Free Republic

This is commentary on how the media picked Saruman(R-AZ) in 2008, in comparison to the current 2012 race. Michelle Bachmann was made to appear 'wacky'. Then Perry, the same. Remember the "big black cloud"? Now the media is trying to say he was drunk at the last debate. Now Cain and this stupid politico scandal. They're being whackified. But what of 2008? Who remembers how Huckabee was made out to be a religious whackjob? Thompson was made out to be a whacko because he didn't even want to be president. And then there's Romney. Romney was a whacko because of...

Mitt Romney seemed to be on a roll. [...comparison of dollars raised....] Romney was starting to move in the polls, and on the campaign trail he seemed loose, even funny. Eager to prove his bona fides as a conservative at a stop in rural New Hampshire, he talked about struggling to kill a rabbit with a single-shot .22-caliber rifle and joked that it got easier when someone loaned him a semiautomatic. The gun-loving crowd laughed appreciatively. Feeling expansive, Romney declared that he had been "a hunter pretty much all my life." .... But he doesn't seem quite ready for prime-time...

Mitt Romney’s campaign blasted a pair of Massachusetts Republicans bent on “exposing” the ex-governor’s record in his race for the White House, while the duo said they were threatened by a top Bay State GOP official. Romney campaign spokesman Kevin Madden lashed out at the founders of MassRepublicans for Truth - GOP strategists Holly Robichaud and Ron Vining - calling them “disgruntled political operatives.” “I expect they’re going to peddle a bunch of distortions and anger in their efforts,” Madden said. “They may be entitled to their own opinion, but they are not entitled to their own set of facts....

(Editor's note: I sat down with Governor Romney at this headquarters in Boston on Friday. I asked to record the interview and Governor Romney agreed without hesitation, and as I turn the recorder on Romney is in the middle of commenting on the fact that his every utterance these days is captured on tape in one way or another.)ROMNEY: You've got to be really careful about what you say and do anywhere you are. I actually had a dream about being in parking garage and having somebody in front of me taking too long to get their change and honking...

WHEN POLITICAL HANDICAPPERS START LAYING ODDS on a presidential election, the conversation inevitably turns to Iowa and New Hampshire. Their status as the first caucus and primary states remains critical, but as media scrutiny has amplified their importance, both have morphed into a kind of Heisenberg fishbowl. Otherwise humble locals, constantly harassed by marauding network TV crews to name their candidate, sometimes retort, "I don't know. I haven't met him yet." It's no surprise political prognosticators are starting to look elsewhere for early clues about the race in 2008. Michigan's status as an important early primary state has been overlooked--until...

Mitt Romney's Evangelical Problem Everyone wants to believe the Massachusetts governor's Mormonism won't be a problem if he runs in 2008. Think again. By Amy Sullivan -------------------------------------------------------- Washington pundits in the throes of post-election doldrums are notoriously eager to find a fresh face to crown the "early favorite" for the next presidential campaign. Even by those standards, however, the speed with which they flocked to Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has been remarkable. Last December, barely a month after Bush's reelection, George Will devoted a column to Romney's potential, and a quick succession of profiles in the Weekly Standard, National Review,...