Power Line News

Mitt Romney is debuting a new ad in which he challenges Republicans to get back to their histor

» View the article

John, what the heck are you babbling about? Romney, the businessman/politician, was elected governor of Mass. Kind of like a business guy named Bush elected governor of Texas and then president, twice. I am undecided at this point (for disclosure) but I think your observation is irrelevant.

George W. Bush may have training and experience as a (not-too-successful in some respects) businessman, but he does have an emotional connection with people, certainly including voters. Gore may have been derided as wooden, Bill as oily, but W. never as plastic. (Stalin sort of eliminated ‘steely’ from this list of ‘material’ attributes.)

I’ve never seen Bobby Jindal, so can’t comment on whether this geek-background politician shares Mitt’s ‘invisible protective shield’ of emotional distance. I’m inclined to agree that this is an aspect of Mitt’s difficulty in getting his poll numbers higher.

I think Romney is easily the best candidate. He is right on defence, immigration, the border, conservative values, political experience, and his personal life.

As far as I’m concerned he communicates very well though not with the courtroom skills of Rudy.

If he were a Democrat he would be promoted as the second coming of JFK (without the weakness of the flesh).

The complaint that he is too slick is difficult for me to comprehend. He is certainly articulate but does not strike me as glib. After the experience of the last 7 years (and I have supported GWB as much as anyone including Laura and the dog) I would think Republicans would embrace an articulate spokesman.

Only well conducted surveys (with honest interviewees) would tell us what is holding Romney back but it certainly isn’t anything obvious. I suspect it’s his religion, which objectively suffers from the being created by a self proclaimed prophet who adopted a lot of existing Judeo-Christian dogma.

This might subconsciously cause people to connect Romney with another religion which has these same similarities. This other religion has been in the news, and on our minds, a lot lately.

I am afraid that Mitt does nothing for me. I can’t get excited about him. I will, however, vote for him if he wins the primary.

Technocrats maybe make decent governors, but Presidents? I think not.

“he is not very good on a stage.” “Romney’s failure to connect with them when he speaks”

These statements are true. In the Fox debate, when the soldiers father admonished Mitt for his misstatement of comparing his sons campaigning to that of our soldiers service. What Mitt did say was nice but it wasn’t personal enough. 

Had Mitt said directly to the father in the coffee shop something like; I’m glad you’ve brought this up, I would like to personally apologize to you and to all of the families of America’s soldiers for my error, I hope you find it in your hearts to accept my sincere apology.

And then move on to the rest of his answer about Iraq, which was a brilliant answer! If you listened to it, it touched on many things I want from a POTUS to be pondering about the Iraq war; listening to the generals and acting on their reports, his comments about the terrorist’s global jihad movement was visionary and showed a studied, deep knowledge of it....almost like, if given the time, he could lecture on the subject. Just wicked smart stuff!

He even got a small dig in at McCain at the end saying he wanted to give deference to the general and ambassador’s report. Which, truth be told, is what most professional grown ups, especially born leaders, do; they listen to their skilled, experienced support staff when making their big decisions.

John McCain’s problem with Romney’s adjective use of “apparent” doesn’t strike me as skill I want in a leader but hey it got him a bump in the polls so....

BTW, I belong to a conservative women’s group here in California and we took a straw poll during our discussion last week and Mitt won, Rudy was second & Fred a distant third.

It could be a women thing but Mitt “polls” very well with Republican women I know. Not one word about plastic or slick came up, just drop dead gorgeous and handsome.

Mitt is my candidate because of his positions. However, I do see what John is saying. When I watch Mitt on stage I don’t have that same emotional attachment I have to say, President Bush. When President Bush speaks sometimes I find myself welling up with pride for the man. He is so sincere in the things he says and you can almost see a fire burning behind his eyes to get things done.

With Mitt it seems more relaxed, comes off the tongue better, but doesn’t inspire.

Of course, I don’t need to be inspired to vote for a candidate but perhaps many others do. Not sure how Mitt can fix that.

Bagginator - 22 September 2007 08:47 PM

When President Bush speaks sometimes I find myself welling up with pride for the man. He is so sincere in the things he says and you can almost see a fire burning behind his eyes to get things done.

I’m not bagging on you, but the above is the part about Bush admirerers that I have never, ever gotten. I hear people say similar things all the time and it just leaves me scratching my head in wonder. I just don’t get it and never have.

At the Fox debate, Wendell Goler’s follow up question to Mitt about wire tapping mosque’s elicited this inspiring comment, which embodies the best of republican, conservative, even libertarian thought & ethics, when he said: “the most important civil liberty I expect from my government is my right to be kept alive”.

I think this is Romney is doing what a truly conservative candidate should be: adopt the Sarkozy script of running against his own party. If there is one thing that most Republicans agree with, it’s that the Republican era was an utterly dismal failure. To take ownership of the most important conservative positions is low-hanging fruit that no one else is willing to do. How about telling Congress to “knock it off” with these D.R.E.A.M. act riders to important legislation? Or chastising everyone, including Republicans, for failing to put any teeth in the earmark reform legislation? If he were to follow up this ad with that kind of a strategy, he would have my vote right now. I’d bet that I’m far from alone. Conservatives have had nothing to hang on to so far.

Terry Gain - 22 September 2007 08:02 PM

I think Romney is easily the best candidate. He is right on defence, immigration, the border, conservative values, political experience, and his personal life.

Terry Gain - 22 September 2007 08:02 PM

I suspect it’s his religion, which objectively suffers from the being created by a self proclaimed prophet who adopted a lot of existing Judeo-Christian dogma.

Now that is not only incorrect, but the next paragraph, however smoothly delivered, leads the objective reader to believe you have a personal prejudice against Latter-day Saints:

Terry Gain - 22 September 2007 08:02 PM

This might subconsciously cause people to connect Romney with another religion which has these same similarities. This other religion has been in the news, and on our minds, a lot lately.

Comparing The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - http://www.lds.org or http://www.mormon.org - with Islam is a disgusting insult, and quite violently anti-Mormon both in style as well as substance.

Consider what Latter-day Saints actually believe:

1 We believe in God, the Eternal Father, and in His Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost.
2 We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam’s transgression.
3 We believe that through the Atonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel.
4 We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are: first, Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; second, Repentance; third, Baptism by eimmersion for the fremission of sins; fourth, Laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost.
5 We believe that a man must be called of God, by prophecy, and by the laying on of hands by those who are in authority, to preach the Gospel and administer in the ordinances thereof.
6 We believe in the same organization that existed in the Primitive Church, namely, apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, evangelists, and so forth.
7 We believe in the gift of tongues, prophecy, revelation, visions, healing, interpretation of tongues, and so forth.
8 We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.
9 We believe all that God has revealed, all that He does now reveal, and we believe that He will yet reveal many great and important things pertaining to the Kingdom of God.
10 We believe in the literal gathering of Israel and in the restoration of the Ten Tribes; that Zion (the New Jerusalem) will be built upon the American continent; that Christ will reign personally upon the earth; and, that the earth will be renewed and receive its paradisiacal gglory.
11 We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may.
12 We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law.
13 We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; indeed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul—We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things.
-Joseph Smith

That’s a far cry from the teachings of Islam (which means submission), such as Jihad (spread Islam at the point of a sword [or these days, an AK-47]), muta’a (taking temporary “wives,” in which men pay for the privilege of temporarily “marrying” a young girl, paying her father handsomely for permission, and then consummating such a “marriage” for pleasure-once the consummating is over, the girl is kept in isolation for six months to ensure she isn’t pregnant before she can be available for another muta’a arrangement), taquiyya (lie to or defraud any non-muslim if you can justify it in your mind as being in defense of Islam), Sharia Law (in which women are treated as property, and can be murdered if they are raped, or even seen with a non-family member of the opposite sex), etc.

Latter-day Saint charity work is done by volunteers, at their own expense, using supplies purchased by funds donated by members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, to the tune of tens of millions of dollars a year, and this from a church with an American membership of only about four million. Not a dime goes to fund islamofascist terrorism, unlike many muslim “charities.”

I’m sure you get the point. Please be more honest with powerline readers when commenting on The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Everytime I hear someone say “Giuliani will eventually fall when people hear his stances on social issues” I just laugh and laugh. Who in the heck is gonna beat him? I’ve watched Romney in the debates and he seems to steal stances or catch phrases from Giuliani and when he’s just being himself he comes off as a phony stiff with that used car salesman look. Thompson came off pretty good on Leno, but I think he’s gonna crash in burn in the debates when he actually has to respond to tough questions. He never seems to get specific and his organizational skills stink. Giuliani is gonna run away with this thing. Book it!

John’s post is the most cogent explanation of something that has troubled me about Romney ever since the second Republican debate.  After that debate I posted saying that Romney just wasn’t coming across the klieg lights.  He’s still not, and there are lots of reasons.  I happened to list a few that I noticed, having judged lots of high school policy tournament debates. There are others, though, chief among which is mouthing off occasionally and saying unbelievably immature and dumb things, like his sons serving the country by working on his campaign.

I think a lot of Romney’s intellect, but there is a somewhat amateurish quality to him at times, as John noted.  I also agree with Sheryl’s post.  He is every Republican woman’s ideal candidate, not to mention husband.  I just don’t think there are enough Republican women in the electorate to help him out.

I guess because I live inside the Beltway, I have seen the day to day fallout from President Bush’s declining to explain consistently the whats and whys of the Iraq war.  And this has been a problem despite the fact that the President absolutely does connect with ordinary people. 

Communicating effectively is absolutely critical.  No Republican who fails to really captivate listeners and make them not mind so much about Iraq will win the election.  Giuliani is doing it, and Romney isn’t.  Freddie T is rapidly becoming a bad joke, and McCain will not pull through.  I respect him a huge amount, but he has too much legislative baggage and a tragic character flaw of Sophoclean proportions:  stubbornness.

Does Romney actually think he’s gonna win over conversative voters by lashing out at Republicans and making us the enemy instead of making Hillary the enemy? That’s the biggest no no he could of made. Rudy is taking it to Hillary and is in total control of this primary so far. Romney, Thompson, and McCain just don’t seem like they have the “it” factor. I’ve been saying for almost a year now. Rudy VS Hillary is a lock. I still think that.

The glove don’t fit. It can’t be Mitt. He’s too plastic. Sorry.