"Send Them A Message in Illinois and Beyond!"
Posted on 03/20/2012 9:32:37 AM PDT by Mountain Mary
Rick Santorum: Send Them A Message in Illinois – and Beyond By Richard A. Viguerie | 3/20/12 Rick Santorum’s campaign in Illinois – once again being outspent 10 to 1 by the Mitt Romney attack machine – is powered by a simple theme: Send Them A Message.
Santorum’s rise as the conservative alternative to establishment moderate Mitt Romney isn’t an accident or the result of a slick advertising campaign. Rick is where he is because grassroots movement conservatives and Tea Party voters across America have had it with the establishment Republican Party, and its business-as-usual insiders of the Wall Street – Washington Axis. Grassroots conservatives are ready to fight all the way to the National Convention for a candidate who will stand with them for conservative principles.
The “vote for Rick Santorum to stick it to the Man” undercurrent in the campaign isn’t the result of some focus group. It is organic to voters out in Real America who first flocked to Sarah Palin in 2008, formed the Tea Party in 2009 to protest Obama's culture of bailouts, and then organized to change Congress in 2010.
These grassroots conservative voters understand that the social issues Santorum talks about are fundamental to resolving a host of national challenges. Establishment Republicans are loathe to acknowledge that such issues are worthy of debate, let alone that they are powerful political motivators that win elections.
The barons of the Illinois establishment Republican Party and their counterparts around the country would like to think that conservatives will eventually acquiesce to the Romney nomination and that come November grassroots conservative voters will hand them back the federal check book and the reins of power they so woefully abused during the George W. Bush years.
Establishment Republican insiders don’t seem to understand that the Tea Party rebellion was as much about them as it was about Obama. Rick Santorum’s rise has been largely powered by these same forces. Whether or not Santorum wins the Illinois Republican Primary the hunger to “Send Them A Message” that is powering his campaign isn’t going to be satiated until the roll is called in Tampa.
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All the more reason that a vote for Newt is not out of order.
We have to show via delegate allocation that Non-Romney+Non-Romney > Romney.
If you’re voting in the Illinois GOP primary, and you plan to skip the “down ballot” races because you don’t know candidates, be aware that the second and third set of choices will probably be the convention delegates.
If you plan to vote Santorum, look for three Santorum delegates and three Santorum alternates (the affiliated presidential candidate will be given in parentheses). That’ll be especially important if there’s no first ballot winner at the convention.
If you’re in a district in which Santorum didn’t qualify delegates, you can just look for delegates affiliated with the most conservative candidate available (your call).
The smart money is calling a brokered convention a long-shot, but if it happens, it all comes down to the delegates, so we’ll want as many conservatives in those positions as possible.
Of course, not all of Gingrich's flip-flops take place over a matter of weeks--sometimes he's waited months, or even years, to change his position. Gingrich fully backed liberal Republican Dede Scozzafava in the 2009 upstate New York congressional race until she dropped out of the race and endorsed the Democrat. Gingrich laid low for a while and then coneded in February 2010 it was wrong of him to endorse Scozzafava.
"She had some positions that were far more radical than I realized at the time," he said. But Scozzafava's liberal record was out there for all to see, as I reported at the time.
Dede was NOT running for POTUS.
There’s a BIG difference between a simple endorsement and the Lil’Ricky Mitt endorsement equivalent of a political “Lewinsky”.
So what? She was running in a race against a REAL conservative (as opposed to McCain) that could have won.
Conservatives were, justifiably, outraged at the time, just like they were when Newt threw Paul Ryan under a bus last spring.
It's absurd to claim Newt is purer conservative than Santorum.
It’s absurd to claim Santorum is purer conservative than Gingrich.
By the preonderance of the evidence of conservatism during an entire career, Gingrich is more conservative than Santorum.
To claim Gingrich “threw Ryan under the bus” indicates you do not know the facts, or know the facts and are repeating the incident as spun by Gingrich’s enemies to deceive the voters.
I never made that claim.
The Lil’Ricky cheerleading squad waiving the “I’m holier and more conservative than thou” pom-poms are the ones claiming conservative “superiority”.
Every time some “obsurd” statement is made trying to claim Santorum is “more conservative than Newt”, I remind them with Lil’Ricky’s OWN WORDS that he most certainly is NOT.
To followup on the Gingrich-Ryan non-story of any actual friction between the two, here is what happened:
On Meet The Press, Gingrich was questioned —
So why did Newt use the term “right wing social engineering” on Meet the Press when discussing these proposed changes to Medicare?
Gingrich is opposed to any political party imposing dramatic change against the consent of the governed. Afterwards, Newt quickly admitted that his choice of words was too extreme, and he apologized to Congressman Ryan shortly thereafter.
In response to the host’s hypothetical question of whether Republicans should change Medicare even if there is public opposition, Gingrich’s response was no you should not. One of Newt’s basic governing philosophies is that government should offer a better alternative to existing entitlement programs that seniors can freely choose. Gingrich is opposed to any political party imposing dramatic change against the consent of the governed. Afterwards, Newt quickly admitted that his choice of words was too extreme, and he apologized to Congressman Ryan shortly thereafter. Newt regards Paul Ryan as one of the biggest innovators in Washington, D.C. and he deeply admires the seriousness and boldness of his historic Path to Prosperity budget.
If that is true, why would you think he'd have what it takes to cut spending and reform entitlements if the polls suggest the masses don't want him to?
Both equally conservative, equally flawed and vastly superior candidates to Romney.
But, only one, Santorum, has any chance of winning. The Rick hatred and Newt fantasies are doing nothing but helping Romney.
I never said he was. But, the reverse is also true -- Newt is no purer a conservative than Santorum. Both are far more conservative than Romney.
ONLY HAS ANY CHANCE OF WINNING -- that is Santorum.
Denying that is simply handing Romney the nomination.
That surely is what Ryan and 99% of conservatives thought at the time. And, do you think that is why Newt dropped like a rock in the polls right after he made the comments about the Ryan plan?
Spin, spin, spin...You're making me dizzy.
Winning WHAT????
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