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Understanding Romney: One size does not fit all
THE HILL ^ | - 01/22/10 | By Bernie Quigley

Posted on 01/22/2010 6:06:18 PM PST by restornu

As The Wall Street Journal points out in an opinion this morning, this is a good day not only for Scott Brown, the new senator from Massachusetts, but for Mitt Romney as well. Glenn Beck doesn’t trust Brown, he says. But with Brown toting friends like the popular former governor of Massachusetts, William Weld, John McCain and Romney around on his bus, it might not be such a good day for Glenn Beck.

The WSJ’s Kim Strassel pointed out that Romney’s closest aides flooded to Mr. Brown, bringing with them the savvy of his national operation.

“From a perch atop his Free and Strong America PAC, Mr. Romney has been raising money, nurturing his team, keeping himself in the national spotlight. With the Massachusetts Senate race, he sensed an unexpected opportunity to step to the front of the GOP presidential ranks,” she writes.

I doubt that the Tea Party’s tent will fold with the election of Brown, but something else has happened: The river that runs between traditional Republicans and insurgent conservative populists now has a bridge in Scott Brown. In fact, it has another bridge in Virginia with the new governor, Bob McDonnell, who will give the Republicans’ response to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union speech Wednesday. The insurgents have built a new base for organization and now, with the election of Brown and McDonnell, it is being absorbed into the mainstream.

But when the very first thinking about regional identity started to surface here in New England as a militant defense against federal overreach, Romney was the governor of Massachusetts and he was already incorporating the same elements of thinking, not as revolutionary polemic, but as practical and effective management strategies here in Massachusetts.

Thus the phrase, “One size does not fit all,” which he began to use as governor, used throughout his presidential campaign and used again this last week in a Fox Business interview. It is his theme song. Texas Gov. Rick Perry now uses the phrase as well, and so does Sarah Palin.

Republican pundits report that Romney’s stock has been down because of RomneyCare, the healthcare program that Romney instituted in Massachusetts. Some of the features suggest ObamaCare, and as large numbers oppose ObamaCare’s vast federal spending, the thinking goes, they would therefore oppose RomneyCare. But that misses the point.

“The bill that was being pushed in Washington was not good for Massachusetts,” Brown said after his election. “It may have been good for other states, but we already had everything and a lot of what was being proposed.”

That is just the point in Romney’s thinking about healthcare: What is good for one state and region is not necessarily good for others. Romney is in fact in the avant garde with this thinking, which has become the base camp of the states’-sovereignty movement.

Romney was unique in the history of Massachusetts governors in that he came to us from the west. He had personal experience in the Western states, in Michigan and in Massachusetts, where he went to college.

My observation here when he was governor was that he had that rare quality which Zen Buddhists call “beginner’s mind.” He does not rebel from new ideas and new people but continually incorporates aspects of new thinking in his own ideas to make a better fit. And he is aware that the country has changed since 1776, when the west was forest and later when it was frontier, and even the 1930s, when the vast majority of Americans worked in one of two places, the floor of the factory or the field.

One-size-fits-all-federalism might have been the perfect system then. But today for a country as full and rich and varied and alive as ours, the old system is a disaster. Romney was the first to catch on.


TOPICS: Business/Economy
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To: Elsie
I was talking about Romney, but my comment about Coakley was referring to Scott Brown’s victory.

Are you trying to twist what I said?

261 posted on 01/24/2010 6:46:43 PM PST by Radix (I am from Massachusetts, and I voted for Scott Brown. You're welcome.)
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To: Diogenesis

That is cute.

Why not just say the Delaware?

The Revolution was won after victories in Trenton and elsewhere. Heading the other direction from the Dark City.

Not quite unlike what we are seeing these days.

You’ll hate him too, soon enough, but for today, he has saved the nation.

We all know it.


262 posted on 01/24/2010 6:52:40 PM PST by Radix (I am from Massachusetts, and I voted for Scott Brown. You're welcome.)
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To: restornu
One-size-fits-all-federalism might have been the perfect system then. But today for a country as full and rich and varied and alive as ours, the old system is a disaster. Romney was the first to catch on.

This writer is clueless. The point of 1787 federalism was that one size would never fit all and that the federal government needed to be strong enough to do a few things and do them well while being limited enough not to do (or attempt) everything.

I wonder whether this writer is even aware that 1776 was not the beginning of federalism. In 1776, we declared independence from Britain. We didn't begin formulating a lasting government until 1783, and that government, the Articles of Confederation, didn't work. Federalism was a philosophy that started in the 1780's.

In advocating that each state devise a system that best meets that state's needs, Mr. Romney is not rejecting the federalism of our Founding Fathers. He is instead embracing that federalism. I wouldn't want to live under the system that Massachusetts has, but I wouldn't want to live under most Massachusetts laws. This guy may be trying to praise Mr. Romney, but he's getting the facts exactly backwards.

263 posted on 01/24/2010 6:59:41 PM PST by WFTR (Liberty isn't for cowards)
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To: big'ol_freeper
Sir, respectfully, I do not see much of a future for Romney in national politics.

I like Sarah...a lot. Ronmey’s light no longer shines here, but for a moment, he saved me from a lot of new taxation.

Scott Brown is likely going to disappoint a lot of folks down the road.....but today....this day...Scott Brown is the man. Today.

You ought to, as I do, appreciate the fact that we might have been Scott free if not for last Tuesday. That could have been ugly.

Lets just revel for a few more days in our wonderful win.

That is what I am doing.

264 posted on 01/24/2010 7:04:35 PM PST by Radix (I am from Massachusetts, and I voted for Scott Brown. You're welcome.)
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To: WFTR

Mass is such a difficult state to run in sense Ted Kennedy machine has diluted so much of what resembles the founding history of America.

It makes you wonder if Teddy sold out after both his brothers were killed.

People have to remember that Mass voted twice for Reagan.


265 posted on 01/24/2010 8:42:17 PM PST by restornu (Separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment.Numbers 16:21)
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To: restornu

Please add me to your LDS Ping List. Thanks.


266 posted on 01/24/2010 10:40:04 PM PST by night reader (NRA Life Member since 1962)
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To: night reader

Welcome night reader you are added to the LDS ping!


267 posted on 01/25/2010 12:26:45 AM PST by restornu (Separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment.Numbers 16:21)
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To: restornu; Servant of the Cross; ansel12; Diogenesis; ejonesie22; Godzilla; greyfoxx39

Thank you, resty.

Your post is a PERFECT example of how the LDS mix Mormonism and Politics and why a RINO like Romney carried Utah.

This is politics, not religion and I think it is beyond naive if you expect non-Mormon political candidates to act in a manner that rank and file Mormons do not.

Wake up and smell the coffee!


268 posted on 01/25/2010 12:52:21 AM PST by reaganaut (It's futile to talk facts to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance)
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To: restornu; Finny; greyfoxx39; ansel12
It is my experience I had as part my conversion that instead of disowning someone who is not in lock step with the template. One should enable encourage another to rise to their better nature. I also want to make known the LDS don’t claim to have any market on this it is just when one is walking the walk they are more likely to practice these attributes

Photobucket

269 posted on 01/25/2010 1:20:22 AM PST by reaganaut (It's futile to talk facts to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance)
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To: All

WARNING: The internet isn't always a nice place of
TRUE CONSERVATIVE values:

To: Chet 99
Huckabee says what he wants in his own name.
Unlike GOP-traitor Mitt Romney's and his minions' knives fresh with the coppery smell of Gov.Palin's and her childrens' blood on them all done secretly, through junior staff's spouses.

143 posted on Monday, November 17, 2008 5:12:53 PM by Diogenesis


http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2133719/posts?page=143#143

270 posted on 01/25/2010 4:14:15 AM PST by GOP_Lady
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To: Radix
Are you trying to twist what I said?

No; I was trying to untwist it.

271 posted on 01/25/2010 4:23:34 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: Radix
I like Sarah...a lot. Ronmey’s light no longer shines here, but for a moment, he saved me from a lot of new taxation.

I have to agree with you.

Sadly though, this is much of the mindset of Americans these days: of not being able to see what the FUTURE is going to bring, painwise, of the pleasure of a temporary 'fix' today.

272 posted on 01/25/2010 4:27:49 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: night reader

You have no enemy with #5?

Big Religion?


273 posted on 01/25/2010 4:28:50 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: night reader; restornu
Please add me to your LDS Ping List.

Fresh members would help, for hardly ANY on it show up in these threads when she uses it...

274 posted on 01/25/2010 4:30:19 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: reaganaut
Wake up and smell the coffee!

Even if your chosen religion forbids you from DRINKING it!

275 posted on 01/25/2010 4:31:30 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: GOP_Lady
You forgot the CONTEXT.....
 

Peeking Out From the McCain Wreckage: Mitt Romney

Someone's got to say it: IS MITT ROMNEY RESPONSIBLE FOR OBAMA'S VICTORY?

Vanity: Team Romney Sabotaged Palin and Continuing to Do So?

Romney Supporters Trashing Palin

Romney advisors sniping at Palin?

Novak: Fred Thompson drop-out rumors traced to Romney campaign

Said Novak: The rumors were "traced in part to Mitt Romney's campaign,
trying to stir up strife between McCain and Thompson
."


276 posted on 01/25/2010 4:34:02 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: GOP_Lady
You insult the memory of Reagan every time you post that.

Shame.

277 posted on 01/25/2010 5:09:53 AM PST by ejonesie22
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To: reaganaut

Your post is a PERFECT example of how the LDS mix Mormonism and Politics and why a RINO like Romney carried Utah.

This is politics, not religion and I think it is beyond naive if you expect non-Mormon political candidates to act in a manner that rank and file Mormons do not.

***

It has nothing to do with any one faith I can only speak from my faith but all Golden rule faiths share the Lord council.

Matthew 7 v12

Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.

Luke 6 v31

And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.

Should be involved and include the Lord in this struggle between good and evil for the survival of this nation.

It is you antis that seek evert opportunity twist turn words for a selfish agenda the LDS try to be good neighbors while you anti LDS daily post why the LDS should not be their neighbor!


278 posted on 01/25/2010 8:59:30 AM PST by restornu (Separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment.Numbers 16:21)
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Comment #279 Removed by Moderator

Comment #280 Removed by Moderator


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