Posted on 02/07/2008 3:30:55 PM PST by Colofornian
SALT LAKE CITY -- Mitt Romney's withdrawal from the presidential race Thursday caught some of his most devoted supporters by surprise and disappointed many who hoped the nation would elect its first Mormon president.
Romney, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints like 60 percent of the Utah's residents, had raised more than $5.2 million here and won the state's primary on Tuesday with almost 90 percent of the Republican vote.
"I'm very disappointed," said state Senate President John Valentine, R-Orem. "Of course I wanted him to go all the way. But what I view him doing is that he's withdrawing now for the benefit of the party."
With the notable exception of popular Republican Gov. Jon Huntsman, who endorsed Arizona Sen. John McCain, nearly every Republican politician in the state backed Romney.
"There'll be a fairly strong sense of disappointment," said University of Utah political scientist Matthew Burbank. "John McCain, for whatever set of reasons, has never been all that popular with Utah voters."
Exit poll data from Tuesday's primary elections showed Utah Republican voters cared more about presidential candidates' personal qualities than their positions on issues, the opposite of the national trend in Super Tuesday voting.
Many Utah voters said they trusted Romney on economic issues. He is widely praised here for running the profitable 2002 Salt Lake Winter Olympics.
In most Super Tuesday states, Republican voters said they thought Romney was only slightly better equipped to manage the economy than front-runner John McCain. But in Utah, nine out of 10 GOP voters said they would trust Romney most with the nation's finances.
Burbank said there's little question Republicans here will come around to support McCain in a general election. Utah is one of the nation's most conservative states, and President Bush won re-election in 2004 with 72 percent of the vote.
I guess this in part explains the almost 90% vote for Romney in Utah. (Now does this mean if a Southern voter cared more about the "personal qualities" of a candidate they're a "bigot," but if a Utah voter cared more about the "personal qualities" of a candidate, they're not?)
I say enough with liberal-tactics of name-calling! These voters, Utah and non-Utah alike, were just exercise their voter rights to weigh multi-faceted qualities in a free republic! But for others who have raised the "bigotry" angle and charge, they need to be challenged to be consistent. Whatever they've aimed at nation-wide Christian voters would be an across-the-board charge applicable to Utah voters as well.
Good grief, give it a rest already.
Now. The past is over. I intend to concentrate of defeating the Democrats--which means supporting the Republican nominee.
true.
Never knew much about him. If he had put on a
public relations program for a year or two before
he entered the jungle of Presidential politics..he
may have got more of a start and acceptance..but
then the media, or computer gurus, seem to have held
him down and he spent too much time on the Morman
faith..at this juncture. I just think a better PR
campaign ahead of time was lacking...too long. JK
Yeah, the gloat patrol is out in full force this afternoon...the glee is palpable.
Glee is good. Gloat is even better! Regards from the Fred Thompson supporters.
I was disappointed with Mormons, blacks and, to a lesser extent, some evangelicals, in this election cycle.
The obvious bias of mormons (Utah voting 90% Romney being the most obvious example) in favor of Romney candidly was surprising to me. My limited interactions with Mormons have been largely positive, but this was a clear example of group think.
The black turn out for Obama (96% or something) is sadly less surprising, as that culture (on the Democratic side, anyway) has bought into victim identity politics.
That ANY evangelicals that fell for Christian Socialist Huckabee (as they did disproportionately, but not as bad as the other groups) was similiarly sad. I recall numerous posts to the effect of “I know Huckabee’s a pinko, but he’s one of us.” Group think again.
Republicans should be above this type of identity politics — Christian, Jewish, Mormon, black, or white. (And no, I am not saying Mormons are not Christian in that previous sentence.)
Good for you.
Well, far be it from me to spoil all the fun. You guys must be a real blast at funerals.
Colorfornian is consistently on the Anti-Mormon side of the aisle and this is just more of the bigoted rancorous vitriol that has proven the left can divide and conquer conservatives if they play the right tune. The tune they played this time has always been foreign to them but they knew that it could be used as a divider and ended up winning big! The tune is Religion: All christians are equal...just some are more equal!
Contrary to the way some posters here try to paint him, Romney is a liberal, all his political life he was a liberal until he decided he wanted to be president. I am happy that he’s gone.
The article points out that most Mormons, will support the republican candidate, so will I. If that’s John McCain, so be it. He, or any other republican candidate, is preferable to the awful alternative of Hillary or Obama.
I have pretty much sworn off reading the comments sections on these threads about politics, I still read the articles though. The non stop bashing of McCain, the presumptive nominee, is some what understandable but will it still be going on at F.R. after the convention? I hope not. It is of the utmost importance that neither of the 2 democrats/socialists become president in ‘09.
Thanks for posting this article.
Opposing a belief system doesn't equate to being against the person. What? Are you saying every atheist or agnostic who is against Christianity is also a "bigot?"
(Oh, and nice job talking about the messenger & not the article content...nice deflection...but of course, when folks are faced with their own double-minded inconsistencies, I expect some of them to lash out)
I have no doubt that Huckabee and even more accurately, Huckabee’s supporters, did more to unite Mormons around Romney than what might have otherwise been possible. People tend to rally when they face adversity, and I saw more than enough anti-Mormon bigotry over these past few months to last a lifetime.
No doubt and likewise the Democrat implication of conservative Christians as knuckle-draggers helped to solidify the GOP evangelical block.
As a Protestant (indeed a Presbyterian), I look at this from the perspective as someone who is in the mainstream moreso than most evangelicals, and yet who can also look on history and see that the Catholic Church indeed has some deal of propriety in claiming that it is the One True Church. It makes the uproar over Mormons or evangelicals seem rather unnecessary and counterproductive.
I hope you’re correct — but a similar metric that spanned the entire campaign was contributions -— 92% of all money donated to candidates from Utah went to Romney.
Between the two metrics (votes and money), the bias is pretty clear.
Were it not for the plethora of southern-bashing bigotry then to galvanize his base of support, that election might have actually been decided on the basis of issues.
Just like this election now. Once again, the enemedia gets to decide and the sheeple will follow.
President Clinton finished 3rd in Utah in his last run. Mitt's rescuing of the Olympics made a huge impact on all Utahans. You act as though they backed him only because he shared their religion. Ask Harry Reid how much money his campaign got from Mormons. Please give the people of Utah some respect. They can think for themselves.
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