Calm Before The Next Storm

Ah, CPAC.  The two one time leading candidates are struggling mightily to reinvent themselves.  Another isn't even there and the last is now the first.

It will be fun to watch next week to see how it all shakes out.  I feel more calm than usual today because I read where Jeb Bush's name is already being bandied about in case of a brokered convention.

He too, however, has baggage. I won't list it all because the press will when and if.  The worst is obvious.  He's a Bush.  Are we ready to accept that he's not his brother? On the other hand it might be poetic justice of a sort.  Obama and his administration keep telling us all our problems are because of brother George's administration.  Who better to fix them than another Bush?  I'm not holding my breath.

Rick Santorum continues to look good to the devout conservative.  One thing about the man whether or not you agree with him, like Paul, he really believes in the positions he's taken.  Maybe we shouldn't be too quick to write them off.

Now is the time to look at other aspects of the elections.  All the promises are for naught if the Congress isn't squarely behind the President no matter who he is.  Obama is finding that to be true.

Whether or not the dynamic of the House and Senate changes sits squarely upon our shoulders and all the speech making and blogging in the world won't change that. Each state and district within will elect those of their own personal choice.  Each has control whether or not they will be ideologues, obstructionists, liberal or conservative.  Hopefully there will be some moderates in the mix so the field is more level than it has been.  It's definitely buyer beware.

There will be no budget, again, from the Senate.  Harry Reid has already said so.  The deficit is to go up another trillion or so.  The President has already said so. That should be an indicator that compromise is unlikely.

Will the tea party types mellow?  Probably not.  Things have gotten so bad in Washington that Democrats and Republicans won't even patronize the same restaurants for fear of running into one another.  How much more sophomoric and petulant can you get?

And so it goes.  I'm beginning to worry about myself.  I find myself laughing at so many of the headlines yet they are far from funny.  It really is more than just jobs and the economy you see.  People in Syria are being slaughtered daily by the dozens and Ahmajinedad is getting ready to dog and pony show Iran's nuclear accomplishments to date.  Israel will be watching, if not acting.  It is imperative that we pay attention.

Meanwhile we worry about the finger flashed at the Super Bowl and whether or not Gisele is detrimental to Tom's performance on the field.  And the President is busy shooting marshmallows across his office.

Why not?  A bit of levity may be all that's keeping us sane.

Now What?

I'm beginning to think the Republicans should change their iconic elephant to a question mark.  Or a tear drop.  Whichever you prefer.

We are witnessing an electorate thoroughly unimpressed with it's choices.  Do I think Santorum can gain the traction he needs to win the nomination?  No.  I checked out his campaign web site today to see if he actually has anything to say.  Not particularly and what is there is predominantly the social issues revolving around abortion and gay marriage.

I touched on this yesterday.  I don't believe either should be the pervue of the federal government.  Both are personal and religious issues, value judgements having nothing to do with governance.  Besides Roe versus Wade is the law of the land and to get a constitutional amendment to over turn it would be a lengthy and difficult task.  As I also said, we have far more pressing things on the national agenda like the possibility of war with Iran and the results that are bound to surface from our failed experiment in bringing democracy to the middle east.  Oh, yes, many of the countries now have it but it bears no resemblance to what we wanted or expected.

There are several issues the candidates seem not to have a handle on.  The first and most important in order to rally the country behind them would be a vision.  What the other guy is doing wrong is not a vision.  I've yet to hear one articulated.  The Democrats last go 'round had 'hope and change' which we took to mean whatever we wanted it to, but it was a slogan that resonated. "I'm not him," doesn't any more than "I was a CEO," or "Ronald Reagan and I...".

I'm totally uninspired.  I would guess even conservatives aren't flocking to Santorum because they've suddenly been enlightened, but because they've no one left.  He is not without flaws when his policies are examined, such as he too, not unlike Obama, sees government picking and choosing who should get tax breaks.  Wrong.

I wonder if the Republican hierarchy isn't working feverishly to find someone to draft if they can swing a brokered convention.  At this point it seems the most appealing option but the question is who?  If someone out there who has been wooed previously might succumb to the siren song, why not now instead of later?  The future of the nation is at stake.  Do they just not care?  And if not, why not?

If we have become a nation of sheep then he who would lead this nation might do well to remember this from his childhood, especially the last two lines.

Mary had a little lamb its fleece was white as snow; And everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to go. It followed her to school one day, which was against the rule; It made the children laugh and play, to see a lamb at school. And so the teacher turned it out, but still it lingered near, And waited patiently about till Mary did appear. "Why does the lamb love Mary so?" the eager children cry; "Why, Mary loves the lamb, you know" the teacher did reply.

That will take some doing on his part.

Is There More To Mitt Than Meets The Eye...Or Less?

I've found little on which I can agree with Newt.  However,  I must agree that the candidates do have ways to sway their super pacs no matter what the rules say.  Hasn't Newt shown that by his own new found, ahem, negativity?

With that as my premise, it's time for Mitt to tone his down.  I don't care how it's done but it's about to become a bigger liability to him than Romneycare.

I hadn't thought much about it, politics being what it is, until Rick Santorum started making headway in the Minnesota polls.  What does Romney do?  Turns his attacks on Santorum.  It leads me to wonder if that is the only egg in his basket other than the 'I know how to create jobs' mantra.

It's getting old on all sides.  It's one of the problems with these year long primaries. The negativity is pointing to things long past.  Yes, Santorum took earmarks while a Senator.  It was and is common practice and he explained it by saying as long as it was allowed it was his duty to see his constituency got their fair share.  That is defensible only if the earmarks were for something worthwhile, but defensible never-the-less.  But it's past.  Just like Romney claims he's changed his past stance on abortion.  He credits becoming more educated, but at the time he was pro choice.  Period.  Frankly, on the legitimacy scale I'm with Santorum on this one. I fear Romney's 'education' might better be described as 'expedience', but that's only my eerie opinion.

When Santorum takes Romneycare apart he does it with the precision of a surgeon when comparing it to Obamacare.  I'd like to see Romney take Santorum to task, Gingrich and Paul too, on the substance of his policy versus theirs in the same way.  What exactly is his other than 57 pages of something on his web site no one is going to read except the most serious of wonks? And why is his superior to the others?

Santorum may be on the verge of getting the latex glove treatment; he's the only one left and we'll know more after tonight's caucuses.   I do not agree with his positions on any of the social and religious issues.  I don't think they should be part of a presidential campaign, especially those that already have regulating law in place.  I cannot support Santorum because of it, I find it too much in the forefront of his thinking when far more serious issues are facing the nation.

That being said, he is probably the candidate most prepared to defend his policies against the others.  Whether he can gain the traction and the money needed to wage battle at this point remains to be seen.  What he has done is bring to the fore the weakness of the other campaigns.

If Romney is anything more than a former CEO now is the time to spell it out.  If he can do no better than to continue the negativity my thinking will follow suit ~ where Romney is concerned, it will go negative.

The Upside Of Downton Abby

Like thousands of others, I've become hooked on the PBS series that takes place during the Edwardian era preceding and during World War I.  It is a soap to be sure, full of intrigue, risque relationships, marriages of convenience, ambition and betrayal.  Not unlike modern day life.

What they had then that is no longer the case is a sense of place.  You know, a place for everything and everything in its place.  With the war we witness the beginning of the end of that sense of place.  Aristocratic young ladies fall for the help  and vice versa, the help dares to question authority, ambitions are not only voiced but acted upon.

The aristocracy is struggling to remain relevant as old soldiers are put again into uniform as a morale booster rather than to fight.  The women left behind find strength within themselves they never knew they had nor thought they could put to practice no matter if they were the aristocrats or the under class. Society is changing dramatically.  It will never again be quite the same and if you don't go with the tide you'll end up being beached.

It reminds me of what is going on today in our political process, especially with the likes of Mr. Romney who can't seem to find his footing.  He was raised in a different time in a class that was segregated from the public as a whole and follows a faith which has values reflecting that time far more so than those of today.  A better time really, because there were values and they were adhered to.

Mr. Gore and Mr. Kerry had the same problem.  Though they tried to be one of us, they weren't.  Though Kerry married into wealth and embraced it wholeheartedly, Gore and Romney grew up with it along with the freedoms and the constraints it provided.  It's who they are.  Just like the old aristocracy.  They could no more fit in with the common man than these men of today.

My thought is they shouldn't try.  I don't particularly want a person in the Presidency because he's like me.  What a disaster in the making!  I haven't the intellect, the experience nor the chutzpa to pull it off! I could care less whether or not we ever share a beer. I don't necessarily want a person as President who is all personality either.  Too many of them are trying to be what they are not and doing a mighty poor job of it.

Mr. Romney is who he is. As James Carville said, he comes across as a detached dofus.  Indeed he does.  But that's his personality and the more he tries to be something other than that the more he falls prey to it. He needs to go for thought out substance and leave the personality to those who have one.  Enough of them have little substance.

Just like Downton Abby, the residents are caught up in the times.  They've already had to suffer through marrying American women in order to fund their vast land holdings.  As the under class gets bolder, however, I hope they cling to their own standards of being as to dress and manner and respect for the order under which they flourish.  They have their own aristocracy if you will.  If they abandon that to the lowest possible denominator they'll end up with the body pierced, tattooed, ball capped, muscle shirted society who swaggers around today thinking they've flummoxed the elitists and are winning the class war.

My generation worries they may have.  If so they will get the country they deserve.  It takes only so long for when we who are fading away become the exception rather than the rule.  Becoming the norm is next.

So to those like Mr. Romney.  Don't  try to be 'ordinary'.  Be yourself, tout the successes you've earned by using your own abilities.  Be proud.  And as John Wayne would say, "Never apologize.  It's a sign of weakness."

Hear that Mr. President?

The Fat Lady Has A Long Wait In The Wings

Mitt Romney wiped the Floridian floor with Newt.  So what does he do to celebrate?  He steps in a brand new mess of his own making.

One of these days I'm going to develop a sense of humor about all this.  So what did he do now?  He structured one sentence that was ripe for taking out of context.  He's not worried about the 'very poor'.  Well, of course he is.  All the candidates are.  They just have to be more cognizant of the 'gotchas'.

In context he cited the very poor have safety nets that can be repaired if necessary and that the very rich can fend for themselves.  It's the middle class that is the most vulnerable.

It emphasizes one area where Newt has a point.  The media loves 'gotcha' questions.  That leaves the responsibility of digging deeper to the voters and my guess is most are uninclined to do so.  It's so much easier to latch on to a twisted phrase and run with it, especially if it tends toward what you want to believe.  For Romney haters it shows one more rich guy looking down his nose at the poor. I can already imagine both the Gingrich and Obama campaigns using it!

We owe it to ourselves to do that digging because if left to the media there will be much that's not picked up.  Take, for instance, this excerpt from Newt's non-concession speech,

So designing and putting together a people's campaign, not a Republican campaign, not an establishment campaign, not a Wall Street campaign, a people's campaign, and saying to every American of every background and every ethnic group and every community: We have a better future for you and your family...This is a future we ask you to join us in imposing on the establishment in Washington and imposing it on both parties.

It jumped out at me the moment I heard it. It sounds to me like Newt is asking us to  join with him to impose his vision on the country, not necessarily our own nor a conservative one and certainly not a Republican vision.

I could assume I'm reading too much into this because the media hasn't said one word about it.  On the other hand maybe I'm not reading enough into it for the same reason!

I make a point of this because a mere three years ago many of us fell for an empty suit with an unarticulated vision other than the innocuous hope and change. We envisioned what we wanted to with nothing to confirm it from the candidate.  Every word that is uttered on the campaign trail has a purpose.  Some candidates do it better than others.  We owe it to them and as I said above, to ourselves, to make sure we know exactly what those words are intended to mean.