Mitt Romney represents the best chance for republicans to beat President Obama and because of that fact MC endorses him for the republican nomination. If you're not in politics to win, you shouldn't be in.
MC has heard all of the criticisms of Romney and isn't about to recite the litany here. Suffice it to say they are unpersuasive on balance. And that balance is a field of imperfect candidates. Has it ever been otherwise?
The stakes for the country could not be higher when it comes to defeating the worst President since James Buchanan. Hence the candidate with the best chance of defeating him is by definition the best candidate. Various problems with this policy position or that can be addressed once in office but MC thinks there will be far fewer of those than his critics anticipate.
And it's not that Romney can't be criticized--who cannot?--but that his critics fancy themselves to be good judges of things political. They criticize him while arguing that Herman Cain or Michele Bachmann are viable candidates in the general election. It's enough, as the late Christopher Hitchens would say, to make a cat laugh. (That was a depressing sentence to write.)
Conservatives believe they have longer memories than their friends on the other side of the aisle and MC certainly believes this to be the case. How odd, then, for them to forget that RINO's like Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin were praising Romney as the conservative alternative to John McCain in 2008. Stay with that for awhile, please. National Review also endorsed him that year.
The puzzlement is that Romney has moved further to the right since that time. This cycle he's been endorsed by Ann Coulter and South Carolina governor Nikki Haley. New Jersey governor Chris Christie has come out strongly for him.
The activist base, not Mitt Romney, has been the flip-flopper this year. From Bachmann to Perry to Cain to Gingrinch, all that can be said about them is MC thinks they'll finally come round to Romney. Add in a vice-president candidate like Marco Rubio and people tend to settle down a bit.
One important subject that has not gotten much attention is the Supreme Court and the next president's nominations to it. Romney has the esteemed Robert Bork as his chief adviser in the realm of judicial appointments. It simply doesn't get any better. People in Minnesota may have largely missed it but months ago there was a small Leftist effort born of angst and despair to pressure Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg into retiring so President Obama could appointment her replacement. This didn't happen, of course, and President Obama made two mediocre appointments that pleased no one but the box checkers of faux diversity. The concern on the Left should please those of us on the Right.
The energy from the republican side was never going to come from our candidate himself. The energy is almost wholly from its well warranted allergic reaction to a far left, incompetent, not-really-so-smart president. This will still be the case with Romney at the head of our ticket. In purple states like Minnesota, it could well help republicans keep one or both chambers in the legislature, a not unimportant but imperiled goal given the latest developments.
Romney will bring strong conservative principles into the contest with President Obama. He's clearly aware of the slimy campaign Mr. Hope & Change knows is his only chance not to be thrown out of office on his ear and is prepared to fight back vigorously. He knows what it takes to win. His strength on things economic will likely prove decisive. He will also, MC believes, govern in a strong and effective manner once elected. For these reasons and more, Mitt Romney should be our nominee.
Seems to me you are correct that there are two considerations. We want a true conservative who will govern accordingly and not disappoint AND we want somebody that can beat Obama. If I accept that Romney can govern as a conservative, for which there is scant evidence, will you accept that ANY Republican ought to be able to beat Obama, given united GOP support and an educated electorate?
ReplyDeleteJ. Ewing
The definition of a true conservative is the problem. Reagan allowed the death of countless unborn when he signed into law the most permissive abortion laws before Roe. More liberal than New York state and that takes some doing. He's rarely held to account because he, uh, did what Mitt Romney did on the subject: changed his mind. So is Reagan still a true conservative?
ReplyDeleteI would be surprised if Mr. Ewing genuinely thought that Rick Santorum or Ron Paul could beat Obama. Just how does that happen?
Anyone we elect will disappoint and we need go no further than W to prove my point. The first question is: who can beat this horrible President? The second is: how can we keep him as conservative as possible? In that task you have my full support going forward.
I will suggest that President Romney would never have nominated a Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court. In that, W failed to govern conservatively and disappointed you, me, us, at the same time. Conservative progress, like any sustained achievement, is by degrees. We rebelled and we got Justice Alito. Good for us.
Merry Christmas to you and your loved ones.
a Merry Christmas to you as well.
ReplyDeleteI believe we all want the same things in the upcoming election. The difference is that some people believe that only Mitt Romney can defeat Obama, while I believe that there are a number of Republican candidates who can, as a practical matter, do so, and that all of them would be better presidents than the current disaster in the White House. On True North I have posted my reasons for believing that Newt Gingrich may, in fact, be the only candidate that can defeat Obama.
J. Ewing
Let me just ask. If Romney were NOT the only candidate that could be Obama, would you still believe he should be the nominee?
ReplyDeleteJ. Ewing
Mitt Romney will indeed be our 2012 GOP candidate simply because he is the most disciplined and electable candidate to beat Obama. He is 10X better than McCain in 2008!
ReplyDeleteYet, I would LOVE to watch a Lincoln/Douglas debate between Gingrich & Obama. It should be a pay-for-view and erase a couple of trillion of our national debt!!
I just read that the Obama campaign has thousands of ads ready to go to paint Romney as a flip-flopper, offending Democrats and Republicans alike. It seems clear that they expect and WANT to run against Romney and can be very successful doing it. Maybe we should throw them a curve? Once more, unless Romney IS the inevitable victor, what recommends him over the others?
ReplyDeleteJ. Ewing
OK, so Santorum wins Iowa, Romney wins NH, and Gingrich (maybe) wins SC. Where is the "inevitability" and what value does it have? What good is a guy that can't beat Obama and doesn't accomplish much if he did?
ReplyDeleteJ. Ewing