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The Best of America on Independence Day

Even if you're not a fan of Mitt Romney, you have to admit that this July 4th video is very uplifting, even Reaganesque to some degree:


 

Obama Gift Registry: Your Family and Friends Should Pay Their Fair Share

#ObamaGiftRegistrySlogans You may stiff the bride
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) June 23, 2012

Could Team Obama, with its world-class campaign fundraising prowess, be that hard up for cash so they had to launch this tacky gift registry?

Got a birthday, anniversary, or wedding coming up?

Let your friends know how important this election is to you—register with Obama 2012, and ask for a donation in lieu of a gift. It’s a great way to support the President on your big day. Plus, it’s a gift that we can all appreciate—and goes a lot further than a gravy bowl.

Aside from wedding and birthdays, how would your family feel about Santa visiting the White House rather than your house?

At this writing, there are about 900 comments posted at the registry. Check it out. It's not going well for Team Obama.

Maybe the Obama campaign is falling short of fundraising goals. Per the Wall Street Journal:

The Democrats' official fundraising numbers, released on Wednesday, showed that the $95 million cash-on-hand advantage Obama and the DNC had over the Republicans at the end of April had been cut by two-thirds at the end of May to $33 million. This is in part because the Obama campaign is burning through its war chest so fast and in part because of the impressive $107 million that the Romney campaign and the RNC announced they had on hand at May's end.

Jay Leno weighs in:

Breaking News: The Romney Campaign Really Wants to Win

                                              [photo credit: Gage Skidmore]

Unlike the lackluster 2008 presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain who inexplicably left so many issues on the table, Mitt Romney's aggressive and rapid response media team shows that the GOP candidate really wants to capture the White House in November.

Using the term "bomb thrower" is gross exaggeration, but otherwise this BuzzFeed piece seems to be generally on the mark, except it that Romney is implementing a strategy for winning the general election:

In the eyes of many on the right, John McCain's 2008 presidential bid was a disaster not because he lost, but because he refused to fight. Conservatives believe McCain bought into a liberal media narrative that personal attacks on Barack Obama were unseemly and even racist. The conservative caricature of Candidate McCain that emerged in the wake of the Republicans' defeat wasn't of an unreliable moderate — rather, it was one of an Establishment figure paralyzed by political correctness, and unwilling to go blow for blow with Obama.

But if the Vietnam veteran disappointed conservatives with his gun-shy campaign in 2008, Romney is uniting the right by playing the role of the bomb-thrower.

The unapologetically aggressive tone of Romney's campaign is manifest at every turn — from his aides' fierce Twitter wars, to the candidate's surprise press conference at failed green solar company Solyndra, and the campaign's continued refusal to apologize for Donald Trump's outlandish conspiracy theories about Obama's birth certificate. It's all part of a deliberate — and, so far, successful — strategy aimed less at convincing undecided voters, and more at rallying the Republican Party around its candidate.

Similarly, Byron York of the Washington Examiner writes that Team Obama misses John McCain and said so publicly:

Faced with deteriorating economic conditions and an unexpectedly aggressive Republican opponent, President Obama and his aides are expressing nostalgia for Sen. John McCain, the Republican opponent Obama defeated handily in the 2008 election...

The last week, more than any in the campaign so far, has shown Team Obama that Romney and his aides are prepared to fight as hard as needed to win in November.  The Romney-organized shouting-down [see below] of top Obama aide David Axelrod in Boston; the Romney sneak event at the old Solyndra headquarters in California; Romney's refusal to give in to Democratic demands to repudiate Trump; and Romney's determination to avoid side controversies while remaining singularly focused on the economy all revealed a candidate who has resolved to battle Obama on his own, and not Obama's, terms.  It's no wonder Obama has become nostalgic for the relatively comfortable days of 2008.

Taking a page out of the left's playbook, Romney supporters disrupt Obama campaign honcho David Axelrod's Boston press conference:

 

 

The First Day of the Romney Presidency

In a non-linear, back-to-the-future world, Mitt Romney had a pretty busy 24 hours as America's new chief executive:

The Dog Eater in Chief

The primaries have yet to officially conclude and the presidential campaign has already gone to the dogs...

For months now, the president's proxies in the Democrat-Media Complex have been obsessing (dare we say "crowing"?) about the 30-year-old incident in which presumptive 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney strapped a dog crate--with dog--to the top of the car for a family road trip.

But, the left-wingers seemed to have stepped in it, as it were, because it turned out that...well, you know how it turned out:



[Learn more about the Republican Party Animals here.]

Added: As Rex Murphy writes in the National Post, "So now the presidential campaign is down to basics. Americans are to be given a stark, unequivocal choice. Which is it to be? Dog in a Crate, or Dog on a Plate?I do not think we have seen such clarity of choice in any presidential race of our time."


 

Mitt Romney Calls Out Biased Mainstream Media

Say what you will about Mitt Romney, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, but give him credit for going on the offense against the Obama-worshipping left-wing press which the late Andrew Breitbart correctly called the Democrat-Media Complex, who, as Romney said, "are inclined to do the president's bidding."


As Big Hollywood.com's John Nolte writes, "Yesterday's Breitbart.com interview not only made clear that Romney completely understands how corrupt the media is, but also that he's not afraid to point to them and call them by name. It's one thing to know who your enemy is, it's quite another to let them know you know."

Romney Bashing in Last Night's "Mad Men" Episode?

                        photo credit: Christina Saint Marche via photopin cc
 
Did you catch last night's episode of Mad Men season 5?

The somewhat overrated drama set in the 1960s had a scene where one of the supporting characters--a former aide to Gov. Nelson Rockefeller who apparently is now an advisor to NYC Mayor John Lindsay in the show--trash-talks about Michigan Governor George Romney, Mitt Romney's father, in a telephone conversation with another political operative.

The character, Henry Francis, calls Romney "a clown."

Was this a subtle or not-so-subtle dig at the current GOP presidential frontrunner from Obama's many sycophants in Hollywood?

If you watch Mad Men, let us know.

Added: ABC News among others also noticed. Big Hollywood.com has the clip in question:

Super Tuesday on Toast

                                                    [photo credit: Jonathunder]

The 2012 Super Tuesday (so-called) primary results tomorrow may or not bring clarity to the GOP presidential race, but the backbiting, hostility, and bashing against other candidates evidence in the right-of-center political blogs appears to have little chance of abating.

Many of the commenters seem to be experts on one subject:  Toast.

After a given candidate loses a primary (or even wins one) or makes yet another dumb statement, any number of commenters rush to upload posts that pronounce that candidate toast.

With all the talk about toast, you'd think these guys work at Denny's or the Waffle House.

And what's with this doom-and-gloom defeatism from some of the toast-masters about the upcoming presidential election? Some of these are paid trolls from the Democrats, but that aside, no one knows what's going to happen in November, including those authoring those blanket blog indictments.

And this almost childish threat that "I'm going to stay home unless my candidate wins the nomination" is ridiculous.

If you haven't noticed, all politicians are full of it, including the four remaining, flawed candidates that are vying for the Republican presidential nomination. But any of them would be a huge upgrade over the current occupant of the White House.

Do you really want four more years of socialism, crony capitalism, and out-of-control government spending and regulation? Do you want Obama making more radical-left Supreme Court appointments or other lifetime nominations to the lower courts? Then by all means, stay home.

As we have written previously, those on the right and in the middle must unite in support of whoever becomes the Republican nominee--whether that's Romney or Not-Romney--in the 2012 general election.

Otherwise, the country could be toast.

 

Indiana Becomes Right-to-Work State

All the media attention this week about Romney's idiotic gaffe concerning poor people obscured a far more significant political development: Indiana passed right-to-work legislation that will end the automatic payroll deduction for union dues. In so doing, it will make the money laundering between Democrats and unions harder. As the New York Times reports, the bill, which takes effect immediately, makes Indiana the country's 23rd right-to-work state.

The legislation, which bars union contracts from requiring non-union members to pay fees for representation, makes Indiana the first state in more than a decade to enact right to work legislation and the only one in the Midwestern manufacturing belt to have such a law.

Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels would hardly qualify as "most interesting man in the world" had he run for president, but in this video from Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, the site of tomorrow's Super Bowl, he talks about the reform measure that he signed into law.



Daniels' website adds that "Seven years of evidence and experience ultimately demonstrated that Indiana did need a right-to-work law to capture jobs for which, despite our highly rated business climate, we are not currently being considered."

Ron Paul for Treasury Secretary

We were in the car earlier today and heard a radio talk show host float the idea of appointing Ron Paul as U.S. Treasury Secretary in a presumed Romney administration.

This idea apparently is not necessarily new, but it must be gaining some traction. Just for the record (whatever that means!), about a month ago we made this same suggestion to some friends during a casual restaurant conversation..

Ron Paul is retiring from Congress. Putting him in charge of the Treasury Department--if he is interested in the post--and vesting him with full authority to audit the Fed is in his wheelhouse. It would also serve to unify two disparate elements of right-leaning voters.

One the primary campaign is settled, will the Romney inner circle (assuming the former Massachusetts governor emerges as the nominee) be bold enough to reach out to the congressman.

The Most Interesting Man in the...South Carolina Primary

   [Image ©Glenn Francis, www.PacificProDigital.com]

GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum this week called front-running rival Mitt Romney "bland and boring."

Would any of remaining candidates, including Mr. Santorum himself, be considered charismatic?

If you were casting for the Dos Equis beer "the most interesting man in the world" radio and TV commercials, would any of these dudes qualify?

We do know, however, that Newt Gingrich (particularly in his performance last night) is the best debater in the group.

The infighting among the the active candidates is one thing; what continues to be disturbing is the intense hostility among the commenters on the right-of-center blogs. "My candidate is perfect--your horrible candidate is fatally flawed." "My candidate is electable--your wretched candidate has no chance in November."

The actual comments aren't that polite.

If Romney is the nominee, we have no idea if he will be a good general election candidate. For one thing, in an ill-advised search for something to brag about in the 2008 presidential election, the former governor messed up bigtime by implementing RomneyCare in Massachusetts.

That being said, given the intellectually bankrupt mainstream media who will protect and push Obama at every turn, the Republican alternative--whoever he is--will have his hands full.

Only one person can get the GOP nomination. To save the country from socialism and crony capitalism, those on the right and in the middle must unite in support of that candidate in the 2012 general election.

To all those Romney bashers, as well as bashers of other candidates who seek "purity" on all issues, do you really want Obama by default spending four more years loading up the federal agencies and federal courts with radical ideologues?

Rick Perry Fail

Who's having a worse week--Netflix or Texas Governor Rick Perry? After three debates, the debating skills of the soon-to-be-former GOP frontrunner seem to getting worse, not better. Let's remember that the 2008 GOP nominee also failed to communicate during the nationally televised general election presidential debates against Obama; it was one missed opportunity after another, and we've seen this movie before and it doesn't end well.

Meantime, despite all his faults, Mitt Romney seems to be getting stronger and stronger at the podium. He may wind up getting the nomination by default. That being said, all along we've felt that the "best candidate" is the one that can stand up on that national stage next fall and effectively and clearly communicate with the broader "Dancing with the Stars" electorate. For better or worse, running for high office is a performance business. Prof. William Jacobson at Legal Insurrection puts it well:

On appearances, Perry came across once again as ill-prepared, stumbling, and uncomfortable.I cringe at the thought of the Rick Perry from last night’s debate on stage in October 2012 against Obama with the whole country watching. I hope there is another Rick Perry out there, because last night’s Rick Perry would not stand a chance on stage against our smooth-talking, fact-misstating Presidentt.

After watching the debate participants (along with admittedly a lot of channel surfing), the best candidate would seem to be a combination of New Gingrich's debating skills, Rick Perry's military background, Mitt Romney's business experience (and excluding the horrid RomneyCare implemented while he was Massachusetts Governor), Herman Cain's inspirational solutions-oriented message, the non-wacky parts of Ron Paul's libertarian philosophy, and Michelle Bachmann's charisma. Even John Huntsman came across far better than Perry.

Note to GOP candidates: Please look into the camera. Your true audience is the viewer/voter at home; the media questioner in the venue is irrelevant. For some reason, Democrats get the memo about looking directly into the camera but Republicans traditionally seem utterly clueless as to who they really are trying to convince.

Update: In response to Perry's disdain for the smoothest debater, Prof. Jacobson offers some further cogent comments:

That’s true but only to a point. We don’t need the smoothest debater, but we do need someone with the minimum required debating smoothness.

Like it or not, in September and October 2012 there are going to be debates which will be watched by an enormous percentage of the electorate, and the mainstream media will be unforgiving of mistakes by the Republican nominee. A miserable performance, on par with the one Perry had Thursday night, would be a disaster.

By contrast, strong debate performances against Obama, holding Obama accountable in front of tens of millions of people, exposing his failures for what they are, could seal the deal. The mainstream media will not perform that task for us, so our nominee needs to do it. Perry has not shown so far that he is capable of that; it’s not smoothness, its preparation and execution.