So, here's the actual context:
According to people close to Romney, he’s firmly decided against primarying Trump, an enterprise he believes to be a sure loser given Trump’s enduring GOP support. Romney has also told people that, as an unsuccessful two-time presidential candidate, he’s the wrong person to take on Trump. Instead, a Romney adviser told me, Romney believes he has more potential power as a senator who will decide Trump’s fate in an impeachment trial. “He could have tremendous influence in the impeachment process as the lone voice of conscience in the Republican caucus,” the adviser said. In recent days, Romney has been reaching out privately to key players in the Republican resistance, according to a person briefed on the conversations. “Romney is the one guy who could bring along Susan Collins, Cory Gardner, Ben Sasse. Romney is the pressure point in the impeachment process. That’s why the things he’s saying are freaking Republicans out.” (Romney, through a spokesperson, declined to comment.)Well, hell. It's something a "Romney adviser" said, and he said it along with conceding that Romney lacks the ability to primary Trump and Romney knows it. So he's got to use that position he took on, U.S. Senator, to try to have "influence in the impeachment process." And it could be "tremendous." Because he could apply pressure. Oh, no, actually — I love to get the metaphors straight — he could be the "pressure point." I think that's the place to which pressure is applied. Let me look up "pressure point." Oh, ha ha ha. Here's the Wikipedia page for "Pressure point":
A pressure point (Chinese: 穴位; Japanese: kyūsho 急所 "vital point, tender spot"; Sinhala: නිල/මර්ම ස්ථාන Nila/Marma Sthana (in Angampora); Telugu: మర్మ స్థానం Marma Sthanam; Malayalam: മര്മ്മം marmam; Tamil: வர்மம் varmam) derives from the meridian points in Traditional Chinese Medicine and Indian Ayurveda and Siddha medicine, and the field of martial arts, and refers to an area on the human body that may produce significant pain or other effects when manipulated in a specific manner.Mitt Romney's own adviser invites you to think of Mitt Romney as the person you want to put pressure on to produce significant pain.
Accounts of pressure-point fighting appeared in Chinese Wuxia fiction novels and became known by the name of Dim Mak, or "Death Touch", in western popular culture in the 1960s.But what body is pressure-point Romney a part of? Put pressure on him and who hurts? Not Trump!
While it is undisputed that there are sensitive points on the human body where even comparatively weak pressure may induce significant pain or serious injury, the association of kyūsho with notions of death have been disproven.
Posts
94 comments:
Romney is a grifter. I did not realize that
Democrats and leftists are perhaps about to make the same mistake millions of Republican have made and forever regret.
Relying on Mitt Romney.
Push back.
Adam Schitt(D) is a disgrace. Even Romney said so. (Hack press ignored that bit)
Romney should practice his superior morality on his own family, not in public.
After watching Senator Susan Collins give her speech supporting her vote in favor of judge Brett Kavanaugh, I am not concerned about her.
I would welcome more discussion about the Democrat Senators who are "pressure points" to vote to acquit our President Trump in the Senate "trial". The obvious such "pressure point" is Senator Joe Manchin.
Typhoid Mitt.
More bluntly, the pressure point is the point you put pressure on to produce results--that is, Romney is the weakest link, the most likely Republican to fold under pressure.
Anybody who wanted Obama to lose in 2012 could have told you that.
An oligarch showdown. How third world of us.
So he can get three to join him. He has a long way to go considering two-thirds is required to convict.
Mitt has lost his way. He doesn't understand the malignancy the Democrats represent to our republic and the need to fight back hard.
Romney is just another data point for banning children of politicians from office.
So McCain died, and now Romney is the Republican they hated when he ran but now they adore because he doesn't love Trump. Is that right?
I don't know about you all, but I for one will not be satisfied until we get a Hillary/Gore, Romney/McCain's Corpse matchup in 2020.
Also, remake Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure and give it a snappy title like...I don't know...Bill & Ted's Spectacular Segway where they travel into the past (I know I know they did this already) and bring back long dead political rivals for a rematch. I can envision:
Hamilton/Burr
Caesar/Pompeii
House of York/House of Lancaster
Roosevelt/JP Morgan
Etc. Etc. Etc.
But Romney vs. Hillary will do for now. I guess.
I don't think I've ever seen the phrase "Republican resistance" before.
Anyone else besides Romney I should be worried about??
"...it sounds like what Romney wants himself to be and what Trump haters would love to be able to be but any Trump supporter would just laugh at."
This is certainly a plausible description, but nonetheless is very much beside any salient point.
Romney may very well be nothing but a turd in the punchbowl from the POV of Trump supporters. But the Mittster only wants to be the catalyst for WPP senators, and Trump supporters lie well outside his target audience. Mitt is an elitist through and through. He favors a government where decisions are made by like-minded men operating in quiet rooms.
Very few U.S. Senators are Trump supporters, when all is said and done. And Mitt views Trump supporters as ignorant yahoos in need of a bath. He cares not about them...at all.
I am a self-confessed Democrat, and if my choices were limited to Trump or Mitt Romney, I would choose Trump 100 times out of 100. So for me, it's off to my morning shower.
Go home, Mitt. Serve Utah. Your days in the national stage are over.
Romney is part of the government whore-for-life corporate machine. Littered with people like The Clintons and The Bidens.
They all wink and nod to their impenetrable power structure.
“Trying to bring him down.” As Prince was known to sing: “Bring us down, oh no. Let’s go, let’s go crazy, let’s go nuts.”
’...the lone voice of conscience in the Republican caucus.’
The pussy who couldn’t even beat Candy Crowley in a debate thinks he has some caucus muscle? Fuck that loser.
The only thing Romney is now is a pressure point on the president’s and conservatives’ backsides.
Politics is a power game, trading power, to get results. Power can be money. The Speaker of the house has huge influence on who get DNC cash. Influence, is a much greater power to trade.
Exactly what power does Romney have, outside of his single vote? I don't see Romney being able to move any levels of power, to facilitate any outcome. He seems to be as much a DC outsider at President Trump
It takes courage to be a “self-confessed Democrat” these days. Make sure that’s a hot shower, and use plenty of soap.
I don't think I've ever seen the phrase "Republican resistance" before.
Anyone else besides Romney I should be worried about??
You are not paying attention. GOPe. (establishment Republican) has been the resistence from the day President Trump descended down the Golden escalator
They’ve told him this is how he can atone for giving his employees cancer.
Romney is the precious pouter in the impeachment process.
More mush from the wimp.
Yeah, that's completely stupid, but what do you expect from Vanity Fair?
Mittens is a nonentity who is properly held in contempt by all. The notion that anyone cares what he thinks of does is risible.
I don't think I've ever seen the phrase "Republican resistance" before. Anyone else besides Romney I should be worried about??
I worry about the politicians (and their kids) who get rich being politicians. Harry Reid and the Clintons are the most egregious examples, but there are a lot of Hunter Biden types out there, in both parties.
Trump is trying to break their rice bowl and they will resist.
Boy scouts taught pressure points to stop bleeding in the attached limb.
Maybe the magic underwear is too tight.
Shorter VF: ohpleaseohpleaseohplease...
Some other leftie agitprop is working on the Why Pence needs to go to think piece...
VF sent 100s if copies to Mitt’s office. Hoping to appeal to his vanity, no doubt...
Is this the same Romney adviser who sits on the Burisma board of directors and stealing money from the impoverished Ukrainian people?
So much integrity from this man and his advisers.
Romney is just a McCain wannabe.
THEOLDMAN
Pay no attention to the man in the magic shorts.
I know one thing for certain, if Ben Sasse votes to convict Trump in the Senate the total unknown in the GOP primary will win. Ben knows that too.
Mitt is delusional if he thinks he can bring any GOP Senators over to convict Trump.
Romney doesn't realize, or wishes to willfully ignore, that Trump is popular with Republicans because he's done conservative things as president. Romney is a squish. He wants to pretend he could be popular because he did collectivist things - like RomneyCare.
He's aiming for the "newfound respect" role that McCain occupied. Both of them were "literally Hitler" just a few election cycles ago.
Personally, I wonder how many of Romney's sons are bought-and-paid-for by Ukraine, Russia, and China. I'd wager more than half of them.
Number of Senators: 100
Number needed to convict the President if the House votes a bill of impeachment: 67
Number of Senators who are Democrats or who caucus with Democrats: 47
Number of Republicans Romney would have to persuade: 19 (assumes he will vote with Democrats)
Number of Republican Senators who could come back to their states without an armed escort if they vote to convict: zero
I guess math is too hard for Vanity Fair.
Harvard and Yale believe nobody else is worthy of the presidency.
More leftist political dream casting.
Surprising, I know.
But whatever gives you hope.
Yes, but has anybody come up with a predicate of actual unlawful or unconstitutional behavior by the president?
Every attempt at this has failed.
Mitt Romney's own adviser invites you to think of Mitt Romney as the person you want to put pressure on to produce significant pain.
There are also admitting that Romney can be manipulated by the Left. Of course, we already knew that.
How can Romney sleep at night after rolling over for those that have unjustly savaged him?
And speaking of integrity. I love how Romney thinks it is OK to plot on how to remove a president who was freely and fairly elected after deciding he cannot best that president in a primary election because he is too popular.
Can we call Romney a pompous piece of shit. I like that better than a pompous ass.
Romney is a proud Globalist that has gotten wealth by using recycled Chinese money flowing back here and buying American businesses that are down and out because of Chinese competition ( ie., Walmart)so he can pretty them up with New Management before looting those businesses of newly borrowed monies and their pension plans. Then he reinvests his gains in China.
The mystery is why he is so willing to see Hong Kong destroyed. That is where his Chinese investors have come from. Only the Mormons know for sure.
It makes me suspicious Mitt has know idea indictments of high level lefties are coming and/or the raison d’etre of impeachment is to get GOP damage out in front of that news.
Mitt, you’re not helping...
“Maybe the magic underwear is too tight.”
I kind of doubt you’d feel this comfortable making a bigoted comment about yarmulkes, but who knows, perhaps you would.
Romney has a 38% job approval rating and his term ends in 2024.1
https://www.deseret.com/indepth/2019/10/5/20900651/president-trump-utah-mitt-romney-impeachment-twitter
Romney seems to have a double standard with Republicans, vs Democrats.
I’m surprised at him playing nice, with the forces that were so vicious to him when he ran against Obama.
Blogger JAORE said..."Go home, Mitt. Serve Utah. Your days in the national stage are over."
He is a carpetbagger in Utah and runs and wins only because of his Mormon big-shot thing. If you remember the 2012 election, he lives in LaJolla in his fancy oceanfront home that has an elevator for his vehicles.
an enterprise he believes to be a sure loser given Trump’s enduring GOP support
Does Trump have GOP support? I think he has support of voters who normally vote for GOP candidates, but I'm not so sure about the GOP politicians. I don't think most of them like him. They, like their D counterparts, see him as a threat to the status quo. Any support they show him is just to keep the deplorables back home happy.
Non-partisan warning for all:
Do. Not. Trust. Mitt.
Mittens is just another filthy piece of Koch-sucking Rove Republican swill. What ELSE would anyone expect of him???
"On Tuesday, the White House sent a defiant 8-page letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, condemning her announced impeachment inquiry and warning that the Trump administration will not comply with the "illegitimate and unconstitutional" effort. Echoing House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, the letter claims that the proceedings have violated congressional norms and the president's due process rights."
"rights" are only afforded to the corrupt and powerful political class.
"obstruction of justice" - applies to anyone who does not submit to the corrupt democratic power structure and Strozk Insurance Policy.
I've long wondered whether the Obama administration did the same thing to Romney that they did to Trump (illegal surveillance, help from the FBI and CIA, etc.). Not that it mattered, since Romney basically played dead for most of his campaign.
I live in Ohio. Obama's ads against Romney came out early, and were devastating. They focused on Romney as a predatory capitalist who betrayed the working class. Romney never answered those ads. Ironically, the same ads could have been used by Trump.
“Mittens is a nonentity who is properly held in contempt by all. The notion that anyone cares what he thinks of does is risible.”
At a man-in-the-street level, that’s true. Yeah, he probably has some influence on the Establishment springs of power in his usual self-interested way, but he seems to have no natural constituency. I’ve heard people prefer Romney to other choices, but I’ve never heard anyone express enthusiasm for Romney. He’s not the John McCain of the Republican Party, he’s the Hillary Clinton.
We who voted for Trump because he’d build the wall would now be in open rebellion and want him primaried. But the coup going on around him makes us forgive and forget the broken campaign promises and fervently support him. All the plotting by the D’s has assured a Trump landslide in 2020.
"the person you want to put pressure on to produce significant pain"
Impossible. Before he feels any pain, Mitt gives in to pressure, especially if it comes from the left. Barry and Candy found out the easy way. A few puffs, and there goes Mitt.
Ah, TheThinMan, I do believe the wall is being erected as we speak.
I am struck by how many comments here accept what this obtuse unknown advisor says. He says Romney wants X, and pretty much every Trumper here accepts Romney wants X. Selective skepticism.
He seems to be as much a DC outsider at President Trump
I agree although we don't know all the details of Mitt's career. As far as "Magic underwear" being "bigoted," he is the first Mormon to run for president and Hugh Hewitt even wrote a book about it. I am no expert on Mormon politics but Harry Reid is not exactly a sterling example.
I wonder how Mitt's attempt at power politics plays at home?
It would take a superhuman effort to convince 19+ Republican senators to turn Trump out of office over this concocted Ukraine nonsense. Mitt, do you want to be remembered as the guy who make that effort? If you fail, your name is mud. If you succeed your name is unprintable.
We all know Romney doesn't really like to get his hands dirty. I just can't see him buttonholing his colleagues to lead the hypothetical Republican betrayal brigade.
Mitt's efforts would have more juice if he helps revive the "scream helplessly at the sky" day to commemorate President Trump's election.
"I kind of doubt you’d feel this comfortable making a bigoted comment about yarmulkes, but who knows, perhaps you would."
Does anyone know where I can get a tinfoil yarmulke? I live in fear of Zionist Conspiracy theories.
Yeah. Vote for a "D" if you wanted the Wall built. Or one of the Republicans that have been fighting to stop it from the very beginning.
Some people around here are either really stupid. Or think we are.
Yes, but has anybody come up with a predicate of actual unlawful or unconstitutional behavior by the president?
I was informed by some lefty commenters at Volokh just yesterday that the House doesn't need any of that. Impeachment is a political process, there are no real rules, just whatever House rules exist at the time.
Only 500 miles of wall.
Only fighting the courts and Congress for money.
But idiots selectively believe the MSM.
Good job, idiots.
Schiff is the chakra that needs blocking.
"So McCain died, and now Romney is the Republican they hated when he ran but now they adore because he doesn't love Trump. Is that right?"
That's just about exactly verbatim what I said to Meade after I wrote this post.
I wonder what Susan Collins thinks when she sees that Mitt Romney thinks he is the lone voice of conscience in the U.S. Senate.
More wishcasting as a substitute for journalism. How much of what you read is exactly that? "I want this thing to be true so here's story about how it could be true, what it would mean if it was true, what kind of things would happen if it came true" and on and on...never bothering to seriously engage with the question of whether it IS actually true.
That accounted for the bulk of the words written on "Russian collusion," and fact is as clear as can be.
I guess Who What Where When Why How aren't any fun for journalists in the way IF obviously is.
Doesn't putting the squeeze on a pressure point cause a person to fold like cheap suit?
Sounds exactly like Romney. Push him a little and TADA! Who'd have guessed Brooks Brothers suits were that cheaply made?
I hate to break it to the person that wrote this (well, not really), but Mitt Romney is completely irrelevant. About the only thing he adds to any impeachment effort is it would allow the Dems and the Media (BIRM) to use the phrase "bipartisan effort". That's it.
Wow, I just didn’t think I could be more ashamed for supporting this anti-American POS.
What a backstabbing prick Mittens is. But then we knew that. Lets have an impeachment, drag it out, and hand the election to Warren, so Mittens can Grandstand and be important.
Incredible. Romney isn't anyone's "Conscious" - what a great phrase to cover up the fact that he's a jealous little girl getting together with the D's to thwart the will of his party and the 47% that voted for Trump. Mittens of course couldn't convict Trump - the D's need almost 20 R Senators. BUT Romney could delay and extend the impeachment trial. Which is what the D's want.
Now we know why Trump - out of the blue - attacked Mittens on Twitter. He must have gotten word that Romney was stabbing in the back trying to organize the Republican "Resistance".
Remember the Jeff Flake Grandstanding during the Kavanaugh hearings? Mittens wants to be that guy.
Ah Mittens! What a comedown. You're now no more important than a pimple on the posterior of progress. Delusions of relevance and grandeur seem to be bouncing around in that empty airy space between his ears.
If Romney really believes any of this, he is completely delusional. Trump will only be ousted in an impeachment if you can convince people like Ted Cruz to vote against him. Convincing NeverTrump Senators isn't going to work. And just to make the point- a Cory Gardner will only guarantee his own defeat next November by voting to oust Trump, and so the same with Susan Collins. They may be stupid enough to believe it is a path to save their seats, but they will learn otherwise in getting crushed.
Romney is one for whom I will not vote.
“I agree although we don't know all the details of Mitt's career. As far as "Magic underwear" being "bigoted," he is the first Mormon to run for president and Hugh Hewitt even wrote a book about it. I am no expert on Mormon politics but Harry Reid is not exactly a sterling example.”
His father did run, but didn’t get the nomination.
I definitely can see Romney offended by Trump. Part of it is jealousy. Romney is smarter (maybe), harder working (maybe), and better credentialed (so what?) than Trump. He was even more so over Obama, of course, but BHO at least always looked sharp and spoke well, when he had his TelePrompTer available. Both BHO and Romney are always dignified. Trump, not so much.
In my experience, and even more my partner’s, Mormons are weird. From the outside, they look as two faced and hypocritical as Democrats (and were Democrats until they got tired, after a half century, of being pandered and lied to over statehood by the Dems, accepted the Republican offer in trade for statehood). In her LDS majority HS, most of the teen pregnancy shotgun weddings were Mormon. We are talking early 1970s, and they were still literally doing shotgun weddings. Her best friend’s single mother (of five) got her shotgun out and marched the guy who had knocked her next daughter up down to the courthouse. This wasn’t the Deep South, but rather Las Vegas. Indeed, they still run Las Vegas - there is still an adage there in the legal community, that if you want to win your case in court, you need a Mormon at the counsel’s table. He doesn’t have to say anything, just be there.
It is partly the egregious hypocrisy to some extent. Mormons don’t have premarital sex, until they show up before the judge with a shotgun wielding parent behind them. They don’t drink, at least with other Mormons around. But as the adage goes, if they are the only Mormon around, watch your beer. They couldn’t drink soft drinks, until their church bought a bunch of Coke stock (and weirdly, including in my law firm in SLC, throughout much of the Wasatch corridor, everyone seems to have switched out unsweetened iced tea for diet uncaffinated Coke on their soda fountains - even McDonalds).
The other thing though is many Mormons seem almost as bad as Jews in dealing with gentiles (I always thought it hilarious that one kid on my wing freshman year was a Jewish “gentile” from SLC). It always seems to be them versus us. They are saved, and we (the gentiles) are not (but they will keep trying to convince us to see the gold tablets, so we can join them in their patriarchal family centric heaven). In my experience, it is the women who are, by far, the worst in this holier than thou attitude, pushing in front of you in line, etc.
There also seems to be a Calvinistic mercenary streak in many Mormons. They very religiously tithe (before taxes, or anything else). That means that the more money you make, the more you contribute to the Church. The more you earn (and tithe), the more respected you often are in the Church. In Mormonland, Mitt Romney is a prince. He did everything right - he went on Mission, graduated at the top of his class at BYU, married in the Temple, then with a lot of hard work and ingenuity, built a decent fortune. Harry Reid started out in much meaner circumstances, and managed to claw his way to prominence and a fortune with a lot of hard work (my partner’s family socialized with his a bit Sunday afternoons growing up). He was probably a Democrat mostly because that was where the votes were in S NV, and much of that is because Vegas is a union town. He made his money mostly off of gentiles, so that was good. And he swung hard left in order to control the Dem caucus in the Senate. That was good too, since it meant more money and power, coming mostly, again from gentiles.
Am I cynical? In real life, not that much. A lot of really good Mormons out there.
“I wonder how Mitt's attempt at power politics plays at home?”
Not well. Sure, some of his Mormon constituents will stick by him, because of their shared faith. But, I expect, unless he switches into one of Trump’s fiercest advocates, that he will be seriously primaried in 2024. His opponent will, of course, be Mormon, because it is Utah, and the Mormons in the state are not going to give the seat up to a gentile. But I expect that most of them are happier with Trump, than with Romney, putting religion to the side.
P.s. An apology to any Mormons here whom I have offended. These are my personal feelings, and I have probably been less charitable about other religions here, including Roman Catholicism. Every religion has good and bad. True believers and hypocrites. I have met and lived around many more of the former, than the latter, when it comes to Mormons.
So McCain died, and now Romney is the Republican they hated when he ran but now they adore because he doesn't love Trump. Is that right?
I assumed there was a job posting on LinkedIn after McCain died and Mitt's experience won out over Sasse's enthusiasm.
The pressure point is Newspeak BS. Since the internet took over, no fake reputations are going to count anymore. Romney is only a Mormon presence. And Nevada and Utah combined are 12 electoral votes. Georgia alone is 16. That is the weight that must be accounted for. It is all about center of gravity, not pressure points.
Journolism. Deep Plunger still has work to do.
Mike Sylvester is right. Watch Susan Collins’ speech she gave when she announced her vote for Kavanaugh, her disgust with Democrats’ contempt for due process, and you won’t worry about her falling for the zombie like message discipline of the Democrats.
If you need absolute message discipline, that’s like admitting you built a house of cards, and are begging everybody in the room “nobody move It’ll collapse!"
I will be happy when Mittens puts his dog back on the roof of his station wagon, and takes his family with him to Cuba, or China, or. wherever he won’t feel so threatened by the accused having rights.
Does Mitt Romney wield any substantial power in the senate? I have no idea, but he certainly represents the "traditional" GOP. That makes him a different cat than John McCain. I do doubt that even McCain would support an effort to impeach/remove a president that is nominally Republican. Overriding the will of the people to vindicate some personal grievance strikes me as bad for the country and for the re-election prospects of those involved.
Romney the weasel was going to do the exact same kind of things if he had become president.
Mittens Romney couldn't handle Candy "Tubby" Crowley. If he can't handle her, he certainly can't handle President Trump. Mittens needs to STFU
Tomcc,
Sell that "nominally Republican" shit elsewhere.
Your subtle concern trolling won't work.
Tomcc: "I do doubt that even McCain would support an effort to impeach/remove a president that is nominally Republican."
On the contrary, we now know McCain and his team were wirking directly with FusionGPS and the dems to undermine the republican candidate and then to subvert and frame the republican President-Elect and then President.
McCain would not only support removing a republican President by illicit means, he would gleefully LEAD it!
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/features/ronan-farrow-book-how-harvey-weinstein-may-have-leveraged-matt-lauer-1246149
Correct use:
The men huddled for hours, strategizing quietly. Weinstein had found a pressure point: Matt Lauer.
If Romney had put half the energy into fighting the sleazy slurs that Obama tarred him that he's putting into disparaging Trump, he'd have been elected president.
" . . . lone voice of conscience . . ." is guffaw-worthy. Could Mitt conscientiously tell me why the US Government is obligated to continue endless feckless wars in the Mideast due to its "ally" the Kurds vis its other "ally" the Turks? Or is that just a situational manipulation by the media and bombing fan Lindsey Graham, war-Dems, and war-neocons? Is war-mongering with Russia while China is handed the keys to the store by spies employed by Dems not enough?
I really am deeply disappointed with how incurious Romney is about the actual facts and the way he toes the line in the Democrat message disciply [rigorously avoid certain facts] on this.
Post a Comment