Mitch Daniels reiterates call for 'truce' on social issues (not a good start to POTUS campaign)

Governor Mitch Daniels is a great wonk, a good governor, but it appears that he isn't much of a politician.

Earth to Mitch: You don't start out a presidential campaign by alienating 1/3 of your base:

The other day on Laura Ingraham's radio show, Daniels re-iterated his call for a "truce" on social issues while America gets its economic house in order. He now says he'd like to "mute" those issues for a little while.
Listen here. (You have to go 4 minutes into the clip to hear this) The transcription is below:

"If you don't accept that we face a republic-threatening issue in terms of the debt--and again I would love to conclude one day that I was overreacting--but that threatens every one of us whatever our views on these other questions. I would like to think that fixing it and saving our kids future could be a unifying moment for our country and we wouldn't stop our disagreements or our passionate belief in these other questions, we just sort of mute them for a little while, while we try to come together on the thing that menaces us all." (Laura Ingraham show 01/31/11)

If Daniels gets in the race you can be sure that some other candidate is going to call him out on this. Whoever does it first will immediately endear himself or herself to social conservatives nationwide. Who's going to do it?

OK - we get it. Fixing the deficit is titanically important. But you don't ask voters - especially when it comes to issues that touch their conscience in very personal ways - to turn off their emotions and engagement just to achieve some nebulous "peace" on social issues. First of all, it takes two to make peace and it is doubtful that the other side would be quite so accommodating. Secondly, it would be like ripping the heart out of the Republican party.

Despite a campaign that had about as much life as a zombie, McCain would have come within kissing distance of the presidency if he could have found a way to energize the social right who showed up in far fewer numbers than they did for Bush. And Daniels wants to discard them?

Not a good start to the Daniels campaign.

His advice will be heeded by exactly no one.

If he thinks this is a winning strategy, let him run and try it. We will see if you can win the GOP nomination while not engaging at all on social issues.

I hate to break it to Mr. political philosopher, but the twin goals of “expanding our outreach into minority communities” and a “truce on social issues” are mutually exclusive.

The only issues we have that are attractive to a significant % of Black or Hispanic voters are school choice (a social issue) and abortion (THE social issue).

So TRY it.

We will see if it works or not.

That is how ideas are tried in a Republic, not with editorial op eds telling telling other people to shy away from some issues.

Now I agree that the TEA party should stick to its foundational issue, but the GOP needs to stick to its guns on what sets up apart from the Dems and what is a critical plank in the conservative coalition.

When your car is racing for the edge of a cliff, is there anything else that you should be focused on save for figuring out a way to stop the thing or escaping from it?

People don’t have to stop caring about their pet issues but I can guarantee that if we see the Republic fail and fail it will if our economy crashes due to the debt and out of control government we have then there are going to be a hell of a lot of other matters to deal with including individual survival.

Write that stupid SOB off. We ended up in the mess we're in by always laying off the social issues. Name one damn thing instituted by the democrat party since LBJ that wasn't justified based on the “social issues”, there isn't one. There may be a few where that argument didn't fly and they changed their game plan later, but the democrat fascists have been doing nothing BUT social issues for fifty years.

It's sad to see that stupidity like this is still paraded around in flower print boxer shorts and red pumps in order to try and please little factions that aren't going to vote out fascists anyway.

Going “agnostic” on social issues ostensibly to allow full attention to fiscal ones isn’t going to cut it. There are no “truces” to be had with the dark side. Like their radical muslim fellow travelers and other types of cancer growths, they are continuously probing, testing and moving forward with their agenda.

Mitch, you’re either all in or out. We’ve been down the moderate road before.. this time it’s a no-go.

Daniels is dead wrong, both morally and politically.

Compromising our core principles is not an option, and nobody respects a candidate or party that does. I'd rather see the country go bankrupt than have millions more babies killed and the nation's moral decline accelerate.

Also, millions and millions of economically liberal/moderate voters cross over to vote Republican mainly or entirely because they strongly oppose abortion and same-sex “marriage”.

In addition, social/liberal, economic conservatives are a very small voting block, and single issue so-lib/eco-cons are almost nonexistent. We don't need to pander to them, they should compromise and join with us.

Finally, the debt crisis can and should encourage those social liberal/economic conservative voters to prioritize economic issues and vote Republican. Shouldn't the party that has the right ideas on the critical issues spending and debt (relatively speaking) have more leverage to set the agenda on other issues?

Daniels is inventing a false dilemma. Cutting spending and reducing debt and fighting for to end abortion and maintain traditional values are not mutually exclusive. In fact, they are complimentary issues.

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