Monday, February 04, 2008

Final Endorsement

First off, I know what many of ya'll are thinking: here Patrick goes again - politics, politics, politics; boring, boring, boring. All the time, every time, every post has to do with conservative vs. liberal, Democrat vs. Republican, nothing is funny, this doesn't affect my life, who cares, everything comes out in the wash, nothing will change, none of this has to do with boat shoes or beach music, etc.

A lot of the above is true, but I have but one desperate plea; I have never asked ya'll to do anything else before: please go to the polls and cast your ballot for Mitt Romney tomorrow.

Why Romney, you ask? Well, now that Fred and Rudy (my previous choices) are out, it's coming down to who can actually win 9 months from now. Let's be clear: Romney has flaws, serious flaws. He implemented the equivalent of Hillarycare when he was governor. Despite these drawbacks, this sudden rational for supporting Romney is becoming clearer by the day: if John McCain wins the Republican nomination, we are going to get demoralized in November. Sure, McCain leads both Obama and Hilary in some polls now, but this in no way reflects the reality of circumstances voters will face an entire baseball season from now. The truth is that Romney can rally conservatives while McCain cannot.

With the exception of Iraq, voters are going to be turned off by McCain's me-tooism in debates with Hilary or Obama. Want to give amnesty to 12 million illegals? Sure, that's cool, I just helped write such a proposal last year with Ted Kennedy that allows that. Want to repeal the the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy? No problem, I fought hard against them in the first place, using the same class-warfare arguments as Dennis Kucinich. I agree with you on most everything Hilary, except the troop surge of course. I'm also 71, really grumpy, have never run a business, and enjoy bashing those who have. Domestically, I've had no guiding principles or philosophy in the Senate other than to rebuke my evil right-wing critics at every opportunity. The media loves me and continues to support me because they know I will effectively render the GOP irrelevant.

Romney, on the other hand, would be undoubtedly able to articulate a strong, energetic conservative response to the warm, fuzzy, feel-good proposals the Dems put forth. He would offer voters a choice instead of a mere echo. And despite his blemishes as Governor of Massachusetts, he is unfortunately our only hope for a GOP victory. He is the only remaining candidate that "gets it", while McCain never has and apparently never will.

Again, Americans deserve a choice in November, not an echo. For this reason, I am now forced to endorse Mitt Romney for the Republican nomination for President of the United States.

3 comments:

Barstool69 said...

Pat, the only thing I would question is how poorly you think JM will do in the general. I don't think he is going to lose the base given who he would be running against. I also remember Mrs. Dolan telling me after the primary, the candidates race towards the middle to pick up those votes. I would think this bodes well for JM's stance.

Joe said...

I was also under the impression that JM only voted against the Bush tax cuts because they didn't include a corresponding decrease in spending.

Patrick said...

Joe, of course that's the rationale he's claiming now because he knows he has to in order to win votes.

But listen to what he said at the time he voted against them: here , here, and here

Bryan, I agree that triangulating and dancing towards the middle works, but only for Democrats.

For Republicans, however, nominating a "moderate" is usually a recipe for disaster (see Ford in '76, Bush Sr. in '92, Dole in '96, etc.) because despite even the worst prospects, a lot conservatives (including yours truly) have no problem staying home on election day in protest.