Posted on 05/28/2011 7:29:57 PM PDT by techno
Stalking-horse definition:
1)Means to disguising a real objective
2)A deceptive candidate who is on the ballot or enters an election only to divide the opposition (eg conservative vote) so that his friend or ally can win the election coming up the middle
In sports, there is an old saying: A team doesn't control its own destiny.
In other words a team finds that it has to rely on another team not doing well or screwing up in order to advance to the playoffs themselves.
In respect to the GOP primaries, CONSERVATIVES do control their own destiny.
Roughly for every 1 liberal and moderate voter there will be in the GOP primaries 2 conservative voters.
In addition Rasmussen at end of January 2011 found that of the entire GOP primary electorate in 2012, 40% of it will be comprised of GOP Tea Party members.
And via the 2008 exit polls it was determined that about 40% of the GOP primary vote then was comprised of evangelical Christians. I don't expect that to change in 2012.
(Obviously there is some overlap with TP members and evangelical voters.)
Poll after poll has shown that Mitt Romney doesn't do well among social conservatives, Tea Party members or folks who self-identify as VERY CONSERVATIVE or evangelical voters. I am not telling you anything that most of you do not know already.
Mitt Romney is NOT a stupid man, plus he has a team of advisers that are pretty savvy. Imho, they have determined there is only one sure-fired way to win the nomination and beat Sarah Palin, which is to set up 1 or 2 viable stalking-horses (eg Bachmann and Cain) to bleed conservative votes away from Palin during the vote and also to stop as many former Huckabee supporters from filtering over to Palin's tent over time.
As the definition of stalking-horse indicates these candidates have no intention of winning the GOP nomination. Instead they are only in the race to stop Sarah Palin from winning the nomination by winning conservative votes that might have gone to her if they were not in the race.
So what does this mean for conservatives. CONSERVATIVES, you do absolutely control your own destiny in the GOP primaries. If you really want to exercise your newfound clout in the most meaningful way and also set the stage for the defeat of President Obama in 2012, I am imploring you to eventually settle on one CONSERVATIVE candidate, and then coalesce behind him or her 100%.
As a Palinista, I hope you settle on Sarah Palin but if you choose to go with either Bachmann or Cain so be it. But for God's sake settle on one conservative and try to convince your conservative family members, friends, neighbors, golf buddies, club members, work associates and anybody who is conservative to adopt the same approach to the 2012 primaries. You must warn them of the consequences of not doing so.
Bottom line: You can't allow Mitt Romney to come up the middle.
As an example of what I am talking about:
First here are two recent PPP state polls in Ohio and Wisconsin conducted post-Huckabee:
Among voters who self-identify as VERY CONSERVATIVE:
a) OHIO
ROMNEY PALIN + BACHMANN + CAIN TOTAL
13 20 15 13 48
VERY CONSERVATIVE (VC) voters give their votes to conservative candidates over Romney by a 3.5 to 1 margin but Romney overall wins the Ohio state poll over Palin 21% to 16% because he dominates among moderates.
b)WISCONSIN
ROMNEY PALIN + BACHMANN + CAIN TOTAL
12 16 17 12 45
Again we see VC voters divvying up their votes three ways among conservative candidates by a 3.5 to 1 margin but again Romney dominates among moderates and wins overall 17% to 16% over Palin.
And finally a lesson from the 2008 GOP primaries in South Carolina (SC). Mike Huckabee dominated among evangelical voters picking up 46% of their vote but only 30% of the overall vote. At the same time Fred Thompson who has been rumored as a stalking-horse for John McCain picked up 15% of the vote in SC, much of it from conservatives, a good portion of it probably would have gone to Huckabee. This allowed John McCain to edge out Huckabee 33% to 30%.
Why was this significant? Charlie Crist, then Governor of Florida soon endorsed McCain. McCain went on to win Florida which was a must-win state for Romney and after Super Tuesday Mitt threw in the towel.
The $64,000 question: Would McCain still have won the nomination if Huckabee had won both Iowa and SC? I think an argument could have been made that Florida might have been tougher for McCain and Mitt might have stayed in.
What I do know however is that the win by McCain in SC had a great deal with McCain eventually winning the nomination which allowed him to pick Sarah Palin as his running mate several months later.
Ironically what may have propelled Sarah Palin into the national spotlight in 2008, the stalking-horse phenomenon, has the potential to derail and sink her presidential ambitions in 2012.
Are you REALLY trying to say Bachmann and Cain are stalking for Romney?
Romney for all his money doesn’t even do as well as this indicates.
Because every other RINO running takes votes from him.
It is not as if he has improved his chances from 2008.
He is a weaker candidate now than he was then.
The possibility did cross my mind.
Cain is a legitimate candidate and so far the only true conservative who has declared.
Her ain’t no damn stalking horse here to open the sluice for RINOmney.
One thing I do know: Sarah Palin is NOT stalking for Romney or anybody else.
This is absolutely spot on. I like Michelle Bachmann, but not as president. Ditto Cain. Neither of them are effective enough beyond their normal spheres to be president. For everyone’s sake, I hope Michelle realizes that her newfound pop amongst the lamestream is cooked.
Same with Cain. He is affable and he is black...and that’s it.,,a passing fad candidate, the anti-bam. THAT is as far as it goes.
In my opinion, a Palin/West ticket is unbeatable by anyone except G-d Almighty.
“Bottom line: You can’t allow Mitt Romney to come up the middle.”
I think any conservative feels this is a correct statement.
We want there to be a conservative (solidly conservative in moral/social issues as well of fiscal). The GOP needs to run against Obama a CLEARLY different choice than him.
Romney could have been President.
All he had to say was that Romneycare sucked, it won’t work, it was a bad mistake.
He didn’t say that and he blew it.
As much as I love Cain, I love West more and think he would be the perfect asset for Palin with his military background.
I like Bachmann and Cain but they take votes from Palin and will leave Romney the winner, I am afraid. I don’t think they have as much chance as Palin does or the gravitas to win. The hatred for Palin is actually an asset, since it will expose a lot of ugly leftists. They can’t help themselves to say the most vile things about her....it will help us in the end, I think. Something needs to shake up the zombie voter public and make them think more about issues than Oprah.
They are usually wrong but who cares enough to remind them after the elections?
Throw a bunch of numbers out there that make no sense, and the ignorant or confused voter will assume he is just too stupid to understand. This moron's explanation is clear as mud.
But he thinks he's really wise.
NOT!
The threat of Romney’s a great reason to pass up Bachmann or Cain, but I can’t believe those two are stalking-horses for him.
In my opinion, a Palin/West ticket is unbeatable by anyone except G-d Almighty.
There needs to be a Cain, West, and Bachmann in the mix for my vote and any others I can influence. Come to think of it I add Perry to the mix.
I disagree with your stalking horse situation. Both Cain and Bachmann are true conservatives and will work with Palin to determine who has the best chance of winning. They will work together to get a real conservative in office.
The stalking horses are among the multitude of RINOs who have entered or who have been threatening to enter into the race. Each one of them is controlled by the beltway boys and party elites who have even been able to get people like Michael Reagan, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity to declare them to be strong conservative candidates when they are really liberals pretending to be conservatives.
There is a stalking horse game being played but the game is coming from the elites through the RINOs. They are attempting to deceive the unwary. The names of these stalking horses are Jon Huntsman, Tim Pawlenty, Rick Perry and any other RINO of the minute that the elites and MSM try to get people to support. None of them have any chance to win but can peel off the few conservatives they can deceive just like what happened in NY 26. They lessen the chance a real conservative will get that conservative vote. The goal of their subterfuge is to prevent the real conservatives from winning.
So don’t put the blame on Cain and Bachmann, who are the true conservatives running. Take a close look at the RINO stalking horses and the people, even those here on this site, who are working like crazy to get conservatives to support their RINO candidates.
Sarah Palin is in the catbird seat, but I don’t think the nomination as you put it is “in hand”.
We are barely into the second quarter of the game. A lot of water has to go under the bridge yet including the topic of this thread.
Will conservatives continue to split their votes among several conservative candidates or will they coalesce behind one name and make it a showdown between Palin and Romney?
Frankly I don’t know the answer to that question and perhaps that is why I wrote this thread to gain some insight on the issue.
The GOP establishment isn’t stupid enough to get into the stalking horse game and bleed votes away from Mitt.
That is why a Huntsman candidacy I predict will NOT gain much traction.
And the GOP establishment will do everything in its power to convince Newt to terminate his bid for the WH sooner than later.
And T-Paw, who is he playing to? He is veering right trying to play to evangelicals. I am NOT saying T-Paw is a stalking horse but I will say he may end up performing like one in the end if he doesn’t get his numbers up soon.
Ridiculous, idnit?
If anyone is a stalking horse it is Cain. He did support Romney for President in 2008 however I must be honest that I don’t really think it is a plan on his part. If he wanted to be a stalking horse he’d be running far right instead he’s managed to muddle his message somewhat. Cain will collapse if Palin get’s in. Bachman isn’t going to run against Palin. If anything she has been a placeholder for Palin plus there very well may be a plan to between Bachman and Palin to run the first two woman ticket. The establishment should just accept the fact that a solid conservative is the only candidate that is going to be acceptable. A global warming environut, govt health care crafting, illegal immigrant hiring Mormon isn’t going to be the nominee. Neither is Huntsman. Why can’t they just for once just do what we did with Reagan and beat the living crap out of the left together? Is promoting left leaning big govt and social issues so damn important to GOP establishment Rhinos? If they would just join the team they’d reap the benefits but they need to accept the fact that if they really want to be Republicans they need to approach things from the Right and stop supporting liberty encroaching big govt and acting as though they are ashamed of the patriots on whose votes they count. I don’t expect them to be as pro-life as I am but I do expect them not to promote abortion. I don’t expect them to be as pro traditional family as I am but i do expect them not to be promoting homosexuality and other deviant behavior using the heavy hand of the federal govt. I don’t expect them to be even as small govt oriented as I am provided they orient their plans for govt so that the citizen who pays has a say and can opt out of big govt programs.
I don’t think those requirements are too much to ask. We each have things we care about more strongly than others. All I expect is that they won’t be taking up the causes of the left and stabbing us and the tax payers in the back.
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