Posted on 05/01/2012 1:42:27 AM PDT by Kaslin
With President Barack Obama's officially starting his campaign this Saturday, many are wondering whether the GOP front-runner and former Massachusetts governor, Mitt Romney, has a real chance at winning the general election. But I know a way he could pull it off, and my wife, Gena, even dreamed about it.
I said that I would vote for whichever candidate won the GOP nomination. As of this writing, it appears to be Romney. Truthfully, I believe that Mitt has the skills and organization to defeat Obama and stop his fundamental transformation of America. We all know what four more years of increased socialistic decisions would do to our country.
By all reasonable rationale and political forecast, in a couple of months Romney will reach the necessary delegate count and become the Republican Party's official nominee. And before the GOP fractures with a third-party candidate (as it did in 1992 and 1996) and hands over the election again in doing so, I want to propose to Romney a way to rally the GOP base and even, I believe, those who dislike him.
Typically, this is the time when we all speculate about the GOP nominee's choice for vice president -- his running mate -- and we pray to God that his decision is so magnanimous that it instantly will rally the entire spectrum of political preferences at his side. Of course, that's a political pipe dream and, I believe, a shortsighted, typical campaign technique in a unique election war that requires a very unconventional strategy for winning. With existing polarities (indeed, divisiveness) in the GOP and conservative base alone, choosing the right VP is alone not going to be enough, inasmuch as a Super Bowl team couldn't rally its fan base based upon just a controversial quarterback and a great wide receiver.
For those optimistic statisticians who would point out that just last week a Fox News poll showed that the race between Obama and Romney is dead-even -- with 46 percent of society favoring each -- I would remind them that those numbers are equal despite four years of President Obama's reckless decisions against our republic and despite the fact that his re-election campaign hasn't even unleashed its billion-dollar war chest against Romney. (That sum makes Romney's effectual $20 million he used to destroy Newt Gingrich's candidacy back in the Florida primary look like chump change.)
If the Obama campaign machine and its mainstream media minions are already pigeon-holing Romney as "extreme" and "right-wing" (are you kidding?!), imagine what they will say and do to his likely more conservative running mate. (Does anyone remember the plight of Sarah Palin with Sen. John McCain in '08?)
I think Romney and maybe even most Republicans are underestimating the difficulty of persuading conservatives, evangelicals and libertarians, let alone the rest of the country, to vote for Romney, despite the prospect of the sultan of socialist swing's remaining in the Oval Office. General election apathy and depression in the fall could take their toll.
It doesn't take a political scientist to see that if liberals such as former President Jimmy Carter say they would be "comfortable" with Romney, conservatives, evangelicals, libertarians and others are going to have a gigantic struggle rallying around Romney. But if he would take the following course of action, they might find backing him much more palatable.
Enough talk. The idea is this, and it is not my idea but the action of President Abraham Lincoln.
A book that highlights Lincoln's brilliant action is titled "Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln," by Doris Kearns Goodwin, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and presidential historian. In addition to topping charts and receiving scholarly acclaim, the book itself is political genius and outlines the crucial strategy needed not only to rally the present GOP base but also to win the White House and save our republic. (I also wrote about this unifying strategy in a former column, "The 8th Miracle To Save America," which can be read at http://www.creators.com/opinion/chuck-norris/the-8th-miracle-to-save-america.html.)
Goodwin's prize-winning treatise details how Lincoln brought together his candidate rivals by appointing them to key positions in his administration when he became president.
Let me re-highlight a few critical points from Goodwin's book review in The New York Times:
"The party in the 1860's was a coalition of politicians who only a few years earlier had been Whigs (Lincoln, Seward, Bates), Democrats (Blair, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles and Vice President Hannibal Hamlin), Free Soilers (Chase), or had flirted with the short-lived anti-immigrant American Party, or Know Nothings (Cameron and Bates). In addition, several cabinet members personally disliked each other: Blair and Chase, Seward and Welles, Chase and Seward, Blair and Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, who replaced Cameron in January 1862. Lincoln's 'political genius' enabled him to herd these political cats and keep them driving toward ultimate victory.
"How did he do it? Goodwin deals with this question better than any other writer. Part of the answer lay in Lincoln's steadfastness of purpose, which inspired subordinates to overcome their petty rivalries. Part of it lay in his superb sense of timing and his sensitivity to the pulse of public opinion as he moved to bring along a divided people to the support of 'a new birth of freedom.' And part of it lay in Lincoln's ability to rise above personal slights, his talent for getting along with men of clashing ideologies and personalities who could not get along with each other."
Whether you agree with Lincoln or not, his team of rivals worked, propelled his leadership and ultimately unified the country.
Isn't our divided country again ripe for a new "team of rivals," made up of past presidential candidates and other vetted, qualified and esteemed national leaders, rather than merely a dynamic duo fighting the Obama campaign machine?
Lincoln recognized the wisdom of Jesus when it came to collective success: "A house divided against itself cannot stand."
The question is this: Will Romney?
Next week, I will not only elaborate more on this concept of a team of rivals and the people I believe should be a part of it but also share the inspiring dream Gena had, which we both hope comes true.
See:
Mitt Romney’s Mentor, his Father, a Fan of Saul Alinsky
January 26, 2012, 4:24 pm By Arlen Williams
http://gulagbound.com/25499/mitt-romneys-mentor-his-father-a-fan-of-saul-alinsky/
I could “SCREAM” right about now! I need a break from you all. It is too depressing listening to this crap! I can’t stand the thought of the rest of my life
being under this regime we are about to set into place because of the blame game. GET THE HELL OVER IT PEOPLE! I am working my ass off canvassing neighborhoods and talking to people to get them engaged into the arena of ideas, and the very people that I come here to get strength from are acting like its over already. It is over if we throw in the towel and not come up with a strategy. If you don’t want Romney, so be it. But for heavens sake, you are depressing the vote of the Senate and Congress when you play this game. The only way we will beat this thing about to take place is to make sure that if you don’t want Romney, you take charge of the Legislature. Young folks don’t understand that, and when you talk this crap, they just won’t get out of bed. You ask me, “so what, they aren’t on these forums anyway”. True that, but you are in the real world and influence people you come in contact with. I run into people that say they just won’t vote, and I explain why it is important to vote. Stop whining and get up and become a precinct captain or a voter watch dog. Show them that we are not going to lay down and take it.
Now I’m going to work so that I can pay my mortgage since my husband has been layed off. Like I said, this is too depressing for me.
Wow! having the word romney and Republic in the same sentence is rich I tell ya.Rich.
No one I have read has even suggested throwing in the towel, except I contend those throwing in the towel are those who say 'It's Romney or else!'.
We need to think outside the box the Ruling Class oligarchs in the GOP-e and Obama have constructed for us to operate within. Voting for their orchestrated candidate with help from Obama and the Media IS NOT an option.
“The problem isn’t in our liberals, it’s in our selves.”
I agree with this. But I also do blame a few people who either didn’t run, ran badly, or just ran away. And those people are: Mike Pence, Rick Perry, and Tim Pawlenty.
Ditto.
Ok, so what will arrest that increasingly leftward slide of the GOP? Every four years, it`s “You`ve gotta vote for the nominee, because .. gosh.. look at the alternative.” Sooo, we bite that hook in the naive hope the party will right itself.
It`s been the same crap every election since Reagan left office. The estabs beg for conservative votes, only to marginalize them once the voting is a done deal.
It is because we have been delegates, precinct chairmen, state representatives/assembleymen, state senators, county officers, municipal officers, and more that we have experienced the problems of massive vote fraud. Pretending the problem can be overcome by just trying harder to get more votes reaches a point where it become irrational and perpetually self-defeating. This is amply demonstrated by the way in which the McCain Campaign did nothing to officially challenge a number of massive cases of vote fraud during the 2008 Election. Physchiatric physicians often diagonose a mental disorder by observing a patient who fails to recognize that doing the wrong act over and over again results in failure, like walking into the same closed door over and over again. The mentally healthy to do is to recognize the problem, adapt, and overcome. Ignoring the problem does not make it go away, not even for the sake of good morale and getting out the vote. On the contrary, getting out the vote is far more successful when the voter perceives doing so can be expected to produce the desired results.
Making effective change certainly does require securing votes for the legislatures, county offices, and municipal officers. But it also going to require sheriffs intent upon enforcing Constitutional eligibility of Presidential candidates. It is going to require state prosecutors and state representatives who will not countenance unconstitutional acts of the state and Federal governments. Getting out the vote for another Arlen Specter, Orin Hatch, Lugar, Romney, and so forth is a perfect way of NOT getting out the vote. The stench gets so bad, it can no longer be swept underneath a table nor served as a helping of crow atop the table. Their are Constitutional alternatives, but the naysayers are going to have to go back to the fundamentals and get over the idea that participation in illegitimate elections is an effective or solitary means of rectifying the problem.
I don’t care if he can divide by zero, Chuck is a Mittbot.
AMEN. Best thing said about this entire subject on myriad threads.
Hey Chuck... even you... as bad ass as you are... will never get me to vote for romney... understand Chuck?
LLS
You are so right. I would never have picked Romney.However, since it appears he is going to be running against Obama, I will vote for him, and try to pick the most conservative candidates from the other races that are still up. I’m certainly hoping that those who say they won’t vote for Romney, and let Obama win will re consider before the elections. We didn’t get in this shape in one election cycle, and we won’t get out of it in one, but we can do irreparable harm by letting a full fledged totalitarian communist have another 4 years. One of the things to remember, if Romney is put in, he will know that going too far too the left as president will surely get him defeated for a second term (hopefully we can find someone more conservative by then.)Obama on the other hand, if he wins another term will show us uncut communism.
Our country needs us like never before!
LLS
You insist upon voting for Romney because you assert doing otherwise unercuts the efforts to remove Obama from the Office of the President. Yet you ignore the way in which you undercut the efforts of other people who would argue for removing Obama and Romney from the Office of the President. How is perpetually defeating your own ultimate goals helpful or inspiring to others?
There are alternatives. Why not consider them, espeically if Romney’s defeat has already been pre-determined by a rigged election?
Your hope is in vain. We will NEVER consider voting for Romney. In fact, since the GOP-e declared war on Conservatives, I am making it my focus to get as many as I know and preach to, to vote for a staunch Conservative, thwart the machine, and hold their principles intact.
Voting for the Ruling Class GOP-e candidate to supposedly stop Obama in November is as clear a definition of insanity that one can find an illustration of.
This nomination was bought and paid for by big money GOP insiders.
That is a lie, and you know it. McCain lost because he was an awful candidate. His loss was insured the day he ran back to Washington to vote for TARP.
And by the way, try to understand the difference between principle and petulance.
“We have 4 SC Justices that could retire in 4 years”
How does this sound:
Supreme Court Justice Eric Holder
Supreme Court Justice Kathleen Sebelius
Supreme Court Justice Janet Napolitano
Supreme Court Justice Van Jones
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.