I reached a personal goal this week.  Not exactly the way I wanted to reach it, but I reached it nonetheless.

More on that in a moment.

As I was hanging out on my third (behind kingsjester.wordpress.com and genehoyas.com) favorite Conservative website, hotair.com, this week, I noticed something:

Conservative Americans are divided and yet, united, at the same time.

We’re divided by 2 things.

1.  Definition – There are Americans out there identifying themselves as Conservatives, who are as far from being a Conservative, as President Barack Hussein Obama is from being a Southern Baptist.

Now, some of them believe if you only agree ideologically with one of the three criteria President Ronald Reagan presented as the three-legged stool of Conservatism (Fiscal, Social, and National Defense), then you’re a Conservative.

These folks proclaim themselves Fiscal Conservatives.  In reality, they are either Moderates or Liberals.

From behind the anonymity of a computer screen, these self-righteous “Conservatives” have labeled Reagan Conservatives “True” Conservatives, meaning it as the ultimate derision, brought about by an over-estimation of their own intellect and political astuteness.

What completely blows their minds, is when you confront them with the fact, per Gallup, that 75% of Americans proclaim Christianity, and 92% of Americans believe in God, because, it turns out, that a lot of these “Fiscal” Conservatives actually seem to have something in common with Karl Marx:  They view religion as “the opiate of the masses”, something which is beneath their gargantuan intellects.

They are a bitter bunch, as a whole.

2.  Conservatives are divided by geographical region.  A lot of these before-mentioned “Fiscal” Conservatives seem to live up in the Northeast or out West.

Gallup.com has released a survey ranking the states as to how Conservative they are:

Mississippi remains the most conservative state in the union, and, along with Utah, Wyoming, and Alabama, is one of four states with 50% or more of its population identifying as conservative. At the other end of the ideological spectrum, 40% District of Columbia residents and 30% of Massachusetts residents identify as liberal; all other states have a liberal population of 26% or less.

As has been the case in recent years, Americans overall are significantly more likely to identify as conservative than as liberal. Forty percent of more than 218,000 adults 18 and older interviewed in Gallup tracking in 2011 said they were conservative, 36% were moderate, and 21% liberal. Only in the District of Columbia and Massachusetts did liberals outnumber conservatives.

Politics in America today varies widely across the states and regions of the country, and ideology is no exception. Mississippi and Massachusetts are the two states that provide the most extreme contrast, with 53% of Mississippians identifying as conservative and 11% identifying as liberal, while 29% of Massachusetts residents are conservative and 30% are liberal.

More generally, the 10 most conservative states in 2011 were in the South (Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Tennessee), the Midwest (Oklahoma and Nebraska), and the West (Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho). None were on the East or West Coast.

By contrast, all of the 11 most liberal states in 2011 were coastal — the District of Columbia, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Connecticut in the East, and Oregon, Washington, Hawaii, and California in the West.

…America remains a conservative nation, at least as measured by the ideological labels Americans choose to use to identify themselves. Residents of all states of the union except for Massachusetts and the District of Columbia are more likely to identify as conservative than as liberal, and in every state except D.C., residents are also more likely to say they are moderate than liberal. The general distribution of ideology across the states follows traditional red-blue distinctions, with liberals most highly represented on the East and West Coasts, while conservatives dominate in Southern, Midwestern, and Western states.

So, how are Conservatives united?

We all want Barack Hussein Obama to become an ex-president as soon as possible.  We share a common bond:  We are the American Majority:

Political ideology in the U.S. held steady in 2011, with 40% of Americans continuing to describe their views as conservative, 35% as moderate, and 21% as liberal. This marks the third straight year that conservatives have outnumbered moderates, after more than a decade in which moderates mainly tied or outnumbered conservatives.

The percentage of Americans calling themselves “moderate” has gradually diminished in the U.S. since it was 43% in 1992. That is the year Gallup started routinely measuring ideology with the current question. It fell to 39% in 2002 and has been 35% since 2010. At the same time, the country became more politically polarized, with the percentages of Americans calling themselves either “conservative” or “liberal” each increasing.

Gallup measures political ideology by asking Americans to say whether their political views are very conservative, conservative, moderate, liberal, or very liberal. Relatively few Americans identify with either extreme on this scale, although 2 in 10 Republicans self-identify as very conservative — double the proportion of Democrats calling themselves very liberal.

Hanging out on the Internet, one can become burnt-out and extremely depressed.  There are a lot of nattering nimrods of negativity out there, claiming to fly the banner of Conservatism.

Just as you do in your real life, spend your cyber life hanging out with people who lift you up.

If Conservatives stick to Conservative principles, lift each other up, and keep our eyes on the prize, 2012 is going to be a great year.

Now, about that personal goal I mentioned earlier.  When I married my bride in July of 2009 I weighed 254 lbs.  As of today, after losing my final 5 lbs this week due to a bout of bronchitis, I weigh 210 lbs, my collegiate weight (at 53 years old), a goal which I set for myself when I began to lose weight in January of 2010.  There was no secret to it.  I backed away from the table, ate more grilled chicken, and used the stairs.  Here are a couple of before and after pictures:

As Conservatives, we need to set a goal of sending Obama back to Chicago.  Because, no matter how lousy the Republican candidates are, every single one of them is better than the present occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, DC.

What a difference a day makes. Hey, that would be a great song title…oh, never mind.

Yesterday morning, Mitt Romney was sitting on top of the world, Ma.  He had just won decisively in Florida (the Southern state full of Northeastern refugees.)  It looked like smooth sailing ahead, as his campaign staff, their paid internet posters, and the MSM had a lot of Americans convinced that the flip-floppin’ Moderate was, in fact, a Conservative.

Then, Mitt’s not-so-very-nice day began.

The morning started off with news that Mitt has inserted his foot in his mouth:

Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney, confident after his Florida primary victory, ended up inviting criticism Wednesday when he said he’s “not concerned about the very poor” because they have an “ample safety net.”

Democrats and Republicans alike – including opponent Newt Gingrich – pounced and the GOP front-runner quickly sought to explain his remarks.

“No, no, no, no, no, no, no,” Romney told reporters on his campaign plane when asked about the comments. “No, no, no. You’ve got to take the whole sentence, all right, it’s mostly the same.” He said his remark was consistent with his theme throughout the race, adding: “My energy is going to be devoted to helping middle-income people.”

Despite that explanation, Romney’s comments quickly became an immediate distraction from his message that he’s more conservative than Gingrich and from the double-digit thumping the former House speaker sustained in Florida. His campaign worked behind the scenes to provide context for the comment.

Spin, baby, spin.  Now we know why his handlers don’t let Mitt speak extemporaneously very often.  But, hey, he still has all those delegates from Florida, huh?

Uhhh…maybe not.  Foxnews.com reports that

The Newt Gingrich campaign is gearing up to challenge the results of the Florida Republican presidential primary based on the Republican National Committee’s own rules which state that no contest can be winner-take-all prior to April 1, 2012.

It was assumed that Mitt Romney, who won Tuesday’s contest, would gain all 50 of the state’s delegates. But the Gingrich campaign plans to challenge Florida’s allocation and demand the delegates be divvied up proportionally.

Fox News has learned exclusively that on Thursday, a Florida Gingrich campaign official will begin the process of trying to have the RNC rules enforced so that the Sunshine State delegates are distributed based on the percentage of the vote each candidate got.

RNC Chairman Reince Priebus warned Florida Republican Party Chairman Lenny Curry of the violation in a December letter quoting the rule, “…’winner-take-all’ states cannot hold a primary or caucus before April 1, 2012.”

Tuesday night’s Romney victory in the Sunshine State awarded the former Massachusetts governor all 50 Florida delegates (the state was already docked half its delegates for moving the election up on the calendar). Romney won the primary with 46 percent to Gingrich’s 32 percent. Rick Santorum finished third with 13 percent and Ron Paul with 7 percent.

That would mean Romney would receive 23 delegates, Gingrich 16, Santorum 6.5, and Paul 3.5.

Where they are going to find a couple of .5 delegates, I have no idea. 

Finally, as the sun was fading into the Western sky, so was the lie that Romney is a Conservative.  Mouth…meet second foot:

Mitt Romney said Wednesday that he supported tying the federal minimum wage to inflation, a move that would result in automatic increases to the pay rate. The position is a break from fiscal conservative orthodoxy — which generally seeks to eliminate the minimum wage — but could help Romney rebound from damaging comments he made earlier Wednesday when discussing the “very poor” in America.

“I haven’t changed my thoughts on that,” Romney told reporters aboard his campaign plane on Wednesday, according to The Associated Press. He was apparently referring to a statement he made in 2002 when running for governor of Massachusetts, when he advocated an increase in the minimum wage and indexing it to inflation — a proposal President Obama touted in 2008 during his presidential run.

But in 2006 Romney vetoed an increase in Massachusetts’s minimum wage, arguing that a salary hike would cause a loss of jobs. The last federal increase, which passed in 2007, implemented gradual increases until 2009, when the minimum wage hit its current rate of $7.25 an hour.

Since then, Romney has made reference to an indexed minimum wage on the campaign trail, signaling that he still supported the idea on a federal level.

Newt Gingrich said last month that he was “surprised” that Romney held the position when asked about it during a New Hampshire town hall.

“I’m surprised because what it does is guarantees higher unemployment,” Gingrich said. When his questioner offered video of Romney supporting the inflation-based minimum wage, Gingrich joked he’d “like that a lot.”

I’ll bet.

What was Romney thinking?  He had it made.  All the formidable resources of the Republican Establishment were carrying his water in 50 gallon tubs.

The inimitable Mark Steyn fired off this missive directly after the day’s first gaffe of the day was announced:

Romney’s is a benevolent patrician’s view of society: The poor are incorrigible, but let’s add a couple more groats to their food stamps and housing vouchers, and they’ll stay quiet. Aside from the fact that that kind of thinking has led the western world to near terminal insolvency, for a candidate whose platitudinous balderdash of a stump speech purports to believe in the most Americanly American America that any American has ever Americanized over, it’s as dismal a vision of permanent trans-generational poverty as any Marxist community organizer with a cozy sinecure on the Acorn board would come up with.

After half-a-century of evidence, what sort of “conservative” offers the poor the Even Greater Society? I don’t know how “electable” Mitt is, but, even if he is, the greater danger, given the emptiness of his campaign to date, is that he’ll be elected with no real mandate for the course correction the Brokest Nation in History urgently needs. In last Monday’s debate, Newt said he wasn’t interested in going to Washington to “manage the decline”. Mitt’s just told us that he’s happy to “manage the decline” for the poor – but who knows who else?

He answered Steyn’s question later yesterday.  He wants to “manage” a benevolent nanny-state, as well.

“Conservative”, my hindquarters.

On January 2nd, politico.com reported the following:

Charlie Black, the longtime Washington power broker and former top adviser to John McCain, has come off the sidelines of the 2012 campaign to back Mitt Romney for president.

Black was one of the operatives involved in planning a possible White House bid for Mitch Daniels, and said after Daniels opted out of the race that he intended to stay neutral.

That changed around Thanksgiving, Black told POLITICO, when he and his wife concluded that Romney was just about the only candidate in the field with the capacity to run a race all the way to November.

“It looked to us like he was the best guy to win and maybe the only guy in the field who could win,” said Black, who explained he’s “trying to help however I can.”

Black predicted that Romney would be able to wrap up the nomination relatively quickly once the early primary states winnow the GOP field.

“As it narrows down, Romney’s not going to have any trouble going from 25 percent to 35 to 45 to 55,” Black said. “When the choices narrow, Romney’s in an excellent position … His message and experience is exactly on point with what people care about now.”

Romney has made headway in recent months — the third quarter of 2011 especially — in winning over veteran GOP campaign hands like Black, and his supporters expect that movement to accelerate once he starts winning primaries.

Now, exactly one month after hiring Mr. Black, Mitt Romney and his Campaign Staff are to be congratulated for their overwhelming victory in Florida.

Who is Charlie Black?

Mr. Black grew up in Wilmington, N.C., the son of Southern Democrats who switched affiliation to vote for Barry Goldwater in 1964. He joined Young Americans for Freedom at the University of Florida, and moved to Washington to work for the group’s national staff, where he met one of its big supporters, Mr. Helms.

In 1975, Mr. Black and two other young conservatives, Roger Stone and Terry Dolan, founded the National Conservative Political Action Committee, which set a new standard for negative advertising with its campaigns against six liberal senators in 1980, portraying them as “baby killers” for their support of abortion rights, cozy with Castro and soft on national defense. His first hire at the 1980 Reagan campaign was Lee Atwater, who was just becoming famous for a slashing brand of politics.

Yet while his partners delighted in their reputations as princes of darkness, Mr. Black has avoided celebrity.

“I’ve always believed you’re in politics to help these candidates and not yourself, and you should stay out of the news if you can,” he said. “Roger and Lee are examples of guys who never did anything to discourage a little bit of a bad boy image.”

He started his lobbying firm in 1980, as he said, “thinking someday I’m going to need a real job in between campaigns.” Black, Manafort and Stone — it would later expand to include Mr. Atwater, who died in 1991 — became one of the most aggressive and well-connected Republican lobbying shops in Washington.

The firm was so entwined with the Reagan White House that administration officials gave it a heads-up so it could cancel its contract with a client, President Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines, two hours before Reagan withdrew his support.

It became bipartisan in the mid-1980s, and its political consulting wing was so successful that its partners frequently worked for both sides in a race. Senior partners were granted Mercedes-Benzes and memberships to the country clubs of their choice. In 1990, they sold the firm to Burson-Marsteller, reportedly making them multimillionaires.

In recent years, Mr. Black’s clients have included AT&T, Johnson and Johnson, the worldwide lottery firm GTech, Lockheed Martin, United Technologies, Yukos Oil, and the governments of Greece, Armenia and Cyprus. BKSH worked for Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress, as well as the Lincoln Group, hired by the Pentagon to generate positive stories about the Iraq war.

“The Republican Party’s quintessential company man,” as one friend calls him, Mr. Black has worked in every Republican presidential campaign since 1972, and sometimes a couple each season, being diplomat enough to get along with both sides in some of the fiercest rivalries.

Including the failed 2008 Presidential Campaign of John McCain.

During the Reagan Administration, African Dictators were negotiated with, including the infamous Angolan Warlord, Jonas Savimbi, whose rebellion left thousands dead or homeless.

The man oiling Washington’s political establishment on behalf of most of this rogues’ gallery is Charlie Black, according to the group Citizens for Ethics Black started his Washington career with segregationist Jesse Helms and worked on Reagan’s re-election campaign in 1984. He used those contacts to ease the path to the Oval Office for his clients. In 1985 the Black lobbying firm reportedly made at least $600,000 from Savimbi.

Well, after all, as Mitt Romney said the other day, while making fun of Newt:

Politics ain’t beanbag.

Nope.  It’s more ruthless than that.

I remember watching Johnny Carson on the Tonight show years ago.  Already on the couch were three legends:  Bob Hope, John Wayne, and Dean Martin.  Comedian Lonesome George Gobel came out to do a stand-up routine.  He came over to sit by Johnny.    For those of you unfamiliar with “Lonesome George”, as he was called, George was around 60 years old, with a brush cut and a face like a basset hound.

George looked down the couch at the three legends sitting there, paused for just the right amount of time, grinned at the camera and said:

Did you ever feel like the world was a tuxedo and you were a pair of brown shoes?

Going into the Republican Primary today in Florida, Newt Gingrich must feel that way.

This past week, Gingrich was the object of an unbelievably intense attack by the Main Stream Media, any Democrat that could get close to a microphone, and, of, course, Mitt “The Legend” Romney.

And it’s continuing even as I write this blog.  According to MSNBC:

Calling himself “the legitimate heir to the Reagan movement,” Newt Gingrich recently cited a 1995 speech by Nancy Reagan in which the former First Lady said that her husband “passed on the torch” to him.

“In 1995, Nancy Reagan at the Goldwater Institute was very generous,” Gingrich told voters in Florida on Sunday. “And she said ‘Just as Barry gave the torch to Ronny, Ronny has passed on the torch to Newt.’”

But as NBC’s Andrea Mitchell reports, Gingrich appears to be taking that comment out of context.

Sources close to Nancy Reagan said the speech itself was written by the host at the Goldwater Organization – where Mrs. Reagan delivered the remarks – and that she was referring generally to Congress and not specifically to the former Speaker, Mitchell reported on her MSNBC program.

Gingrich’s claim that he was a key figure in the Reagan revolution in 1980s is “patently false,” added Al Hunt, executive editor of Bloomberg News, during an appearance on Mitchell’s show.

Hunt said that Reagan biographer Lou Cannon has contended that Gingrich had nothing to do with the “Reagan Revolution.”

“He was a backbencher. Lou’s not even sure Reagan knew who Gingrich was,” Hunt said.

Hunt painted a stark contrast between “can-do optimist” Reagan and Gingrich, whose appeal derives from being able to “attack Democrats better than anybody.”

“I think they are quite different people. And certainly at a minimum, the Speaker’s claims — or his latter-day Reaganism — are exaggerated” Hunt added.

So, what was Newt doing while this “story” broke?  He was out campaigning with MICHAEL REAGAN.

Meanwhile “The Legacy”, gracious individual that he is, was not out attacking Obama and explaining all the great things he’s going to do if he wins the Republican Nomination and, somehow, beats the incumbent. (If Obama doesn’t bring up the whole “rich guy” thing or, shudder, Romneycare.)

Nope.  He was making fun of Gingrich:

A confident Mitt Romney solidified his lead in Florida polls and ridiculed Republican rival Newt Gingrich on Monday, calling his opponent’s attacks “sad” and “painfully revealing” the day before the state’s crucial presidential primary.

Romney’s self-assuredness was on full display during a campaign tour that felt at times like a victory lap, with the front-runner telling a crowd of 2,000 in Dunedin, Florida: “With a turnout like this I got a feeling we might win tomorrow.”

Romney has a double-digit lead in most polls in the state, where he said voters responded to his more aggressive criticism over the past week of Gingrich’s work for mortgage giant Freddie Mac, his ethics probe and his resignation as U.S. House of Representatives speaker.

“There’s no question that politics ain’t bean bags, and we have made sure that our message is out loud and clear,” Romney said on NBC’s “Today” show.

Gingrich, hit hard last week by a more aggressive Romney strategy, branded his rival as a party insider and elite friend of Wall Street while pledging to stay in the presidential race for the long haul no matter what the outcome in Florida.

“On big philosophical issues, he is for all practical purposes a liberal and I am a conservative and that’s what this fight is going to be about all the way to the convention,” he said of Romney on “CBS This Morning.”

Romney shrugged off the continued Gingrich attacks, drawing cheers from the crowd when he said Gingrich was not doing too well and had been “flailing about.”

“I know, it’s sad isn’t it?” Romney said, calling it “painfully revealing” and adding: “You’ve just gotta shake your head.”

Funny.  Mitt didn’t deny he was a Liberal, did he?

There’s a reason that “The Establishment” Republicans, the Democrats, and the Main Stream Media have gone out of their way to destroy Newt Gingrich’s Reputation and political aspirations:

They will tell you whom they fear.

Appearing on Fox News Sunday, Former Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin gave Conservative voters in Florida the following advice:

You gotta rage against the machine, at this point in order to defend our republic and save what is good and secure and prosperous about our nation, we need somebody who is engaged in sudden and relentless reform and isn’t afraid to shake it up. Shake up that establishment.

So, if for no other reason to rage against the machine vote for Newt, annoy a liberal. Vote Newt. Keep this vetting process going, keep the debate going.

What did Governor Palin mean by “The Establishment”?  Is she a former hippie, somehow reliving the heady days of Haight-Ashbury? Nope.

The Establishment to which she’s alluding is the GOP Elite, the Beltway Insiders who are attempting to maintain control and continue the status quo of Moderate mediocrity.

A perfect example of how out-of-touch the GOP Elite are, may be found in the words of George Will,  token “Conservative” Political Pundit of Newspaper Editorial Pages and ABC This Week, where he said yesterday:

Time is not Newt Gingrich’s friend because the more time he has the more he talks. And the more he talks the more he says things, as he just here this morning, he said that I would love to be civil, but I’m running against a maniacal liar. Now, that’s pretty strong language. I don’t know if you have ever told Longfellow’s nursery rhyme to your 4-year-old daughter Alice yet. ‘There’s a little girl, had a little curl right in the middle of the forehead. When she was good, she was very good indeed. And when she was bad, she was very horrid.’ And we’re at the horrid stage with Newt Gingrich.

Remember, this is the same snob who wrote the following about good old-fashioned American blue jeans on April 16, 2009:

Denim is the carefully calculated costume of people eager to communicate indifference to appearances. But the appearances that people choose to present in public are cues from which we make inferences about their maturity and respect for those to whom they are presenting themselves.

…Today it is silly for Americans whose closest approximation of physical labor consists of loading their bags of clubs into golf carts to go around in public dressed for driving steers up the Chisholm Trail to the railhead in Abilene.

This is not complicated. For men, sartorial good taste can be reduced to one rule: If Fred Astaire would not have worn it, don’t wear it. For women, substitute Grace Kelly.

If it was up to Beltway Boys like Mr. Will, Conservatives would behave like good little sheeple and shut up and vote for Romney.

Former Professional Politician turned actor and Conservative Radio Talk Show Host Fred Thompson has noticed the shenanigans as well, calling out candidate and Pundit alike:

Former Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.) on Sunday attacked Mitt Romney for “unseemliness and overkill” in his aggressive campaign against Newt Gingrich, the candidate Thompson has endorsed.

Romney’s “modus operandi, basically, is to play Mr. Nice Guy until somebody gets close to him,” Thompson said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “And then he unleashes his attack machine. And that’s what happened in Iowa and it’s what’s happening in Florida.”

Thompson said that a story in Sunday’s New York Times depicts “Romney’s staff … patting themselves on the back, talking about how mean and down they are. How they’ve got Matt Drudge in their back pocket. And how Romney is in on all of it.”

For months, Drudge has been running a steady stream of pro-Romney and anti-Gingrich stories on his website, Drudge Report.

Fred’s right.  Romney and his campaign staff have definitely turned up the heat this week on Newt Gingrich.  According to the previously mentioned New York Times article:

In a call last Sunday morning, just hours after Mr. Romney’s double-digit loss to Mr. Gingrich in the South Carolina primary, the Romney team outlined the new approach to the candidate. Put aside the more acute focus on President Obama and narrow in on Mr. Gingrich.

Find lines of attack that could goad Mr. Gingrich into angry responses and rally mainstream Republicans. Swarm Gingrich campaign events to rattle him. Have Mr. Romney drop his above-the-fray persona and carry the fight directly to his opponent, especially in two critical debates scheduled for the week.

The results of that strategy, carried out by a veteran squad of strategists and operatives assembled by Mr. Romney to deal with just this kind of moment, have been on striking display here.

By this weekend, Mr. Romney’s aides were on the offensive and increasingly confident, with some combination of their strategy and Mr. Gingrich’s own performance swinging polls in Mr. Romney’s direction. Even as it acknowledged the damage inflicted on Mr. Romney by the past several weeks, his team suggested that it had learned a lesson about never letting up on rivals, especially if Mr. Romney wins the nomination and confronts Mr. Obama in the general election.

As far as The Drudge Report is concerned,  please read it and decide for yourself.

My good friend, Gene Hoyas, The Bulldog Pundit, has been writing for a while now, that Mitt Romney was going to be the Republican Candidate, no matter what.  It’s not that he’s a big fan, quite the opposite.  He knew, early on, that the Political Chicanery brought to bear by The Establishment would symbolically tar and feather  Gingrich’s Campaign beyond redemption.

Unfortunately, so far, the Former Col. Manly Rash is turning out to be a prophet.

And ain’ t it a cotton-pickin’ shame.

On Friday, Sarah Palin posted a Facebook Note in which she relayed her disgust over the actions of “Establishment Republicans” and the tactics being used by them and the Romney Campaign to eliminate Newt Gingrich from the Republican Primary Race.  Former Governor Palin, for someone who has been deemed “irrelevant” by vociferous Romney supporters posting on Conservative Websites, sure does attract a lot of responses, as packed comment sections on these websites document.

Here are some excerpts from her message:

We have witnessed something very disturbing this week. The Republican establishment which fought Ronald Reagan in the 1970s and which continues to fight the grassroots Tea Party movement today has adopted the tactics of the left in using the media and the politics of personal destruction to attack an opponent.

We will look back on this week and realize that something changed. I have given numerous interviews wherein I espoused the benefits of thorough vetting during aggressive contested primary elections, but this week’s tactics aren’t what I meant. Those who claim allegiance to Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment should stop and think about where we are today. Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater, the fathers of the modern conservative movement, would be ashamed of us in this primary. Let me make clear that I have no problem with the routine rough and tumble of a heated campaign. As I said at the first Tea Party convention two years ago, I am in favor of contested primaries and healthy, pointed debate. They help focus candidates and the electorate. I have fought in tough and heated contested primaries myself. But what we have seen in Florida this week is beyond the pale. It was unprecedented in GOP primaries. I’ve seen it before – heck, I lived it before – but not in a GOP primary race.

I am sadly too familiar with these tactics because they were used against the GOP ticket in 2008. The left seeks to single someone out and destroy his or her record and reputation and family using the media as a channel to dump handpicked and half-baked campaign opposition research on the public. The difference in 2008 was that I was largely unknown to the American public, so they had no way of differentiating between the lies and the truth. All of it came at them at once as “facts” about me. But Newt Gingrich is known to us – both the good and the bad.

…As I said in my speech in Iowa last September, the challenge of this election is not simply to replace President Obama. The real challenge is who and what we will replace him with. It’s not enough to just change up the uniform. If we don’t change the team and the game plan, we won’t save our country. We truly need sudden and relentless reform in Washington to defend our republic, though it’s becoming clearer that the old guard wants anything but that. That is why we should all be concerned by the tactics employed by the establishment this week. We will not save our country by becoming like the left. And I question whether the GOP establishment would ever employ the same harsh tactics they used on Newt against Obama. I didn’t see it in 2008. Many of these same characters sat on their thumbs in ‘08 and let Obama escape unvetted. Oddly, they’re now using every available microscope and endoscope – along with rewriting history – in attempts to character assassinate anyone challenging their chosen one in their own party’s primary. So, one must ask, who are they really running against?

Whom, indeed, Governor Palin?

I believe that Governor Romney and the GOP Elite, are running against Conservatives.  Furthermore, I also believe that strategy is exemplified by a certain National Broadcasting Company and its former News Anchor, whose footage thereof he used without asking, to further his attack on Newt Gingrich:

NBC asked GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Saturday to pull a campaign advertisement made up almost entirely of a 1997 “Nightly News” report on Newt Gingrich’s ethics committee reprimand.

The “History Lesson” ad started running in Florida on the weekend, when it is harder for stations to switch ad traffic even if they want to. Broadcast days before Tuesday’s primary, the ad shows NBC anchor Tom Brokaw saying that some of Gingrich’s House colleagues had raised questions about the then-speaker’s “future effectiveness.”

Under Brokaw’s image is a line that reads — “Paid for by Romney for President, Approved by Mitt Romney.”

The footage was used without permission and the extensive use of the broadcast “inaccurately suggests that NBC News and Mr. Brokaw have consented to the use of this material and agree with the political position espoused by the videos,” NBC’s vice president of media law, David N. Sternlicht, wrote Romney’s campaign manager, Matt Rhoades.

“Aside from the obvious copyright issues, this use of the voice of Mr. Brokaw and the NBC News name exploits him and the journalistic credibility of NBC News,” the letter said. The network asked for the campaign to stop running the ad immediately and revise any other videos or commercials to remove at NBC material.

“As a news organization, NBC News objects to any use of NBC News journalists and our copyrighted material that suggests to the public that we or our journalists are taking sides with any individual or organization involved in a political campaign or dispute, and we request that your organization respect that concern,” the letter said.

Romney spokesman Rick Gorka said the campaign hasn’t received formal notification from NBC and had no immediate comment.

One would think that the staff of someone who is campaigning to be the Leader of the Free World would have sense enough to gain permission for a stunt like that.

Evidently, “The Legacy” and his loyal subjects don’t feel that they have to worry themselves with trivialities like copyright infringement and common courtesy.

 

During Thursday’s Republican Primary Debate, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney responded to an attack by Rick Santorum concerning Romneycare by saying,

First of all, it’s not worth getting angry about.

Rick Santorum replied Friday that Mitt Romney’s health care record is “a big, big liability” and “something to get mad about.”

“Yeah, Gov. Romney, there is something to get mad about,” Santorum said on Fox News, referring to Romney’s statement at Thursday night’s debate in Jacksonville that his health care record was nothing to get “angry about.” “People — you and Barack Obama and others and Newt Gingrich want to tell Americans that as a condition of breathing in America, you have to go out and buy private sector insurance so the government will fine you, is something that people get angry about.”

Santorum noted Friday that he had addressed the issue not with anger but with passion, and repeated that the eventual GOP nominee must be able to draw a stark contrast to Obamacare.

“And what Gov. Romney did last night was stand up and forcefully defend government controlling the health care system at the state level,” Santorum said. “The bottom line is, he’s for government control of health care, which is not a conservative principle, which does not differentiate himself between President Obama, and that is a big, big liability for us going into this general election.”

I did a little research (as I am wont to do), and found out that Romneycare is indeed “something to be angry about”:

On June 22, 2010, Michael F. Cannon wrote the following article, Study  Romneycare Increased Health Premiums By 6 Percent, found at cato-at-liberty.org:

One of the main arguments for both RomneyCare (the health care law Massachusetts enacted in 2006) and ObamaCare (the federal law enacted in March of this year) is that once the government mandates that everyone purchase health insurance, premiums will fall due to broader pooling. A new study published by the Forum for Health Economics & Policy suggests the opposite.

Supporters of those laws, like MIT health economist Jonathan Gruber, point to data showing that premiums for individually purchased health insurance policies in Massachusetts fell after 2006. Yet that was expected, and is not evidence that RomneyCare reduced health insurance costs. RomneyCare merged Massachusetts’ “individual” health insurance market with the market for small employers. The individual market accounts for just 4 percent of the private market, and premiums in that market were higher than for employment-based coverage. When the two markets merged, the price controls that Massachusetts imposes on health insurance led to an averaging of premiums: premiums for individual purchasers fell, and premiums for small-business employees increased to pick up the slack. That is, RomneyCare shifted costs from people who purchase their own coverage to workers who obtain coverage on the job.

Economists John Cogan, Glenn Hubbard, and Daniel Kessler compared premiums for job-based coverage in Massachusetts, before and after RomneyCare, to job-based premiums nationwide. They found evidence that RomneyCare increased employer-sponsored insurance premiums, particularly at small firms:

We find that health reform in Massachusetts increased single-coverage employer-sponsored insurance premiums by about 6 percent in aggregate, and by about 7 percent for firms with fewer than 50 employees. The effect of reform on family premiums is less uniform. If Massachusetts is compared to the nation as a whole, reform had a modest 1.5 percent effect on family premiums. However, in the Boston MSA, and among employees of small firms, the effect of reform on family premiums was much greater. Family premiums grew by about 8 percent more in Boston than in the 19 largest other MSAs from 2006-08, as compared to 2004-06. For small employers, the differential Massachusetts/US growth in small-group premiums from 2006-08, over and above the growth from 2004-06, was 14.4 percent.

Their study is subject to important limitations. But it is getting harder and harder to claim that RomneyCare — and ObamaCare, which is just RomneyCare 2.0 — are going to reduce costs.

And then, I found this little tidbit at National Review Online, published on September 15, 2011, which is a summary of information culled from the Boston Herald:

The Beacon Hill Institute study found that, on average, Romneycare:

•    cost the Bay State 18,313 jobs;

•    drove up total health insurance costs in Massachusetts by $4.311 billion;

•    slowed the growth of disposable income per person by $376; and

•    reduced investment in Massachusetts by $25.06 million.

The method used:

The institute analyzed trends in health-care costs before and after the state law was passed. Researchers compared the Bay State’s numbers to national health-care cost trends. They found that instead of reducing health-care expenses as advocates had promised, Romneycare actually increased costs by $4.3 billion. Using computer modeling to determine the effect of those increased costs on businesses and Bay State residents, the institute concluded that the law has cost Massachusetts an average of 18,313 jobs.

If I was one of those that lost their jobs, I would be pretty angry, Governor.

As they always say on the late-night Ronco Info-mercials,

But wait!  There’s more!

“Let me tell you, there’s a big difference between what we did and what President Obama is doing,” Romney said in a Mar. 7, 2010 Fox News Sunday interview.

“What we did, I think, is the ultimate conservative plan. We said people have to take responsibility for getting insurance, if they can afford it, or paying their own way. No more free- riders. And we solved this at the state level – not a federal plan, but a state plan.”

Romney went on to describe the mandate as the “biggest pro” of his health care plan.

“It’s a plan that has pros and cons,” he said. “The biggest pro, in my view, is that we don’t have free riders now expecting other people to pay for their health care costs. And we’re also able to have individuals, who otherwise would not have the kind of specialty care they need, receiving treatment.”

Two weeks later Romney said during an interview on CNN’s Larry King Live, “right now in this country, people that don’t have health insurance go to the hospital if they get a serious illness, and they get treated for free by government. My plan says no, they can’t do that. No more free riders. People have to take personal responsibility. I consider it a conservative plan.”

Governor Romney, I do not think that you know what that word means.

So, who won the debate last night?  Well, It depends on whom you talk to.

Those who favor Mitt as the greatest thing since sliced bread, are saying he won, hands down.   And, those who like Newt, give him kudos for last night.

Supporters of Dr. Paul were too busy adjusting their tin foil hats to comment.

However, it does appear that Rick Santorum, winner of the Hawkeye Cauci, made up a lot of ground last night.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich sparred Thursday with Mitt Romney over immigration policies race as tempers flared in the opening minutes of the CNN/Republican Party of Florida debate in Jacksonville.

Gingrich charged Romney’s immigration policy would result in the deportation of grandmothers who are in the country illegally. Romney has advocated for “self-deportation,” a policy that involves making economic conditions so difficult for undocumented workers that they choose to leave the country to find better opportunities.

The former House speaker said Romney was the most anti-immigrant candidate on the debate stage, which prompted outrage from Romney.

“I’m not going to go find grandmothers and take them out of them homes and deport them,” Romney said, accusing Gingrich of using “highly-charged epithets” irresponsibly. “Our problem is not 11 million grandmothers.”

Ron Paul ready to be oldest president Gingrich questions Romney’s investments Romney defends his extreme wealth Gingrich: This is a nonsense question

However, Gingrich and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum did agree with Romney that at least some illegal immigrants would be likely to “self-deport” if the government were to crack down on employers who hired illegal immigrants. All three men advocated a system of identification for immigrants that would help employers verify an employee’s legal status.

Texas Rep. Ron Paul said some of the measures proposed by his opponents were difficult to implement, and called for American dollars to be used on the United States-Mexico border instead of in the Middle East.

The debate audience roared back to life on Thursday after a Monday matchup in which attendees were asked to hold their applause. Romney drew frequent applause early in the debate when he took on attacks by Gingrich over immigration.

…For his turn, Santorum launched into a screed against the personal turn the campaign has taken of late, asking that the debate shift back to the issues facing the country rather than the financial dealings of two candidates.

“The bigger issue here is, these two gentlemen, who are out distracting from the most important issues — we have been playing petty personal politics, can we set aside that Newt was a member of Congress and used the skills that he developed as a member of Congress to go out and advise companies — and that’s not the worst thing in the world — and that Mitt Romney is a wealthy guy because worked hard and he’s going out and working hard? And you guys should leave that alone and focus on the issues.”

The Florida Republican Primary is still anybody’s to win.

According to a CNN/Time/ORC International survey released Wednesday, 36% of people likely to vote in Tuesday’s Republican primary in Florida say they are backing Romney as the party’s nominee, with 34% supporting Gingrich. Romney’s 2-point margin over Gingrich is well within the survey’s sampling error.

All day Thursday, the Republican Establishment and its minions tried their darnedest to eliminate Newt Gingrich from the race.  From Matt Drudge to Bob Dole, negative naysayers against Newt’s nomination (trying saying that real fast) turned up the heat, weaving a fascinating falsification (that’s two) of Newt’s relationship with President Ronald Reagan, that moved his sane son Michael to issue this statement:

I am deeply disturbed that supporters of Mitt Romney are claiming that Newt Gingrich is not a true Reaganite and are even claiming that Newt was a strong critic of my father.

Recently I endorsed Newt Gingrich for president because I believe that Newt is the only Republican candidate who has both consistently backed the conservative policies that my father championed and the only Republican that will continue to implement his vision.

It surprises me that Mitt Romney and his supporters would raise this issue, when Mitt by his own admission voted for Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale who opposed my father, and later supported liberal Democrat Paul Tsongas for president.

As governor of Massachusetts, Romney’s achievement was the most socialistic healthcare plan in the nation up until that time.

Say what you want about Newt Gingrich but when he was Speaker of the House he surrounded himself with Reagan conservatives and implemented a Ronald Reagan program of low taxes and restrained federal spending.

Newt’s conservative program created a huge economic boom and balanced the budget for the first time in more than a generation.

Mike Reagan concluded: I would take Newt Gingrich’s record any day over Mitt Romney’s.

In a 1995 speech at a dinner honoring Ronald Reagan, Former First Lady Nancy Reagan said:

The dramatic movement of 1995 is an outgrowth of a much earlier crusade that goes back half a century. Barry Goldwater handed the torch to Ronnie, and in turn Ronnie turned that torch over to Newt and the Republican members of Congress to keep that dream alive.

I predict that the interminable bashing of Newt Gingrich, by Republicans and Democrats alike, will continue until the citizens of Florida step into the voting booths on Tuesday, January 31, 2012.

It’s all about maintaining control.