Posted on 01/20/2008 6:57:50 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
An e-mail:
I see that some people (Adler, Geraghty) are calling for Fred to stay in the race. The practical consequence of Thompson's presence so far has been to hand South Carolina to McCain. It's seems unlikely that this dynamic will change in other southern states. All Thompson is managing to do is to split the conservative vote and clear the way for McCain.
Adler also makes the improbable claim that Romney has been revealed as a very weak candidate, even though the information is right there on The Corner that Romney has garnered more votes so far than anyone else in the race.
Lastly, Romney gets slammed for spending money. He is the only candidate running who is attempting to win or place in every state. Giuliani, who also has spent quite a lot, has abandoned most of the country. Fred made a minimal effort outside SC. I half expect a plea for campaign finance reform to follow some of these complaints that Romney is spending too much money. It's very strange.
UPDATE: Another:
Fred is "splitting" the conservative vote with Huckabee. Don't ask me why a conservative would vote for Huckabee, but without Fred, Huckabee would have won S.C. big. If all of Fred's votes had gone to Romney, he still would have been third. Fred should stay in. I'd rather see a brokered convention than Huckabee or McCain as the nominee before then.
I’ve seen a lot of posts like this on FR from posters with a variety of agendas.
This is not the General Election; we are in the process of choosing our nominee! Among Conservatives and most Republicans it is well know the MSM and the Elite punditry are our biggest foes. So, at the time when we should be the most careful, thoughtful and principled, so-called Republicans vote on a whim.
No candidate can overcome the combined power of the Media, pundits and pollsters...not to mention the Democrats...without the help of the individual voters who will read past the headlines and look past the talking heads on television.
What could be more conservative the “We are responsible for our own votes?”
Dominate the media? Ridiculous. It ain’t going to happen. Even Romney could spend his entire fortune and not dominate the media.
Why should Thompson stay in? He said himself that South Carolina was his ‘line in the sand’.
This is getting delusional.
Here’s why we are where we are, thanks to the MSM and passive Republican voters:
McCain wins: The base is demoralized and the MSM still trashes him after the convention.
Rudy wins: He won’t even win his own state.
Huckabee wins: The MSM would just LOVE a few months of bashing the crazy liberal Christian from Arkansas.
Romney wins: Well, there’s that “Mormon” thing, which we’ll hear about a million times a day. The Northeast Pubbie will have a hard time in the South.
Fred wins: Let’s see...he talks funny, he’s lazy, he’s a right winger...where have we heard all this before?
If the Party can unite behind Bush, it can certainly unite behind Fred Thompson.
That’s why the MSM, the Dems and the Elites want him OUT.
Bush won a primary
McCain has been the 'flavor of the week' for the media this week, as was Huckabee before him. I suspect it will be Rudy before the FL primary.
Not so soon on Rudy. Voting has already begun in Florida.
From Rasmussen today:
It’s McCain 19%, Giuliani 18%, Romney 18%, and Huckabee 17%. Fred Thompson is a few points off the pace at 11% while Ron Paul is a distant sixth with support from 5% of Likely Primary Voters.
It always seemed to me that the mainstream media is covering Fred Thompson very poorly.
He’s a joy to listen to when you can hear him speak!
And if the mainstream media doesn’t like him, there must be something good about him!
***Thompson sounds the best to a lot of us, period. But the fact is that Fred hasn’t been doing a good job campaigning.***
“If the Party can unite behind Bush, it can certainly unite behind Fred Thompson.”
True, and it would be a stronger, broader union under Fred Thompson.
Fred's comment had nothing to do with whether or not he'd stay in the race. He said that SC was the Republican Party's 'line in the sand'; whether or not Republicans would abandon conservatism for the more liberal/moderate ideas. Seems like he was wise to worry.
Why should Thompson stay in? He said himself that South Carolina was his ‘line in the sand’.
His concerns with keeping the records sealed shows me that he is scared of the truth being exposed to daylight.
You really can’t keep up.
Thompson plans to go on to Florida
Boston Globe ^ | 1/19/08 | Joe Williams
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Fred Thompson, trailing Mike Huckabee and John McCain in the polls, will continue his presidential bid even if he finishes third in today’s South Carolina primary, his campaign said. Thompson, who had talked of South Carolina as his last stand, appeared this afternoon at a gun show in a suburban Shriners’ auditorium — a natural fit given his strong support of the Second Amendment right to own firearms. Several patrons wore “Fred ‘08” stickers on their clothing; as Thompson swept into the packed hall he was greeted by a modest round of applause. “Go, Fred!” one woman...
I just don't see how Giuliani can pull this one out. His idea of avoiding the early primaries, because of all the Democrats and independents allowed to vote in them, made sense at the time but just hasn't worked in practice.
Democrats hate Giuliani because he beats them like a drum, but that also means they cross over to vote against him in open GOP primaries so they won't face him in general elections. I HATE open primaries.
Yep, something’s not right there.
The delegate leader concede? Obviously you jest.
The problem with the analysis in the article is that Huckabee with his Christian Socialism is the one splitting the conservative vote by drawing off single issue voters who don’t care if taxes are raised, the borders left open, or American foreign policy has a steady hand at the helm, so long as the POTUS is against abortion enough to support a quixotic campaign for a human life amendment (even though the POTUS has no role in the constitutional amendment process), and openly self-identifies as an evangelical protestant.
Fred is the only candidate in the field whose nomination won’t alienate 1/4 or more of the Reagan coalition.
McCain can’t win as Democrat lite; Huckabee can’t assemble a winning coalition, as he has no attraction for any conservative constituency other than evangelical protestants; Guiliani loses socal conservatives; and Romney has enough folks who see his position changes as expedient flip-flops, and ‘Romney care’ as ‘Hillary care lite’ that he can’t keep the coalition intact.
Short of Fred getting the nomination as a dark horse unity candidate (he does seem to be a lot of folks’ second choice), the best we can hope for may be a Romney v. Obama race, simply because they seem the least disasterous of the remaining choices on the two sides: Romney the corporatist tory v. the one Democrat who isn’t a proven slime-ball.
Of course at that point the question of whether four (or eight) years of RINOism is to be prefered to four (or eight) years of misrule by the other party becomes interesting. It’s possible that Islamic reaction to America electing a murtad fitri as President will finally concentrate the mind of the American left on the fact that the intellectual heirs of Abu Hamid al Ghazali pose more of a threat to their projects of extending the Continental ‘Enlightenment’ than do the intellectual heirs of William Jenning Bryan, and thus lead to real national unity behind the Long War.
Some of you Fredheads love to insult people who have a far better understanding of political reality than you. It gets annoying.
Huckabee’s campaign is dead. He doesn’t have money to compete on a national level, and he’ll have trouble raising more after failing to win SC.
Somebody who stated FALSE information has a far better understanding than I do.
Right.
Buzz off.
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