Marco Rubio, the anti-Romney
This is key. A big reason Romney lost in 2012 was because of his inability to connect with the middle class, and the Obama campaign made great gains by painting Romney and the GOP as the party of the wealthy.
Rubio comes from essentially opposite circumstances. This, of course, is not news to anybody who knows Rubio; it’s a well-documented portion of his biography. But many viewers were introduced to Rubio for the first time on Tuesday, and many people who already knew him were judging him and his ability to take the next step toward a potential 2016 presidential run.
Where Rubio excelled was in his ability to weave his personal details into a core conservative message. Rubio didn’t dwell on these details, delivering an effective (and pretty strongly conservative) rebuttal to the president’s address as well. Rubio, after all, was speaking for his party and not himself, so the speech couldn’t be too personal.
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Perhaps a public speaking anti-Romney.
aryeung on February 13, 2013 at 3:32 PM
The fact that WaPo likes this guy should tell you something. It’s the adopted Bush son.
Oil Can on February 13, 2013 at 3:33 PM
Hard to connect when you refuse to offer anything.
besser tot als rot on February 13, 2013 at 3:36 PM
Rubio can’t take a solid stand on any issue. Not even immigration, where he’s still waffling back and forth waiting for popular support to come his way.
He can’t make a solid statement on Tokyo Rove’s “hit squad” targeting conservatives … instead, siding with both sides.
I’m sorry – but if he can’t take FIRM and BOLD positions on the little things … then how in the hell is he going to be a President who FIXES THE BROKE D1CK SH*T? And, make no mistake, this government is BROKE D1CK.
HondaV65 on February 13, 2013 at 3:39 PM
That approach would pretty much make him the Anti-Obama as well
Quisp on February 13, 2013 at 3:40 PM
This whole article boils down to “Romney’s parents were rich, while Rubio’s parents were poor.” Brilliant analysis, Mr. Blake.
steebo77 on February 13, 2013 at 3:43 PM
Romney failed to win because he was almost a perfect copy of Obama on almost every single major issue that was out there.
Energy, they both attacked energy.
Healthcare, they both signed the same freedom stealing legislation.
Obama is a nice guy that is in over his head…
Romney said he came up with the bailout idea for GM/Chrysler. He was on three sides of this issue.
No real argument how Obama handled the wars…
You would almost imagine that Romney chose to be the Nominee in order to insure that Obama would get re-elected.
Like McCain, when he finally came through with some conservative meat, McCain had Sarah Palin and Romney his first Debate, particularly the immorality of sticking the next generations with a tab for all your luxuries, he worked after that point to back away from it and ensure his own defeat.
I think the progressives have our number. First McCain throws the election and then Romney. Something stinks, what the hell is wrong with the republican primary voters?
astonerii on February 13, 2013 at 3:47 PM
Unfortunately, we could have used a little more of this brilliant analysis a year ago. Failing to see how badly the entire Republican Party would be caricatured and abused because of Romney’s wealth was deadly. I will readily admit that I didn’t think it was a big deal, but it was. We can rage against that all we want, but this is the electorate we have now. This election proved that the messenger IS the message, if a well funded opponent wants it to be.
Romney said many of the same things Rubio said last night, but they rang hollow to millions of voters because they felt like Romney could not possibly understand how tough things are for an average middle-class person right now, ot even understand their dreams for their children. When Rubio says these things they come from a place average voters can relate to.
It sucks out loud that we have been forced into looking at potential Presidential canddiates now based not on their actual accomplishments or the total of their policy ideas, but based on “how can we avoid the attacks and caricatures that worked so well for Obama against McCain and Romney?” and “who can we pick that average Americans will think understands them?” But that’s where we are. If we reject Rubio in favor of another candidate who is either a)rich, b)old, or c)has no discernible life experience with any minorities (or all of the above), we’ll get the same result we got in 2012, regardless of how brilliant a conservative leader that person might be.
If Rubio runs, I don’t see how we can NOT choose him, if we want to win. The very act of beating Rubio will brand the winner as the candidate of the rich white racists.
rockmom on February 13, 2013 at 4:00 PM
Who were the alternatives? Huckabee? Santorum? Newt Gingrich, fer chrissakes?
Romney lost because he was defined by the Obama campaign as Thurston Howell III, a rich white a-hole, the caricature of an old-fashioned Country Club Republican that had about as much relevance in 2012 as a three-martini lunch. The media also helped enormously by assidulously suppressing news and commenatry on the crappy economy. But even people who knew how crappy the economy was and didn’t expect Obama to do much about it voted for him anyway, because Romney was a rich white a-hole who led a party that thinks rape is OK, Big Bird should be fired, and gay people are scary.
rockmom on February 13, 2013 at 4:04 PM
It was because Romney didn’t offer anything. He didn’t offer how what Obama was doing bad, or how it was going to hurt the future. He didn’t off how his plans would make things better (and didn’t offer any real policy plans – just vague points). What he did offer were his services as a more capable manager to the big government behemoth. In that context, of course the story was and stayed about his wealth. There was nothing else to talk about.
besser tot als rot on February 13, 2013 at 4:08 PM
Newt and Perry would have fared better and likely had coattails.
Imagine the damage 4 years of Romney would have had on the party. He would have done much of what Obama does, would have done it with a hostile media, and they would have failed almost as spectacularly. All the while he would have been dragging Republican politicians to the edge of the cliff to be pushed off in the next round of elections in 2014.
But hey, he was totally electable.
astonerii on February 13, 2013 at 4:09 PM
The lack of alternatives is irrelevant in the determination of the validity of his argument vis-a-vis why Romney lost – in other words, it doesn’t make what he said any more or less true. (Although, I’d have preferred any of them to Romney, with the exception of Huckabee and Santorum.)
besser tot als rot on February 13, 2013 at 4:12 PM
By the way, in case anyone missed it, Graham declared the border secure today, and said it’s time move on and pass amnesty.
xblade on February 13, 2013 at 4:17 PM
It is entirely possible credible alternatives could have run if Romney hadn’t vaccuumed up all the big money donors early. The GOP got behind him before the dust settled from the McCain campaign. Two of my top candidates for 2016 would be Scott Walker and Mike Pence, and I think it is very unlikely either of them are going to run because the GOP is going to pick one of either Jeb Bush or Rubio.
But even beyond the “If not Romney, then who?” question, is the fact that conservatives who warned about Romney’s selection were basically correct in all their predictions. It’s pretty clear that we need to change course on candidates, and running McCain 3.0 in the form of Rubio is not going to change much, because he will make most of the same critical errors Romney and McCain did during their campaigns.
This is a terrible assumption. We are not going to get a break from the MSM and the Democrats no matter who we pick as our candidate. One of the “narratives” that helped Romney was that since he was a moderate, the MSM couldn’t possibly attack him. That narrative was wrong then and any similar “Rubio is a Hispanic so they can’t possibly tar us as racists” meme is wrong now.
Remember, we’ve had black conservatives being harassed as “inauthentic” in the past. The media will push an outrageously racist meme that Rubio isn’t a “real Hispanic” while the GOP whines and flaps its arms uselessly about how unfair it all is.
Doomberg on February 13, 2013 at 4:26 PM
Barf. The LEFT loves Rubio because he is helping obama by pushing ‘instant amnesty’ – but, once they build him up, they will destroy him. It is always a HUGE RED FLAG when obama’s state-run media praises a Republican – RUN, do not walk, to the nearest exit!
Pork-Chop on February 13, 2013 at 4:31 PM
Each one was a far sight better than Romney.
Stoic Patriot on February 13, 2013 at 4:33 PM
Rubio isn’t going to change anything and his being Hispanic won’t bring in the Hispanic vote. The Hispanics vote for what they like and they like socialism. Unless Rubio is also going to adopt Democratic policies then he will lose their vote.
sharrukin on February 13, 2013 at 4:54 PM
I was responding to astonerii’s question “what was wrong with Republican primary voters”? I didn’t think then and still don’t think the primary voters were stupid to pick McCain or Romney over their alternatives. Romney’s wealth didn’t matter to them in the primaries or in the general, but it mattered to a hell of a lot of other people (I would argue even a lot of cultural conservatives stayed home rather than vote for Romney, because of WHO HE IS and not what he stood for. The entire Obama ad assault in Ohio was meant to turn off cultural conservatives from Romney and suppress Republican turnout, and it worked.)
You can debate whether Romney lost because of his lack of concrete policy ideas or policy differences from Obama, but I don’t think the facts support that. The only concrete policy ideas Obama ran on were raising taxes on the rich and free birth control, and Romney clearly opposed those. This was not an election about substance at all, and it would not have been no matter what Romney offered as policy solutions. Obama wanted a campaign about personalities and cultural appeals, and the media gave it to him. This is why we have to have a candidate next time that can win a culturally-based campaign. Democrats will not have Obama at the top of the ticket, so it will be even more imperative for them to caricature the Republican Party and its nominee on cultural grounds.
The candidate people around here seem to want is Rand Paul. Good luck winning a general election with him. I agree with every single thing he says, but he has zero chance of getting 51% of the vote.
rockmom on February 13, 2013 at 5:02 PM
He will bring in some, and some is all we need. I agree that most Hispanics like big government. But not all do, and we can get those voters with the right candidate. He will bring in more young white voters who see his ethnicity as a positive and will favorably view the party that picks him. It’s impossible to overstate how bad a demographic problem the Republicans have right now, their base is literally dying and they are not appealing at all to newer voters who view themselves as multicultural and modern, and the GOP as old and white. This is why Rubio is important and why the Democrats do fear him.
rockmom on February 13, 2013 at 5:07 PM
ROFL…man, are these people predictable or what?
ddrintn on February 13, 2013 at 5:10 PM
Not very many, after 3 years or so of steady “if
RubioRomney runs, I don’t see how we can NOT choose him, if we want to win” propaganda.ddrintn on February 13, 2013 at 5:17 PM
He just might, he has said it is a LEGITIMATE direction for the nation to go.
astonerii on February 13, 2013 at 5:35 PM
Unfortunately he will have a lot of company from the GOP as they seem fairly eager to drop conservatism and embrace progressive policies.
We have a liberal party and a socialist party. There isn’t a conservative one.
sharrukin on February 13, 2013 at 5:38 PM
I agree with just about nothing that you said.
Disagree. If Romney’s coat tails were going to be so short that we lost ND and IN, we should have run someone who offered a platform of free markets and free people. Anyone.
I don’t know what you mean by this, except that I think his wealth did matter. Not because it mattered per se, but because it mattered to him. Obama attacked him for it and he wouldn’t defend the free market principles that allowed him to create that wealth because of his liberal guilt.
Disagree. He offered them nothing to vote for other than a better statist manager. If he’s offering nothing, it’s hard to motivate people to vote for him.
Disagree. It worked because Romney failed to give voters a reason to vote for him.
Strongly disagree and I don’t know what facts you are talking about.
Disagree. Romney used the same 200K/250K language that Obama did. And Romney never disavowed anything about state run healthcare, so I don’t believe that he was against “free” birth control.
Disagree. People disliked Obama’s policies. Popular opinion was against so many of Obama’s positions that it was ridiculous. But Romney never went after those. Never connected Obama’s policies to the non-existent recovery. It wasn’t about policy because Romney didn’t make it about policy – he made it about stewardship. Just stupid. And it was entirely predictable that this was going to be his strategy for at least a year before the election, and it was equally clear that it would result in abject failure.
So did Romney. He didn’t even try to fight this narrative.
That’s insane. We need someone who will argue about real world solutions and policies, not about who can come up with the better mindless platitude.
Yeah. Democrats “argue” with strawmen and ad hominems. And that was the debate Romney stuck with. Rather than being the adult in the room and arguing with reason and facts.
Rand Paul has principles and sound argument behind them. I think that is better that has a lot better chance of winning than a candidate running on being a better manager of a system that everyone hates.
Well, you did get one thing right.
Gag.
besser tot als rot on February 13, 2013 at 6:15 PM