choosing a candidate whos one part Charlie Crist and one part John Kerry as our nominee. If thats the case, conservatives should certainly vote for him over Obama. After all, Mitt Romney will undoubtedly often do the wrong thing if he becomes President, but Barack Obama will almost always fail the country. So Romney would definitely be the lesser of two evils.
Yet and still, conservatives will probably have to pay a big price if Romney becomes the nominee. Barring an unforeseen miracle, were not going to see someone who was a third rate, unpopular moderate governor become a great, popular, and conservative President. The idea that Republicans in Congress will keep Romney in line isnt borne out by anything that has happened in the last decade. During the Bush years, time and time again, conservatives in Congress abandoned their principles to follow Bushs lead. It has been much the same under Obama. Many Democrats were willing to take votes that ended their careers because they felt compelled to stick by Barack. Mitt would have little to fear from the Tea Party or the rest of the conservative base either. After all, his thinking will be, if grassroots conservatives still had any sway in the Republican Party, he wouldnt be the nominee. What are they going to do after he gets the nomination? Vote for Obama? Same goes if he gets elected. No matter how Nixonian Mitt turns out to be, conservatives will still view our own Massachusetts version of Arnold Schwarzenegger as preferable to whatever socialist the Democrats run against him in 2016.
However, we cannot forget that to the majority of the American people, a Republican president IS the conservative movement. His successes are its successes, his failures are its failures, and his policies are its policies. So, if the conservative movement pricks its collective finger and signs on with Mitt Romney, it should be aware of what its signing on for.
1) Mitt Romney is the bailout king of American politics: Just about the only thing that the Tea Partiers and Occupy Wall Street agree on is that they really hated the bailouts. Yet, Mitt Romney is the bailout king of American politics. You could fairly argue that he took a bailout when he was at Bain, he supported TARP, hes now comparing what he did at Bain to what Obama did at GM and Chrysler, and he has noted in a debate that hes open to future bailouts. This isnt even the compassionate conservatism that the base detested under Bush; its moderate corporatism. Is that what conservatives will have to defend if Mitt Romney is the nominee? Are we supposed to be rallying behind bailouts now?
2) Hes not a flip-flopper, we swear: John Kerrys campaign in 2004 was hurt badly by the charge that he was a flip-flopper. Mitt Romney is also a flip-flopper a far worse one than Kerry ever was. Even amongst conservatives, saying this about Romney is about as controversial as saying that the sun is hot, water is wet, or Barack Obama is a terrible President. Yet, Mitt Romneys line is that Ive been as consistent as human beings can be. Are conservatives going to have to argue that a guy whose positions are so liquid that you really dont know where he stands on anything is actually consistent? Its ludicrous, its patently untrue, and conservatives know it.
3) Smearing capitalism to help Mitt Romney: I support capitalism because I believe it creates more prosperity, for more people, than any other system mankind has ever come up with. That doesnt mean capitalism is flawless. After all, if capitalism had no flaws, socialism wouldnt exist. What socialists dont get is that capitalism, even with its flaws, is the best, most efficient, most effective way to help everyone including the poorest Americans.
On the other hand, what some conservatives seem to be starting to lose sight of in their efforts to defend Mitt Romney is that not everything that creates a profit is moral, good, admirable, or even politically palatable. Wed never run a candidate who got rich running a chain of strip clubs, closing all his factories and sending the jobs to China, or by being the worlds most effective spammer. We can all see the issues there.
Along similar lines, its not particularly admirable to buy a company, load it up with debt, run it into the ground, and walk away with an enormous profit while the business goes under and hundreds of poor and middle class Americans lose their jobs which is a very fair description of some of the deals Mitt made at the end of his tenure at Bain. Listening to conservatives talk about what a glorious thing it is when regular Americans get fired is more than a little bit disconcerting, particularly since when it was Bains turn to face that same kind of creative destruction, it had millions of dollars in debt forgiven by the FDIC in what could fairly be termed a bailout. The same goes for Bain making more than 15 million dollars on GS Technologies when a federal government insurance agency had to pony up $44 million to bail out the companys underfunded pension plan. Thats not a liberal argument, its a prime example of the sort of capitalism on the way up and socialism on the way down that most Americans, including Tea Partiers, hated about TARP. Now, were going to be asked to defend that as one of the wonders of the free enterprise system because Mitt Romney may be the nominee?
4) Read Mitts lips: He wants a VAT: Like Barack Obama, Mitt Romney is open to the same sort of value added tax that has helped drive the tax rates of Western European nations into the stratosphere.
Since Mr. Romney mentioned a consumption tax, would he rule out a value-added tax?
He says he doesnt like the idea of layering a VAT onto the current income tax system. But he adds that, philosophically speaking, a VAT might work as a replacement for some part of the tax code, particularly at the corporate level, as Paul Ryan proposed several years ago. What he doesnt do is rule a VAT out.
Amid such generalities, its hard not to conclude that the candidate is trying to avoid offering any details that might become a political target. And he all but admits as much. I happen to also recognize, he says, that if you go out with a tax proposal which conforms to your philosophy but it hasnt been thoroughly analyzed, vetted, put through models and calculated in detail, that youre gonna get hit by the demagogues in the general election.
You could make a case for a VAT as a REPLACEMENT for the income tax, but as an ADDITION to the current tax code, it would be a disaster that would lead to ever-increasing tax rates. If theres one thing that the Republican Party has stood for over the last few years, it has been low taxes. So, what happens when Mitt Romney introduces a VAT tax, just like the one Barack Obama wants to implement? How did that work out for George H. W. Bush? How do you like the idea of seeing Republicans implement a tool that will allow the Left to simultaneously drive our taxes into the stratosphere and then turn around and blame businesses because the price of all their products are going up?
5) Why support Romneycare and oppose Obamacare? Obamacare is nothing but Romneycare on a larger scale. Even Mitts consultants on Romneycare, like Jonathan Gruber, have admitted that Obamacare is just Romneycare writ large,
The truth is that the Affordable Care Act is essentially based on what we accomplished in Massachusetts. Its the same basic structure applied nationally.
So, if Mitts the nominee, we go into the election with a nominee who fundamentally agrees with all the principles behind Obamacare and is opposing it (Ehr we hope) for the sake of politics. Are we going to have to pretend that Romneycare is a success or worse, that Mitt Romney really has some big ideological problem with a healthcare plan thats probably almost identical to what he would have come up with if hed been President?
This is not an academic discussion. Mitt Romney can still be stopped in South Carolina and (b)etween now and March 3rd, the last event before Super Tuesday, only 15.20% of all delegates to the Republican National Convention will be selected and the vast majority will be proportional. Mitt Romney is the least conservative candidate remaining in the field and isnt particularly electable either. If you dont want to spend the better part of the next year trying to drag this sad sack of Mitt across the finish line so he can disappoint us for the next four years, then stand up, speak out, and stop letting the mainstream media and a bunch of Beltway conservatives tell you that the race has to be over with just 1.8% of the delegates needed for a victory awarded. The Tea Party didnt rise up, fight Barack Obama, and help the GOP have its best year in half a century just to see the Republican Party ideologically slide all the way back to the pre-Reagan years as a reward. If the establishment manages to grease the wheels for Mitt to such a degree that it turns out hes unstoppable, then its still better to go down brawling instead of supporting a candidate you know is a mediocrity because you think hes probably going to win the nomination. Given the type of man he is, whether Mitt wins or loses, youre unlikely to look back at fighting like hell to get another nominee with anything other than pride.
Sounds like you already have.
because the abomination that is the Obama Administration has got to go! Or we lose The Republic!
Frankly I think that our nation is strong enough to survive either Obama or Romney. Mitt Romney is not the solution to our decaying nation and it is debatable based on his record (not his flexible rhetoric)whether he is even a marginal improvement over Obama.
No you are wrong.
And this is the pattern in most states.
“When there is very little difference between Obama and Romney, which is worse - 4 years of Obama or 8 years of Romney?”
We already had 3 years of Obama, it would be 8 years of Obama vs 4 years of Romney and then we could toss him out.
“When there is very little difference between Obama and Romney, which is worse - 4 years of Obama or 8 years of Romney?”
We already had 3 years of Obama, it would be 8 years of Obama vs 4 years of Romney and then we could toss him out.
I’m voting Constitution party for president. But stay as a GOP registered to help in local races and state races and for congress. But really, I am riding it out until I see what happens next.
But what are electrolytes? Do ya even know?
THE MOVIE “IDIOCRACY” SHOULD BE REQUIRED VIEWING FOR ALL FREEPERS
(Romney = Brawndo-The Thirst Mutilator)
I can not recall a party that has the presidency EVER dumping their candidate. It will be 8 more years of Romney
No need to sell your soul, or complain about having to sell it.
If you've been voting and following politics for years, what makes you think you still have a soul to sell anyway?
Absolutely!!
Because the fix is in and always has been. There is still hope, a very slim hope. But after the convention if Mitt really is the nominee of the GOP-e, We The People have a very big problem.
If Romney wins this election, he will do it without my vote.
I will NEVER support a candidate chosen (shoved down my throat) by the GOP-e, MSM, Fox-Romney News, Rove and the DAMN DEMOCRATS.
Four more years of Obama will likely kill this country. If it does, we may be forced to rebuild from the ashes... it will be tough, painful and it will likely take a long time. Hell, it may not even be possible, at least not for a generation.
We now have the most ignorant electorate in the history of American elections. I believe we have the most corrupt government and media our country has ever seen. Perhaps America needs to see and feel the consequences of it’s ignorance before it will wake the heck up.
I hear you, and just about threw up when I hear Rick withdrew today. As Rush said, "Negative ads work and that is what mitt did". No mittens for this Texas voter. Heck, I'll vote for Ron Paul in the primary to take one vote away from mitt.
He may not be the candidate that you or I preferred, and I didn't particularly like him when he was Governor of MA, but he will be head and shoulders above Obama. I do not want the US to have to endure four more years of that man, and if we sit the election out, that's exactly what we'll get.
Yes, electing more conservatives to the House and Senate will be crucial, but if they're having to fight against Obama for the next four years, they will be useless. And if Obama gets to appoint another couple of Justices to the Supreme Court, we can kiss our rear ends goodbye as a Representative Republic.
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.