GOP Lawmakers Unhappy With Course Of Romney Campaign
Republican lawmakers are starting to express frustration with the course of the Romney campaign.
With the poll numbers not looking so great, and Electoral College projections continuing to show Mitt Romney’s path to victory being a very narrow one, it’s not surprising to hear Republican lawmakers, most of whom will be up for re-election in November, expressing some concern about the direction the campaign is taking at the moment:
Republican lawmakers are grumbling about the direction of Mitt Romney’s campaign and say he needs to change course.
The complaints come as polls show that Romney lost ground on President Obama following the party’s respective conventions in Tampa, Fla. and Charlotte, N.C.
The GOP members say Romney must do a better job of communicating to voters what to expect of him, either by making a bold pledge akin to George H.W. Bush’s 1988 “no new taxes” promise or fleshing policy proposals with more details.
“Papa Bush was down after the Democratic convention in 1988, people worried he couldn’t come back and then he made his ‘read my lips, no new taxes’ pledge,” said one senator who requested anonymity.
The Republican said Romney should make a concise, bold promise to reform wasteful spending in Washington.
“He should say, ‘I’m a money manager and I will manage your money in Washington. I will eliminate waste, fraud and abuse. Obama wants you to send more money so he can spend more money.'”
(…)
Another GOP lawmaker said the aura Romney’s advisers are trying to create around the candidate has muddled the most compelling rationale for his candidacy: he is a no-nonsense problem-solver who can turn the economy around.
“My advice is don’t try to turn him into something he’s not,” said the senator. You’re never going to turn him into a teddy bear.
“He needs to say if you elect me, this is what you’re going to get, someone who’s going to bring common sense to the White House,” he said.
Lawmakers spoke to The Hill about Romney’s campaign on background to avoid publicly criticizing their party’s nominee.
Other lawmakers are anonymously quoted in the article, and their message is essentially the same. Romney, they say, is making a mistake by not being more specific about the kind of policies he’d adopt to stimulate the economy and help fix the nation’s fiscal problems, and he’s hurting his campaign as a result. Indeed, there have been many pundits and observers who have wondered why the campaign didn’t take the opportunity of the Republican National Convention to roll out something far more specific than the somewhat bland general statements that are part of the Romney and Ryan stump speeches, and even conservative pundits are starting to complain:
The Weekly Standard published an open letter to Romney from contributor Peter J. Hansen urging him to be more specific in his policy prescriptions. Conservative media titan Rupert Murdoch this week tweeted: “Romney must draw clear line: offer specific path to restore American dream versus ugly Obama class war with jobs disappearing.”
Wall Street Journal columnist and former Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan on Wednesday said Romney struck the wrong note by calling Obama’s response to the deadly attack on American diplomats in Libya “disgraceful.”
“I don’t think in his statement on what happened in Libya last night and in his remarks today I don’t think he did himself any favor. At a moment of crisis like this, I think it’s kind of a water’s edge moment,” she said during an interview on WSJ Live.
“Romney looked weak today, I feel,” she added.
Much of this, of course, is an example of the old proverb that “success has a thousand fathers, while failure is an orphan.” Perhaps sensing that the Romney campaign is letting its chances of victory slip through their fingers, and likely endangering the GOP’s chances of taking the Senate with it. Obviously, the Romney campaign doesn’t seem to be all too interested in taking advice from outsiders, so these lawmakers are turning to other outlets to both send a message to Boston and to begin to distance themselves from what they obviously fear is going to be a losing campaign.
There’s nothing new about this, of course. There comes a time in the course of nearly every election campaign when party insiders start to distance themselves, even subtly, from a candidate that appears destined to lose. Nobody wants to be associated with a losing campaign, after all, and when the inevitable intraparty battle comes after a loss, people seem to prefer to be on the side of not having to defend the losing campaign. The only thing that’s somewhat unusual this time around is that this nitpicking and distancing seems to be starting earlier than usual. In a Presidential campaign, you don’t usually start to see stuff like this until mid-October or so when there are less than three weeks left until Election Day. The fact that we’re seeing it now, albeit anonymously, strikes me as, perhaps, a last ditch effort by party insiders in Washington to get Boston to start paying attention to them before it’s too late. If past behavior is any practice, that effort won’t succeed and, unless there’s a massive turnaround in the polls, we’ll begin to see more open criticism of the campaign from pundits and lawmakers alike as Election Day inches closer. None of this is good news for Romney, of course. The last thing you want as a Presidential candidate is to see your party starting to abandon you.
What’s interesting is that Romney’s proposed tax cut, replete with more deficit spending as far as the eyes can see, is a definitely a stimulus action. the problem is, the anonymous lawmakers want austerity measures, which will definitely not stimulate the economy.
On the upside Bob Dole’s 1976 campaign is looking better everyday.
Oops – should read 1996 campaign.
It’s incredible to me how easily people can dupe themselves. I know we’re all guilty of it, of course, but I’m nonetheless amazed when it happens in situations like this:
“He should be more specific about how he’ll fix the economy,” they say. Right. Because giving more specifics about helping the rich, spending cuts and social issues is really going to do the trick. The fact is that the GOP brand is damaged and unless they do something about that brand, it will never be a winner. Now Romney could have been a winner in that on paper he’s a perfect generic Republican who could pretend that he has some plans to fix the economy, the problems is that he comes across as a plutocrat. Christie would have been a much better choice because he seems more like one of us, the 99%. The problem is that Christie would never have been elected in the present GOP primaries, he’s way to the left of the base. So if they want to blame anyone, they should blame themselves.
I’m encouraged by these news. The circular firing squad has started early, and I’m hopeful that the party will start to come back to sanity, slowly, but surely.
@Ron Beasley:
Ironically, Bob Dole was Gerry Ford’s running mate in 1976 too.
He didn’t perform much better then:
Here’s the video of that classic meltdown:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6G9AePwl1AE
Man, they’re really in trouble if they’re actually looking for a “Read my lips” moment…..
Isn’t that just courting an even greater level of embarrassment?
I had much the same reaction as @Latino_in_Boston when I read this piece yesterday.
It is wonderfully heartening to see a) the circular firing squad forming up early, and even more, b) the fact that the suggestions are so utterly clueless. My favorite is the one where the guy thinks Romney can win with a message of, “I’m a manager, I will take on waste, fraud and abuse.”
Yes! People totally want to deal with waste, fraud and abuse. Because it’s not like they’ve been promised that in every campaign since Noah ran for Inspector of Watercraft. W, F and A: because the problem isn’t Medicare, Defense and debt service. It’s just a wee little trim around the edges that’s needed. That and another tax cut for rich people! Yay! We’re saved!
When the outside-the-campaign suggestions are even stupider than the collapsing campaign itself, then it’s just barely possible that your party is brain dead. Someone quick: see if there’s a pulse.
The campaign was “looking bad” before the full import of the “3 AM phone call” sank in.
Now it’s over.
I wonder if the Republican lawmakers are also unhappy with their own performance from 2001 to 2006. The Republican Party would still be relevant if the Republicans from 2001 to 2006 had not been such massive failures.
WTF?!??!! A Republican Senator says that the “bold” plan is for Romney to say that he’ll eliminate waste, fraud and abuse and to use a reworded “Democrats want to tax and spend” line? Is everyone phoning it in at this point?
Welcome back, ma’am. Here’s your gigantic gavel.
I wonder once Ryan realizes that the jig is up, whether or not he will go “rogue” like the last VP trying to save face.
I read the other day that Ryan was still running for his house seat, while also campaigning for VP. How much you want to read into that, is up to you.
While there is still plenty of time till the election for something catastrophic to happen that would swing the race for Romney. It obvious to everyone, even those in severe denial, that Romney can not possibly turn this race around with his charisma(the lack there of), speeches, and policies.
I really do fail to see how acting like Bush Sr. would help Romney at all. Considering Bush was a one term-er for raising taxes. Romney has also said that his Bain tenure should be off-limits. Meaning he wouldn’t be able to stomach running on business experience, as the first thing people will do is bring Bain back to the forefront of the campaign.
I think these GOP Lawmakers/writers are only saying this type of stuff because they know Romney won’t do it and it will allow these people to distance themselves safely. Well, maybe they are hedging their bets. Romney doesn’t do what they suggest and loses…they come out of it looking good. Romney does what they suggest and wins…they come out of it looking good.
Of course they all could go down kicking and screaming if Romney does what they suggest and he still loses.
(Also if Bain is brought back in a big way, the tax-return problem would not be far behind.)
@Me Me Me: That seems awfully premature.
There are better odds of Reid retaining his, and I put his odds at south of 50 percent.
@Peacewood: A few weeks ago I would have said it was impossible but then the Republicans put on a convention that was even worse than I imagined possible and now Romney is imploding. The Republican majority is just 25 seats.
Said this before, but after a lot of debates, Romney was the best of the GOP candidates in this cycle.
Paul Ryan was brought aboard to firm up the specifics, I thought. The problem is that the “specifics” that have been publicized haven’t particularly helped the campaign.
Lots of this seems like clients blaming the ad agency rather than the actual product on offer.
I think the recent news from the GOP darlings in VA is going to not only hurt the brand even more, but it will also be held against Romney. As Mitt toes the party line regarding abortion. Even campaigning on wanting to overturn Roe v Wade.
I find it odd that I have not heard a peep on this site about the VA AG using his personal feelings to pressure The State Board of Health. I would have thought that after a Obama questioning google to review their stance on their infamous Islam video post…something like this abortion issue, which has happened certain author’s home state, would have had least gotten a “both sides do it” post.
But, hey, maybe a state AG strong-arming the state’s health board into acquiescing to their demands, I guess that’s not such a big deal. I mean it’s not like this same AG is running for governor next election…oh wait…
There a a mutation in C. elegans, a worm extensively studied by developmental biologists, that produces a blockage in the worm’s birth canal. The mutation is called ‘vulvaless’. Unfortunately these worm are also hermaphrodites, this means that the eggs hatch inside, leading to what biologists call the ‘bag of worms’ phenotype. Eventually the newborn worms explode from their parent.
Somehow, Romney’s campaign seems reminiscent of that. Make that the whole damn GOP.
@Mr. Replica:
I would like to take this time, again, to say that I wish I knew why google chrome does not allow the edit functions to appear. Firefox has those functions available. (Maybe I need to go back to that browser so that I know I have a second fail-safe after the preview function.)
No, no, no you guys
Once it gets out that Obama has totally abandoned freedom of speech, Romney’s going to turn this thing right back around
“With the poll numbers not looking so great, and Electoral College projections continuing to show Mitt Romney’s path to victory being a very narrow one, it’s not surprising to hear Republican lawmakers, most of whom will be up for re-election in November, expressing some concern about the direction the campaign is taking at the moment”
Well, Isn’t that just grand: The most quotable person in the article is “Anonymouys” & “Some unidentified Republican Senator”. Good Grief; Did you even read the article you posted whose entire premise is based on “someone, anyone” behind the curtain”. I have to give “The Hill” credit: Gin up a story, based on the obligatory “Mr or Mrs Anonymous”,and run with it as a fact. The least you could do is caution or, at a mimimum, inform your readers the article is largely unsourced. The tried and true “Republicans are against Romney without Naming Names” to push a story line is par for the course for far left Liberal rags like POLITICO, Buzz Feed, The Hill, et al.
@Smooth Jazz:
Actually The Hill frequently uses anonymous Hill sources. It’s how they get access. Most people in DC credit The Hill with being pretty accurate, I believe.
@Smooth Jazz:
@Doug Mataconis:
2nd Paragraph, first sentence.
@Smooth Jazz:
Of course nobody wants to go on the record, standard operating procedure. Problem is, the base was skeptical of Romney from the beginning, but really, he was the best of a mediocre group. o everyone put up with his nomination – somewhat analogous to Democrats nominating John Kerry in 2004. Kerry turned out to be a stiff and kind of clunky, as is Romney.
@michael reynolds:
I have a feeling any news source that is to the left of WND is going to be called a “liberal rag”.
@michael reynolds: Exactly, Romney/Ryan sucks…..but the entire GOP is bankrupt of ideas.
Romney can’t run on specifics because he really doesn’t have any. His strategy to date has been to be not Obama, and hope that the voters who don’t like Obama allow their own opinions to define him further.
When you get specific you might alienate people.
@Argon:
HA! Argon wins guys.
Tho, what is scary is that might be an all too accurate prediction. If you think things are bad now, just wait until the last shred of sanity has left whatever is left of the GOP>
The problem is that even if Romney did make a bold pledge, no one would believe him.
Has anyone already linked to this on Politico? This marks the official beginning of the Not My Fault food fight.
Stewart Stevens thrown under the bus by Romney staffers. And then backed over. Repeatedly.
So of course Team Stevens throws the candidate himself under.
Now that’s entertainment.
Sorry, that links to page 4 of the Politico piece. Here’s page 1: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0912/81280.html
@Jr: “the entire GOP is bankrupt of ideas.”
GOP’ers I talk to say they do have ideas… that government is the (imagined) problem and the (rigged) free market fixes everything.
@michael reynolds: Agreed.
What’s really hysterical is: ““He should say, ‘I’m a money manager and I will manage your money in Washington. I will eliminate waste, fraud and abuse. Obama wants you to send more money so he can spend more money.’”
Romney made most of his money by ‘managing’ money such that he and his cronies ended up with the money, and everybody else ended up with worthless IOU’s.
@MM: “Romney can’t run on specifics because he really doesn’t have any. ”
He could, but he doesn’t want to:
‘Obamacare was a copy of Romneycare’.
‘I made huge sums of money as a vulture capitalist, looting companies and destroying the lives of peons like you’.
‘I personally know a whole passel of Wall St CEO’s, and will let them run amok again.’
‘I love wars, and plan on starting a couple immediately. I figure I’ll be worth a cool billion from them, by the time that I leave office. Enjoy $10/gallon gas.’
@Mr. Replica:
At least the Romney campaign is smart enough to allow/back-up their VP candidate. Rather than trying to constrain him.