The following two comments were made on my recent thread about Romney’s campaign working the RNC summer confab in Florida this week. They bring up a point that I think deserves front page attention.
The first is from “wateredseeds”, a long-time Huckabee supporter:
Super smart. Romney has the edge…and is going to win out of iowa no matter what. The question comes down to momentum…and holding the line. Romney is playing it SMART rather than SAFE as many people assume. He had nothing to win at the straw poll…he’s a top 3 finisher in iowa no matter what. He wins new hampshire almost no matter what. And he has nevada pretty much in the bag as well. Romney is running for the general election…and if he tap dances a miracle victory off in iowa…it’s over. People don’t understand…romney doesn’t HAVE to win iowa…but he very well may do it. I’ll bet romney lays low and makes a small push in iowa until right before the caucus. He can win it….and if he does it’s over.
The second is from “Still Hurting”, a Romney supporter:
Wateredseeds,
To add to your commentary, the rest of the early calendar also favors Romney, almost as if he could have drawn it up himself. (Conspiracy nuts, knock yourself out with that one.)
The RNC voted today to not levy harsh penalties against AZ, MI, and FL if they jump the gun on the first Tuesday in March. They have tabled the discussion until their January meeting, meaning that everything will be irrevocably calendared by then.
FL is solid Romney territory (not unchangeble, though). He’s a favorite son in MI. And Romney did very well in AZ in ’08.
It looks like he will have lots of opportunity to build momentum in teh 1st quarter of 2012.
There is little doubt that the odds right now are in Mitt’s favor. Things are shaping up well for him. Will anyone be able to beat the odds and take the nomination from him? They might. Will they? Not likely.
I am reminded of that old saying, “The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that is the way to bet.”
Now don’t get me wrong. Mitt should not be writing his nomination acceptance speech just yet. By the same token none of his opponents should be slitting their wrists, either. There is still time for someone other than Mitt to catch fire. Time is growing short, however.
If things remained the same, Mitt’s path to the nomination is clear. Everyone else’s path, however, depends upon Mitt imploding. In other words, Mitt controls his own destiny. Nobody else can say that.
But I thought it was Palin’s to lose? What ever became of her half-finished Bus tour! I remember all the Palinistas on FA dismissing her “break” as just “temporary”.
Let’s face it, It’s Romney’s to lose because Palin is a flake. She doesn’t have the balls to do what it takes to win. She slid into the VP slot on her good-looks and that is about it.
Ugh, I despise Romney so it looks like I’ll be voting Constitutional Party for the first time.
The only reason Romney is doing well in the polls is because the MSM is in lockstep behind getting him selected as the Republican nominee. They did the same thing during the last Republican primaries when they supported John McCain, then once he got the nod, they turned all their guns on him. This time, voters need to ignore the blue-state headed elite propaganda machine and instead, vote for the candidates they want.
@Ivan:
Well, it looks as if the Palin bus tour will be resuming within days.
Now, if we could just find your lost honor.
@Ditto:
Ditto Ditto!
J.G. and Ditto I suggest the MSM holds little sway over the REPUBLICAN voter.
You hold the MSM in CONTEMPT and follow the Syrens and Sirens from Fox.
If the far right has it’s way you’ll bury Romney like you did in 2008. If Romney holds up and beats Perry, which is a distinct possibility irrelevant of the MSM, will you vote for him? That’s the question?
@rich wheeler:
I rarely, if ever, watch FOX, Rich. And it has nothing to do with their “perceived” political leaning from the view of the liberals. I tend to distrust all big media outlets and get my news by piecing together consistent facts from several sources.
As far as Romney goes, it was the MSM that slobbered all over McCain in the primary season and then turned on him for the general election. And if Romney is the candidate, I don’t have any idea what I will do. I wouldn’t like it, that’s for sure.
One thing you need to understand about me, Rich, is that when it comes to social issues, I have my personal opinions but I don’t push them onto other people. The only thing I despise concerning social issues is those who wish to force others to pay for it, such as government funding abortions, or the latest, contraceptives.
But on fiscal issues, I am very conservative. And that doesn’t mean that I would deny funding for some things liberals would agree with, or that other conservatives might not like, or vice versa. To me, it is about fiscal responsibility and the liberal/progressives in congress, FROM BOTH PARTIES, have shown their lack of ability to engage in fiscal responsibility.
@RichWheeler
Your intent is so transparent that it is laughable. You and other progressives have a vested interest in promoting Romney, in that he is an “Obama-lite” progressive and, (just as with McCain,) you wish to ensure that a conservative does not win the Republican primary. As I have said, “If” Romney did the primary, your fellow Democrat progressives and the MSM (except for FOX) will turn on him just as you did McCain. I will decide whom to vote for President when the primary election is over, and not before. As such I refuse to play your “what-if” games. I have already hung-up numerous times on pollsters for already “assuming” that Romney has won the Republican primary, asking me to choose between he and Obama. That is a biased push-poll, the clear purpose of which is not to get accurate results, but to suggest to those polled that the outcome of the Republican primary has already been decided. You know full well that the reason many conservatives declined to vote in the last Presidential elections was because they felt that they “didn’t have a horse in the race” and you hope that by getting Romney elected, that you will get that result again. With the damage your “chosen one” has done to this country, conservatives will definitely be voting in both the primaries and the general election.
I happen to disagree with most of the politically biased commentary on both FOX and CNN, nor are either even in the running to being exclusive “news” sources for me. I wholly distrust the MSM including FOX when they resort to managing news to create “conventional wisdom” rather than simply and responsibly “reporting the news” in an unbiased manner, regardless of who’s political ox get’s gored. There is very little ethics in politics or news reporting (which often has become little more than propaganda and sensationalism seasoned with occasional grains of actual news).
Ditto I’m gonna start calling you Oliver. When were Dem progressives ever for Mac and how could they influence Repub.primary voters? Conservs lost in 2008 because Thompson was slow and lazy.Stop blaming MSM for all your ills.It’s getting old.
Fact is,as I’ve said for months, Romney/Rubio ticket has best chance to beat BHO. You may not like it but it’s the truth.
J.G. “perceived” political leanings of FOX. C’mon John.
@rich wheeler:
I’m talking about the slant of the actual news presented, Rich, not the shows like Hannity and O’Reilly.
@RichWheeler
Name calling is irrelevant to discussion.
As I have already stated, Democratic progressives were speaking out in favor of McCain in the last Republican Primaries. They have been using the “Republicans have to pick a moderate” argument continually after Ronald Regan won his second term. Bush Sr. and Bush Jr. were both progressive Republican “moderates.” As to how they could influence Republican primary voters: Precisely as they have been through 80% of journalists and MSM leadership who identify themselves as Democrats, and who have been practicing yellow journalism in order to create “conventional wisdom”. Progressives and oppressors the world over have been following Woodrow Wilson’s example ever since he initiated modern propaganda practices.
Ditto To say Dem. Progressives influence Repub. Primary voters is like saying Right Wing Conservatives like you or Dr.J. could influence my Dem Primary vote for Hillary or BHO. Nonsense. I don’t believe Repubs. are THAT gullible.
Bachmann just declared winner in Iowa with Paul a strong 2nd.
You keep misrepresenting my words. What I wrote quite clearly is that self-admitted progressive Journalists and MSM leadership Democrats use their media positions to influence the public. The practice of managed media based propaganda became widespread by direct actions by the Wilson administration. The JournoList scandal is but one example of how politically biased journalists have worked to politically influence voters. It is also true that some Democrats (like you,) use democratic talking points in attempts to convince Republican voters that conservative candidates can not be elected, and that only a “moderate” Republican can win against a Democrat Presidential candidate, (which is total nonsense, as conservative candidates such as Regan have won.) We’ve been listening to progressive propaganda for many decades now, trying to influence “conventional wisdom” and telling fabrications, lies and twisting the truth, and repeating the propaganda over and over. (‘When you keep telling people the same lie over and over, the begin to accept it as the truth.’)
You can deny it all you want, but your intent in supporting Romney in the Republican primaries is completely transparent. It’s called hedging your bets. None of us are surprised that you and Greg speak highly of him, because you know full well that Romney will be an easy target to discredit, because as a progressive Republican he has supported many of the same progressive issues that Obama has. He can not deny this without dissembling or sounding hypocritical, as even other Republicans have called him out on this. However, should he get the nomination and beat Obama, the progressive agenda of transforming America can still go forward, slightly less as enthusiastically as it would have under a second Obama term.
DITTO I don’t profess the ability to influence anyone on the far right. I enjoy the game of politics as I do baseball and college football.Go Irish. That’s not to diminish it’s importance but to realize how it’s played.
Of the remaining viable candidates,Perry,Bachmann,Romney,Palin and yes Ron Paul only Romney has a legitimate shot at beating BHO.
The moderate and Reagan Dem voters needed for victory will NOT support a social Conservative for POTUS. .It’s that simple. Your beloved Tea Party has slipped to 26% approval and 51% disapproval.For sure Congreess and BHO aren’t winning any beauty contests either.
I truly believe a Romney/Rubio ticket can beat BHO. Palin or Bachmann will get beat.Perry to win would need to play up his economic achievements against his perceived far right social stances.
Nominate Palin or Bachmann You win the battle but lose the 2012 war. Maybe that’s good enough? Mario Rubio looms large for 2016.
Note Ron Paul remains the gadfly in the ointment. Let’s see how he does in N.H.
Again, I don’t say that Democratic progressives try to influence conservatives (who are well aware of their tricks and political games). The Dem’s goal is to influence non-conservative Republicans in the primaries away from considering conservative candidates with the lie that a conservative could never win the general election. You are playing that game here. Your saying that Romney is the only one who could beat Obama is pure poppycock, but that is what you want independents and Non-conservative Republicans to believe, so you keep saying the lie over and over. That’s why in the Presidential elections, the Democratic progressive machine lies to the public, telling them far-lefties like Obama and Hillary are not on the far-left, but are “moderates”. With Obama’s current result’s in the majority of polls, compared with historical analysis of past polls, it is possible for anyone that the Republicans can nominate, to have a very good chance beating Obama. The progressives of both parties are just scared that it very well could be a Regan-esk conservative, so they and their MSM cohorts are resorting to their “Jedi mind tricks” to try to forestall that. It is the spouting of the kind of propaganda, akin to self-fulfilling prophesy, that Progressives use to create a per-determined outcome.
As for the Tea Party, these same progressives have been hammering the movement since 2009 with concentrated propaganda attacks of the most vicious and spurious kind. With such constant barrage of the same lies told over and over, some in the public begin to believe the lies, and that is what is reflected in the polls. The anti-Tea Party campaign of the progressives is the most rabid, hateful and evil I’ve seen in modern times, borrowing heavily from similar propaganda attacks of past progressives, like Hitler’s Nazi party, Wilson’s controlled press, the KKK hate movement, and the anti-antisemitism propaganda practiced from the dark-ages, to today. The only tactics your beloved progressives have not done yet, is to start burning crosses in conservatives yards, (although Democratic far-left union goons have marched on conservative’s homes to intimidate and create fear, just like the KKK did half a century ago,) nor have they yet begun arresting conservatives and Tea Party supporters as terrorists and traitors. But if we give the progressives time to totally “transform America” into the progressive fascist state they dream of, such practices will not be far behind. History tends to repeat itself.
Ditto If I thought you actually believed all that crap about Dems being fascists,Hitleresque or KKK like etc I’d be concerned about your sanity.
As it is that kind of talk when viewed by mainstream voters will cost you any chance of electing a far right candidate.Keep it up
BTW REAGAN.
Semper Fi
@Rich Wheeler
Again, you continue to put words in my mouth that I did not say. Do I consider “all Dem’s” fascists? of course not, but it is true that a small minority of the party members are. A larger minority of the party are socialist-progressives. You choose however to ignore the historical facts of your party: that the progressives have a long history of control through propaganda, of verbally slandering those who oppose their policies, the party radicals of purposely elevating racial tensions and class warfare, and the party elite who prefer to loose their far-left militant attack dogs to intimidate others including the opposition, but also anyone else they choose. What party do progressive socialists align themselves? Democrat, but this doesn’t mean all Democrats are socialists. Were the KKK Democrats? Yes, their celebrated Senator Robert Byrd for example, but that truth should never be twisted to infer that all Democrats are racists. What was the party affiliation of those who supported segregation? Democrat, although many bucked the party and supported equal rights for all races. The hateful actions of a minority of your party are relevant, as is the fact that you party looks the other way and ignores the militant tactics their radicals perform against conservatives, republicans and American business, while at the same time adopting the far-left’s invented, unsubstantiated slanderous attacks against innocent political opponents, then treating such extremist labels as if they were legitimate.
The true main issues of the Tea Party movement are that they want smaller, less intrusive, less controlling governments, and that these governments be fiscally responsible and live within their means. Is that racist? No. Does that sound fascist? No. Does that make them terrorists, baby killers, or people who want to kick grandma, grandpa, and poor people out in the street? Of course not. Do they want to over-throw the government. No, they are trying to exercise their constitutional rights, to reform government. Is the Tea Party a tool of the Republicans? No, in fact the Tea Parties are made up of Republicans, Democrats, Independents, from people spanning all races and religions. These fiscal conservatives are continually painted as far-right radicals, which is simply not the case. Tea Party protestors are mainly those people with normal, everyday, small town, main-street American mindsets. The political opposite of far-left Democratic socialists are small ultra-limited government Libertarians.
Yet the MSM, Far-Left Democratic radicals and the progressive Democratic leadership have all continually made the above mentioned, unsubstantiated accusations against supporters of the Tea Party movement. I think we can all see clearly that it is those listed in my previous sentence, who are making up crap, in order to retain Democratic party control of our nation.