Romney’s announcement was a marked contrast to his presidential rollout four years ago. Then, he delivered a soaring speech before some 800 supporters at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Mich., that covered an array of issues from jihadism to American ingenuity. Then he flew by private jet to campaign in Iowa, New Hampshire and Florida before staging a major fundraiser in his hometown of Boston.
This time, Romney aimed for a lower-key rollout, with a simple gathering on a rolling hayfield in New Hampshire.... Tickets to the kickoff event say, “A Cookout with Mitt & Ann,” and indeed campaign volunteers were serving his wife Ann Romney’s favorite chili recipe from a line of crockpots.
June 2, 2011
Mitt in.
WaPo reports:
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Mitt in
Crafty, Professor.
Lost interest long ago.
And, as someone who used to subscribe to the NYTimes. And, I also remember how on Saturday nights, along Broadway, you could see stacks and stacks of "sections" being tossed together for Sunday's sales. Meaning lots of New Yorkers, stopping for bagels at Zabar's, also lugged these papers home ...
Means that there were once subscribers. The paper didn't change!
We all did.
Missing choices in the poll...
"A big waste of time."
"Unlikely to sway anyone thanks to his association with RomneyCare."
"An acknowledgement that he just won't have the campaign funds he needs this time."
And my favorite: "A place to get some free chili without actually having to support the candidate."
Mitt's not creating any swell of enthusiam, here. Which is no surprise.
There is a real Mitt Romney! If we can only learn to appreciate the value of his poker face in politics, then we can see his superior skill in not letting on where he stands on issues, nor letting on how long he will stand for them this time. That is a talent seldom seen apart from certain statues of great men.
He should join--rather than oppose--forces with Palin somehow.
Black Tea, is the Tea Party racist with the rise of Cain?
The Left loves to hurl the racist label at those who stand in the way of their policies and candidates.
Regardless of Romneycare, and assuming we are still in economic doldrums, the candidate that's going to beat President Obama is the one that's not going to play the "nice guy". This administration has provided ample ammunition, usually in their own actions and words, to a willing attacker. A GOP candidate that can do that has a good shot at winning.
I don't know if Romney is capable of that, but his speech yesterday seemed to imply he's got the message.
I said ham-handed, but I can't really blame him for switching it up, given the current economic circumstances.
The low key entrance of the Romnoid should excite SevenMachos. With no personality known to exist in him, there is NO Way that the Romnoid will create a dangerous cult of personality.
Romney thought that having his state gov't manage healthcare for the entire state was a good idea.
I just can't figure out how any Conservative, Republican or Libertarian could reconcile that with their own philosophies.
WV: horshed - Yes, that sums it up.
The announcement this time is...redundant. I assumed that Romney had declared long ago. Speech had some good lines.
Romney's not running on theatrics and drama. He's not running for Head of State and First Citizen. He's running for Chief Magistrate and Senior Executive.
The announcement this time is...redundant. I assumed that Romney had declared long ago.
Let's be honest. His 2008 bid never really ended.
In my mind the last three choices are all the same.
"As before, Mitt strikes just about the right note"
Indeed.
I don't see how Romney can survive his continuing defense of RomneyCare.
Especially given how much of a disaster it has -- quite predictably -- turned out to be.
I checked out his website and he is saying the things I wanted to hear, so that is at least prudent. It is difficult for me to get too excited about the primary because anyone running would be such a huge improvement. The most impressive thing I know about Romeny is that he is not Obama. And that may be enough!
Trey
meh
Nice pun though.
Should we expect to see a flannel shirt soon?
Maybe, "A little more in tune with the times"?
In any case, he can't live down RomneyCare and, as Scott M noted, it's going to take somebody a lot less whitebread to go after Mr "Get in their faces, punch back twice as hard", Dr Evil, and their soulless minions.
Right now the GOP base wants nothing to do with Mitt Romney, nothing.
I had to chose the phony dot.
However, had I had my actual choice on the poll it would have read something like
F U POS
We already have a Mitt president and his name is Obama.
"I don't see how Romney can survive his continuing defense of RomneyCare."
Me neither. As I understand his argument, it's that the federal government doesn't have the right to impose RobamaCare but a state does. That argument is a distraction at best.
Romney will have to answer the question, "is ObamaCare a good idea?" If his answer is Yes, he loses the conservative vote. If his answer is No, then the next question is why are you continuing to defend RomneyCare?
I just don't get how he gets out of this.
Mitt could easily beat Obama if liberty minded conservatives got behind him.
Unfortunately, I think he's as far right as the electorate as a whole has the guts to go. Too many years of indoctrination in overwhelmingly liberal schools, media and culture.
This country has one all encompassing problem: it does not have enough people who understand the power, and beauty of free markets. It never really did, but at one time it was what we were, even if we didn't understand it, we acted like we did. We were busy being a free market; growing, building, expanding. We knew we didn't like or need being told what to do by far away strangers, and they didn't have the means to force us.
Now they don't need to force us. They have voters who who will only choose between a liberal and a liberal called a conservative. Mitt seems to be a nice man, but he is no revolutionary, and that's what we need. Our problems are too big and deep to fix by choosing between acupuncture or aroma therapy, but that's what we will do.
Althouse's plan to let Obama show what Democrats do with all the power did show us that, but most people consider the alternative to be a Republican, but that's really not an alternative - it's just a party designation. Obama's damage on top of all that came before it will not get fixed, the best we will do is slightly Mittigate it.
The question I'm left with is what Romney has done since 2008 to encourage voters to give him a second look? He really does seem to have just kept in campaign mode, just lower key until now.
The same might be said about Palin, but she has affected the national debate in a way which far outstrips Romney's contributions to that over the last four years.
Romney just seems to have been treading water and now wants voters to see him as a dynamic force.
I do feel a bit sorry for him, at least right now. He would have done better with the financial crisis than either Obama or McCain. He is smarter than both, and probably would have been a better President than either.
But, McCain was the Republican nominee, and he lost to Obama.
If this had been a normal election cycle, then Romney would have had a good chance against Obama. BUT, it isn't. Romney has RomneyCare to his name, and a record of being a bit too willing to spend government money and to flip-flop on issues.
Maybe he could win, if he were to get the nomination. But I just don't see all that many Republicans this time around backing him. Sure, the party elite. But, they have less power these days, esp. after giving us McCain, Dole, etc.
Mitt is a paint by the numbers guy and he's good at it. But it ain't art.
Maybe he'd have done better had Ann R, she- wolf of the LDS, shown off her most bodacious tits.
That said, Mitt's got an IQ in triple digits, unlike uh one S***h P***n. That's not going to help him with the TP-GOP-tard base.
It just took Mitt a little longer because he had to get all of his wives to agree.
I wonder how the press will feel about Juniper Creek as the Summer Whitehouse.
Crawford Texas won't seem so bad. Just sayn'
J said...
Maybe he'd have done better had Ann R, she- wolf of the LDS, shown off her most bodacious tits.
That said, Mitt's got an IQ in triple digits, unlike uh one S***h P***n. That's not going to help him with the TP-GOP-tard base
And yet single digit IQs such as J can't get enough of Miss Sarah, and, apparently, her IQ is big enough to outsmart the whole Leftosphere.
PS When it comes to breasts, J is starting to sound like Titus.
Coincidence?
I supported Romney in the 2008 presidential primary but in the 2012 primary he’s going to be running as the guy who lost to the guy who lost to Obama.
Also while I’m somewhat sympathetic to the federalism argument as well as the argument that Commonwealth Care may have been an improvement over what Massachusetts had before (e.g. fewer benefit mandates, exchanges that were more market-oriented, etc.), I’m afraid that on the surface it looks too much like Obamacare for him to be very effective in making the case for its repeal.
That being said, I think that based on his executive experience, he could be a very effective president. I just think he has too many handicaps to get the chance.
Mitt's been tagged as a flip-flopper. But he steadfastly defends Romneycare, the one thing he should definitely flip-flop on.
I don't have a dog in this fight, but I think Mitt has an argument that it's okay for a state to enact healthcare, right or wrong, because it was voted in by the state's legislature, which has a read on its own population. Kind of like you have to pay taxes in your own school district, federalism, etc.
We can like Palin, or like Romney, or like T-paw, or like Cain. It is fun to pick the flavor we like most at Baskin-Robbins. But we are in for the win, so we must pick a candidate that takes it at Obama and fights to the election day not handicapped by a fear of being cast as a racist white man. So far Palin is all that we have who is in warrior mode and ready to beat Obama. Cain could also do well, but his lack of experience is a bridge too far.
"I think Mitt has an argument that it's okay for a state to enact healthcare, right or wrong..."
But the "right or wrong" is the more important question.
"So far Palin is all that we have who is in warrior mode and ready to beat Obama."
Her negatives are higher than Obama's, aren't they?
Yes, OM, but that wasn't my point. He could sell federalism/bloc grants.
It reduces the issue to a mere disagreement over process, Deborah. If Romney is the nominee, it defangs one of the major attacks against Obama. I can't believe he thinks this will fly.
Who cares?
He should have said Romneycare might be fine for Mass, but not for other 56 states, and more importantly, health care was a state issue, not a federal govt's responsibility, then he would be free. But he doubled down, and sounded really stupid. Everyone except the union bosses, and may be Weiner, knows Obama fails, but no one wants to see the failure repeated under Romney.
TeaPartiers would rather skewer Obama the next four years than defend an Obama-light. The days that he may be an sob, but he is our sob is over. Republicans want no sob.
My overarching point is that that's probably the only arrow in his quiver to get past the stigma of having passed Romneycare and refusing to admit it it was a mistake.
wv: unbio
"...the only arrow in his quiver to get past the stigma of having passed Romneycare and refusing to admit it it was a mistake."
His decision not to own up to it as a mistake dooms him, IMO. The argument is extremely weak.
Gotcha :)
I liked Mitt. I was so hoping he would take the opportunity to say, "We tried ObamaCare in Mass. and I'm here to tell you it doesn't work". Oh well.
I don't have anything against him, really, but the Mormon thing is not going to fly, and as Thorley said above, 'he lost to the guy who lost to the guy.'
Mitt may be in, but he's a bit of a mutt. Next...
He's a Ken Doll. Nice hair, no balls.
Original Mike...Rush today pointed out the problem that Mittens causes himself. Romney will not attack Obama as the man who is causing disasterous problems. Romney will only point out that there have been mistakes in Obama's policies. Voters can forgive Obama for mistakes and let him try harder next time. Voters need to face a very real need to remove Obama because Obama is intentionally harming our economy and thereby intentionally harming our military. Obama has not made mistakes.
It's weird how options 2 and 3 have had nearly exactly the same number of votes for hours. I assumed 2 would win easily.
McCain was a Maverick for seven years 2001-2008, constantly stabbing Bush and the Repubs in the back, reaching across the aisle to give Ted Kennedy back-rubs, voting against Tax cuts, pushing Amnesty, and generally being the darling of the Liberal New York Times.
And he got nominated. Because he was next in line.
Never underestimate the stupidity of the Republicans. Romney will be nominated in 2012, its his turn, and he's the closest thing in 2011 to Jerry Ford - the Republicans dream.
Seems as though 84% of us don't think the guy is quite with it.
(Nor is he quite with us.)
Ann's poll on Mitt, like many of her polls is:
A) A near perfect example of how to determine how people feel on a a subject without injecting a scintilla of bias. It could stand as an example of perhaps the most bias-free poll in modern polling history. I am in no way an idiot for choosing this option.
B) An biased poll in which Ann's preferred choice was embarrassingly clear.
C) A clever poll designed to prompt thoughtful consideration of the subject that was unfortunately too narrowly constructed to reflect my feelings on the matter.
You left out "I didn't pay attention to his announcement last time, because who gives a damn?".
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