Mind explaining to me how Mitt’s money management skills mean he’d have sound judgment on foreign policy? You guys throw around the term “executive experience” as if all executives do basically the same thing. Mind you, this is a guy whose managerial “prowess” was such that he never did figure out a consistent message for his campaign despite more than a year on the trail.

Allahpundit on March 11, 2008 at 6:31 PM

And I repeat my question: Kindly explain why Mitt’s stock-picking skills makes him a better commander of troops or assessor of geopolitics than Obama. Define “executive experience,” in other words.

Allahpundit on March 11, 2008 at 6:43 PM

Allah, it must really suck to be you. You are the most pessimistic guy I know. Must be all those prayers to you asking you to give Victory to Muslims everywhere over the infidels. Even the Almighty would have to hold His nose to answer all those missives.

Sorry, big guy, but who says foreign policy experience is required in a VP? Who says governors can’t lead, in good times or bad? Who says the American people have to have Superman as a candidate to be satisfied with their leadership. Perfection is a goal unattainable in any candidate. And all our heroes have feet of clay. You just pick the guy who you think truly has America’s best interests at heart, especially in the face of people who think America is the root of all Evil in the world.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m damn tired of my own leadership, Republicans included, accepting rhetoric that says my neighbors’ and my acceptance of American support for Israel or war against radical Islamists are the reason we are hated everywhere in the world. We elect people to make us safe (especially after a threat was so adequately and surprisingly displayed to us), and allow us to prosper without having to kill our neighbors or steal their money, food, and toys to do so. I want someone to begin answering the calls for our deaths every time some raghead says Death to America, every time Hugo says he will make our oil go sky high, every time Putin says we don’t deserve a common defense against ANY threat.

I will remind you that W had almost no foreign policy experience when he was first elected. He may claim visits to Mexico were foreign policy experience, but they weren’t. You may all dislike the end where he brought the Republican party, but you cannot dispute that he has changed the world for the better for Americans. And that was his job.

The American Executive branch needs nothing more than a Man with the character and convictions to do what he thinks is best for the country, to be unafraid to make unpopular decisions because they are in the country’s best interests, and to be willing to suffer the slings and arrows of the liberal biased press every single time he opens his mouth. There has never been a President so maligned in the press for doing what is best for America.

There is no perfect candidate. There is no magic bullet. There is no one Man or Woman who is guaranteed to win for Republicans or Dhimmicrats. All the panic and hype being expressed on this subject begin to make every pundit out there seem like a bunch of pantywaisted whiners interested only in selling air time, newsprint, or blog ads. Real Men don’t panic when they are faced with unattractive choices. They make the best of what they got.

You lead the country with the leaders you have, not the leaders you wished you had. (Thanks, Don Rumsfeld.)

A McCain/Romney ticket would do fine in this election. The only thing preventing a Republican Victory is the unwillingness to take on Obama and Hillary’s Defeat and Retreat mantra in the face of every foreigner’s opposition to American interests or foreign policy (I am sure once the primaries are over, this will be corrected. The timing is as it should be right now). I place my faith in the American Soldier and the American Conservatives to do what is right, and to listen to the professionals whose job it is to protect us, to figure out effective and conservative ways to overcome economic problems, and to find solutions to complex social issues using the ingenuity and knowledge and experience of Americans who have expertise on those subjects.

And I refuse to be pessimistic about electing John McCain, Mitt Romney, or any other Republican to the highest elected office in the country. But under no circumstances will America support a President who believes France, Saudi Arabia, Al Jazeera, and Hamas have ANY insight into what is best for Americans, or any right to tell us when or how we may defend ourselves. And all they handwringing and hype to the contrary will be shown to be just that in November.

Subsunk

Conservative Voice: I think we agree. Just one nitpick: the moderate “label” differs from other labels (social liberal, classical liberal, conservative et al.) in that moderate essentially covers “everything else.” Perhaps it would be more appropriate to say no label applies.

kongzilla:
You completely missed my point about moderates vs. conservatives. Of COURSE people who support Rudy’s positions are moderates. My point was that THAT’S NOT THE BE-ALL AND END-ALL OF MODERATE PHILOSOPHY. There are moderates who *gasp* supported Romney, McCain, Huckabee, Hillary, and Obama. If you’re going to talk about the specific section of moderate center-right voters that supported Rudy Giuliani’s viewpoint, then say so. Don’t just say “moderate voters believe x” because it’s NOT TRUE. On a side note, I would think that Giuliani’s policies were at least as conservative as Huck’s, but that’s neither here nor there.

Evolving, huh? Is that what Pres. Bush was doing his first four or five years in office? Because he tried working with the Dems and we’ve all seen how that’s worked out. You go ahead and evolve I’ll stay here and hold down the right side of the tent.

Hey, you’re the one who first used the term “evolve” in the context of this discussion. You also made it clear that the term applied to the Republican Party, not any one politician or constituency of right-wing voters. So no, it has nothing to do with what Bush did during his first term. Or rather, it has nothing directly to do with that. Bush is a war hawk social conservative with a mixed record on economics. That he was selected to represent Republicans shows that the Republican party was beginning to evolve away from the Reagan trifecta by 2000, and this evolution has plainly continued into 2008 with McCain’s selection. You also attempt to apply the term “evolve” to me, or my voter type (difficult since I can’t vote yet). That doesn’t make sense since I explicitly said in my last post that voting constituencies aren’t the parties evolving here. Parties don’t evolve because their voters evolve, parties evolve because the COMPOSITION of their voting bloc evolves.

Once again you attempt to limit the definitions of “moderate” and “conservative” so that your side is the “true” conservative side. Conservatism > social conservatism, moderate > Rudy supporter.

LOL! I don’t label them moderates, this is what they call themselves.

First, who said conservatives have to evolve to a more moderate viewpoint? Conservatives don’t have to become moderates to vote for McCain.

I agree and I will vote for McCain. I preferred Thompson myself but McCain has been conservative more often than not.

If you call that balancing act an evolution away from the conservative base, you’re right. But if that evolution was not necessary to win the election, Republicans wouldn’t do it.

Evolving, huh? Is that what Pres. Bush was doing his first four or five years in office? Because he tried working with the Dems and we’ve all seen how that’s worked out. You go ahead and evolve I’ll stay here and hold down the right side of the tent.

Who cares what this tard thinks?

Any dude that has THAT much time to post THAT many times in a day is a no-life worthless loser posting in his mom’s basement and I for one dont give a rat’s ass what he thinks but I prefer he stop flooding the forum.

Will the rest of you get a clue and stop engaging this boring troll in this endless boring argument? He doesnt like Mitt…he likes McCain. OK? Thats it. We get it.

No need to repeat it one billion times, troll. Instead, you might consider trying to get a date (with the opposite sex) one time before you die.

I guess its a matter is the glass half empty or half full. I agree that there are few who have all three legs of conservatism down…but I would say even fewer have no legs. The problem I have with the moderate label is its too squishy. Of course the problem I have with the conservative and liberal label is people don’t really know what they mean anymore, they just yell it out…they either think like the Chosen One that to be conservative means you are a prude who longs for the days of covered wagons. Others think liberals means Communist progressive.
And maybe that is the problem, we are stuck with calling each other names, me included, instead of taking the time to figure out where the other person stands. Because 99% of the time if we did that we would find common ground. I learned that lesson again ( an expert is someone who recognizes his mistake when he makes it again ) with my discussion with Squid Shark. In fact after he listed a bunch of things he believes in, behold I believed the same things ( for the most part ), yet we were stuck for a while on the word moderate and conservative.
I will try harder to see people as fellow Americans before casting a label that no one understands, but think they do.

Math_Mage on March 12, 2008 at 11:24 PM

Wonderful post Mage, appreciate it

I guess you didn’t notice I never called anyone out by name.

You’re right. But in that case, who are you talking to? Chosen one? Because if you’re not talking to somebody specific, you’re trying to paint all moderates with the blue brush and it’s not going to work for the reasons I detailed before.

Anyway, the point of my post was that it seems popular lately to ridicule conservatives for their stances yet a few months ago “moderates” were crying about their boy Rudy losing and Huck’s momentum.

Don’t kid yourself. Huck was also backed by moderates. He identified with the social conservative part of the Republican platform, but economically he was liberal and his foreign policy was a farce. Rudy was backed by a different kind of moderate, one who was a war hawk, most likely fiscally conservative, but liberal on social issues like abortion or gun control. McCain, at the time, primarily represented people who were war hawks, socially mixed (pro-McCain-Kennedy, anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage, etc), and slightly on the liberal side of the economic divide. And Romney represented SOME of the people who were conservative on the war, the economy, and social issues, except that many of these people saw that he couldn’t stick to one position on some issues and were alienated.

Once again you attempt to limit the definitions of “moderate” and “conservative” so that your side is the “true” conservative side. Conservatism > social conservatism, moderate > Rudy supporter.

It seems when reading a so called moderate’s posts that by and large they discount conservative views and hand pick an item or two from the Republican party. Fine, that’s your right. But why does the historically more conservative party have to evolve to suit you guys because you like a few of our policies?

kongzilla on March 12, 2008 at 12:49 PM

Here you suffer from sampling bias. Moderates have little reason to post on issues where they agree totally and completely with the posts that have already been made. Furthermore, you’re less likely to notice a post by a “moderate” on an issue where they agree with you because they get lost in the crowd of conservatives. The moderate posts you’ll remember are the ones where they disagree with you. And it only takes a few self-described moderates to have at least one in opposition to your viewpoint on every issue. From there, it’s not hard to make the leap to “moderates are left-wing”; the problem is that that conclusion is based on false premises.

Anyway, your conclusion that moderates generally disagree with Republicans on all but one or two issues is another misinterpretation of the “moderate” viewpoint, mostly because there isn’t a single moderate viewpoint, otherwise they’d go by a party name rather than the moderate label.

Two more points. First, who said conservatives have to evolve to a more moderate viewpoint? Conservatives don’t have to become moderates to vote for McCain. The Republican Party, however, has to try to achieve a balancing act between the center-right and the conservative base, because if they lose either part of the vote they’re screwed. The Democrats normally have the same balancing act to make, but in this election all the left-wing candidates espouse essentially the same viewpoint so there’s little to balance. If you call that balancing act an evolution away from the conservative base, you’re right. But if that evolution was not necessary to win the election, Republicans wouldn’t do it. If the conservative base constituted a majority of the electorate, the Republican Party would not feel the pressure to balance conservative and liberal values in such a way as to satisfy both conservatives and moderates. The fact of the matter is that if the conservative base wants to maintain any kind of political power they’re going to have to ally themselves with the people closest to them, the center-right portion of the electorate. That’s what Republicans are doing, and why they elected McCain to represent them in this election cycle.

Second, I’m no moderate; I supported Fred Thompson. I merely understand some of the basic mechanics of party politics.

Professor Blather on March 12, 2008 at 9:28 PM

Havent all the “True” conservatives given up on this one anyways, might as well have fun with it.

He’s done everything and done it well. If you can’t see the value in that, then you have no idea what a good idea looks like.

spmat on March 12, 2008 at 12:41 PM

He’s got a point. Romney has done everything.

Lifelong hunter. King-confidant and civil rights crusader. Pro-life and pro-choice. Pro-gun and anti-gun. Pro-Reagan and anti-Reagan.

It’s true. On every issue, Romney’s done everything you can do.

On both sides of the issue.

And there’s the hair. It’s been a while since anyone’s mentioned the hair. It deserves at least a mention.

McCain/Romney in ‘o8! Because winning is over-rated.

The value of the vice president is determined by the President he serves. I could easily see Mac treating a VP Romney like “a bucket of warm spit”…it would be consistent with what we saw in the primaries.

If McCain picks Huck, some lucky vanity-party candidate will get an uptick, because I can’t vote for the dems and I will refuse to vote for the Bigot Ticket.

Here’s why Romney can’t be VP…If Romney is VP nominee we would suffer the worst loss in U.S. history since Mondale. It’s pretty simple Ed.

In fact it’s the silliest question ever.

You and I both know what this post is about…throw a bone for the Romneybots to slobber over…increase traffic drastically.

Mccain(who’s already loathed by evangelicals)knows better than to put Romney on the ticket.

AP, If you cannot tell the management experience difference between Romney who has an MBA, was CEO for 14 Years and Governor for 4 vs. Obama well I can’t help you:

Mitt Romney

Age: 60

Education:
- B.A. Brigham Young University, 1971
- J.D. Harvard University, 1975
- M.B.A. Harvard University, 1975

Political Experience:
- Governor of Massachusetts, 2003-2007

Professional Experience:
- Vice President, Bain and Company, Incorporated, 1978-1984
- CEO, Bain Capital, Incorporated, 1984-1998
- CEO, Bain and Company, Incorporated, 1991-1993
- President, Salt Lake Winter Olympics Organizing Committee, 1999-2002

Barack Hussein Obama

Age: 46

Education:
- B.A. Political Science, Columbia University, 1983
- J.D. Harvard Law School, 1991

Political Experience:
- Illinois State Senator, 1996-2004
- U.S. Senator from Illinois, 2005-Present

Professional Experience:
- Attorney, Miner, Barnhill & Galland, 1993-1996
- Lecturer of Constitutional Law, University of Chicago Law School, 1993-2004

An article in the Weekly Standard by Fred Barnes seemed to have jumpstarted the search for McCain’s Vice Presidential candidate around the blogosphere. Choosing a Vice President is an inevitable task for any Presidential candidate, but it presen…

Whoever gets the nod from McCain, we’d best remember McCain’s age and could that V.P. successfully pull out an election in 2012. Looking like Romney more and more. And, with a recession looming on the horizon we’d best find someone that can add 2+2 and not come up with a deficit.

He has executive experience and can demonstrate a familiarity with the economy.

No one can say anything bad about his family.

He was the best Republican fundraiser.

Disadvantages: He has a reputation as a flip-flopper, and as someone who makes technically correct, but disingenuous statements (”I saw my father marching with Martin Luther King”) Despite his impeccable private life, he came across as very insincere.

He wasn’t that popular as Governor, and it’s noteworthy that the people of Massachusetts chose to follow him with a Democrat, in a state where Weld had been Governor.

It’ll be difficult for the wealthy son of a Governor to say that he understands ordinary Americans. His mormonism doesn’t help in this case, given that it can add to the sense that he’s been sheltered.

He outspent his Republican opponents by a lot, and still failed.

I guess you didn’t notice I never called anyone out by name. Anyway, the point of my post was that it seems popular lately to ridicule conservatives for their stances yet a few months ago “moderates” were crying about their boy Rudy losing and Huck’s momentum. It seems when reading a so called moderate’s posts that by and large they discount conservative views and hand pick an item or two from the Republican party. Fine, that’s your right. But why does the historically more conservative party have to evolve to suit you guys because you like a few of our policies?

Yeah. Sure, chief.

Executives make snap decisions on less than full information. They make quick assessments of situations and the good ones make the right kinds of decisions to improve the situation. Executives are an entirely different beast from legislators. Romney has had executive experience in every meaningful facet of American public life: private, NGO and government.

He’s done everything and done it well. If you can’t see the value in that, then you have no idea what a good idea looks like.