comMITTed to Romney!

After blatantly dishonest remarks about the war are hurled by McCain at Romney, the following comes out. How ironic. An Arizona paper reported the following at the first of the year.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., one of the most stalwart supporters of the war in Iraq, said Thursday that he might propose that the Iraqi government meet certain benchmarks for the United States to continue its engagement.

Fellow senators and independent political scientists said McCain’s thinking reflected growing concerns within the Republican Party about the course of the war, and also might mark a turning point for the likely 2008 presidential contender, whose previous unconditional backing of the war may have hurt his prospects.

McCain said Thursday that he hadn’t yet decided on precise benchmarks. “They’d have to be specific, and they (Iraqi government officials) would have to meet them,” he said.

Asked what penalty would be imposed if Iraq failed to meet his benchmarks, he said: “I think everybody knows the consequences. Haven’t met the benchmarks? Obviously, then, we’re not able to complete the mission. Then you have to examine your options.”

Andrew E. Smith, a political science professor and the director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center, said: “I think it certainly could be politically significant.” New Hampshire will hold the first presidential primary of 2008.
“This seems to me like he’s trimming his sails a little on the issue,” Smith said…

It was unclear what consequences or timetables McCain would spell out, or whether he believes that Congress has the authority to enforce them.

Still, several Senate Demo-crats who oppose the troop buildup and also may seek the presidency said they were struck by McCain’s comments.
“We Catholics call that an epiphany,” said Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Joseph Biden, D-Del., who is sponsoring the main Democratic resolution opposing the troop buildup.

Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., said: “I called for that . . . several weeks ago. I’m glad that John McCain agrees with me.

All this points to…McCain is weak on the economy and he knows it! Anything to try and weasel his way out of not having to address the economy! Hypocritical and dishonest attacks, and using war as a political tool are not beneath him.

~Ryan Jesperson

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Charles Mitchell over at EFM writes about the dishonest attacks that are now coming from John McCain just a few days out from the primary. Interesting…why did McCain wait until now? If he was comfortable with his internal polling then there is no way that he would risk going dishonest and negative right before the primary. McCain knows it is risky, but he has no other choice. He sees that things are trending Romney’s way and slipping away from him. Check out the numbers for the last three days of Insider Advantage daily tracking polls.

Insider Advantage Floriday Daily Tracking Poll

Date Romney McCain
(1/25) 26 / 24
(1/24) 23 / 23
(1/23) 22 / 23

The only option is to attack, even if he has to do it dishonestly. Mark my words…the supposed “straight talk express” will take a even greater detour before Tuesday!

~Ryan Jesperson

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From cnn.

If Hillary Clinton and John McCain become their party’s presidential nominees, the general election race is likely to be a love-fest.

At least according to Bill Clinton.

“She and John McCain are very close,” Clinton said. “They always laugh that if they wound up being the nominees of their party, it would be the most civilized election in American history, and they’re afraid they’d put the voters to sleep because they like and respect each other.”

Sens. McCain and Clinton last met publicly at an ABC debate earlier January, when presidential candidates of both parties shared the same stage. The two were seen exchanging pleasantries, and a Clinton side said she told the Arizona senator he’d done a “good job” staging a comeback in New Hampshire. He asked that she say hello to Bill Clinton for him.

Come on Florida, we are counting on you! You’ve got to stop McCain! No wonder it was Romney who led the charge against Hillary in the debate last night. McCain didn’t want to offend one of his “very close” friends.

~Ryan Jesperson

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h/t to Justin Hart at My Man Mitt

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Romney’s latest ad going up in Florida.

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H/T to Kyle over at My Man Mitt. In my opinion this is one of Mitt’s best interviews. He will dominate the talk on the economy while in Florida this week.

Part 1

Part 2

~Ryan Jesperson

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This comes from Jonathan Martin at Politico.

To make matters worse, as Huckabee’s challenges have grown more intense of late, he has lost the aide he brought on to handle his rapid-response and research operation.

Joe Carter, who took a leave from the Family Research Council to move down to the former Arkansas governor’s campaign headquarters in Little Rock, has returned to Washington, leaving a key position unfilled in the crucial final days before the caucuses.

With Carter gone — his last e-mail to reporters was Dec. 17 — Huckabee has been largely responding to every new story or attack that emerges himself, at times compounding the problem.

~Ryan Jesperson

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The following is from an interview today with Tucker Carlson.

Huckabee Iowa Campaign Manager: We believe that uhh a guy trained as a pastor…makes him very well prepared in regards to the war on terror.

~Ryan Jesperson

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Today, Romney for President launched its newest television ad, “Searched.” In the ad, Robert Gay, a former business partner of Governor Romney, recounts the story of his daughter who disappeared in New York City in the summer of 1996. When no one could find her, Governor Romney and his colleagues stepped forward and closed down their company in Boston, Bain Capital. Together, they headed to New York City to aid the search. Spreading out across the city, they set up command centers, combed through neighborhoods, passed out fliers and drew media attention to the case. Through their efforts, Robert Gay was reunited with his daughter. This ad is their story.

Here is the link to the press release.

~Ryan Jesperson

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~Ryan Jesperson

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The following stats and quotes makes it seem likely that it is not the Evangelicals that will jump on the Hucktrain, but convicted criminals from all across the country. They couldn’t dream of a better friend and ally than Mike Huckabee.

Huckabee frees ten times more convicts than Clinton!

Gov. Huckabee is on a roll: He has freed more convicts than all of his recent predecessors combined – more than 10 times as many as Gov. Clinton during a 10-year period from 1983 to 1992.

Huckabee has issued more clemencies in the last 18 months than he did during his first six years in office. This feverish pace of clemencies suggests that he’ll free hundreds of convicts before he leaves office in January 2007… Victims’ families fear there will be many more in the coming months, but they’re organizing to stop Huckabee before he cleans out the prisons. Some victims’ families are so unhappy with Huckabee, they’re demanding that he resign.

This scandal should haunt him for the rest of his term and probably for the rest of his life. His shameless refusal to explain his actions and his insensitivity toward victims’ families tell a lot about the man’s character.

Huckabee granted more clemecy than the combined number of six states surrounding Arkansas!

Here are the figures for neighboring states since 1996, when Huckabee took office (and keep in mind the population of these states is nearly 20 times ours):

>> Louisiana – 213.
>> Mississippi – 24.
>> Missouri – 79.
>> Oklahoma – 178.
>> Tennessee – 32.
>> Texas – 98 (in-cludes 36 inmates released because they were convicted on drug charges with planted evidence).
Total: 624 vs. Huckabee’s 703.

Governors in neighboring states almost never grant killers clemency, while Huckabee has commuted the sentences of a dozen murderers.

Huckabee laughed at those that thought he was setting too many convicts free… stiff arming the families of victims!

Until last week, Huckabee and his staff thought it was pretty funny when a prosecutor criticized one of the governor’s all too frequent clemencies. It was nobody’s business but Mike’s.

…He wouldn’t meet with victims’ families and didn’t bother telling them about pending clemencies. After he was forced to withdraw his offer of clemency to Glen Green – the former Air Force sergeant who beat his own pregnant wife, then brutally murdered a teenager and dumped her body into the Twin Prairie Bayou – Huckabee pretty much admitted he knew nothing about the case. As is his custom, he had listened to a fellow preacher who pushed for Green’s release knowing about as much about the killing as the governor did

….This is how he operated in the past: He had his staff write insulting letters to his critics. “The governor read you (sic) letter and laughed out loud,” wrote a scoundrel named Cory Cox, a Huckabee legal adviser, by way of a reply to Saline County Prosecuting Attorney Robert Herzfeld, who opposed clemency for yet another vicious killer Huckabee took a liking to. “He wanted me to respond to you. I wish you success as you cut down on your caffeine consumption,” Cox signed off mindlessly. But even as Huckabee and his staff gave the public the proverbial finger, Herzfeld went to court and had the clemency overturned, and prosecutors from both parties thought the governor was out of control.

Amazingly enough, this is only a fraction of the controversy surrounding the way in which Huckabee granted clemency as governor.

~Ryan Jesperson

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Jim Geraghty over at NRO reports on the speech:

Based on the chattering class buzz about Governor Romney’s “Faith in America” speech, it was a universal homerun. Heck, even Chris Matthews liked it:

MATTHEWS: For the first time in this campaign, it’s long already, I heard greatness this morning

~Ryan Jesperson

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This comes from Hotair.com

On June 11, 2007 Mike Huckabee clearly stated his support of keeping open the detainee facilities at Guantanamo Bay.

Detainees being held at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on suspicion of connections to terrorism enjoy conditions better than many prisons in the United States, Republican presidential contender Mike Huckabee said Sunday.

While the government’s handling of Guantanamo detainees has come to symbolize “what’s gone wrong” in the fight against terrorism, the former Arkansas governor said, it’s better to err on the side of protecting the American people.

After a meeting with a few unnamed former generals, Huckabee does a complete 180 and now opposes Guantanamo. Take a look at this report from the Washington Post. It reeks of political expediency.

After the Iowa poll showed that Republican voters like him but found him much less “presidential” and “electable” than Romney, Huckabee sought to build his foreign policy credentials, meeting with a group of retired generals who are in Des Moines to urge the 2008 candidates to commit to opposing torture. After the meeting, Huckabee joined Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in declaring his opposition to the interrogation procedure known as “waterboarding,” and said he would support closing the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a contrast with the other leading Republicans.

A few questions for Mike Huckabee. How long was the meeting? How long did it take for you to be swayed from your previous position? You stated that Guantanamo is a problem because of how it is seen by “the rest of the world.” What other items of national security are you willing to be swayed on and put at risk because of what “the rest of the world” thinks?

There are some intersting comments after the original post at Hotair. One caught my eye.

When people first started making comparisons between Huckabee and Jimmy Carter, I thought that was a bit too harsh. Now, I’m not so sure.

Mike Huckabee=Jimmy Carter? I’ll let you decide.

Take a look at the original post.

~Ryan Jesperson

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National numbers won’t win the nomination, but take away national frontrunner status from Giuliani and his campaign falls apart. The final poll numbers could be a little off because ARG has been somehwat suspect in the past, but the trending does have significance.

ARG Republican National Primary

Month Nov Oct Sep

Giuliani 25% (24) (24)
Romney 21% (15) (9)
Thompson 17% (16) (23)
McCain 12% (14) (14)

~Ryan Jesperson

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