Posted on 11/09/2008 3:27:03 PM PST by GVnana
Aides blast accusations, not from Mitt camp
By Dave Wedge
Saturday, November 8, 2008 -
Mitt Romneys camp is firing back at reports his foot soldiers are behind a brutal smear campaign against Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin in a backdoor strategy to position the former Bay State governor for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination.
Its a completely absurd allegation that is totally divorced from the truth, Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said.
Fox News, the New York Times [NYT] and Newsweek have reported on a host of criticisms of Palin, including that she threw tantrums that made staffers cry and didnt know Africa was a continent. Several media outlets reported some of the leaks came from within the McCain campaign. But the political blog, The Palmetto Scoop, citing very good sources, said it was Romney loyalists working for McCain who were behind the premeditated last minute sabotage of Palin.
Fehrnstrom took issue with the Scoops claim that as much as 80 percent of Romneys campaign staff went to work for Sen. John McCains team after the GOP primary. Only a handful of Romney operatives joined the Arizona senators campaign, he said.
The truth is, there are no former Romney staffers in senior roles at the McCain campaign, Fehrnstrom said. I can think of a handful of people, maybe three or four, who went over, all in junior positions.
However, Romneys former campaign spokesman Kevin Madden was among the ex-Romney staffers to bash Palin. In an interview on CNN just a week before the election, Madden called Palin unseasoned and questioned whether she should have been McCains pick.
When you put out an unknown and you give them 70 days with which to go through a vetting process, both by voters and the national press corps, ugly things can tend to happen, Madden said.
Since McCains loss, Palin has been accused of dragging down the ticket in what her spokeswoman Meg Stapleton reportedly called a circling firing squad.
GOP strategist Holly Robichaud, who writes the Lone Republican blog for the Herald, said: Its definitely Romneys people. Theyve been doing it for a while. Romney is thinking about running again in 2012 and he needs to kill off Sarah Palin in order to get there.
Romney himself has defended Palin, calling her a positive addition to the ticket in an appearance on CBS Early Show a week before the election.
For a first-time candidate on the national stage . . . youre subject to the national spotlight. Its more like a national torch, Romney said. She has been able to keep cool under the pressure.
Meanwhile, a new Rasmussen poll shows that 64 percent of Republicans want Palin to be the GOP presidential candidate in 2012 while 11 percent prefer Romney.
“There are some [who]would prefer it if I would simply distance myself from my religion, say that it is more a tradition than my personal conviction, or disavow one or another of its precepts. That I will not do. I believe in my Mormon faith and I endeavor to live by it. My faith is the faith of my fathers I will be true to them and to my beliefs.
“Some believe that such a confession of my faith will sink my candidacy. If they are right, so be it. But I think they underestimate the American people. Americans do not respect believers of convenience. Americans tire of those who would jettison their beliefs, even to gain the world.”
Mitt Romney, December 6, 2007.
Romney is not one of us.
Maybe not, but sure is nice to look at...
Maybe someone else will come forth. I just don't think trashing any possible Republicans/Conservatives does us any good. There are plenty on the other side who do that. And until you can come up with proof of Romney's offenses, the accusations you make seem to be just based on a personal disdain for the man or his faith.
FRiend, there is no hate from the Romney critics.
There is documentation of bad behavior by Romney,
and to find it yourself: use the **search** engine or
Google or hit a few of the URLs and links.
Only the RomneyBOTs have shown hate, ad hominem, and
lack of explanation for their and Romney’s treason
against conservatives, or Romney’s
[fill in] _____________ (socialized medicine, 2nd amendment,
gay marriage, illegal aliens at this mansion, shapeshifting,
backstabbing, fake LEO badges, pushpull polls against GOP
...).
The only time religion is brought up is by his defenders.
It happens over and over and over. Romney’s defenders
attack and lie and attack. No wonder their knives have
Gov. Palin’s childrens’ ‘blood’ on them. At this site,
they attacked the VP Candidate UNTIL, AND THROUGH, THE
DAY OF THE ELECTION.
If you really care about the facts, go to the links
yourself, then decide yourself. We did.
FM DJ, you are in even better form than usual, just darned ELOQUENT throughout this thread! Man o manishevitz.
I, like many others here, regard Romney "bashing" as a timely and worthy battle that is NOT divisive to the party, but unifying because Romney is a Trojan Horse threat to Republican limited government principle and needs to be rooted out asap. The fight against him needs to start NOW.
Thank you. It is oh-so-true. “Trojan horse” is a frequent description I’ve used for these RINOs... Democrat agents to destroy the GOP from within (because as discovered eons ago, it’s much easier to destroy your opponent once you’re inside their camp).
Pray tell, why do we not adopt such hardcore tactics to similarly undermine THEIR party ? Perhaps because our TOO trusting and naive party gets taken by these confidence men, while the Dems, already being chock-full of these folks, usually can spot those a mile away and they give ‘em the bums’ rush out of the building before they reach the elevator. A crooked party they are, but with a helluva lot more street smarts than we have...
The only way to assure every state’s vote’s count would be a national primary.
I’d like a closed national primary in May with instant runoff voting but that’s likely a non-starter among the unimaginative.
NH and IA are ludicrous. And no one has the balls to say “no more” to these little bastards “traditional” status.
You make good points but it’s really not fair 2 small states have such disproportional power to choose the President. A better way should be reached.
This reminds Conservatives of Romney's fake badges and attacks on Sen Thompson.
Novak: Fred Thompson drop-out rumors traced to Romney campaign
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.