Posted on 08/30/2009 10:25:41 AM PDT by Replace all Democrats
Just before Thanksgiving last year, a group of former aides to Mitt Romney convened at his salmon-colored Belmont home, many of them gathering for the first time since Romney had disbanded his presidential campaign some nine months before. Romney had invited them for a post-mortem of the election weeks earlier, the type of dispassionate assessment that the Harvard Business School alumnus so enjoyed. But over cookies, they found few of the metrics for success that Romney prized -- Republicans had been decisively thumped at all levels -- and his attention shifted from 2008 to the future.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
Nobody questions his military experiences. But is that all you have to show that he was not a disastrous candidate? He was a complete disaster who told us that we should not fear an Obama presidency. I voted for him only because Palin was on the ticket. Why do we need an ethnic Catholic? Please explain.
Jindal/Patraeus 2012
Obama is black and people thought he was Muslim (and I think he is). We had every chance in the world to win that election based on those two things alone. However, McCain’s numbers began slipping as Palin kept getting hit and while I believe that a majority of Americans were ready to put him office, they were not ready for him to die and for her to replace him
2008 should have been a gimme. Black candidate with Muslim roots. Writes a book that contains personal revelations that usually kill politicians. Doesn’t even actually win the nomination by popular vote and large numbers of his primary opponent supporters hated him (and still do). Obama should have been an easy victory, even with the crash. And, you’re obviously a Palin fan and so this is why you feel so strongly but, a lot of us disagree and many of us do hold her responsible for this moron that we have in there now.
There are also other more personal reasons I don’t like Palin but politically she was the wrong person to run in 2008 and she’s even more wrong for 2012. It’s just the way it is. I’d vote for her as nominee but I’d never vote for her in a primary and will probably actively work against her in 2012.
Character, Values, clear Conservative track record. Telegenics are important but trails the other three.
If the masses don't vote for Conservative Values over identity by 2012 the country is doomed plain and simple.
Last thing we need is Palin. It is my honest opinion that she foisted herself onto McCain and that he wasn’t actively seeking her out. I don’t like Palin. I do believe that she cost us a lot of votes. Hispanics and women did not like Obama. However, when Sarah Palin got on the ticket they suddenly put away their anger and hate because of their honest distaste for her.
Interesting observation. Palin who? She came upon the scene much like Dan Quayle did under Bush. Both were unknowns nationally. Why Bush picked Quayle I have no idea but I think McCain picked Palin because of her gender. He was trying to offset one minority candidate with another. He failed big time and Palin sorta got Quayled in the process.
However, since we are on the subject, let us consider the presidential primary season, in general. After all, this process is precisely what saddled the United States with Obama and McCain. While it's a great game to the parasitic consultant cadres, gaming this system with dreams of becoming high-paid legends dancing in their heads, I seriously propose tossing the whole presidential primary system on the grounds that it is both wrong and illegal.
Are the political parties private or public institutions? When asked, their representatives will insist they are private. Further, there is nothing in the U.S. Constitution about political parties except in the literacy and poll tax amendments, where the word "primary" is inserted. Beyond this, the presidential primary is a cobbling together of latter day traditions and arcane state policies, such as "bragging rights," etc., that have the appearance of being as old and revered as Mount Vernon, when most of it came into view with Estes Kefauver in 1952. It was after Lyndon Johnson won the New Hampshire Primary in 1968, and in the years immediately afterward that Republicans were compelled by reforms mostly instituted by the Old New Left in the Democrat Party to hold their delegate selection processes at the same times and places. You can fill in the blanks yourself.
The point is this: no State (let alone the Federal government) should spend a single dime of taxpayer money "aiding" the delegate selection process for a private institution. It comes might close to violation of the First Amendment, it seems to me, but beyond this, it's just wrong. Does it make sense to you that, in North Carolina, for example, a Democrat-run state government decides how the state's Republicans choose their candidates and delegates?
Using the example of North Carolina, again, by the time they held their presidential primary in 2008 both Obama and McCain were essentially already de facto nominees of their parties, as all but the most stalwart in both the "major" national parties had already exited the stage long before. Thus not only Republicans but African Americans in North Carolina had their votes submerged into the larger voting strength of New Hampshire. (Cough, cough.) They were denied the right to an opportunity to select a candidate of their own choosing, and, thus, the whole presidential primary system is illegal, a violation of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (cough.)
Nothing in the make up of the Republican Party or the Republic requires them to allow an inherently hostile entity, like a state government, to decide how they will pick their nominee.
You want more people at your precinct caucuses? You want more attendance at the state convention? You want the opportunity for delegates (who are not getting a golden ticket to attend a media event) to hammer out a nominee?
Bring back the Smoke-filled room, Amigos. Disband the presidential primary process and eliminate this basketball tournament and meat parade farce that allows the most shallow to chose our nominees. Why should New Hampshire, and a handful of other states with wide-open primaries, rigged and run by busloads of imported goons, decide who our Favorite Son or Daughter is to be?
Face it. All the speculation this time two years ago gave John McCain the most outside shot of becoming the nominee. This elaborate game, regulated and run by state governments, is a sham. Instead of gaming and speculating, we need to toss the entire babe out with the bathwater.
“Why do we need an ethnic Catholic? Please explain.”
Catholics vote for the winner. Look at recent elections.
“Idiotic identity politics is the last thing we need”
Needs repeating over and over.
We need conservatives - period.
Please excuse my ignorance...but what is an “ethnic Catholic”?
Thanks!
...Couldn’t get through thAt first page. Admit, I need to stidy about Romney. But, what has me grins, is the Republican Party, “principals”. I’d rather see the Republican Party return to conservative “principles”, instead of looking for “leaders”. If they’re going to get along, bi-partisan, I’m not having it. It’s time to be partisan, take a stand, for individual beliefs. Screw the principals, up with principle. I will debate, but not compromise my core beliefs...
*We need a charming, authentically black authentcally conservative candidate to run against “O” and paint him as the “faux” candidate who is actually white.*
That’s a recipe for ballot-box suicide. Blacks will never vote for a Republican, ever. All the Dems would do is paint the black GOP candidate as an Uncle Tom.
Well you may say that but look at the 2008 primaries and tell me if identity politics did not drive them on both sides when they were competitive. Alabama’s results in both are instructive on that front in terms of which counties and precincts broke for whom.
Also, by running a pro-life Catholic at the top of the ticket Joe Robinette Biden would be put on the spot and while he could probably finesse it like Cuomo always did it wouldn’t be good for that ticket overall, if they are the ones who are renominated in 2012.
You may not like identity politics but it is the way things work in this country. There is a reason why you don’t have German politicians getting elected in Rhode Island and that you don’t have Scots-Irish Pentecostals getting elected in Michigan. People just naturally tend to gravitate towards their own. That 90% Romney got in Utah had nothing to do with policy.
And especially when times are tough such as we are in now, that is when people instinctively retreat back into their neighborhoods, back into their groups and become more responsive to identity politics than ever. Now, we can capitalize on that because Obama does have an identity politics weakness but only if we use the right candidate. That candidate should have the right positions but if the choice is between two candidates that both have the same positions (and are conservative) but one has better numbers for identity politics purposes you take the one with the better numbers
Yes and I have to be honest, knowing Alabama, if the Republican Party ever nominates a black candidate to the Presidency, at least in the next 10 years, white turnout in this state will depress dramatically. It’s just a fact of life and that would be true across much of the South. It’s why the black candidate that is running now doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell.
I voted Alan Keyes.
Not a perfect candidate, but my conscience is clear.
The Republican party leadership consciously decided that they didn’t want or need conservative.
I honored their choice.
Definitions may vary but I would say a Catholic from a family with a strong Catholic lineage.
Maybe he quit paying them?
Kay Belout Hutchison is more a creature of the Beltway than a daughter of Texas. And please explain just how in the hell Palin “forced herself” on McCain?
You don’t have clue one what you’re talking about.
- JP
Eyes will opened, people will get involved, and true conservatism will show as a welcome contrast as in Reagan's day.
Or, maybe not. We might just elect a RINO like Romney and kill off conservatism for decades.
Yes it did and that is why we need to abandon it.
McCain - RINO, looked like a doddering old fool but had a war/pow background.
Romney - RINO, Mormon so automatically generates some bias against him.
Thompson - Conservative, but looked like a doddering old fool and he quit on us.
Huckster - RINO, biggest attribute was sucking up to McCain and torpedoing Romney.
Guiliani - Rino, took a huge gamble on Florida and lost quickly.
Character, Values, Conservative track record PERIOD.
Do what you want, but as for me NO MORE RINOS PERIOD. I will not vote just to win, I will only vote on principles.
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