While Romney took an extended hiatus to write his book — “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness” — he never really left the political game, staying in close touch with a small group of political advisers who have kept the presidential flame lit over the past two plus years.
That loyal group has helped Romney emerge as the frontrunner in the Invisible Primary — the behind-the-scenes battle before the battle for the nomination, a contest defined by fundraising, endorsements and general political sway. (The Romney team’s performance was near perfect until a background quote disparaging former Alaska Sen. Sarah Palin caused a bit of stir nationally.)
What better way to kick off our 2012 inner circle lists — the men and women closest to the various Republicans (and Democrat) running for president — than with Romney. Look for future inner circles for Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and, yes, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin in this space in the coming weeks.
The Romney Inner Circle
*Matt Rhoades: Rhoades served as communications director for Romney’s 2008 bid and earned a reputation as a savvy strategist in and out of the press world. Rhoades was named director of Romney’s Free and Strong America PAC earlier this year — a move that won the governor praise among insiders — and is widely expected to be the campaign manager for the 2012 race.
* Beth Myers: Myers served as chief of staff during Romney’s time as governor and managed the 2008 race. Myers is regarded as the staffer with the closest personal relationship with Romney — a not-insignificant thing in a presidential campaign where scads of advisers seek to win the candidate’s ear.
* Eric Fehrnstrom: While Fehnstrom has dabbled in outside consulting — he helped guide Sen. Scott Brown (R) to victory in Massachusetts earlier this year — he is still focused heavily on forwarding Romney’s political interests. Fehnrstrom’s relationship with Romney cemented during the ’08 campaign when he served as traveling press secretary but the two also have history; Fehnstrom served as Romney’s deputy campaign manager in the 2002 governor’s race.
* Stuart Stevens/Russ Schriefer: Romney had many — too many, according to some — media consultants on board during the 2008 presidential campaign. (Check out our 2008 Romney inner circle post for a look at all of them.). Stevens and Schriefer, whose firm helped elect Gov. Chris Christie (N.J.) in 2009, are the only image men left standing and are a near-lock to produce Romney’s ads in the race to come.
* Spencer Zwick: Commonly referred to as the sixth Romney son (Romney has five boys), Zwick is tasked with raising the money for the PAC — and, by any measure, has done a bang-up job. Romney has collected nearly $6 million for Free and Strong America since the start of 2009 and had doled out hundreds of thousands of dollars to candidates across the country as well. In both money raised and donations made, Romney stands alone among 2012 candidates — thanks to Zwick.
* Peter Flaherty: Flaherty is Romney’s go-to guy in outreach to conservatives, the same critical role he played for the governor in the 2008 presidential race. Flaherty, like Myers and Fehnrstrom, goes way back with Romney; he served as Romney’s deputy chief of staff in the governor’s office.
Kevin Madden, Spokesman for Mitt Romney's 2008 Primary Campaign
* Kevin Madden: Madden, the telegenic spokesman for Romney in 2008, has moved on to the world of political consulting — he is partners with former Republican National Committee strategist Jim Dyke — but keeps a hand in Romney world. Madden is also a regular presence on cable television, a role he’s likely to reprise if/when he signs up for a second bid.
* Ben Ginsberg: Ginsberg (and his law firm Patton Boggs) remains on Romney’s PAC payroll — a sign that the governor values the advice of one of the top election lawyers in Washington (or anywhere.)
* Ron Kaufman: Kaufman, a principal at the Dutko Group, is the insider’s insider and serves as a behind-the-scenes advocate for Romney within the professional political class in Washington.
Jim Talent, former Missouri Congressman and Senator
* Jim Talent/Mike Leavitt: Talent, the former Missouri Senator, and Leavitt, the former Utah governor, know the life of an elected official and can relate to Romney in a way that few others in the inner circle can as a result.
The 2,315 page Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill that President Obama will sign today should not be called “financial reform.” Instead the bill, which passed the Senate 60-39 last week when Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown joined Maine Senators Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins to grant cloture, should be called what for what it is: pages and pages of massively costly, counterproductive and possibly unconstitutional mandates on nearly every type of business except for those government-sponsored enterprises at the root of the crisis. And while the bill claims to crack down on excesses on Wall Street, its harshest impact will likely be on Main Street businesses that had nothing to do with the meltdown.
A front-page Wall Street Journal article this week noted that “far from Wall Street, President Barack Obama’s financial regulatory overhaul… will leave tracks across the wide-open landscape of American industry.” The Journal notes that “the bill will touch storefront check cashiers, city governments, [and] small manufacturers.”
But one thing it will leave totally untouched is the government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which new research by Congress’s Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission and other bodies shows was even more of a prime factor in the subprime boom than originally assumed. The Federal Housing Finance Agency now reports that Fannie and Freddie purchased 40 percent of all private-label subprime securities in 2003 and 2004. Indeed, according to Edward Pinto, housing scholar and Fannie’s former chief credit officer, millions of mortgages to borrowers with credit scores of less than 660, considered by prominent researchers to be the dividing line for subprime loans, had been labeled by Fannie and Freddie as prime going back as early as 1993.
Rather than wait for Congress’s own Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission to issue its report in December to examine the role of the GSEs and other causes, Congress passed a bill that will not prevent future bubbles and imposes untold costs that will put the country in danger of slipping back into a recession.
New collateral requirements on derivatives could cost U.S. companies as much as $1 trillion in lost capital and liquidity, according to the International Swaps and Derivatives Association. And as the WSJ piece notes, these costs would hit not just big banks, but farmers who use derivatives to hedge the price of their crops and fuel for their tractor. The new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau could also hit retailers that issue credit tangentially related to their business, such as small stores that offer layaway plans.
On the other side of the retail ledger, some of the biggest retailers also got an unjustified mandated benefit with the Durbin amendment that puts price controls on the interchange fees they pay to process credit cards. This corporate welfare for fat cat merchants will mean higher costs to consumers, community banks, and credit unions.
In addition, the bill contains provisions that will empower special interests at the expense of ordinary shareholders and that may exceed the limits of the U.S. Constitution. The bill’s “orderly liquidation” authority will allow the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department not only to bail out firms whose failure is deemed to be a threat to “financial stability,” but to actually seize firms that are not even asking for a bailout.
Most popular official in survey; For incumbents, message is mixed
US Senator Scott Brown, who only months ago was a little-known figure even within the tiny band of Republicans in the state Senate, not only catapulted to national stature with his upset US Senate victory, but is today the most popular officeholder in Massachusetts, according to a Boston Globe poll.
After less than five months in Washington, Brown outpolls such Democratic stalwarts as President Obama and US Senator John F. Kerry in popularity, the poll indicates. He gets high marks not only from Republicans, but even a plurality of Democrats views him favorably.
The support for Brown, whose victory became a symbol of voter anger, is consistent with widespread sentiment that incumbents in Massachusetts and Washington “need to be replaced with a new crop of leaders.’’ That statement was supported by 50 percent of those polled, while 28 percent said they trust the incumbents.
Yet there’s one surprising consolation for Bay State Democrats who hope to defuse the voter backlash. When asked whether they will vote for a Democrat or Republican in their own congressional district in November, 42 percent of likely voters say they will vote for the Democrat and 27 percent will vote Republican.
While those polled tend to favor the nine Democratic incumbents running to keep their US House seats in November, Republicans can take hope in the state’s only contest for an open seat, being vacated by Democrat William Delahunt. Voters in the Southeastern and Cape and Islands communities that make up the district are evenly divided on whether they will vote for a Republican or Democrat.
The survey of 558 adults in Massachusetts, including 497 likely voters, was taken June 17-23 by the University of New Hampshire’s Survey Center.
Brown’s backers can be heartened by the depth of his support.
Asked their opinion of Brown, 55 percent of those polled said they view him favorably, only 18 percent unfavorably. His rating among Republicans is 79 percent favorable, 3 percent unfavorable. And 55 percent of independents — the majority of the state’s voters — say they like him, while only 11 percent have an unfavorable opinion. The poll has a margin of error of 4.2 percent.
Despite the fact that his election in January was a crushing blow to both the state and national Democratic party, 41 percent of Democrats say they view Brown favorably, and 32 percent, unfavorably.
In contrast, Kerry was viewed favorably by 52 percent of those polled and unfavorably by 37 percent of the respondents. And in a sign that Obama is a polarizing figure even in Massachusetts, 54 percent of the respondents view him favorably and 41 percent unfavorably, according to the polling data.
The best strategy for Republicans running for office this November? Get President Obama to campaign for your Democratic opponent. It’s a plan that appears to be working rather splendidly for the GOP so far. In fact, it’s so successful, there should be little doubt that Republicans would be willing to open their wallets and fund Obama’s campaign travel through Nov. 2.
Obama campaigned for Democrat Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who lost his primary to Rep. Joe Sestak 46 percent to 54. Republican Scott Brown defeated Democrat Martha Coakley 52 percent to 47 in January’s special election, despite Obama’s support for Coakley.
Republican Chris Christie trounced New Jersey’s Democratic incumbent governor, Jon Corzine, even after Obama did his best to pull Corzine to victory last fall. The story repeats itself in Virginia, where Obama didn’t have the clout with voters to help Democrat Creigh Deeds defeat Bob McDonnell for Virginia governor. Numbers don’t lie.
The White House may try to argue that Obama was not on the ballot Tuesday in Pennsylvania, nor in New Jersey and Virginia last year or Massachusetts earlier this year, where, despite the president’s efforts on behalf of the Democrats in each and every one of those races, his candidate lost. And while there is, indeed, a whiff of anti-incumbency in the air, Corzine was the only incumbent on that list where that point can even be debated. (House incumbent Sestak beat Senate incumbent Specter.) Obama himself may be the most vulnerable incumbent, and his “help” could be the kiss of death.
Searching desperately for something resembling a shred of good news from Tuesday’s results, Democrats are celebrating their ability to hold on to a House congressional seat (until November, at least) in Pennsylvania held for 36 years by the late Rep. John Murtha (D) in a district where Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 2-to-1 margin. But Democrats opining that holding Murtha’s seat is an omen for their party’s fortunes come November are more foolish than prescient.
Democrat operatives are loath to admit the hotly contested Pennsylvania primary between Specter and Sestak spurred more Democrats to get out and vote, thus putting Democrat Mark Critz over the finish line in Murtha’s congressional district. Simple turnout levels between Republicans and the more passionate Democratic voters interested in the Senate primary are what most likely kept the seat in the “D” column.
Pennsylvania Democrats came out to vote so they could vote against Obama’s pick for the Senate. Obama had nothing to do with Critz’s win. Putting the full weight of his presidency behind Specter failed, just as it failed in Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts.
With Obama’s approval rating below 50 percent (according to the most recent Real Clear Politics poll average) and his approval and disapproval numbers just about even, his astonishingly high self-esteem isn’t likely to save him or his party. Prior to Brown’s stunning win over Coakley, the Democrats’ supposed heir apparent to the late Ted Kennedy’s throne, Obama was queried about Democrats’ trepidation about November. Obama unflinchingly stated, “The difference between here [2010] and ’94 is, now you have me.” Yes. We do. Along with government takeover of our health, banking and auto industries and the saddling of our nation with debt burdens for generations to come.
One primary night seems to have shattered nerves across the Capitol.
Instead of toeing the party line, two Democratic senators broke away and handed Harry Reid an embarrassing – albeit temporary – loss on financial reform because they wanted more aggressive measures. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) seems to have reversed a plan to vote with the Democrats to advance the Wall Street bill, further upsetting the once smooth path to passage for the bill.
The takeaway message from Tuesday night is that nobody’s safe, and they feel like they might be punished by voters for actually being bipartisan.
The unpredictable swings signal that this is going to be a long five months for congressional leaders if they want to build any consensus deals on legislation.
Today’s Monday Fix column — yes, we write for the dead-tree edition of the Post too! — looks at Sen. Scott Brown’s (R) decision to wade into the special elections in Hawaii and Pennsylvania and what it might mean for the man from Massachusetts’ political future.
Brown has emailed the Hawaii addresses on his broad national fundraising list — gathered during his stunning January special election victory over state Attorney General Martha Coakley (D) — to ask for donations for Honolulu City Councilman Charles Djou in advance of the May 22 special election in Hawaii’s 1st district.
Brown will actually travel to Pennsylvania on May 14 for a fundraiser and rally to benefit businessman Tim Burns who is locked in a tough race with former congressional staffer Mark Critz (D) in the 12th district.
To date, Brown has been reluctant to step far outside the boundaries of Massachusetts when it comes to endorsements, having only supported Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) prior to now.
But, Brown could face a choice on that front soon enough.
We write:
“While Brown insists his focus is on winning a full term in 2012 and supporting the likely presidential candidacy of former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, his star power and the challenge of holding a seat in a strongly Democratic state could well force a rethinking of that plan — and a move to the national stage — at some point soon.”
Brown may be too green to be presidential material but he would almost certainly be in the mix for vice president if anyone other than Romney is the nominee.
I just received an email from Sen. Scott Brown’s office that said that there is talk in MA. Democratic circles that the Party is talking to MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow about the possibility of running against Scott when his partial term in the Senate expires.
Ms. Maddow lives in Western Massachusetts and her high visibility as a news anchor has peaked the interest of Democrat apparatchiks in the state. No word on whether or not she is interested in running.
If we conservatives are right about Obamanomics and his new Health Care bill being economy flatteners and job killers, by the time Ms. Maddow is ready to hit the rubber chicken circuit, the voters will be so completely turned off by All Things Democratic that they will reward Sen. Brown with a full term.
If your heart didn’t sink when the Senate bill went over the top in the House last night and Democrats began chanting “Yes, we can” on the floor, you’re either not a conservative or inured to all disappointment. Conservatives will be temped to despair in the weeks ahead, as the magnitude of this defeat and its potential consequences sink in. But there are good reasons not to despair. Here are five:
Public opinion. Democrats were never able to convince the public of the merits of their reform — despite having the highest-profile platforms in American politics, including a president who wore out his teleprompter-festooned bully pulpit for a solid year. Liberals comforted themselves by saying that the bill gained popularity at the end. But look at the Wall Street Journal/NBC News polling on Obamacare. In September 2009, 39 percent thought it was a good idea, 41 percent a bad idea. In January, it was 33 a good idea, 46 a bad idea. The latest poll had it at 36-48 — basically flat from the beginning of the year. Fox News polling had the bill at 38 percent approval and 48 percent disapproval in mid-September 2009, then at 34-57 in December, and 35-55 in its latest survey — again, essentially flat. The public has displayed an irreducible reservoir of common sense throughout the debate, which will be something crucial to draw on during the fights to come.
Structured so can it be overturned. The classic play in entitlement politics is to hook people on the benefits, making repeal impossible and growth inevitable. Obamacare is built so the major benefits, the subsidies, don’t kick in for years. This is part of the fiscal ruse — if the benefits kicked in immediately, Democrats would have exceeded their politically dictated ceiling of $1 trillion in official costs over the first ten years. The delay means there’s time to reverse key aspects of the bill before they take effect.
There’s no doubt that this will be difficult. Democrats have created a fact on the ground in the form of the bill, which puts the power of inertia on their side. Republicans will have to defeat an incumbent president in 2012, never easy. And they will have to offer alternative policy ideas that carry the day. If the odds are against them, all of this is still within the realm of the possible. One way to look at it is that Obama and Nancy Pelosi won the debate within the Democratic caucus over whether to pass a maximalist bill. But they haven’t yet won the debate in the country, which will rumble on.
A moment of clarity. Democrats generally win national elections by posing as moderates. In 2006, congressional Democrats sounded like a reasonable alternative to a corrupt Republican party that was losing a major war. In 2008, Obama usually portrayed himself as a moderate post-partisan; if the nature of Obama’s governance had been blatantly forecast back then, he might not have won, despite the financial crisis, the unpopularity of Bush, and the weakness of McCain’s campaign.
It’s a long time until 2012, but the health-care bill and the way it passed will make it much harder for the president to obscure his ideological commitments. There’s even less reason than before for anyone to misunderstand what Obama and his Democratic party are fundamentally about.
The truth will out. Obama has been saying things about his bill that are untrue: It won’t make premiums do down; it won’t control costs; it won’t allow everyone who likes their current insurance arrangements to keep them. These false representations may well make the bill more unpopular rather than less after passage.
Democrats learned with the stimulus that it’s not much fun to defend a law that they vastly oversold prior to passage. They’ll have exactly the same experience with health-care reform. The legislation on which they’ve staked so much will not withstand its first contact with reality.
The GOP has been better than expected. I remember listening to a Republican congressional leader answer questions about health care at an off-the-record event back in early 2009, and feeling profoundly depressed. He sounded as if he’d already given up. It’s been a very pleasant surprise how Republicans rose to the occasion over the last year. The bill sank in public opinion mostly of its own weight, but Republicans were relentless in their critiques and held together to oppose it. If Mitch McConnell hadn’t held his caucus together, Scott Brown wouldn’t have become the 41st vote and almost brought the bill down. At the health-care summit, Republicans offered an alternative vision for an entirely different direction in reform and found a star to articulate it in Paul Ryan. They couldn’t stop the large Democratic majorities in the House and the Senate from passing the bill, but the way they performed provides hope for the ongoing debate.
None of the above means we should minimize what happened yesterday. It’s a severe blow. But if we are to recover, we can’t despair.
Scott Brown has delivered the Weekly Republican Address and he takes the opportunity to warn America once again of the disastrous Health Care Bill that the Dems appear willing to end their careers with. I supported Scott and made phone calls into Massachusetts for this very reason. Scott said he would vote to stop this toxic bill and he continues his fight against it.
I am asking our readers to help Scott by going over to dickmorris.com for the list of swing lawmakers that he has listed there and to call their offices all through this coming week, right up to the start of voting. My understanding is that Pelosi has scheduled the vote for the 18th. I know that information changes at warp speed these days, but that is the latest date that I am aware of.
Let’s take the fight to these people and let them know they will face the electoral wrath of the voters this November if they continue to defy us.
Ever since Scott Brown’s historic come from behind upset of Massachusetts Democrat Martha Coakley, the Shawmut Group of political consultants have been one of the hottest commodities in the business. They are the group that helped Scott formulate the message that obviously resonated with the voters in the Bay State.
Now word comes that the Shawmut Group is working with John Loughlin who is campaigning in Rhode Island to replace retiring Democrat Patrick Kennedy. They have been instrumental in honing in on several hot button Rhode Island issues, including the long overdue switch in policy toward accused unlawful combatants from “molly coddlle and lawyer up” to,” press them hard for intelligence and then clamp them in leg irons on the flight down to Gitmo.”
Mr. Loughlin is also campaigning on the need to get the economy back on track in a state that suffers from high unemployment.
The Shawmut Group is also working on Rick Lazio’s Gubernatorial campaign in New York as well as several other New England contests.
It is fascinating to see a team built up in response to what has been happening in America for the last 14 months. A huge opportunity lies before the GOP and it is evident that the Shawmut Group and others recognize the opportunity. It remains a mystery how Obama and Co. could have had their finger on America’s political pulse well enough to get elected and then be struck completely tone deaf within 60 days of the Inauguration.
The political consultancy groups are doing what this administration will not or cannot do…..listen to the voter’s concerns and respond with policies that will make their lives safer and more prosperous. Obama’s top down approach is not working and poll after poll confirms this. On the flip side of the arrogant, we-know-what’s-best-for- you- poor-schlubs, is the approach that the Shawmut Group is taking. Stay close to the voters, know what’s on their minds and give them a voice in Washington that expresses how they feel about what’s going on in their lives and what they want to see from government. They deserve that and they haven’t been getting that these past 14 months.
Hopefully the upcoming mid term elections will see a marked change from the hard left politics of the tax, borrow and spend crowd to a let’s put America back to work crowd.
New York — Mitt Romney, sitting ramrod straight, is gazing up at the gleaming glass boxes on Park Avenue as we zoom through midtown Manhattan. It is lunchtime, and the streets are swarming with business folk — attorneys with lattes, analysts with take-out sushi. For Romney, this is a glimpse of his old world, a world of mergers, acquisitions, and Harvard Business School lingo.
His new world, one of big ideas and presidential aspirations, sits on his lap, in the form of his latest book, No Apology: The Case for American Greatness.
Romney knows how to use his time in the wilderness. Unlike many of his potential Republican foes for the 2012 presidential nomination, Romney has kept a relatively low profile since ending his 2008 primary campaign.
No television show, no drama for the former Massachusetts governor.
Instead, Romney is laser-focused on electing state and federal Republican candidates in the midterm elections.
That strategy is paying off. In January, Scott Brown, the Bay State’s new GOP senator, credited Romney as being instrumental to his come-from-behind win. Elsewhere, Romney’s political-action committee, Free and Strong America, has donated over $120,000 to Republican candidates over the past year. Last month, he went so far as to defend former president George W. Bush, his party’s battered hero, in a speech at a conservative conference. All of these efforts, and his book, are signals to the GOP faithful that a certain former governor is tanned, rested, and ready.
GETTING TO THE POINT
The release of No Apology has garnered Romney numerous lighthearted television appearances, from The View to The Late Show with David Letterman. The buzz is nice, he says, “and a lot of fun,” but not his purpose. The will-he, won’t-he presidential chatter misses the point as well.
Americans, he explains, do not want to hear horse-race chatter, but desire, strongly, a real and substantive policy debate, be it about geopolitics or domestic policy. No Apology — a 324-page Romney vade mecum chock-full of policy talk, data, charts, anecdotes, quotes, and arguments — is, in his eyes, a step in that direction. It covers a few key policy areas: 100 pages on America’s role in the world, plus chapters on health care, fiscal policy, education, and “the culture of citizenship.”
“I have wanted to write something like this for about 20 years,” Romney says.” He jokes that he “became unemployed unexpectedly” and, “with a little time on my hands,” told himself that “this is the time to do it.”
Developing his book’s theme was easy. “When I was in the private sector, doing business around the world, I became concerned that Americans were not seeing what was happening around the world,” Romney says. “We think of ourselves as being light years ahead of other nations, and that was the case when I was going around the world in the 1960s. But today that is no longer the case. There are other parts of the world that are eclipsing us in terms of productivity, infrastructure, investment in higher education, and technology. Unless we change course, I’m very concerned that America is going to be eclipsed by some of those other nations. So I wanted to tell this story.”Read more at NRO
Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.), who campaigned on the idea of freezing federal worker salaries to control the deficit, may soon get to explore the topic further.
Senate Republicans announced Tuesday that Brown will join the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, as well as the Armed Services and Veterans Affairs committees.
The homeland security panel, chaired by Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.), oversees the Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. Postal Service and federal-workforce issues.
In his campaign, Brown supported a freeze on federal salaries as a way to rein in overall government spending.
“I recognize that our federal workers do important work,” he said at a January campaign event. “But it’s not right that lesser-paid private-sector workers suffering through a recession have to pay for expensive government salaries.”
He also suggested the salary freeze during a later interview with ABC’s Barbara Walters.
We have something awful right now: four years of Obama’s incompetence and socialism. If conservatives of all parties don’t start pulling the rope in the same direction, we will have something worse: four more years of Obama’s incompetence and socialism. Please take the time to read Mr. Wright’s brilliant analysis of our current political milieu. Then take his advise and vote for the awful party instead of the evil party this November and that will buy us time to clean the mess up.
~~John Cronin~~
By C. Edmund Wright
The debate over third parties and how bad the Republicans are comes down to this: evil versus awful. That’s it. Your next Congress and your next president will be either from the evil party or the awful party. Whatever perfect virginal party that is out there yet to be formed will not come to fruition in time to save the republic.
Besides, no one in politics is perfect, and virgins are almost equally rare.
Threatened with the loss of liberty with the “fundamental change” on the way from the Obama crowd, none of us on the right should luxuriate in irrelevant and phony purity. There’s a reason they call government “making sausage.” No one who has ever actually been in the sausage factory can remain pure. You can only do that if you remain irrelevant. Irrelevance will not stop the evil of a government take over of our society.
Irrelevance is cathartic. It feels good. It is liberating. It is still irrelevant. A progressive Republican may sometimes be awful, but it is not the same thing as a progressive Democrat. (Please see 2009 health care vote for some recent compelling evidence.) These differences have real impact on everybody’s freedom.
Newbies to this history-making movement may assume that they are the first Americans to ever have this anti-Washington outrage. Our schools and media certainly have not emphasized these traditions. It is somewhat analogous to Obama thinking American history started at his birth and American greatness started at his inauguration.
Consider that it was precisely the conservatives within the Republican Party who sounded the loudest alarms against Obama. And by “within the Republican Party,” I include party officials, elected officials, media figures and voters who readily identify themselves as Republicans. These are all people “within the Republican party.”
It is a mistake to judge the national party by Michael Steele and his staff. Most folks who insist on doing this cannot name another person who ever held this job. It is not relevant. It is a glorified fund raising admin job.
And it is no secret that McCain and others like David Brooks and Colin Powell were blind to who Obama was in varying degrees. But so were so many independents and moderates and un-affiliated voters who are suddenly enlightened.
Suddenly enlightened? Yes. Remember, Obama won in 2008 but would lose today.
As flawed as many Republicans are — and I have written extensively on this very subject on this very website — the folks who were right about Obama were the not so flawed Republicans. The very folks who rightly warned of a government run by the terrible tri-fecta of Obama-Reid-Pelosi were mostly the same folks who warned of the dangers of having folks like McCain represent the party.
And what did those prescient Republicans get for being right? They were ridiculed and lampooned by the Beltway pundits, pollsters and strategists who said that making this clarion call was a huge mistake. The independents and neophytes rejected this warning by the Republican right and voted in droves for Obama. Others “disgusted with both parties” stayed home.
And guess what? Every single one of them now is governed by Obama, Reid and Pelosi. How did that equal disgust with both parties work out for them?
Not well. After a year, many have decided they do not like it. They have decided now to join the outrage over the liberal — er progressive — takeover of the nation.
Welcome. We’ve been waiting for you.
History and perspective are critical here. They teach us this: that today’s choice is between the awful Republican Party and the evil Democratic Party. Awful can be rehabilitated, starting with the good that is in the party. It has happened twice in the last 30 years. Evil is evil. Period. There is a difference.
And one should never harp on the awfulness of the Republican progressives without praising the Republican conservatives. Moreover, it is critical that you contrast the evil left as the only other option. Perfection is not on the ballot. I didn’t create the situation of evil versus awful. Facts are stubborn things.
History always teaches us this too: that under Reagan, the GOP was barely in control of the conservatives yet magnificent and long lasting good was done for us and freedom everywhere. Today, it’s barely under the control of the moderates. The needed change is not that difficult. Regardless, we must make it because the GOP is the only thing between us and a socialist state.
Scott Brown’s cloture vote was awful. If he votes for the actual bill, that would be more awful. Call it that. I’ll join you. No, I’ll beat you to it. Together we can try and purge this thing from the party and shift more influence to the Rubios and the DeMints and the Coburns and many, many other greats in the awful party.
But Coakely or Kennedy would have matched Brown’s cloture vote and gone him one better with a vote for evil Obama Care. Take your choice. It’s all you have currently.
There had been rampant speculation that the White House would narrow its ambitions for health-care legislation after the loss of the Democrats’ filibuster-proof Senate majority last month. Instead, the president’s proposal is striking for the extent to which it hews to the basic scale and framework of the bills on which Congress has toiled for months.
That decision — to go big one last time, rather than small — emerged quickly inside the White House after senior advisers to President Obama concluded privately that his goals for comprehensive changes to the health-care system could not be done piecemeal.
And after initially reeling from the surprise election of Republican Scott Brown to the Senate in Massachusetts, Obama’s chief political strategists came to believe that voters would punish Democrats more severely in this year’s elections for failing to try, they said.
OMG! Obama is in Nevada, campaigning for Harry Reid…..based on Obama’s track record since Nov. 2009, you know that this means Harry Reid’s defeat is virtually guaranteed!
~~John Cronin~~
President Barack Obama needs Harry Reid to get his legislative agenda through the Senate.
Reid needs Obama for something more — his political survival.
The two leading Democrats are taking those efforts to Las Vegas, where Obama is heading Thursday to bolster the embattled Senate majority leader. The president’s overnight trip, the first of his second year in office, is a sign of how entwined Reid and Obama’s fortunes have become.
And of how Obama, whose administration was blindsided last week by Reid’s decision to abort a bipartisan jobs bill, isn’t holding a grudge but instead sees Reid’s success as essential to his own.
“The president has a lot of respect and affection for Sen. Reid and appreciates that he’s been a solid leader in a very difficult time,” said David Axelrod, Obama’s senior adviser.
Obama and Reid’s political marriage has weathered some bumps since the last time the two were together in Vegas in May, including the revelation that Reid once described then-Sen. Barack Obama as as “light skinned” and “with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one” while expressing his support for his presidential bid.
Several weeks later, Obama irked Reid when for the second time he used Las Vegas to highlight poor economic decisions, saying, “You don’t blow a bunch of cash in Vegas when you’re trying to save for college.” Reid fired back, telling Obama to “lay off Las Vegas.”
And to the applause of House Democrats, Obama dinged Reid’s domain in his State of the Union speech as the place where much of his legislative agenda was stacking up.
Both men suffered last fall as the health care debate dragged on, with Obama’s approval ratings taking a hit and Reid cutting deals to line up all 60 Democratic senators to get a bill passed. At times Obama questioned Reid’s approach, but he ultimately trusted that he knew his caucus better than the president did. And Reid ultimately got the job done, passing a health care bill in a dramatic Christmas Eve vote hours before Obama jetted off to Hawaii with his family for the holidays.
Weeks later, Republican Scott Brown shocked Democrats from the White House on down when he won the special Massachusetts election and stripped Reid of a 60-seat, filibuster-proof Senate majority.
As CPAC director, De Pasquale spends all year planning and organizing the annual three-day conference that is the largest gathering of its kind in the country. The event has become so huge that it was moved this year from its longtime home at the Omni Shoreham Hotel to the larger Marriott Wardman Park, just off Connecticut Avenue near the Woodley Park Metro station.
“We’re at a larger facility this year, but it looks like we’re already going to be bursting at the seams,” said De Pasquale. “Right now, we’re about 20 percent above pre-registration for last year. So we’re expecting between 9,000 and 10,000, if on-site registration is on pace with last year.”
Not only will this be the biggest CPAC ever, but it is likely to be the most energized conference in several years. This year’s conference will bring the added enthusiasm of hundreds of new attendees who have been active in the Tea Party movement. In fact, one of the movement’s first events took place during last year’s conference, when about 200 CPAC attendees gathered for a rally in front of the White House that featured Michelle Malkin.
That February 2009 LaFayette Park rally was mocked by liberal bloggers — “puny,” sniffed the Village Voice — but the grassroots movement swelled into a force that made a real political impact. Tea Party activism helped conservatives score big wins in last fall’s Virginia and New Jersey gubernatorial elections, as well as Republican Scott Brown’s stunning victory in Massachusetts, capturing the Senate seat held for nearly four decades by Ted Kennedy.
Political handicappers Larry Sabato and Nate Silver both projected recently that if the November election were held today, Democrats would wind up with only 52 Senate seats, a net loss of seven. Evan Bayh’s sudden retirement yesterday is prompting most observers to give Republicans an edge to capture his vacant seat, which would mean a net loss of eight Democratic seats.
Such a setback isn’t unprecedented. In “wave” elections, one party tends to win all of the close races — in 2008 Democrats captured eight seats from Republicans by running the table on competitive Senate seats.
The political picture for Democrats could improve between now and November — or it could deteriorate. What if former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson, who leads incumbent Senator Russ Feingold in at least some polls, decides to run? Similarly, former New York Governor George Pataki could enter the Senate race, hoping to take advantage of a divisive Democratic primary between appointed Senator Kristen Gillibrand and former Congressman Harold Ford. Finally, Democratic Senator Patty Murray could face a last-minute challenge from Dino Rossi, the well-known Republican who came within an eyelash of being sworn in as governor a few years ago.
Should Democrats fall to only 50 or 51 seats in the Senate, they would be at the mercy of Connecticut’s Joe Lieberman on many key procedural votes. Mr. Lieberman has already signaled his willingness to consider running as a Republican in 2012. He could always threaten to jump the political fence early if it meant giving the GOP Senate control.
Even without further deterioration in their political prospects, Democrats could end up holding only a slim majority or exercising control only by virtue of Vice President Joe Biden’s tie-breaking vote. You could forget about much of the Obama legislative program unless input from moderate and even conservative Republicans is incorporated into legislation. This may not be the “change” that President Obama believes in, but it would be the only kind that could happen.
The new political landscape also has big implications for the Supreme Court. The odds of one or even two vacancies occurring this summer before the current oversized Democratic Senate majority shrinks have just gone up in the wake of Scott Brown’s victory in Massachusetts and Mr. Bayh’s retirement. Justice John Paul Stevens turns 90 this April, and has already signaled his retirement by hiring only one law clerk for the Supreme Court term that begins next October. A retired justice is allowed a single clerk; a sitting Justice normally has four clerks.
Plenty of Democrats viewed the Massachusetts Senate upset as a message to move cautiously. But some are convinced Scott Brown’s victory sent just the opposite message, which means the sort of intraparty power struggle that got nasty during the health care debate isn’t likely to go away anytime soon.
This week, progressive groups that ran ads pushing Democratic moderates to embrace sweeping reform efforts are expected to launch a new round of ads that are likely to target the party’s already vulnerable incumbents.
They won’t disclose many details such as who the targets will be, or the size of the buys, but they do say they will release new polling that shows support for including a government-run insurance plan, the so-called public option, in health care reform — an idea left for dead in Congress some months ago.
“There is a real danger that some are taking away the wrong lesson from Massachusetts: to give up on health care reform and embrace a Republican-lite agenda,” said Justin Ruben, executive director of MoveOn.org.
“If anything, we are redoubling our efforts to make sure our members’ voices are heard and Democrats and Republicans stand up to the lobbyists on financial reform and other key priorities,” he said.
The groups are forging ahead despite pleas from the White House, congressional leaders and some of their targets to bring an end to the friendly fire that distracts lawmakers and creates a sense of being under siege from both the left and the right.
I realize this post may be controversial, but I sincerely believe that Palin cannot win the Republican primaries. If she would then leave the GOP to run on a third party ticket, she will be responsible, more that any other person, for a second Obama term. I ask her supporters to think this through and to not insist that a charismatic and inexperienced politician with a very thin resume be put in charge of the world’s biggest economy and strongest military. The voters did that in 2008 and we can all see what that gets us. Lectures from hostile governments, a broken economy, an empty Treasury and political drift and stagnation.
If you really think that Sarah Palin should be President, don’t throw her to the sharks before she is ready to fight them off……and you can be assured the sharks will come after her in 2012.
As Dr. Savage says, we need an experienced person who understands how to get a bill through Congress, how to get a legislative agenda actually passed into law. The inexperienced politician we have in the Oval Office now has been stalemated for almost a year and he still has a Supermajority in the House and, but for the Massachusetts Miracle of Jan. 19, he’d still have one in the Senate.
So, in 2012, lets pick someone who has a proven and time-tested track record, someone who has allies in the House and Senate who will help the new President get his/her agenda passed…..and who can start to repair the damage done to this country by Obama & Co.
