Posted on 01/15/2015 12:01:03 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Put me down as someone who would really enjoy a contest between Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney. They are both serious and qualified men. I've always loved Romney's mixture of private and public sector experience. Jeb Bush ran a big state that looks a lot like the U.S. They are good patriotic men who have thought hard about the issues confronting the country.
However, they have problems:
1) Romney lost in 2012. Fair or unfair, many people think that he ran a poor campaign. He seemed poised for victory after the first debate and then fell back. Also, a lot of the base was never excited about him. The lack of enthusiasm hurt him specially against the Obama "get out the vote" drive.
2) Bush is Bush, and I don't mean any disrespect to Bush-41 or Bush-43. I'm not sure that the country wants a Bush-45. Maybe that's a little too much Bush, although running against Hillary Clinton would kill that "dynasty" criticism.
Therefore, I think that a Romney vs Bush contest could end up helping a fresh new face named Scott Walker, the very talented and able governor of Wisconsin.
As Caitlin Hailey Burns points out, Walker has a lot going for him:
"While Bush, Romney and Christie compete for the establishment lane, and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and others seek out the conservative base, Walker is fashioning himself as something of a hybrid, capable of winning the hearts of the base and the minds of the center-right.
Walker’s take-no-prisoners approach with unions over collective bargaining rights catapulted him onto the national stage.....
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Scott Walker Calls for RNC Member Who Shared a White Supremacist Article on Facebook to Resign................"It could also put pressure on the Romneys. Mitt Romney, who will speak at the winter meeting, hasn’t called for Agema to step down. Neither has his niece, Ronna Romney McDaniel, who is the committeewoman for Michigan.
Yawn. ZZZzzzzzzz.
Walker is said to be acceptable to the Republican Establishment.
Need I say more.
I want a presidential candidate that is not acceptable to the GOPe.
NRO OpEd linked below is worth a full read before comment [We need to assess the field; issues; tactics; successes.].
Scott Walker, Right Again "Some conservatives are disappointed by Wisconsin governor Scott Walker’s apparent reluctance to push for right-to-work legislation in his new term. Today the Wall Street Journal joins the chorus, calling it “unfortunate that he’s ducking a chance to make Wisconsin the country’s 25th right-to-work state.” But Walker has made it clear that such legislation is not a priority and that he wants to focus instead on education reform and on cutting Wisconsin’s woefully bloated budget....
....As Walker explained to me last May, Wisconsin is already essentially a right-to-work state. The major union power was in the public sector, which was squeezing the state’s finances and economy, and Scott Walker broke that stranglehold in his first term, with the passage of Act 10. Public-sector union membership has fallen by more than 50,000.
Meanwhile, private-sector union membership in Wisconsin is down below 7 percent of the workforce. Basically most people in Wisconsin already have a de facto right not to join a union, because the vast majority of firms are not unionized. A right-to-work law would be great; it just wouldn’t affect that many people.
The political downsides, on the other hand, are considerable. Private-sector unions in the Badger State have much more public support than membership, which means that right-to-work legislation will antagonize many more people than it will benefit.
The Journal notes that Wisconsin’s economy is lagging behind that of other Midwestern states. But that has little to do with its status as a union state under the National Labor Relations Act. The main reason, as I have argued, is that the state’s budget is bloated and imposes a crushing tax burden on Wisconsin’s businesses and working families. Even after billions in tax cuts under Walker, per capita state spending in Wisconsin is the highest of any state in the Midwest, including Illinois. In per capita terms, its state budget is twice as big as that of Texas.
Dramatically reducing the overall size of the state’s government is by far the most urgent priority for Wisconsin’s conservative reforms — and it will require a lot of political capital. Every dollar in the budget has a powerful special interest gunning for it, and those special interests fall across the political spectrum. Cutting the budget will require both Republican and Democratic legislators to defy some of their most important constituents.......
.......To be sure, right-to-work legislation is the right public policy. Interference with efficient labor markets is always fraught, and the federal labor laws are among the most awful legacies of the New Deal. The Texas model of letting as much competitive oxygen into the economy as possible is clearly best.
Wisconsin very simply has bigger problems right now than right-to-work. And the whole country has a stake in Walker’s successfully tackling them. The reason Walker matters is that, more than any other Republican governor, he is demonstrating how to build a broad coalition for historic conservative reforms, a coalition that includes independents and Democrats. With the exception of President George W. Bush’s tax cuts, that hasn’t been seen in a conservative leader since Ronald Reagan.
Actually getting things done in government means building coalitions for your agenda. That should never be an excuse for compromising on principle. But it is a good reason to avoid needlessly antagonizing the opposition and polarizing the electorate along party lines for little practical benefit.
Conservative reforms will succeed only if they benefit the great majority of working families. The key is for legislators to champion the public interest over the special interests — including the special interests that support them. That’s Walker’s formula for success, and Wisconsin’s conservatives should stick with it."
Let's hope the Republicrats split their vote and let Cruz or Walker win.
“Let’s hope the Republicrats split their vote and let Cruz or Walker win. “
I’m Texan, and would/will support either. But, I don’t think Cruz will run. I like Walker as he’s a real Conservative who can deliver some states that Cruz may not.
Walker, Cruz, Paul, Perry, Bachmann, Palin...all names I would vote for if the GOP primary process works out for them. Romney, Bush, Christie...all names I will note vote for with a gun to my head.
I will NOT vote for Jeb, Mitt or any other RINO that the GOP again foists upon us.
Real true conservative or go fish.
Enough smoke has been blown up our wazoos what with Dole, Mitt, McLame etc.
I’ll vote for him.
Things will not get better in this country if you do.....
Probably because Walker is pro-amnesty.
Bringing the government employee unions under control is a necessity in the present economic turmoil we are experiencing and hats off to Walker for doing that.
That makes him an austerian acceptable to the elites because the story of government spending worldwide now and the future will be the simultaneous cutting of spending by government and raising of taxes to sustain the welfare states.
Walker is for amnesty and he also was quick to throw in the towel on gay marriage not appealing the lower court ruling.
I personally don’t believe in fighting gay marriage as a issue, but believe resistance is necessary because of the grave threat posed by its proponents.
The GM movement is not going to stop with just legalizing gay marriage, they intend to impose their will on all churches, businesses, institutions and individuals.
The GM’ers have defined their enemies as the Klan and Nazis justifying a never ending campaign of harassment and legal actions aimed at anyone who opposes gay marriage and homosexuality.
Of course its the GM movement that are the fascists and the Republicans are caving to them like people did in Germany.
When Brendan Eich was forced out of the tech industry in the last year, he was treated like Jewish business owners were in Germany in 1933.......
No way, dude. Scott Walker once said something that some FReeper misunderstood and took the wrong way, which means Scott Walker is a RINO!
Nothing’s stopping gay marriage. And, sadly, government unions are not a priority with the GOPe—or we would have seen action on it.
Walker thought he was simply following in the footsteps of Mitch Daniels in IN by finding a way via the unions to make his state budgets work better, so he’d be a viable national candidate. He had no idea he was walking into a hornets’ nest that he barely made it through via the recall.
The big issue is amnesty, since that’ll assure we have a leftist voting majority—which is fine with the leftist-sympathetic, short-sighted, and selfish GOPe pols.
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