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Mitch, Mitt, And The Race They Can Win (GOP Establishment Alert)
The Episconixonian ^ | February 25, 2012 | John Taylor

Posted on 02/26/2011 8:17:18 AM PST by Rufii

Mitch, Mitt, And The Race They Can Win

By John Taylor

Gov. Mitch Daniels of Indiana is, according to current criteria, a moderate Republican, which is to say an authentic Reaganite. His mentors include respected centrists such as William Ruckelshaus and Richard Lugar. Now David Brooks and Andrew Sullivan want him to run for president in 2012. I'm a little confused about why fans of a more pragmatic conservatism would feel that way. Assuming an incumbent's advantage in a recovering economy, President Obama will probably be reelected. Why waste a candidate who could win in an open year?

Presidential elections aren't parlor games, I realize. Both parties should try as hard as they can to win in order to keep debates vigorous and urgent and give voters a real choice as well as be in the position to exploit the vagaries of circumstance. A young first-term senator from Illinois didn't start out expecting to beat Hillary Clinton. No one expected the September 2008 financial crisis to guarantee the election of whichever Democrat had been nominated.

No, you never know what will happen in politics. You also don't know what's going to happen when a .240 singles hitter steps to the plate, but you can make a pretty good guess. As political scientists have shown and common sense confirms, the smartest money and best candidates have a tendency to stay away from riskier races. The last year a Democratic incumbent was up was 1996, when Bill Clinton, thanks to his survivor's instinct and the ministrations of the great triangulator Dick Morris, seemed well positioned for reelection. So the GOP anointed Bob Dole, a respected warhorse about whom no one seemed especially enthusiastic.

But as the open election of 2000 approached, the drum beat for George W. Bush began two years or more before election day. In Republican circles you could feel the influence and moneymassing behind him. That's not happening now with any candidate because most of them (such as Daniels, I'd think) are wondering whether this is really the right time to run. All things being equal, the best nominee, whoever he or she is, will be naturally disinclined, since a better chance looms for a shift to the GOP four years later. It will be an especially tough call for Mitt Romney, who lost a strenuous bid for the nomination in 2008 and can't risk being a two-time loser.

Losing matters less to true believers such as those conservatives who, in Richard Nixon's deathless formulation, would rather be right than president. The likes of Daniels and Romney would be wise to leave 2012 to any one of the tea party's Quixotes. Assuming I've read the tea leaves correctly and Obama wins, we'd see if in 2016 the GOP wanted to try to get another pot out a used bag or come back toward the center where the voters are.



TOPICS: Politics
KEYWORDS: 2012; daniels; gigarinoromney; kilorinoromney; megarinoromney; rinoromney; romney; romneybigdig; romneycare; romneydeathpanel; romneytherino
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John Taylor, the former director of the Nixon Presidential Library and a former aide to President Nixon, is an Episcopalian clergyman.
1 posted on 02/26/2011 8:17:20 AM PST by Rufii
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To: Rufii

An incumbents advantage in a recovering economy?.

Where is the recovering economy.

If you think it’s bad now , wait until gas price’s hit $5.00 or more.


2 posted on 02/26/2011 8:22:30 AM PST by Venturer
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To: Rufii
“a moderate Republican, which is to say an authentic Reaganite”

Reagan, who they said was way too much a far right radical to ever win an election, is now a “moderate Republican”?

Based upon what and compared to who?

3 posted on 02/26/2011 8:26:33 AM PST by allmendream (Tea Party did not send the GOP to D.C. to negotiate the terms of our surrender to socialism.)
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To: Rufii

He’s all over the place in what he’s saying here: “Obama will, probably, win re-election in ‘12.”; “Anything can happen in politics.”


4 posted on 02/26/2011 8:27:56 AM PST by johnthebaptistmoore (If leftist legislation that's already in place really can't be ended by non-leftists, then what?)
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To: Rufii

no more RINOs

Mitt is a doooosh who invented zer0bamacare.

which episocopal group is this guy taylor with....the gay marriage sect???

and Nixon was another ‘one world rino’, who thought that wage and price freezes was the way to go....


5 posted on 02/26/2011 8:30:11 AM PST by Vaquero ("an armed society is a polite society" Robert A. Heinlein)
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To: Rufii

Both are RINOs!


6 posted on 02/26/2011 8:30:43 AM PST by A. Morgan
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To: Venturer
The government workers screaming to maintain their taxpayer funded cadillac benefits/salaries/inefficiencies are going to face a huge backlash when gas prices rise to $5/gallon. The middle class private sector taxpayers who are funding these government workers, their unions bosses, and political contributions/activities/campaigns/bribes can't take much more strain on their wallet!
7 posted on 02/26/2011 8:31:19 AM PST by KansasGirl
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To: Rufii

In general, one in a world where there was nobody better running. More specifically, one in a world where Sarah Palin either didn’t exist or wasn’t running. Just to be clear, that only gets them to the nomination. That’s not a guarantee they’d actually win the general.


8 posted on 02/26/2011 8:31:44 AM PST by RichInOC (Palin 2012: The Perfect Storm.)
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To: Rufii
Gov. Mitch Daniels of Indiana is, according to current criteria, a moderate Republican, which is to say an authentic Reaganite

The Nixonians had no use for Reagan, and now they want to claim his mantle?

I remember the Nixonians of 1976 and 1980. They had no use for Reagan and called him an extremist. He was one of those quixotic tea partiers running against an incumbent who was due to hit a recovery real soon now.
9 posted on 02/26/2011 8:32:44 AM PST by Dr. Sivana (There is no salvation in politics.)
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To: Rufii

the establishment gop actually think the economy is improving so have no problem with obama being president for another 4 years


10 posted on 02/26/2011 8:33:09 AM PST by 4rcane
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To: Rufii

Episcopal = Gay.


11 posted on 02/26/2011 8:34:49 AM PST by fieldmarshaldj (~"This is what happens when you find a stranger in the Amber Lamps !"~~)
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To: Rufii
You also don't know what's going to happen when a .240 singles hitter steps to the plate, but you can make a pretty good guess.

Well, I'd guess he would get a base hit 80% as often as a .300 hitter. Of course, he might be a slugger in which case his hit is more likely a double or home run, where he gets to bring in other base runners on the same team. I might prefer the .240 hitter in that case. When the bases are loaded with two outs, it might be better to have Ron Cey or Dave Kingman up than Pete Rose, if you are down four runs.
12 posted on 02/26/2011 8:36:07 AM PST by Dr. Sivana (There is no salvation in politics.)
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To: Dr. Sivana

On base percentage is actually more important than batting average - a walk is as good as a hit.


13 posted on 02/26/2011 8:40:17 AM PST by bwc2221
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No thanks.

Palin/West 2012.

14 posted on 02/26/2011 8:41:48 AM PST by NoRedTape
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To: Rufii

Well, this guy really doesn’t seem to know what on earth he’s talking about. But I’m glad to have a RINO confirm my opinion that Mitch Daniels is a “moderate.”


15 posted on 02/26/2011 8:43:15 AM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: Rufii

Blah, blah, blah....WRONG AGAIN!
Wake up and smell whatever goes for coffee these days.
Listen:THERE IS NO MIDDLE ANYMORE! The Obama polarization has destroyed it for at least the next election cycle.
Think a dumbell graph on the political spectrum—not the usual bell curve. We have a bulge on the Liberal left, and one on the Conservative right, with very little in the “middle” anymore.
To WIN, we need a candidate who can increase the size of that bulge on the right.
NOT another RINO!


16 posted on 02/26/2011 8:44:36 AM PST by Flintlock
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To: Rufii

Sorry. If I was going to vote for a liberal, I’d vote for one with his mask off.

But I’m not, either way.


17 posted on 02/26/2011 8:48:14 AM PST by EternalVigilance (But what is Freedom? Rightly understood, a universal license to be good. -- Hartley Coleridge)
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To: Rufii

If any of these pathetic liberals (RINO’s) win, we’re sunk. And by “we” I do mean America.


18 posted on 02/26/2011 8:49:03 AM PST by fwdude (Anita Bryant was right.)
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To: Rufii
Gov. Mitch Daniels of Indiana is good for Indiana BUT not good for the United States.. his "vision" is too weak..

Whats needed is a machete wielding trail blazer..

A no nonsense guy like Chris Christy ( not him ) but one like him..

A Union busting fire bug, a HIVE destroying varmintator, a Nest burning Bird Dog, Who IS THAT?..

Probably a republican WOMAN... not a man.. i.e. Palin, Bachmann, Malkin, Ingraham, Coulter, hopefully all of the above.. in some capacity..

19 posted on 02/26/2011 8:59:00 AM PST by hosepipe (This propaganda has been edited to include some fully orbed hyperbole....)
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To: Vaquero
Wages and price freezes have been a bad idea from the time of Diocletian!

“If you saw the size and quality of the fruit I grow in my gardens with my own hands, you would speak to me no more of Empire” Diocletian

20 posted on 02/26/2011 8:59:41 AM PST by allmendream (Tea Party did not send the GOP to D.C. to negotiate the terms of our surrender to socialism.)
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