http://myclob.pbwiki.com/Myclob-Blog

This from a recent Boston Globe Article:

“Recent polls have found that around 40 percent of Americans say they would not vote for a Mormon for president — though nearly as many said they would have reservations voting for a Catholic in 1960, the year John F. Kennedy won the White House.”

So can we once and for all put the issue behind us? The same number of people who said they wouldn’t vote for a Mormon now, say they wouldn’t have voted for a Catholic then, but they did once they got to know him.

The Boston Globe will not let us put the issue behind us, because they keep talking about Romney’s religion. I believe The Boston Globe would like nothing more than to see Evangelicals and Mormons have a big fight over the next two years. That is why they are fascinated with contrasting Mormonism to Evangelical beliefs.

This article:

http://www.boston.com/news/education/k_12/articles/2006/12/31/imperfect_fit/

doesn’t go into the religious differences so much as it tries to analyze the political difference.

It asserts: “In short, neither the Mitt Romney who ran for Senate in 1994 vowing to keep abortion safe and legal, nor the more recent “firmly pro-life” Romney, would be in the wrong according to the teachings of his church.”

Neither Romney? They are the same Romney. Lord Byron said; “Opinions are made to be changed - or how is truth to be got at?” Are you going to ask, which Lord Byron said that? The fake pandering Lord Byron, or the real Lord Byron? You say good morning to people on the internet, and they say, “You said good EVENING last night! Which is it going to be! You are a flip-floper.” Romney was represented to represent Massachusetts. They are pro-choice. He declared a truce on this issue, and advanced other republican causes. Now Romney is trying to represent a group of people who are split over the issue. He is explaining what his policy will be now that he is representing a different set of people. At least that is my belief. His position changed over the stem cell debate.

read about it here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitt_Romney#Abortion

and here

http://myclob.pbwiki.com/abortion

This might be upsetting to Evangelicals. They might think that the Mormon Church has no position on Abortion. This is not true. I think you can be ex-communicated from the Mormon Church for having an abortion, or encouraging someone to have an abortion. So evangelicals and Mormons aren’t so far apart on the issue. It�s just that “the Mormon church doesn’t tell you what your political position should be”. And this is where I get mad. Not all Evangelicals believe that Government should be involved politically either. The article tries to paint Mormons as free thinking and all evangelicals as Dobson-order taking robots. This is not true, and it is the best way to get evangelicals mad at Mormons and Mitt. Evangelicals think for themselves. They don’t need Dobson to think for them. This is one of the strengths of the Evangelical movement. They don’t have a centralized individual whose job it is to interpret the will of God.

The article said, “Smith was an abolitionist, for one thing; and he argued for the communal ownership of property.” Is the former a surprise? Most religious leaders of course were abolitionist! On the later, Smith did not argue for the communal ownership of property. He, like all Christians, understood that the disciples of Christ “had all things common” but that those were special circumstances. Mormons concluded, like other churches, that the world is not ready for it. This is a subtle way to tell evangelicals that we are communist, which couldn’t be farther from the truth.

(click below for page 2)

Pages: 1 2 3 4

http://myclob.pbwiki.com/Ronald-Reagan

2004

* �It is appropriate and fitting to set aside a day to honor the memory of Ronald Reagan, who inspired the nation with his optimism and belief in the greatness of the American people. He led the nation with vision, courage and humor and defended freedom and democracy around the world.�
o Governor Mitt Romney, 06-08-2004 Press Release

* “And if you think that during the great national policy debate of the 1980’s, Ronald Reagan was wrong and Ted Kennedy was right, then by all means send in John Kerry.”
o Governor Mitt Romney, 09-01-2004 2002 Republican Convention

2005

* �I believe people who are in a position of visibility and leadership affect the character of young people and individuals who look to them as leaders. And in some respects just as important as their policies and positions is there character and their substance. What for me makes people like Teddy Roosevelt and Franklin Roosevelt and John Adams and George Washington and Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan such extraordinary leaders is that they had integrity through and through. What they were on the inside and what they said on the outside was harmonious. There a lot of people like that. I think that if people try to live a very different personal life not consistent with the role they�ve assumed as a governor or senator or president, we lose something as a nation.�
o Governor Mitt Romney, The Atlantic (September 2005)

* Ronald Reagan is one of my heroes,” Romney said as he praised Reagan’s strategy for winning the Cold War: “We win; they lose.”
o Governor Mitt Romney

* �Ronald Reagan is also my hero and a friend of all of ours�I believe that our party�s ascendancy began with Ronald Reagan�s brand of visionary and courageous leadership.�
o Governor Mitt Romney, Speech in South Carolina (February 2005)

* “And for all those people, for all those people like myself who yearn for world peace, don’t forget that a strong America is peace’s best ally. As Ronald Reagan said, he said, I saw four wars start in my lifetime and not one of them was started because America was too strong. We have a president who is committed to defending this land and to spreading liberty throughout the world and we are firmly behind him. We just had a–we recently just had a visit from Shimon Peres of Israel. He said America is unique in the world and plays a unique role. In the history of the world, he said, when wars are fought, they’re fought over land and the victor takes land. But when America has been drawn into war and when millions of its sons and daughters’ lives have been taken, it asks for nothing in return. No land did we take from Germany, no land did we take from Japan. In fact we invested in their countries to preserve their liberty, because we recognize their liberty and their freedom provides freedom for us and the entire world. This is a nation which is unusual in the history of the world, it is unique, and this is a nation which helps preserve the peace of the entire planet. And I’m proud and privileged to know that we have such great militrary and such great leadership carrying out and fulfilling that promise.”
o Governor Mitt Romney, 06-03-2005, NH Federation of Republican Women’s Lilac Dinner

2006

* “Well, I think people in this country want a person of faith to lead them as their governor, as their senator, as their president. I don’t think most people care what brand of faith they have. And I don’t believe that that’s been an issue for me in my race for governor. It wasn’t an issue, I believe, serious, for John Kennedy when he ran for president. People said oh, gosh, Ronald Reagan, he’s been an actor who’s been divorced, you can’t elect him. Those things, I think, get swept away as people get to know the individual, understand their character, their vision, their values, and I think that’s true regardless of a person’s faith if they are a faithful person.”
o Governor Mitt Romney, 02-27-2006 Interview with CHRIS WALLACE on FNS

* “When I was running for office for the first time in 1994, I was trying to define who I was, not who I wasn�t. I was trying to define that I was an individual who had his own views and perspectives and I wasn�t a carbon copy of someone else. I�ve said since, and continue to reiterate, that one of my heroes is Ronald Reagan. I�ve been asked time and again in interviews, who are your heroes? And I mention Ronald Reagan and Teddy Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower among others as some of my favorite heroes, and I feel that deeply. But I am a different person than any other person and my interest is, of course, looking forward to defining who I am. Of course, now there�s no need for me to try to define myself in reference to others. I�ve got a record. And people can look at my record and see, for instance, that when people were clamoring to raise taxes in Massachusetts, I said �no� and we held the line on taxes, and held the line and borrowing, and we balanced our budget. They can see that I vetoed literally hundreds of line items in budgets because I thought there was too much spending. They can see that I fought for better schools. They can see that I fought for a better environment. And they can recognize that a lot what Ronald Reagan was doing I�m also doing. So I�m pretty proud to follow in his legacy, if you will, recognizing, of course, that there�s some differences. He�s just a lot better than anyone else I know.”
o Governor Mitt Romney, Human Events, Robert B. Bluey, 12-28-2006, http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=18683

* Now of course there’s some big differences between Massachusetts and New Hampshire as well. There is this affection that some people in Massachusetts have for toll booths. I don’t understand it. This Memorial Day weekend my wife and I waited in the toll booth line at the Hampton tolls for just about half an hour. And I have a message for your Democratic governor. Tear down that wall.
o Governor Mitt Romney

* �I believe people will see that as governor, when I had to examine and grapple with this difficult issue, I came down on the side of life. I know in the four years I have served as governor I have learned and grown from the exposure to the thousands of good-hearted people who are working to change the culture in our country. I�m committed to promoting the culture of life. Like Ronald Reagan, and Henry Hyde, and others who became pro-life, I had this issue wrong in the past.�
o Governor Mitt Romney, NRO Interview 12-14-2006

* “Not really. Not at this stage. You know its possible that there will come some point were there is a question that galvanizes interest and there is an occasion to say something that cuts through the confusion that may develop but at this stage it is kind of hard to predict what will happen. I mean I remember in the race with Ronald Reagan, it was in his debate that he said, “I’m not going to let your youth and inexperience become an issue in this campaign”. That sort of put aside his age issue. And there may well be something of that nature. I just don’t think Americans will do something the constitution forbids. The constitution says that no religious test shall ever be required for qualification for office in these United States, and I don’t think my party or the American people would ever do that.”
o Governor Mitt Romney, discussing his religion on the Charlie Rose Show. Was asked, “John Kennedy, we remember, looked for and found a venue where he could talk about his catholic faith. The Houston ministry is a very famous speech that he gave. Would you look for and are you looking for a place were you can make a statement like this and are you looking for the right place and time?”

Press Releases from Governor Mitt Romney about President Ronald Reagan

06-08-2004, ROMNEY DECLARES JUNE 11th DAY OF HONOR FOR PRESIDENT REAGAN

Comparisons Between Governor Mitt Romney and Ronald Reagan

“Romney had a genuine conversion on the abortion issue,” French acknowledged. “In that he is no different than Ronald Reagan.” He might have added George H.W. Bush, who was embraced by pro-lifers in 1988 despite a pro-choice past. Source: http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=10274

Mitt does not appear to have any skeletons in his closet. He is likely to remind many people of Ronald Reagan with his easy-going attitude. Sourece: http://thetemplarpundit.blogspot.com/2005/06/2008-profile-mitt-romney.html

Mr. Romney could be an attractive presidential candidate. His sunny disposition puts one in mind of Ronald Reagan–he laughs easily and smiles almost continuously. He is a governor, as four of the past five presidents were; but he can claim more international experience than most state executives. In addition to his work on the Olympics, he has served on the federal Homeland Security Advisory Council, chairing its working group on intelligence and information sharing. Source: http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110007755

~ Mike

* “The reserve of modern assertions is sometimes pushed to extremes, in which the fear of being contradicted leads the writer to strip himself of almost all sense and meaning.”
** Sir Winston Churchill (1874 - 1965)

* “You say good morning to people on the internet, and they say, ‘You said good evening last night! Which is it going to be! You are a flip-floper.’”
** Mike Laub

* “Opinions are made to be changed - or how is truth to be got at?”
** Lord Byron

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/5…00779e2340.html

This is the second positive British piece about Romney in a week

By Rebecca Knight

Published: December 29 2006 02:00 | Last updated: December 29 2006 02:00

Before he was elected governor of Massachusetts, and even before he rescued the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympic Games, Mitt Romney was known in business circles as the venture capitalist with the golden touch.

During his 14 years at the helm of Bain Capital, the Boston-based private equity firm, Mr Romney earned a reputation for an owlish knack for appraising opportunities - spotting start-ups with lucrative potential and taking troubled, undervalued companies and retooling their business models.

Mr Romney, who worked as a consultant for Bain & Co before he founded the spin-off venture capital firm with $37m, helped launch some 180 companies including Staples, The Sports Authority, and Domino’s Pizza. He also he made his investors a lot of money: during his reign at Bain the firm’s annual rate of return on realised investments exceeded 100 per cent.

As Mr Romney eyes a possible bid for the 2008 Republican nomination, some observers note that his limited experience in public office would be a big liability in the greater Republican party contest. He has only one term as governor under his belt and he managed to court controversy during that tenure - for instance, opposing gay marriage. However, even Mr Romney’s detractors concede that his successful record in the private sector has left mostly a string of admirers.

Described by former colleagues as “tough-minded”, “analytical” and bearing “Reagan-like leadership” qualities, Mr Romney - who holds degrees from Harvard Law School and Harvard Business School - became well known in the world of venture capital for his ability to parse a lot of information in a short time, his sharp attention to detail and his penchant for poring through facts and figures.

Tom Stemberg was hawking around his business plan to start a chain of office supply stores when he first met Mr Romney in 1985. “It was a long business plan and the only group that had thoughtfully read it and taken it apart was Mitt and his team,” he recalls. “There was one firm that laughed and said, ‘Who in the world cares about how much they spend on pencils and erasers?’ But Mitt paid a tremendous amount of attention to details like that.”

Mr Stemberg remembers that, at one point, Mr Romney questioned his calculation that the amount that small businesses spent annually on office supplies was more than $1,000 per employee. Mr Romney said that he had surveyed businesses in Boston and they claimed to spend only about $250 a head. “So I told him that one of the big problems is that companies don’t know what they spend. You have to look at the invoices,” says Mr Stemberg.

That is exactly what Mr Romney and his Bain colleagues did - a tedious task. Mr Romney discovered that Mr Stemberg’s figures were correct and Bain Capital made an initial investment of about $600,000 to start a little company called Staples. Today it has 69,000 employees and a market capitalisation of about $19.5bn (�14.5bn, �9.9bn).

During Mr Romney’s career as a buyout specialist he sometimes had to make unpopular decisions - including trimming costs and slashing jobs - and not all of Bain’s companies were resounding winners. But that was part of the job. “He is a decision maker and the buck stops with him,” said one former colleague.

Bob White, a partner at Bain Capital and a friend of the out-going governor, says that Mr Romney’s strength lies in his ability to surround himself with smart, passionate people - and, crucially, people with divergent views. “He believes it’s very important to have people that don’t all see everything the same way.”

Mr White says that one of Mr Romney’s finest hours in business came in the late 1980s. Bain & Co had embarked on an employee stock ownership plan by borrowing money to pay founders for shares that the company would then sell to new partners. But the estimated worth of the company was too much and Bain could not meet its debts.

In 1990 the partners asked Mr Romney to return from Bain Capital to oversee a restructuring of the company that entailed complicated negotiations with banks, as well as the company’s former partners, to get significant portions of the debts forgiven.

Mr Romney managed to convince all but one of the top partners in the Boston office to go along with him, according to Mr White. “It was exactly the right thing to do,” he says.

“The company was potentially weeks away from financial ruin, but he was able to turn it around and today it has done extraordinarily well.” The company is today worth about $36bn.

Then came the Olympics. When Mr Romney arrived as its chief executive officer in 1999, the Salt Lake City Winter Games had a $379m fiscal shortfall and had been hit by bribery allegations. “In walks Mitt and the place brightened immediately,” recalls Frazier Bullock, who was chief operating officer of the games and also worked with Mr Romney at Bain.

“He understood the big picture right from the beginning and had a road map for how to rebuild.”

Mr Romney reworked the organisation’s policies, cut budgets and increased fundraising. The games ended in surplus and Mr Romney won national praise for turning them into a resounding commercial success. “Not only is he drop dead smart,” says Mr Bullock, who now works at Sorenson Capital, “but he has a leadership quality that you can see and feel.”

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2006

Ann Marie

http://www.christiantoday…mpaign/8863.htm

Clinton Hires Evangelical Consultant for Presidential Campaign

~~~Mike

http://hughhewitt.townhal…f9-582aba582b43

Romney was on Human Events and Town Hall yesterday.

Here is the link to the Hugh Hewitt transcript.

~~~Mike

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=18683

Click here for the interview. Here is the intro:

As he ponders whether to seek the presidency in 2008, Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney yesterday took a break from his family vacation in Utah to talk exclusively to HUMAN EVENTS about the War on Terror, his conservative beliefs and the role bloggers are playing in politics. He also clarified his views on abortion and gay marriage and addressed concerns about his healthcare plan.

Romney�s term as governor ends on January 4, 2007, and he�s expected to announce his future plans shortly thereafter. Recently he�s reached out to conservatives, including National Review Online and talk-show host Hugh Hewitt to discuss his political views.

A complete transcript of our interview follows. It is also available to download in .mp3 format or via Windows Media.

~~~Mike

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: CONTACT:

December 27, 2006 Eric Fehrnstrom

(617) 725-4025

Statement of Governor Mitt Romney on the Passing of President Gerald R. Ford

Today, America mourns the loss of President Gerald R. Ford, a great public servant who showed steady leadership during a turbulent time in our country’s history.

President Ford was proud of his heritage and where he grew up. Wherever he traveled, both at home and overseas, Hail to the Victors; was played, a fitting accompaniment for a son of Michigan.

As a leader in the Congress, and then in the White House, President Ford demonstrated the highest levels of integrity and decency. He counted among his friends political rivals, and he worked across the political aisle to do the people’s business. And in a dark hour for America, he brought credit and honor to the highest office of the land and restored America’s faith in itself.

Ann and I extend our deepest sympathies to Betty Ford and to President Ford’s entire family on their loss.

###

~~~Mike

PS:

Mrs. Clinton has never governed, commanded or even managed anything larger than her Senate staff. The only time she was placed in charge of anything was when President Clinton appointed her to chair his task force on health care reform which promptly crashed and burned because its structure and operation violated the Federal Advisory Committee Act (a law known only to some of us who had been constrained by it while in government.) The presidency would be on-the-job training for her. As it would be for Mr. Obama, whose only �job� outside of government was as a community activist. Voters and big-dollar donors will wonder if either of them is capable of running against a qualified and determined Republican. Not that there are many of them.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/12/death_taxes_and_mccain.html

The oldest living President has died at the age of 93.

I was fortunate to fly into the airport that bears his name in November when I was deployed to Michigan in advance of the November elections. I was not able to see his museum due to time constraints but you can definitely feel the Ford touch in the area.

Rest in peace Mr. President!

�My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over. Our Constitution works. Our great republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here the people rule.�

�I am acutely aware that you have not elected me as your president by your ballots. So I ask you to confirm me with your prayers.�
-Gerald R. Ford after becoming President of the United States in 1974
Source: MSNBC

Story from his hometown Grand Rapids paper here

Further coverage here

Ann Marie

P.S. Feel free to leave any remembrances/tributes of President Ford in the comments section.

http://www.reagan.com/article.php?id=187

Michael Reagan (son of Ronald Reagan and talk show host/columnist/potitical pundit) has a column up where he has some great things to say about Romney. Essentially, he says that Romney and Giuliani are the type of leaders/candidates that could beat Sen. Hillary Clinton:

Consider her record as a senator. She admits she voted for the war and now she says it was a mistake, not exactly the kind of consistency we expect from a president.

Senatorial candidate Hillary Clinton promised to bring 200,000 new jobs to New York. She failed, claiming that she didn�t have the benefit of a Democratic Congress to help her achieve that goal, but adding that even though there had not been the kind of environment she hoped for, there had been some progress.

The fact is that there hasn�t been any progress. New York is not improving � it�s getting worse. New York has lost 112,000 jobs since sending Senator Clinton to Washington.

In contrast, consider the records of two Republicans, Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani. Both governed with Democratic majorities in both state legislatures.

Back on April 12, 2006, Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney signed into law an act to provide health insurance to virtually all citizens of Massachusetts and did it without raising taxes.

Working with Democrats in the state legislature and others, he developed a plan that starting next July will make mandatory health insurance for all state residents, providing a plan is available to the individual that is deemed affordable according to state standards.

Romneycare won in 2006, Hillarycare lost in 1993.

Romney has done much more and been credited with creating an environment that has attracted new jobs to his state, especially in the field of technology. Massachustts added jobs, New York lost them.

Another executive facing Democratic-controlled city and state legislative bodies was New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. His leadership in the nation�s toughest city created jobs, brought down crime, and shepherded the city through the darkest days after 9/11.

Those are genuine records of accomplishments, and when you run candidates with such records you can win against candidates with dismal records such as Senator Hillary Clinton�s.

The point is when you argue on the merits you can win. When you argue on personalities, you lose.

It�s no wonder Senator Hillary Clinton, who has the media in her pocketbook, wants you to attack her as Hillary Clinton and not as Senator Clinton who has accomplished nothing meaningful as a senator.

Matched against a Republican with a solid record for getting things done, she�s a sure loser.

Romney is such a leader that “gets things done”.

Jeff