Romney also wins CPAC strawpoll

[Guest EXPAT]

Romney won the CPAC poll this year. For the last two years, Ron Paul has won the CPAC straw poll.

Yesterday I posted Santorum's speech to the CPAC. In this link you can hear the lies that Romney told the CPAC to get their vote. . .

http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/10/politics/campaign-wrap/index.html?hpt=hp_bn3

[JKane]

Wow, that's kinda surprising. Damn, if Mormon elite Romney can convince the CPAC whack-jobs then I'd guess the primaries will be winding down soon. Damn it.

[Guest EXPAT]

Now Santorum is questioning the results of CPAC and the Maine caucuses. He is suggesting foul play by the Romney campaign. This gets better and better each day. I can't wait for the campaign with whoever after August. . .

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/12/ron-paul-rick-santorum-mitt-romney-elections-2012_n_1271495.html?

[Guest hitoallusa]

Well if we remember Hillary and Obama four years ago, I don't think there is anything new here or to be excited about. It's just politics.

Now Santorum is questioning the results of CPAC and the Maine caucuses. He is suggesting foul play by the Romney campaign. This gets better and better each day. I can't wait for the campaign with whoever after August. . .

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/12/ron-paul-rick-santorum-mitt-romney-elections-2012_n_1271495.html?

[JKane]

I was kinda wondering how Romney could win with the arch-conservative Christians right in the middle of a surge in Santorum--which seems to be continuing it's slow, viscous spread across several states, I think I just heard in a poll.

Oh god, Santorum covering polls, hurugfh, just threw up a little! (And KyleRaw probable got aroused!)

[MsGuy]

Pew Research just released a poll showing Santorum has pulled even with Romney nationally among likely Republican voters (actually slightly ahead but within margin of error).

[Guest EXPAT]

Pew Research just released a poll showing Santorum has pulled even with Romney nationally among likely Republican voters (actually slightly ahead but within margin of error).

Santorum is living in a dream world if he thinks he would even come close in a main election against Obama. The more I see this fight the more I believe the Republican Party is headed for a big fall because they are only catering to the far far right wing. They have forgotten all of the moderates and independents. I can't see any of those two groups voting for Santorum.

[MsGuy]

To me, Santorum is not so obviously erratic as Bachmann & the Grinch, nor so obvious a loser as Perry. Not all moderates will care all that much about his positions on abortion or gay equality.

Hopefully some really nasty stuff will surface during the primaries because Santorum is the only guy in the clown car that actually scares me. I'm not so sure that he's unelectable should the economy head south this summer.

[Guest EXPAT]

To me, Santorum is not so obviously erratic as Bachmann & the Grinch, nor so obvious a loser as Perry. Not all moderates will care all that much about his positions on abortion or gay equality.

Hopefully some really nasty stuff will surface during the primaries because Santorum is the only guy in the clown car that actually scares me. I'm not so sure that he's unelectable should the economy head south this summer.

If you are right then I will leave this country. I refuse to believe that the majority of this country are that nuts to elect such a wackado.

[TampaYankee]

To me, Santorum is not so obviously erratic as Bachmann & the Grinch, nor so obvious a loser as Perry. Not all moderates will care all that much about his positions on abortion or gay equality.

Hopefully some really nasty stuff will surface during the primaries because Santorum is the only guy in the clown car that actually scares me. I'm not so sure that he's unelectable should the economy head south this summer.

You gotta be kidding. They all scare me.

As for Santorum getting a pass on abortion from the moderates -- maybe. But he won't from women on birth control. 98% of women support birth control and most have used it. Abortion does not touch their lives and their daughters anywhere like contraception does. Surprisingly and stupidly all of the candidates are picking up that smoldering turd up and spouting nurturing words to it. If they persist then it will burn the GOP badly with women. (This will be another reason why the base will be disillusioned in the general election. Those nurturing words will be thrown overboard with that issue down the road, unless of course it is Santorum.)

Mitt is even more of a lightweight that I ever imagined. Severely conservative -- my ass. I saw him operate in Mass. The real reason behind Romney Care? He thought it would be a feather in his cap when courting the Presidential Nomination and general Election. He waited until the last year of his term to move it. He never made a big campaign issue out of it or pinned it as his raison d'etre. His healthcare plan just sort of appeared out of thin air on the agenda towards the end. He hung it on prior GOP healthcare principles like 'the mandate' and 'exchanges' made up of insurance companies. He thought it would make him the great GOP visionary of the new Century -- showing how to use Republican ideas to achieve virtually universal health care.

This guy is so rudderless other than in pursuit of ambition. He has no real principles, he's a fucking green-eyeshade-wearing bean counter with a meat cleaver who has no compunction about wielding it to make the bottom line look better, even worse to stuff his and his cronies pockets with cash and leave the workers with down-adjusted jobs or at the unemployment office .

At least Bill Clinton had some principles to compromise. He also lied in campaign mode like Romney saying different things to different groups feeding them what the wanted to hear. But unlike Romney, although Clinton compromised his principles, at least he had some to compromise. Clinton bowed to the wind and change course a bit too readily but when the wind died down he would come back to his base principles. Romney has none other than making money and feeding his ego.

[Guest EXPAT]

Your Romney summary is spot on. I have never seen such a weak backbone in all my life. I first noticed it during the 2008 presidential primaries when he kept saying that he would rely solely on the views of commanders on the ground about troops. As the Commander in Chief he has to take all input and make the decision himself. I think he is a complete waffle on all issues depending on who he is talking too. A true leader has opinions and principles that he sticks to and I frankly can't find any with Romney.

Then you have Santorum who is only courting the Evangelistic Religious crowd and plans to run the country as if he were one of those pastors. THAT ALONE IS SCARY.

Gingrich is "the historian" who has ideas by the second instead of trying to do one or two big things. I doubt anyone could keep up with his line of thinking and that's not a good thing in this case.

Ron Paul actually has some good ideas, but he is living in the 50's on how he thinks communities should behave. That isn't going to happen. So he needs to just step aside. But his son is much more scary (it is his son isn't it?).

[JKane]

That is a great summary, TY. Romney is a plastic bag blowing in the wind.

Modern democrats have been more like a sail, always swinging back and forth, but generally there's a rope that'll stop them from going 180 degrees from their starting point...

[Guest CharliePS]

I know I've said it here before, but I'll repeat it: Don't underestimate Santorum. Yes, he lost by a big margin in 2006, a year when the Democrats surged, but his opponent was a well-known conservative Democrat who was also notoriously anti-abortion, so voters were really voting on the wars. Santorum had been elected to the House and then to two terms in the Senate, in a state that is not dominated by evangelicals, and his social positions weren't very different in those elections than they are today. He won Pennsylvania in 2000, when the state as a whole went for Gore. He is good on one-to-one campaigning, and people tend to like him personally even when they don't agree with him (sound like Dubya?). I think his biggest problem will turn out to be with the Tea Partiers, because he has been less fiscally conservative than Romney in the past, and they will not be happy when they discover that he is basically just a socially conservative DC insider.

[JKane]

Yep, I have worries along those lines, came up in comments over at BIE.