It’s been a rough week for Republican Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, who has seen Texas Governor Rick Perry eclipse him as frontrunner by double-digits in a new poll. But that’s not the worst of it. Romney of late has been flip-flopping on issues like global warming, leading to a comparison to one of the more ignominious candidates in recent history. From MSNBC First Read:
Romney played into his biggest weakness, that he’s inauthentic by backtracking on global warming and on Dodd-Frank. And he also played into the awkwardness meme. On Tuesday, Jill Lawrence wrapped some of Romney’s odder moments, comparing him to John Kerry, whom Lawrence covered in 2004. Kerry, she says, has been on her “mind as Mitt Romney, in his second presidential outing, keeps adding to his digital library of remarks that are insensitive, inappropriate or not nearly as funny to others as they are to him.” [Pols emphasis] And his “I’m sorry it’s my turn” town hall adds to it. How many other ways could he have handled that? The Romney campaign thinks moments like this show strength – that’s what they said after the Des Moines Register Soap Box “corporations are people” event. But they may have learned the wrong lesson from the Soap Box moment. The party may want a hard-charger, but is that who Romney really is? People still ultimately want their politicians to be likeable.
Yikes! Is there a worse comparison in recent history for any Presidential hopeful to be compared to the comatose 2004 Presidential campaign of Sen. John Kerry, the patron saint for how to run for President and look like a boob while doing it?
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was unpopular with the ditto head segment of 2008’s Republican voters, Rs wound up not breaking with precedent and nominating him anyway. A lot has changed since then. Will this be the first time the GOP fails to go with the establishment guy whose turn it is?
But because I’m watching the Packer game, I don’t have to elaborate.
None of the other primary candidates appear to be running a sustainable campaign. Perry’s on the fence – right now he’s being compared to Clarke and Thompson as a fast starter and big loser in a primary.
Furthermore, Obama is wading into Carter territory.
Though today I would still give the odds to Obama, they are attenuating more and more every day.
BTW, Gore was another recent example of a candidate with the wind at his back but who snatched defeat from the jaws of victory by visibly being a great big asshole.
You mean that’s the explanation for the butterfly ballots and why so many black voters were wrongly purged from the Florida rolls? At last, something that makes sense!
Yes he actually won that election, even with the butterfly ballot fiasco and extensive dirty tricks, suppression, purging, etc. but had he been a better candidate it wouldn’t have been close enough to steal via judicial coup. Also a statewide recount instead of the Gore camp’s choice of cherry picking would have resulted in Florida going for Gore as even that wacky former SOS has often stated. Clinton not cooperating with his enemies in creating so much sleaze Gore felt compelled to run away from also would have helped. It should have been a cakewalk, what with all that peace, prosperity and surplus, not a close one.
we wouldn’t be talking about Florida.
And if he didn’t run away from The Big Dog, he would have carried his home state.
makes him as bad of a candidate as John McCain turned out to be.
The benefits of hindsight are great — one or two tiny things could have broken the other way, and Gore would have been president. Then his decision to “run away from the Big Dog” would have looked like a brilliant strategy, and his loss in Tennessee would have meant he played things just right by reaching out to key swing states. But of course, they broke the other way, so those look like awful mistakes.
or Joe the Plumber as a prominent face of the campaign so I’ll agree that the McCain/Palin ticket was lamer.
who undercut the Gore recount campaign at a crucial moment.
And even though I knew that everything Cheney was saying was bull and hated Cheney’s guts, he quite decisively clobbered Lieberman in the VP debate. It sure would have been nice to get Lieberman out of the Senate before he turned on his party, though.
all by himself – per many of the other comments here. (It should be noted that the ballot problems were exclusive to counties with Dem. clerks).
As for Kerry, I think it was Carville who said Hell would have to freeze over before Kerry lost the election b/c of the public angst over Bush, even in ’04. But he too came across as completely arrogant and inaccessible.
McCain was not a great candidate, but in contrast to AG & JK, he ran into an historic tsunami. He could have cured cancer and wouldn’t have won.
Fast forward to Romney, he’s the right guy at the right time. I think it’s ok that he’s a little awkward. One thing he’s not: arrogant. And if the economy doesn’t markedly improve over the next 6 mos, general election voters will view him as the right man to cure what really ills them.
That’s crap. McCain, completely under his own power and with his own consent to bone head moves like Palin, took himself from being a favorite of indies and a natural choice for grumpy old Dems wary of the black guy to hopeless. Before McCain was through screwing himself he was absolutely the R candidate Dems liked, respected and feared most.
yeah demolishing his seaside villa to make a much bigger one, in this economy, reaks of entitlement and elitism
He was a hedge fund manager, one of those guys that crashed the economy. That’ll play well with indies.
firing all the workers. Try to turn that into the right guy for jobs jobs jobs. I can see the ads now listing the companies and the number of workers terminated to the accompaniment of suitably sinister music.
Hey, ajb. Got any response yet from ‘tad to the info with links you provided about the situation with teacher’s jobs in Texas? I never got any response to my inquiry as to what is so sinister about Soros. Or anything else, ever, for that matter.
The triumph of hope over experience.
It seems to be doing OK so far. Fingers crossed. But not bothering to cross any fingers or click my heels together three times or wish upon any stars for a response from ‘tad.
but it’s truly ironic that the two GOP candidates who would have a decent chance in the general election (Romney and Huntsman) have such difficulty in winning the GOP primary.
Personally, I hope that Perry wins the GOP nomination for two reasons. First, I think a lot of independent voters will be turned off by many of Perry’s positions. Second, many of Perry’s “accomplishments” don’t hold up under scrutiny–and I believe Perry will not do well under the national spotlight.
I don’t think that either Romney or Huntsman would be a disaster. Do you really want to run the risk of a Perry presidency?
🙂
I think Perry has two chances of beating Obama–slim and none, and slim just left town. Huntsman or Romney might have a chance.
And yes, even though they are the least bad of the lot, I think either would be a disaster–which is not to say Obama has been perfect. Not by a long shot. But Obama is infinitely better, in my judgment, than any of the GOP candidates.
… I fear the sentiment expressed by I can’t remember who: if we get a double-dip recession, Obama will lose to even a block of Velveeta. Perry or Bachmann could be that block of Velveeta.
Right now most of the public is barely aware of all the crazy and negative stuff that’s in Perry’s public record. They don’t know how phony the alleged Texas miracle is or how loony his ideas and associates are or how many shady deals he’s connected with. The reason we’re not seeing a strong effort to bring it all to light now is that it needs to be fresh and new to the public for later on when people start paying attention if he does become the nominee.
As for the present, Bachmann seems to be trying to go to the right of Perry. That might actually make him look less extreme, less crazy and help him get the nomination. They do like nominating Governors. But this year’s GO(T)P politics make so little sense compared to the usual orderly ascension of the one whose turn it’s judged to be by the establishment, I give up on predictions.