ComMITTed to Romney!

Not sure what the McCain strategy is in Missouri, but he better get something ‘ginned up quick if he wants the State’s 13 Electoral votes in his column come November.

~~John Cronin~~

http://www.news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080622/NEWS01/
806220382/1007

Springfield, Mo.

Arizona Sen. John McCain knows he has a lot of work ahead of him if he’s going to win Missouri in the Nov. 4 general election — especially in southwest Missouri.

In the Feb. 5 primary, McCain lost soundly to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in 11 area counties but managed to carry the state by 8,411 votes.

“I’m going to have to be coming back to Missouri a lot,” McCain told reporters following his Wednesday town hall meeting at Missouri State University in Springfield.

But since McCain wrapped up the nomination in early March, some southwest Missouri Republicans say the McCain campaign has done little to reach out to the party faithful here.

Danette Proctor, chairwoman of the Greene County Republican Party, said the McCain campaign’s establishment of offices and field directors in the state has been “very slow.”

Hat Tip to Doug for the heads up on this story. I continue to believe that we will have to remain very actively engaged in the political process no matter who is elected in November. Reports like the one below reinforce that belief.

~~John Cronin~~

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080620/D91DI6LO0.html

Jun 19, 11:22 PM (ET)

By MICHAEL TARM

CHICAGO (AP) - Republican presidential John McCain assured Hispanic leaders he would push through Congress legislation to overhaul federal immigration laws if elected, several people who attended a private meeting with the candidate said Thursday.

Democrats questioned why the Arizona senator held the meeting late Wednesday night in Chicago. But supporters who were in the room denied that McCain held the closed-door session out of fear of offending conservatives, many of whom want him to take a harder line on immigration.

Both McCain and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama support giving legal status to millions of illegal immigrants, but neither has made the issue a centerpiece of the campaign. At one time, McCain’s campaign suffered because of his stance on the issue.

If Obama and McCain really believe what they are saying about the oil companies, they both need to re-open their studies of Economics 101. The quotes below show a stunning lack of understanding about both economics and human nature. Although I am not a big fan of McCain, Obama’s policies are radioactive. What he says in the quote below is just good old fashioned socialism and I don’t use that term lightly. He proposes to take money from Exxon, in other words from American citizens who own Exxon stock and then redistribute it to other Americans to use however they see fit. The implication, of course, is that if you will vote for me, I’ll confiscate someone else’s property and turn it over to you.

This attitude is flat out dangerous. Mr. Obama must be defeated at the polls this November. You might be tempted to think, well, I don’t own any Exxon stock, so his policy won’t adversely affect me. Don’t think for one moment that he will stop with Exxon. To politicians who think like Obama, the U.S. Treasury is their very own gigantic piggy bank and it exists only to fund whatever ideas emanate from their fevered brains.

~~John Cronin~~

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121383441884986739.html?mod=googlenews
_wsj

By KARL ROVE

June 19, 2008; Page A13

Barack Obama and John McCain are busy demonstrating that in close elections during tough economic times, candidates for president can be economically illiterate and irresponsibly populist.

In Raleigh, N.C., last week, Sen. Obama promised, “I’ll make oil companies like Exxon pay a tax on their windfall profits, and we’ll use the money to help families pay for their skyrocketing energy costs and other bills.”

Set aside for a minute that Jimmy Carter passed a “windfall profits tax” to devastating effect, putting American oil companies at a competitive disadvantage to foreign competitors, virtually ending domestic energy exploration, and making the U.S. more dependent on foreign sources of oil and gas.

This past Thursday, Mr. McCain came close to advocating a form of industrial policy, saying, “I’m very angry, frankly, at the oil companies not only because of the obscene profits they’ve made, but their failure to invest in alternate energy.”

Well, Mr. Huckabee (that Schmuck he is), has taken his “Holier Than Thou” attitude and chastised people against “Demonizing” Barack Obama, now I don’t believe that anyone should go after Obama for his race, but I find it very tart of him to act like he’s all “high road” when he was the biggest damn bigot during the primary season going after Governor Romney with his sick attacks against his faith. Who in the heck does Mr. Huckabee think he is? Religious Authority of the United States of America? I don’t give a crap about what this low life of a politician has to say. He doesn’t have a bit of credibility period.

Photo Credit: Getty Images

In an affirmation of the pervasive power and far reaching influence of the Editorial Board of CommittedToRomney, President Bush, John McCain and Florida Governor Charlie Crist have now come around to our way of thinking about the energy crisis and have agreed with us that the policy of the United States of America needs to support offshore drilling to help alleviate tight oil supplies.:) (just kidding, but it was fun to write that sentence)

~~John Cronin~~

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080618/D91CDVG01.html

WASHINGTON (AP) - For a quarter-century, drilling for oil and gas off nearly all the American coastline has been banned in part to protect tourism and to lessen the chances of beach-blackening spills.

Then gasoline prices topped $4 a gallon this summer. Drivers and others began clamoring for federal lawmakers to do something about the record price of oil, much of it produced in foreign countries.

In response, President Bush is renewing his call to open U.S. coastal waters to oil and gas development, arguing that it’s high time to battle high prices with increased domestic production. He is planning to ask Congress on Wednesday to lift the drilling moratoria that have been in effect since 1981 in more than 80 percent of the country’s Outer Continental Shelf and to let states help to decide where to allow drilling.

“The president believes Congress shouldn’t waste any more time,” White House press secretary Dana Perino told The Associated Press on Tuesday. “He will explicitly call on Congress to … pass legislation lifting the congressional ban on safe, environmentally friendly offshore oil drilling.”

The major party candidates are taking their time making a decision on their respective Veep picks. What are your thoughts about their strategies? Do you think they have already made their picks and that the “selection process’ is nothing but a Kabucki dance? When do you think they will announce? Will they wait until the convention, with teases continuing throughout the summer months?

~~John Cronin~~

http://www.concordmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=
/20080615/OPINION/806150330/1101/NEWS04

On the Straight Talk Express Thursday, McCain declined to promise a Boston television reporter that he’d add former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney to his ticket. McCain said he was looking for a vice president who shared his “values and principles and priorities.”

Though he said it will be a while before he settles on a veep, he did say that Romney fit that bill. “Mitt Romney has earned himself a very important place in the Republican Party,” McCain said.

More good news on the common sense in energy policy front. Two Republicans have changed their minds about drilling in ANWR.

~~John Cronin~~

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=298251904169099

By INVESTORS BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Friday, June 13, 2008 4:20 PM PT

Oil: Exxon Mobil is selling its gas stations because there’s no money in it. Meanwhile, two GOP congressmen do what John McCain should do — change their position on drilling in ANWR.

We already drill in Alaska. More than 15 billion barrels of oil have been sent down the Alaska pipeline from Prudhoe Bay, just 60 miles west of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, over the last three decades, much more than the six months’ supply predicted by critics.

As Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman notes, the development “footprint” would be minimal: “ANWR, in its totality, is about the size of South Carolina, and the area where we believe the hydrocarbons are located is about the size of Delaware, not to mention the exploration site would be no larger than about the size of (Boston’s) Logan International Airport.”

As for the “pristine” wilderness, the tiny portion of ANWR where drilling would occur is what hell would look like if it ever froze over. Winter on the coastal plain lasts for nine months. Total darkness reigns for 58 days. The temperature drops to 70 degrees below zero without the wind chill. Your spit freezes before it hits the ground.

Unfortunately, GOP nominee John McCain’s energy policy has been, well, inconsistent. He opposes drilling in ANWR because he considers it a historical treasure like the Grand Canyon.

Two House Republicans previously opposed to drilling in ANWR, Reps. Jim Walsh of New York and Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland, announced Thursday that they’d now support drilling there. Some would call it flip-flopping. We’d call it coming to your senses.

No new information in this BEEHIVE STANDARD article, but it does reinforce what we have been saying for months on this site.

~~John Cronin~~

http://beehivestandardweekly.com/articles/198/1/
Romney-Wins-With-or-Without-VP-Spot

By leaving the GOP nomination in a timely fashion, Mitt Romney is poised to win with or without a spot on the McCain ticket. Though Romney is certainly hoping to join the ticket as John McCain’s presidential running mate, if he is not chosen, he is clearly the leading candidate going into the next election cycle, whether that is in four or eight years.

CHOOSING ROMNEY

John McCain won the presidential nomination fair and square. The problem for McCain is that he didn’t win over conservatives, he split them between Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney. In a sense, McCain’s win happened only because he split the financial and evangelical base of the party. McCain clearly won the national defense component of the party, but that will not win him the White House — especially during a time of an unpopular war.

Times have changed since the last primary for John McCain. America has slipped into financial chaos. If McCain were to run today against Mitt Romney, a well known financial fix-it man, Romney would win two out of three contests. Earlier the Iraq War was still front and center, whereas today the economy is the most important issue to voters. McCain has many choices in a vice presidential selection, but none so credible in speaking on financial matters than Mitt Romney.

I saw this story this morning before I left for work, so I bookmarked it for later. In the meantime 2thepoint spotted it as well.

The buzz around Jeff Beatty’s Senate campaign is getting louder, with each week that goes by, press stories relating to Beatty are cropping up with increasing frequency.

Unseating Kerry is going to be very tough, the incumbent has about a $13,000,000 head start on Jeff. But if everything goes as planned, two very influential politicians by the names of McCain and Romney, may well see to it that the financial gap is narrowed.

~~John Cronin~~

http://news.bostonherald.com/news/regional/politics/view/
2008_06_10_Kerry_s_GOP_challenger_hoping_to_tap_party_s_money_machine/
srvc=home&position=recent

By Associated Press
Tuesday, June 10, 2008

BOSTON -

Jeffrey Beatty has had tougher jobs than unseating an incumbent U.S. senator — there was the time his Blackhawk helicopter was shot down on a rescue mission — yet few have come with longer odds.

The former CIA counterterrorism expert and one-time member of the Army’s elite Delta Force is hoping to oust Sen. John Kerry, the Democrats’ 2004 presidential nominee, and take a seat on Capitol Hill with the backing of residents from the bluest of Democratic blue states.

He’s aiming to win the support of state and national Republicans, including the GOP’s 2008 presidential nominee — Sen. John McCain of Arizona — when he comes to Boston for a fundraiser Wednesday.

The buzz from the NEW YORK TIMES CAUCUS BLOG is that speculation about Mitt Romney being asked to be John McCain’s VP is on the rise.

~~John Cronin~~

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/

By Michael Falcone

The speculation over who the two presumptive nominees will tap as their running mate is heating up as the media and the opposing campaign place more scrutiny, not only on the field of potential vice presidential contenders, but also on the campaign operatives who are combing through their resumes.

Tonight Senator John McCain is scheduled to appear at a fundraiser in Boston alongside his former rival for the Republican nomination, Mitt Romney. The Boston Herald’s Hillary Chabot notes that speculation that Mr. McCain might invite the former Massachusetts governor to be his No. 2 is on the rise.