Mitt Takes Michigan

It looks like our former Governor Mitt Romney has emerged victorious in the Michigan GOP primary. This was widely seen as a must-win for him given his previous losses (at great expense, I might add) in Iowa and New Hampshire, and the fact that Michigan is one of Mitt's many home states. Romney has the personal fortune to keep him going if he had lost, but three high-profile losses would probably have defined him as someone no one trusts and no one would vote for.

As much as I would have enjoyed the Romney schadenfreude, it's probably better for Democrats that he managed to win (and convincingly so). The longer the GOP field is fractured, the more money they'll spend, but more importantly, Romney's victory should slow John McCain's momentum from his New Hampshire victory. Though I think he's past his expiration date, McCain is really the only Republican who can challenge the eventual Democratic nominee on foreign policy experience. He's also the only Republican with any sort of crossover appeal -- I admit that I myself nearly got swept up in McCainimania back in 2000 when I attended a McCain rally on Wall Street of all places. I'm not sure that McCain has enough money to compete everywhere on Super-Duper Tuesday on anything other than name recognition, and with the field still uncertain, there's a chance that Rudy Giuliani's strategy of skipping the first several contests could actually work out for him.

I tuned in to a few minutes of Mitt's victory speech -- just as much as I could stand. I noted that he made the claim that Washington lobbyists are now scared because he represents change. I had to laugh out loud. I'm sure that these lobbyists are really upset today.

Update: I noticed from the exit polls that Mitt Romney won the self-described liberal vote 33% to McCain's 30%. Maybe this had an effect, after all.

Poor Mitt

Seems like our former absentee governor had a bit of a bad night tonight. I suppose it's not too early to get him a consolation gift.

It may be obvious, but the reason this hurts Mitt so much is not necessarily that he lost, but that he lost by double digits (or nearly so) to someone he outspent by 4-to-1 after laying groundwork in Iowa for nearly three years. Romney was buying favors in Des Moines before anyone outside of Arkansas ever heard of Mike Huckabee. That someone could waltz in and render all that effort moot in the last month or so leading up to the election shows how soft Romney's support really was.

Also, don't forget that Romney needed some big wins to raise his national profile before Super-Duper Tuesday next month. He doesn't have the name recognition that Giuliani, McCain and even Thompson have.

That said, Romney could pull it off. I think it may end up being McCain, since the Republicans gravitate toward the person whose "turn" it is when in doubt (See Dole, Bob). But McCain is the darling of the media and of Independents, not necessarily Republicans -- and they'll have more of a say in the nominee than anyone else. I have a hard time picturing the GOP faithful who consistantly rank "immigration" as one of their top concerns turning en masse to the candidate least in line with the Republican platform.

Question of the Evening

If Mitt Romney is the candidate who will "stop the militant gays", then why was he unable to do so as Governor of Massachusetts? This has perplexed me for a while. Romney could not stop marriage equality here in Massachusetts. Why should those for whom banning same-sex marriage is a priority think that he is the best person to do so nationally? Because he failed so often and utterly that he's due for at least one victory?

Question of the Evening

I came across this chart of 2008 candidates' positions via BoingBoing. It has a large matrix of candidates and issues with checkmarks for positions they support and X's for things they oppose. But for former Governor Mitt Romney, they had to invent a new icon -- an x'ed out check -- for his position on reproductive choice. Given that they'd already invented one symbol for Mitt, why not give him double the checkmarks under the Guantanamo category?

MA-05 Hopefuls on Libby

I'm not entirely sure why an aspiring Congresscritter needs to trumpet their reaction to President Bush's commutation of Scooter Libby's prison sentence, but I got statements from two of the candidates in the Fifth District race to replace the now former Congressman Marty Meehan (D-Lowell). I hate blogging-as-stenography, but I'm trying to get back in the swing of things after a busy couple of days in the real world.

The first statement came in yesterday from Rep. Barry Finegold (D-Andover). Here's what he had to say:

"This is a display of the cronyism that has infected Washington. Lying under oath is illegal, unacceptable and unethical. And now the protection racket has swung into action yet again to avoid accountability for this administration. President Bush has, once again, shown his contempt for the rule of law. The American people deserve real leadership. They don't deserve more of the same."

Fellow candidate and former Lowell Mayor Eileen Donoghue followed with this:

"President Bush is once again proving that he has no respect for the office and the people he represents by pulling special favors for his staff. We demand more of our public servants. This action mocks the system we have in place, and flies in the face of efforts to make it better."

Meanwhile, our one-time Governor, Mitt Romney, has predictably gone the other direction and defended the President. This, despite the fact that Romney never once issued a pardon or commutation himself in his four years as Governor, saying that he did not want to overrule a jury.

Mitt Romney and the Dog on the Roof

The Phoenix's Adam Reilly is fascinated by how the Boston Globe took a story about how Mitt Romney hosed dog excrement off his station wagon into some kind of profile in courage. Here's the excerpt from the Globe profile Reilly quotes with his emphasis:

As the oldest son, Tagg Romney commandeered the way-back of the wagon, keeping his eyes fixed out the rear window, where he glimpsed the first sign of trouble. "Dad!" he yelled. "Gross!" A brown liquid was dripping down the back window, payback from an Irish setter who'd been riding on the roof in the wind for hours.

As the rest of the boys joined in the howls of disgust, Romney coolly pulled off the highway and into a service station. There, he borrowed a hose, washed down Seamus and the car, then hopped back onto the highway. It was a tiny preview of a trait he would grow famous for in business: emotion-free crisis management. [emph. added]

It is strange that the Globe would pick this anecdote to highlight Romney's coolness under pressure. Still, what I was more struck by was the act of strapping a dog to the roof of your car in the first place, and I'm not the only one. I've never been a dog owner, but I am a frequent driver, and I've never seen roofbound dogs in my travels. Is this a common practice?

Update: Romney's Dog Speaks!

Mixed Signals from Romney

I kept hearing over the weekend from former Governor Mitt Romney's spokespeople how well fundraising is going for the presidential candidate during his efforts at Fenway Park and TD Banknorth Garden. But, if his fundraising were as good as his they make it out to be, why then is Romney dumping his own money into his campaign account?

Mitt's explanation is that he's not as well known as the other leading candidates -- after all Rudy Guiliani and John McCain are national figures and lurking in the wings is Fred Thompson with his Law and Order exposure. Because of that, it's necessary for him to spend money to introduce him to the people of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina in a way that the other candidates don't have to.

Of course, it might just be that Mitt's second quarter fundraising isn't living up to his high Q1 numbers. After all, the first quarter is when you get all your friends, relatives and other supporters to max out. The second quarter is a much better test of how you're able to convince people you're worth giving money to. Still, Romney's burn rate remains very high, and he's spending funds as fast as he can raise them. Romney has hundreds of millions of dollars at his disposal; it will be instructive to see how much he's willing to put toward his candidacy.

Either way, we'll find out after Friday, when the second-quarter fund-raising effort ends.

Creepy

Today's Boston Herald has a story on a Forbes Magazine poll that shows former Governor Mitt Romney as the fourth "creepiest" presidential candidate and second creepiest among all Republicans. You can read the Forbes story here. I wasn't going to comment on the poll because I've never found Romney all that creepy myself, and a 10% creep-factor for 4th place isn't really all that impressive.

Then I saw this picture.

Clearly Mitt was not satisfied with his showing in this poll and is working overtime to creep out as many people as he can.

The Unspoken Word

Former Governor Mitt Romney has a brand new TV ad where he claims he's "done the toughest things" as governor of "the most liberal state." One word does not appear at all in the ad. That word is 'Massachusetts'. Sure, Romney flashes pictures of John Kerry and Mike Dukakis as a newspaper headline blasts Ted Kennedy's name in the background. Still, one would think that he'd deign to mention the name of the "tough state" he governed.

Last week the New York Times noticed that Mitt avoids saying 'Massachusetts' in an article detailing the the subjects that the 2008 candidates prefer to avoid. Here's how that article describes the phenomenon:

In campaign ads running in early primary states, Mr. Romney boasts that he was "the Republican governor who turned around a Democratic state" and "vetoed hundreds of spending appropriations." But you would never know where.
[...]
"Romney is trying to say that he foiled a robbery in a brothel, the brothel being Massachusetts," said Ralph Whitehead, a political analyst at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. "But the question people will ask is, what was he doing in the brothel in the first place?"

To counter this, Romney's opponents, I've noticed, are constantly mentioning Massachusetts. Check out the statements from John McCain's spokesman in the Chicago Tribune profile on Romney from yesterday:

"The question for voters is: Does a one-term governor from Massachusetts have the foreign policy experience necessary to deal with the challenges of today's world?" said Brian Jones, McCain's spokesman.
[...]
"Mitt Romney has been consistent in one regard: that nearly every position he holds now is opposite of what it was when he was governor of Massachusetts," Jones said.

Romney Ad via the Herald's Daily Briefing. See also Universal Hub, Mass. Liberal and Blue Mass. Group.

Romney Boosted By Ads, Not Debate

Via BMG, I see that local pundit Jon Keller has attributed Mitt Romney's jump in the New Hampshire polls to his performance in the GOP debate last week, and more specifically to the former governor's response to a question about embryonic stem cells. Keller, I think, has fallen victim to the fallacy common to those of us who follow politics closely -- namely that any one else is paying a lick of attention. That Republican debate was watched by about 1.7 million viewers. If we assume a proportional number of those were from New Hampshire (spare me the pabulum about NH voters taking their responsibility so seriously that they'll be disproportionately paying attention at this stage in the GOP primary) then we can estimate, based on Census data that about 7500, or the about population of the NH town of Pembroke (or West Boylston, MA) of those viewers watched from the Granite State. Sure, that's a good chunk of people, but not so much that would cause Romney's poll numbers to jump dramatically.

I think what's really happening here is that Romney is getting the benefit of being on television since February. The last poll from SurveyUSA/WBZ was taken in January, before Romney's big ad buy in the early primary states. Unless I'm mistaken, Romney is the only Republican candidate running spots in New Hampshire this early, and as such you'd expect to see his numbers go up since he's not yet being challenged by anyone. Couple that with the fact that he was the governor of the state next door and owns property on Lake Winnipesaukee, and any result other than a Romney lead would be extremely surprising and potentially devastating to his 2008 hopes.

Wednesday Morning Links

I don't have a whole lot of time this morning, so here are a few articles I found interesting this morning:

• In the Boston Herald, Brett Arends has a column about his conversation with Congressman Ed Markey (D-Malden) on energy independence. The Congressman notes that "If we improve fuel economy from 25 mpg to 35 mpg over the next 10 years, that backs out the equivalent of all the oil we import from the Persian Gulf."
• Also in the Herald is Margery Eagan's column about Diane Patrick's triumphant return to the spotlight.
• In the Boston Globe, Senator John Kerry has a piece on the Healthy Businesses, Healthy Workers Reinsurance Act he plans to introduce this week. The bill would reimburse companies for their health insurance costs for the most chronically ill employees, thereby driving down their expenses. His prediction is that health insurance premiums would go down 10% for everybody under his plan>
• Ever wonder what Mitt Romney's favorite novel is? Frankly, I'm more surprised that it's not one of the Left Behind novels, than the fact that it's by L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology (via Universal Hub).

Patrick on Romney

Last night, Governor Deval Patrick was on Newsnight with Jim Braude (video here). There was nothing particularly earth shattering about the interview, but Braude spent most of it seemingly trying to get the Governor to say bad things about people -- Joan Benjamin-Wallace, Don Imus, Al Sharpton, and so on. Patrick mostly avoided doing so, but toward the end of the interview, Braude asked him about Mitt Romney and what he would say to someone who asked about the former Governor as he runs for President. Here is Patrick's response:

Well, I think [Romney] is a very nice man, and a charming one, but his leadership was about press avails and photo-ops and flash, and not about substance. We're dealing today with decisions he didn't make and should have, and decisions he did that were not in the long term best interest of the Commonwealth.

Arends: Mitt Will Say Anything

In case you missed yesterday's Brett Arends column in the Boston Herald about Mitt Romney's recent gun gaffe, here's the best part:

His record here will not stand much scrutiny. Campaign claims he "turned around a Democratic state" are absurd. He did no such thing. He was an absentee landlord at best. He had the second worst jobs creation record of any governor and his health care plan had to be rescued by others. He left the state GOP dead in the water.
[...]
When Romney had his Elmer Fudd moment last week, what he was really saying wasn't "I'm a lifelong hunter" but "I will say whatever my audience wants to hear." It's a pattern. Abortion. Gay rights. New taxes. "Reagan-Bush." From 1994 to 2007, like a good salesman, Romney always seems to agree with his audience completely on every issue. Put him in a room with a bunch of stamp collectors and suddenly he'll be a "lifelong philatelist."

It wouldn't be such a political problem if it weren't so painfully obvious.

Governor Romney can crack all the jokes he wants, but he's not going to be able to escape the idea that he holds no core beliefs, but will always say whatever he thinks will help him politically. Maybe that's an okay way to win an election, but Romney supporters should not be surprised if he has another change of heart when the political winds start blowing in a different direction. He doesn't style himself a "turnaround" artist for nothing, after all.

Recent Polling in Context

Over at Media Nation, Dan Kennedy has beat me to a comparision of Mitt Romney and Deval Patrick's poll numbers at similar points in their terms. Much has been made of the recent Globe and State House News polls, and I think Kennedy has put them in the proper perspective by matching Romney's numbers from 2003 to Patrick's this year. Here's his summary:

At roughly the same point in their governorships, they were in a similar position with respect to public perceptions. Patrick is better liked. Although a higher percentage of respondents approved of Romney's job performance, a higher percentage disapproved, too. Apparently more people are watching and waiting with Patrick.

Each governor dug himself into something of a whole rather quickly. As we know, Romney never dug himself out — and, after a while, he stopped trying, as he decided to run for president by making fun of Massachusetts rather than govern.

I don't have too much to add about the polling, though I think it's safe to say that the results are better than they could be, but certainly worse than the administration wants. It's also funny to me to see Republicans now claim Governor Patrick's favorability rating (which is still relatively high) is meaningless when they were clinging to Governor Romney's relatively high favorability rating just over a year ago when they claimed that Romney would be overwhelmingly reelected.

Update: Afertig over at BMG makes a similiar point and presents a 2003 review of Mitt Romney's first 100 days from the Boston Phoenix.

Should Dems Be Rooting for Romney?

On Monday, Chris Bowers of MyDD wrote a post detailing why, at this point, Democrats should be rooting for former Governor Mitt Romney to get the GOP Nomination for President. His basic premise is that, of the three frontrunners, Mitt Romney, Senator John McCain, and former NY Mayor Rudy Giuliani, McCain and Giuliani are "generally viewed as different from, and independent of, the Republican Party." At a time when the Democrats win the generic ballot by 20 points, being apart from the Republican Party could be more of an advantage than a disadvantage. Romney, on the other hand, suffers from these problems:

Mitt Romney has none of the advantages enjoyed by McCain or Giuliani. While they have been defined, or some time now, as exceptions to the Republican rule, Romney would just be a another Republican during a time when it is very bad to just be another Republican. Polls show him down by between fifteen and thirty points to every top-tier Democrat, and that is not just name ID. Whether or not it is justified, as a Mormon, he has a huge problem with national electability, according to a recent Gallup poll. Further, after spending two decades running against such people, Republicans would ironically, and hilariously, nominate a flip-flopper from Massachusetts. And oh yeah--he is entirely in favor of endlessly continuing the Iraq war, which I sure will be a hugely popular position in another year or so. The guy is so beatable I almost want to go volunteer for his campaign. Had he run for re-eleciton in Mass., Deval Patrick would have eaten him alive.

In fact, this might surprise regular readers of this blog, but the only part of that I really disagree with -- aside from the Mormon business, which I think is overblown -- is that Deval Patrick would have "eaten [Mitt] alive" had Romney run for re-election. Let me clarify: If Patrick had run against the Mitt Romney who spent the last two years of his term running for President, Patrick would have won. I saw the 2006 election as much as a referendum on Romney and Romneyism than a contest between Deval Patrick and Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey. That being said, if Romney had decided to run for re-election, I believe that he would have been savvy enough to forgo his out-of-state pandering to conservatives and perhaps Massachusetts voters would not have tired of his antics. That is, if Romney had spent 2005 and 2006 acting like a candidate for re-election instead of a candidate for President, we would have seen a completely different election last November. Ultimately, I think Patrick still would have won, but it wouldn't have been the landslide we saw against Healey and Christy Mihos.

Do I, like Bowers, hope that Romney will become the Republican nominee for President? Not really, even though I agree that he is very beatable at the national level by a Democrat. Partly, I'm still holding out hope that the GOP will go nuts and nominate Senator Sam Brownback, or Congressman Tom Tancredo. Mostly, though, I think it's because I've grown tired of Mitt, and I don't think I can handle seeing him on the TV for another election season.

I'll say this for Romney, he has certainly shown an ability to fundraise. I do, however, have two questions about his $23 million first quarter. First, will he be able to keep it up? How many of those donors are his now-maxed-out friends that he will no longer be able to rely on? He'll need to grow his donor base, which might prove difficult if he stays at the bottom of the polls. Second, how much of that is he burning through already? Romney needed to raise a ton of money because he's already airing television ads and he's paying 10% commissions to interns who raise money for him. It will be interesting to see what his cash-on-hand is compared to the other candidates.

De-Romnefying Massachusetts

Today's quote of the day comes from former Governor Mitt Romney's communications director, Eric Fehrnstrom on the news that current Governor Deval Patrick is going to allow 26 out-of-state same-sex marriages to be entered into the state's vital records.

"Now that Governor Romney is out of office, we are seeing an erosion of the previously strong defense of traditional marriage coming out of the executive branch."

And thank goodness for that.

This move comes after Governor Patrick reversed two other Romney era policies, first reversing Romney's restrictions on stem cell research, and then giving the go-ahead to Cape Wind. Part of me wonders whether Patrick would have kept more of the goodwill he earned shortly after the election if these decisions had been made in January. Massachusetts voters wanted a change of course and the media wanted something to talk about. Perhaps if the media narrative would have been about undoing Romney's legacy and not about drapes and cars and helicopters.

Romney Fatigued By Self-Promotion

The Boston Phoenix's David Bernstein has a link to former Governor Mitt Romney's official presidential announcement. Frankly, after four years of Romney's act here in Massachusetts, I'm tired of the guy, but I just couldn't resist commenting on the snippet Bernstein excerpted in his blog.

Apparently Romney wants to bring innovation and transformation to government, because "We are weary of the bickering and bombast, fatigued by the posturing and self-promotion" of politics.

This from the guy who signed last year's health care law -- along with a bunch of rubes -- in a carefully choreographed ceremony at Faneuil Hall.

Perhaps he forgot about the fancy tokens he commissioned with his name on both sides and an emblazoned "LXX" -- for the 70th Governor of the Commonwealth.

I also seem to remember a glossy 24 page "progress report" -- paid for by his campaign -- that he put out in 2005 in the Boston Globe. There were three different pictures of him on the front cover of that, and eleven of them on the last page, including my favorite.

The guy who once told the Boston Globe "from now on it's me, me, me" after every one of his hand-picked legislative candidates lost in 2004 is sick of self promotion. Frankly, so am I. Good riddance.

Romney's Congressional Outreach

My mole in Washington sent me a copy of a subscription only article in Roll Call detailing former Governor Mitt Romney's outreach to Congressional Republicans. The big news is that GOP Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) is considering giving Romney his endorsement. From the article:

Republican presidential hopeful and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is making a concerted effort to build a coalition of House Members to act as campaign liaisons, and early signs indicate that Romney is the likely favorite of a growing number of Republicans, including Minority Leader John Boehner (Ohio).

Boehner has not endorsed Romney, but knowledgeable sources said the Minority Leader is leaning strongly in his favor.

"He likes him - a lot - but he's not there just yet," said one source.

The article also lists Congressmen Jim McCrery (R-LA), Howard McKeon (R-CA) and Dave Camp (R-MI) as in Romney's camp. Congressman Tom Feeney (R-FL) is also expected to announce his endorsement Friday. The article also reports that Romney and his team have been having meetings with prominent House Republicans like former speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) and Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO). Of particular importance is getting a bloc of Southern members to come out for our former Governor, to show that he's viable amongst Southern evangelicals.

By the way, Political Wire also noticed this article and titled their post "Romney May Get Boehner", which the twelve-year-old kid in me thinks is hilarious.

Money Can Buy Mitt Love II: Maybe it Can't!

Earlier this month we noted that Senator Jim DeMint's endorsement of former governor Mitt Romney for president came after a series of donations by Romney's Commonwealth PAC to the Senator's campaign. It appears, however, that some endorsements are not as easily bought.

Via Daily Kos:

You are Rep. Jim Nussle. You decide to vacate your seat to run for Governor of Iowa.

The Republican Governor's Association, headed by Mitt Romney, chips in $1.2 million.

Romney himself throws in $100K -- the largest contribution Nussle received the entire campaign.

How do you reward such largess?

You join the Giuliani campaign.

How much did Giuliani give to Nussle's gubernatorial effort?

Zero.

Now, to be fair, Giuliani did campaign for Nussle, even going so far as appearing jointly on Hannity & Colmes. Add to that the fact that Romney's tenure as head of the RGA was pretty much a disaster, and it's no surprise that Nussle has thrown his lot in with someone else.

Romney Far Behind in the Carolinas

Sure, polls for 2008 are mostly based on name recognition at this point, but even so, it seems like former governor Mitt Romney has a lot of catching up to do in North Carolina. A recent survey by Public Policy Polling of Raleigh has him at a distant fourth in the Tar Heel State. (via Political Wire)

Rudy Giuliani	30%
Newt Gingrich	29%
John McCain	22%
Mitt Romney	6%
All Others	13%

That's a little unfair, though, because it's been South Carolina that Romney's been paying attention to, not North Carolina, after all. So, how's Mitt doing there? ARG did a poll in mid-December of South Carolina Republicans.

McCain	35%
Giuliani	28%
Gingrich	15%
Romney	5%
Huckabee	1%
Undecided	16%

Ouch. It looks like all those trips to Spartanburg have yet to pay off for the former Gov.