Posted on 12/14/2011 5:30:22 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
It’s now a three-way race before voting begins for the Republican presidential nomination. as either Newt Gringrich, Mitt Romney, or Rick Perry will be the GOP standard-bearer to challenge President Obama.
The same pundits that have confidently miscalled the GOP race all along are now declaring it’s a two-way race between former Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Governor Mitt Romney.
They’re wrong. Either man might be the nominee, but not necessarily.
Romney is the former frontrunner. He’s educated, polished, and has tremendous private-sector success and some high-level public experience. He even has a picturesque family.
But a majority of Republican primary voters do not support this consummate establishment candidate. He has a record of flip-flopping on issues that should be consistent because they should arise from a personal worldview and set of core principles that usually hold steady throughout a person’s adult life.
Newt is the current frontrunner. He’s brilliant, knowledgeable, articulate, and experienced across a wide spectrum of policy and political issues.
But he has serious weaknesses. There are matters of personal conduct that shock many core Republican primary voters, and policy issues such as previously believing the federal government can impose a healthcare individual mandate or pursue cap-and-trade to more recent issues involving immigration.
There’s also a bombastic tendency, seen in kicking a Middle-East hornet’s nest with the Palestinians, backhanding Paul Ryan’s reform plans, and attacking capitalism by vilifying Romney’s business success.
And Newt tops it off by proposing that instead of three coequal branches in our federal government, Congress and the president should destroy judicial independence by subjugating the federal courts. This would abolish the courts’ power to uphold the Constitution when the political branches violate it (such as with Obamacare).
But there’s no perfect candidate. So all that said, one of them might win the nomination and become the next president of the United States.
However, these flaws are sufficiently serious that there is room for a third candidate to emerge. Romney is stable but has not been able to rise above 25 percent. Gingrich has had a meteoric rise but could misstep and implode just as quickly.
Who could it be? Filing deadlines are past in many states and talk of a brokered convention is fanciful; it’s almost certainly someone currently on the stage.
Jon Huntsman is at low single digits because he’s shown contempt for the GOP base and he’s about as exciting as reading the Economist, so it won’t be him. And despite the thrill at rebelling against the machine that drives so many people—especially young people—to support Ron Paul, he might be the only literally unelectable Republican in the field.
That leaves three. Of them, Rick Santorum has tremendous policy expertise. Michele Bachmann is short on public experience, but has a great personal story and private-sector experience.
But they don’t have money or organization. Even a surprise win in Iowa—which won’t happen—wouldn’t bring money in fast enough to build a national team and saturate the media markets in the other January contests.
Which leaves Governor Perry. A long-serving governor of America’s second-largest state, Perry has executive experience and an almost-perfect record on economic, social, and national-security issues. Three of the best lines from the last debate were his—seeing the big picture on Newt’s Palestinian comments, knowing Obama should have recovered or destroyed our stealth drone, and declaring that securing the borders will change the national mood enough to discuss long-term immigration reform.
Moreover, he has tons of campaign cash and a large organization. And coupled with pushing for a flat tax and Balanced Budget Amendment, his support for guns, marriage, and faith will help in Iowa and South Carolina.
If Romney or Gingrich falter, Perry might take it all.
Nice bus
I hit the link “Perry hits the road”...A CNN blog? .....comments were pure CNN
But the photo is great!
Well said.I hope Perry is the nominee.I recall reading numerous threads months ago dissing Perry because someone that didn’t run was pulled from a podium at a gov. conference because these wacky people think Perry was jealous of the one that didn’t run.I hope these were trolls.
Obama is counting votes. He uses the media to campaign...remember the pillars, the trip to Germany.
The more we diss, the less they have to do and they can concentrate on his choreography.
He goes after very specific districts and areas....Philadelphia was a good example.
Not for nothing....But I trust Newt 100% to do the right thing.
Rick Perry is still my candidate. He far from out of this race. Ron Paul will prolly win Iowa so this muddies the waters. Nothing decisive for Newtie or Mitt. So Rick Perry gets even more time
“Rick Perry is still my candidate. He far from out of this race.”......
BUMP!!
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2820371/posts
Uh... did you mean that Perry has always been pro-life?
This one left me scratching my head.
Nope. I am just one of those heartless conservatives....
Goodness. That certainly was a short romance.
Watch for Perry to blow you away tomorrow night. People did not realize that he was just recovering from a Lamonectomy (Spinal fusion) when he entered the race. Having had two of them (the first one failed had to do it again) I can tell you from experience that when he was on the stage in the earlier debates the only thing he was thinking about was how much pain he was in how uncomfortable the turtle shell back brace he was wearing is and how much longer he had to stand there.
He is back to the Perry us Texans know who destroyed Kay Baily in the debates. look for him to mostly attack Obama and get under Mitts skin. Perry figured out that Mitt is a loose canon when he is mad, he doesn't like Perry and Perry will capitalize on it.
Perry also has a debate style where he tends to ignore the question if he thinks it is a stupid one and just talk about something else. If the mods challenge him on it, he will unload on them and say something like, "look, I know it's your job to ask the questions, I'll answer them any way I see fit".
oops
yes, Perry is Pro-Life without a doubt
Sorry about that
Excellent post TexMom!!
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