Today, from Iowa — The Prolo Family (from CA) Meets Mitt
Good friends of ours (and our neighbors), the Prolo family, have been traveling around Iowa this week as their daughter Marisa has been performing for the Radio City Rockettes in their East Coast tour of the “Christmas Spectacular.” I spoke to Marisa’s mom (Celeste) about an hour ago who said that if the whole political scene was not happening, they would be bored stiff in the off hours. Celeste told me it amazing how busy it is with reporters, voters, groupies, tourists, and just everybody converging on the offices and venues of the candidates. She said all of the campaign offices are very close to each others.
Dave and Celeste told me they have met just about every candidate and hope to complete their “meets” today with the Dems. As a side note, Celeste told me that Mrs. Huckabee is quite a bit taller than Mr. Huckabee. If by some stretch of some person’s imagination he were elected President, would it be the first time the first lady was taller than the President?
Dave sent me the following email just now from Iowa. These “meetings” and photographs were from this morning in Iowa.
Alexa was just on FOX News with Romney!!! Attached are a couple of photos from today. Celeste interrupted Mitt’s speech when he mentioned his time at the Olympics with a “whooowoow”. He stopped and asked if she was there and she pointed to the girls and said, “They were in the closing ceremonies”. The Salt Lake Tribune DC correspondent came and interviewed them while he was working the voters/crowd.
A far cry from our visit to the Giuliani camp. We were ushered with all the other voters to the back of his offices while the press all were at the front. Giuliani’s staff assured all of us that Rudy would visit every room to shake hands and say HI. Well, needless to say he entered through the rear, where we were, rushed through the crowd to the front and only because I shoved my hand out for him to shake did I get his attention. When he was done speaking to the media, we were ushered out of the office because, “Rudy has to do an interview”. So it is clear that Rudy’s strategy is to play to the media and not his voting public. A pre-cursor of what will happen if elected broken promises!
Having been with all three Republican candidates over the past two days, here’s my take…
Huckabee, personable, sincere and caring. Does not necessarily feel or look like a strong leader in person. While I think he is a good guy, what I didn’t see, feel and hear was anything that leads me to believe would be an effective leader of our country.
Giuliani, arrogant, self serving and political. He didn’t connect with anyone at this campaign headquarters (especially the voting public there to see him). He only wanted to play to the media. Even a simple “promise” that he would visit and shake everyone’s hands was broken in exchange for a media interview. Just a foreshadowing of what would come if elected. Not an impressive man after having been in his presence.
Governor Romney shaking hands with Brad and Marisa Prolo
Romney, honest, direct, amicable and engaging. He speaks from his heart while still talking about what the future holds and needs to be. His remarks and content of the same show vision and leadership. His past experience in the business world coupled with his leadership experiences in Massachusetts come alive when he speaks. He took time to engage his supporters/public and was very genuine with each person he addressed. He has an “air” of leadership and confidence that I didn’t see in his peer republicans.
Governor Romney speaking with Dave Prolo (Alexa Prolo in foreground)
While I will say I was partial to Romney before the past two days, it is quite clear that after being with all three the past two days, Romney has and possesses leadership qualities that the others don’t. He can be trusted and while he may not have all the answers today, his past experience is indicative of figuring out solutions to domestic and global issues.
Dave and Celeste tell me the people of Iowa seem to be done with the process. They seem to be ready for it all to end.
~ Vic
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December 29th, 2007 at 5:43 pm
What a great post!!! I imagine that the people in Iowa are probably very, very ready for it all to be done. I’m very into politics (obviously) but even I would have a hard time having the race shoved in my face every 15 minutes. In Idaho, no one cares about you (Romney is the only candidate on either side of the aisle who has spent time in Idaho this election cycle, period) so we don’t have to deal with that problem - we don’t get inundated with politics like other states do.
I think it would have been a blast to have met everyone like that. Tell them thanks for the pictures, and the e-mail. I love reading stuff like this.
Havs
http://www.votemittforpresident.com
December 30th, 2007 at 1:14 am
So tonight as my wife and I were reflecting on the fun day our family had we thought we would share a comment that we heard as we were leaving Romney’s breakfast chat in Altoona. We overhead a gentleman sharing with another local voter that he had been called by Huckabee’s campaign team and was asked what he thought about Romney’s alleged “flip-flopping” on some issues. The gentleman said he thought about the question for a minute and then responded, “Hey, I am an educated guy and as time goes on and I learn more about issues, my views and positions change. What is so bad about someone clarifying their views on complicated issues?” It sounded like for this voter, the “flip-flopping” is a non-starter.
To all our new friends in Iowa, we’ve learned how important it is to get out and “caucus” on the 3rd of January. Now is the time to participate in the future. What a privilege it is to live in a country where we do have a voice.
Dave