Link to my blog and I might actually have to start posting on it again.  The news of my demise have been highly exaggerated.  I can only claim an attack of employment as my excuse.  But I digress.  Enjoy Hannah Montana!

Just some housekeeping items of note.  I’ve added a few new bells and whistles to the site. 

First - to your right you’ll see a compilation of links from around what I like to call the Mitt-O-Sphere.  Thanks to a feed from Planet Romneyyou can now view the latest ten posts from most all the Mitt bloggers.  Check them out often - they’ve got a lot of good stuff out there.

Second, scrolling down from the Mitt-O-Sphere cullings, you’ll see the latest from the MSM.  I put it below the Mitt Bloggers simply because I think what bloggers have to say about this race far outweighs whatever the MSM can put together.  Yes, Glen Johnson, I’m talking about you.

Anyway, enjoy the new information sources and make use of them often.

I wasn’t planning on writing a Round-up today for one simple reason.  I’m tired.  Add to that the fact there wasn’t much of anything worth commenting on at post time and I was well prepared to let today go and catch up later.
 
Then ABCNews saw fit to publish the obviously badly researched piece written by Teddy Davis.  I’m not sure what to make of Mr. Davis.  He is either lazy, biased, or a bit of both.  He wrote a hit piece on Mitt on (what else) abortion – taking aim at Mitts pro-choice stance by claiming Mitt has flipped (again) on the issue.
 
Davis claims to have a new angle on the issue because Mitt favors the overturning of Roe v. Wade as well as a Human Life Amendment which would protect unborn children under the 14^th Amendment to the US Constitution.  Mr. Davis sees daylight between the two positions when, in fact, there is none.
 
Overturning Roe v. Wade would return the abortion issue to each individual state where it could be regulated as the state saw fit.  Some states would outlaw the procedure entirely, others would regulate it differently.  Either way, the legal status of abortion would change. 
 
Mitt also favors going the federal route with something similar to the Human Life Amendment.  Different angle, same result.  Roe v. Wade – the holy grail of liberal politics – would no longer be the Law of the Land.  Mr. Davis considers this a flip, or a flop, or both.  Mr. Davis is, at best, misguided.  At worst he’s a bad student of Mitt’s position.  Mitt has reiterated his abortion stance in several different forums over the past year or so.  The only thing muddled here is Mr. Davis’ attention to detail
 
Moving on to the Blogosphere, I caught RedState’s Mark Kilmer.  He spent $5 plus shipping for a copy of Lou Cannon’s Governor Reagan: His Rise to Power and used this new found knowledge to also assail Mitt’s abortion stance.
 
Let me state for Kilmer’s benefit that there are few people who hold the Gipper in as high esteem as I do.  That said, Reagan was a man and made mistakes as California’s Governor and this nation’s President.  As governor he signed into law what was, at the time, one of the nation’s most liberal abortion laws.  Kilmer details the inside debate on the bill, but the bottom line is, Reagan signed it into law.  He shortly came to regret that decision, but it was his.
 
Therefore, and it gives me no pleasure in pointing this out, as a governor, Ronald Reagan was functionally Pro-Choice – even though such labels did not exist at the time.  Perhaps he did behave, as Cannon opined, as if he were “lost at sea” but when the time came, he put his name on the dotted line of a pro-choice bill.  Those are the facts.  Facts, as Reagan was fond of saying, are stubborn things.
 
There is no argument that Reagan was a convert to the Pro-Life view of the abortion issue.  Again, facts are facts.
Mitt is also a convert to that same viewpoint.  Yes, when he ran for Senate, and again for Governor, he ran as a Pro-Choice candidate even though he was personally Pro-Life.  That said, when the issue of life came before him as Governor, he came down on the side of life – every time.
 
So, Mr. Kilmer, the most you can get Mitt on is – perhaps – a bad choice of phraseology.  Perhaps he shouldn’t have used the word “adamantly” when referring to Reagan’s Pro-Choice actions.  I’ll give you that.
 
As for myself, and I’d suspect a good majority of American, I’m more concerned with action than I am with rhetorical word-play.  Mitt’s actions as Governor put him firmly in the Pro-Life camp – someplace he will find himself alongside people like Ronald Reagan.
 
To put it bluntly, I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for a retraction or an apology – much less an explanation.  If you’re going to look for daylight between where Reagan stood and where Mitt stands, you’ll have to look elsewhere.
 
End Memo.  Good night.
 

The Club for Growth came out with a white paper on Mitt today.  The MSM will read it as a lukewarm endorsement, but the bottom line is the Club thinks Mitt is a good capitalist and would “generally advocate a pro-growth agenda.”  Contrast that with Hillary’s “we’re going to take things away from you for the common good” and its not hard to see which economy would be better to live in.
 
The Daily Illini’s Paul Schmitt declares Mitt the best solution for America’s ills.  A good piece overall, but I tip my hat to Mr. Schmitt for his description of Obama Fever symptoms.
 
Howlin Mad Howie Dean’s Head Mitt Hit Man Damien LaVera returns to the fray with an obviously limited grasp of things foreign to DNC operatives – facts.  Yes, Mitt won’t address the VFW convention in Kansas City.  LaVera obviously overlooked Mitt’s recent work to support Armed Forces members as well as veterans.  I guess Damien didn’t get the Surge of Support memo.  Then again, Damien doesn’t get a lot of things.
 
The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder has details on Mitt’s advertising spending.
 
The Providence Journal’s Froma Harrop chimes in on the issue of the Romney 5’s lack of military service.  She’s so far off base on so many issues I hesitate to name all of them, but let’s start here.  Memo to Froma:  I first take issue with your statement 

Let’s pin down the real problem. We know that the armed forces are all-volunteer (”the good news,” Mitt said) and that few children of the rich have much to do with it. 

If we “all” know this, than it shouldn’t be too hard for you to come up with the facts supporting your argument.  Show me the numbers.  Show me the hard data that shows the majority of the Armed Forces are poor people who couldn’t get other jobs.  Forgive me if I don’t take your word for it, but you are after all a journalist and your profession’s word isn’t worth much.  Moving on to your next (but not only) absurd assertion: 

So while the “chickenhawk” label could stick to most of the candidates, there’s something especially jarring about the Romney family portrait: six hunky males, all untouched by military service. (During the Vietnam War, Mitt obtained a draft deferment to do missionary work in France.) 

What, exactly, is “especially jarring” with that family portrait, Froma?  For your information, my family portrait looks much the same as Mitt’s – minus about $250 million.  Are you going to trot out the ‘chickenhawk’ label for me too?  And, by the way, you neglected to mention that Mitt did in fact sign up for the draft – unlike a very recent former occupant of the Oval.  I guess you think he manipulated his way to a high draft number as well.  Of course, you saved your final cheap shot for last: 

As part of his answer to the “rude” question, Romney called for a “surge of support” for the troops. A more politically astute response would have been to propose a national program requiring everyone’s children, including his own, to serve their country in some fashion. 

Whiskey.  Tango.  Foxtrot.  Over.  A national program requiring everyone’s children to serve their country?  What, Americorps isn’t good enough for you?  Just come out and say it, Froma.  You want Mitt’s boys to be drafted and sent off to the Land of Sand.  You’d be a lot easier to read if you just came out and said what you thought rather than couching it in some nebulous call for national “service”.  Of course, that would make your columns a lot shorter.  Now that would be a good service.  End Memo.
 
Via IMAO.US (I link because they’re friggin’ hilarious) I found Pereiraville.  She went to meet Mitt in Winter Park, Florida.  Great pictures – including the picture of all five Ron Paul supporters.  Who knew they all got together in one place!

Somehow I missed the latest Political Derby Rankings.  A thousand apologies.  Mitt is back on top.  Jason Wright nails the race at this point.  Ethan Boivie, not so much.  Listening to Ron Paul can do that.
 
Captain Ed comments on Mitt’s post-Ames poll bounce.
 
TPM’s Steve Benen shivers at the possibility that John Edwards might be taking a page from the Mitt health care playbook.  Considering that Edwards hasn’t had an original thought in well over a decade, Benen might be on to something.
 
Michelle Malkin interviewed Mitt.  I haven’t had time to watch it yet.  Let me know what you think.
 
AOL Stump Blogger Patrick Casey takes the MSM to school on the difference between an investment (a la John Edwards) and a blind trust (a la Mitt).  Casey does a fine job, but the MSM doesn’t see Edwards money in the same light as Mitt’s coffers.  There is a difference – Mitt actually earned his money as opposed to Edwards – who fleeced it from corporations by channeling dead children during closing arguments.
 
WOWK’s Chris Stirewalt gives us a very confusing geography lesson.  He says there are mountains in West Virginia, but in my book nothing under 8,000 feet qualifies as a mountain.  So, I’m still confused.  Isn’t West Virginia due to be re-named the Robert Byrd State?
 
The American Daily’s Warner Huston takes aim at Mitt’s abortion stance.  What Huston is really ticked about is Mitt’s invocation of the Gipper in his explanation.  Memo to Huston:  You’re splitting the hair rather fine.  Find a new angle.  End Memo.
 
BloggingStocks’ Zac Bissonnette wonders if another MBA president would be good for America.  While Bissonette mentions the obvious differences between Bush and Mitt, he ends with this question: 

But will his business background help him or hurt him in the general election, especially with all the controversy surrounding private equity? 

Memo to Bissonnette:  Controversy surrounding private equity?  Where did this come from?  Anybody with even a rudimentary understanding of the market knows private equity has its ups and downs.  The key is to maximize the ups and minimize the downs – which Mitt has done quite well.  Controversy is only made by those who end up on the downside.  Most people call that envy or jealousy.  End Memo.
 
McClatchy Newspapers’ Steven Thomma reports how Mitt is “distancing” himself from Bush.  Why is this news?  Mitt is a different man.  Of course he’ll have a different take on things.
 
The Detroit Free Press’ Todd Spangler compares and contrasts Mitt and his father, George Romney.  Sigh.  Like this drum hasn’t been beaten lately.
 
The Boston Globes’ Lisa Wangsness pokes fun at Mitt’s demeanor.  Must be hard for the MSM to follow Mitt around.  He never turns the air blue with profanity and there’s hardly a beer to be found at his campaign events.  This is what happens when the MSM gets bored and must fill column space with something.
 
The Cleveland Plain Dealer Editorial Board gets the point.
 
Whoever writes this stuff picked up by TransworldNews does not. .
 
And finally today, Mark Davis is at it again – making even less sense than he did the last time he wrote something about Mitt and Mormonism.  Davis begins his column by praising Mormons – in general – and stating that: 

On radio and in print, I have made clear that Romney’s membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is a non-issue to me. 

But, without even pausing to draw breath, Davis adds 

But this does not mean it is a non-issue for him, or to America. 

Excuse me, Mark, but Mitt has gone to great lengths to show that his religion is not a political issue for him.  Unless you’ve been under a rock, you know this – so stop the charade.  If Mitt’s Mormonism wasn’t a big deal to you, you wouldn’t be writing about it. But I digress.
 
Davis is very frustrated that Mitt refuses to take the bait and enter into an ecclesiastical debate for which Davis is wholly overmatched. Memo to Mark Davis: Yes, Mark, Mitt is fully qualified to expound on Mormon Doctrine.  I’m sure he can answer every question you – or any of the hypothetical people you write of – could hurl at him.  The point, which you obviously aren’t willing to accept, is that this is a secular race for a secular office.  Your assertion that Mitt should be prepared to answer any and all religious and doctrinal questions about the LDS Church is – on its face – absurd.  Yes, Mark.  Absurd.
 
When you can show me one other presidential candidate – in the past 30 years – who has been put to the same test you’re asking Mitt to take, I’ll consider coming over to your side of the fence.  I’m pretty sure I can get comfortable where I’m at, because you can’t meet my standard for debate.   End Memo.

Time Magazine’s Joe Klein made some great points in his latest dispatch from the campaign trail – this one from the corn fields of Iowa.  Oracle Joe predicts: 

… if nominated, Romney will be formidable in the general election.
 
Listen to him speak. Listen to what he has to say about Iraq. Actually, he has practically nothing to say about Iraq—which leaves him plenty of room to maneuver in the autumn of 2008. He also doesn’t have much to say to Republicans about his signal achievement as Governor: the nation’s first universal-health-insurance plan. But if he’s running against Hillary Clinton, Romney will be able to say, “You couldn’t get your Big Government plan passed. I got my private-enterprise plan passed through a Democratic legislature.” He’ll also be able to say his last name is neither Clinton nor Bush—no small advantage after the past 20 years.
 
Unlike Clinton, Romney has shown a tendency to get flustered under pressure—a question about why his five handsome sons were not serving in the war he supports left him boggled. But he is smart and pleasant and tells the most risqué joke that I’ve ever heard from a presidential candidate: “I asked Ann, my wife, ‘Did you ever in your wildest dreams believe I would be running for President?’ She told me, ‘You weren’t in my wildest dreams.’” He’s not in his party’s wildest dreams either, but he may well be its future. 

Now I don’t agree with Joe’s assertion that Mitt gets flustered under pressure.  I’ll grant you that he was surprised by the question – a  question which is invalid on its face and has no place in the campaign.  You don’t get where Mitt is by getting flustered under pressure.  Other than that, great column Joe.
 
Forbes’ Shannon McCaffery reports on details from Mitt’s blind trust.  The MSM is sifting through the FEC report – some 50 pages in length – and are finding out that some of Mitt’s investments conflict with his policy statements.  I don’t know why this is surprising.  It actually proves the trust really is blind and Mitt has nothing to do with the day-to-day operation of it.  Its taking awhile to sort out because – well – Mitt has a lot of cash.
 
The AJC’s Jim Galloway reports on a recent Mitt trip to Hot-lanta.
 
The Street’s Brett Arends writes that Mitt has been hit by the recent stock market correction.  No revelations here.  Sometimes you win.  Sometimes you lose.  Sometimes it rains.  Seasoned investment types know this.
 
The Kansas City Star’s Rhonda Lokeman (published at Centre Daily) gets today’s cheap shot award.  Ms. Lokeman knows little about Mitt and less about Mormons.  She thinks since Mitt has served in LDS Church leadership he must be passionate about his religion.  This is probably true.  But then she goes a bridge or two too far by stating that “anyone who the step to ascend your church’s hierarchy” must also have “ambition”.
 
I won’t get into the rest of Lokeman’s waste of space, but I will say this:  Memo to Rhonda Lokeman:  I will grant you the benefit of the doubt as to your knowledge of LDS Church structure and leadership.  I’ll even give you a quick tutorial so you don’t make the mistake of slandering the good men and women who serve as LDS church leaders again.  Please take notes.
 
One does not “ascend” to leadership in the LDS Church.  Passion has little if anything to do with who sits in the big chair – ambition doesn’t figure into the equation at all.  Men like Mitt who serve as Bishops and Stake Presidents do so at great personal and familial sacrifice.  They don’t draw a check or receive compensation of any kind.  Church leaders are called from their congregations – they don’t campaign for the job.  The current President of the LDS Church (Gordon B. Hinckley) once stated that no man in his right mind would actually seek ecclesiastical office.  For the record, yet again, this is not a theological race.  The sooner you figure that out, the sooner people can actually focus on something that really matters.  End Memo.
 
The USAToday’s Memmott & Lawrence report on Mitt’s ideas about the “minimum wage”.  I don’t think he and “leading Dems” see eye to eye on the minimum wage.  If that issue were taken out of politics (where it belongs), Hillary, et. al. would have less to complain about.
 
WBAP’s Mark Davis says that Mitt is doing a good job building a bridge to the evangelical community.  Thanks for the props, Mark, but we’ll just have to agree to disagree about Mitt being required to answer Mormon doctrinal questions.  That’s what LDS.ORG is for.
 
The Chicago Sun Times’ Bill Zwecker reports that Mitt’s campaign is no fan of September Dawn.  This movie’s producers know that Mitt’s rising media coverage is the only hope they have of ever making back their production investment.  This movie has “flop” written all over it.  Don’t believe me?  Then ask them why they keep pushing the release date further back down the calendar.
 
As for Political Derby’s Ethan Boivie – there is such a thing as stretching a metaphor too far.  Any further and Ethan might get whiplash.
 
John Herbert writes for the obscure paper Hernando Today.  Never heard of it?  Me neither.  Herbert’s bigoted anti-Mormon rant doesn’t do much to raise Hernando’s stock.  So you were forced to see an English copy of the Book of Mormon while in Argentina.  Big deal, John.  Grow up.
 
And finally, the NRO’s Rich Lowry says its time for Cheap Shot Sam to fold the tent and go home.  Well said, Rich.
 
 

 

NRO’s Joshua Treviño writes about Mitt and Mormonism.  For some odd reason he saw the need to include “Rum” in the title of his piece.  Perhaps he was trying to answer Captain Jack Sparrow’s immortal question, “Why is the Rum always gone?”  The answer, obviously, is Mitt didn’t buy any.  According to NBC’s Today Show, Mitt spent only $118 on beer this past quarter.

Other than that Treviño’s column doesn’t hold much water.    He seems to think a candidate’s religious beliefs should be fair game in the political world.  This despite a long history of said beliefs having been off-limits and a Constitutional Amendment guaranteeing freedom of religion and a clause declaring there shall be no religious test for public office.  Those important facts mean nothing to Treviño.  He’s all for grilling candidates on religious questions.  He even goes so far as to advocate a discussion of “Mormonism per se and its role in public life.”

Go right ahead, Joshua.  Just don’t plan on anybody taking you seriously – and no, guys like Jim Geraghty and Richard John Neuhaus don’t count.

The Denver Post’s Chuck Plunkett reports from Mitt’s visit to Colorado’s El Paso County GOP’s annual Lincoln Day Dinner.  Most of the article is dedicated to the over inflated concern about a Mormon’s ability to court the Christian vote.  Little is mentioned about what he actually said there.  The Gazette’s Ed Sealover went to the same show and has a far more informative (and optimistic) piece complete with reaction quotes from attendees.

The Washington Examiner’s Bill Sammon interviewed Mitt where he had some forceful things to say about internet pornography.  Somehow a reference to Mitt having dropped the f-bomb twice made it into Sammon’s piece.  Somebody please tell me the relevance. 

USAToday’s Susan Page writes about Ann’s “delicate balance”.  Overall a good biographical piece.  Ann’s a strong, classy woman. 

Financial News’ Heidi Moore has some mind numbing private equity donation numbers.  All I can tell the money-men is donating to Obama hoping he won’t raise your taxes is like throwing steaks at lions hoping they won’t eat you next. 

The Nation’s Matt Blumenthal thinks “values voters” are set to unleash their “wrath” on Mitt.  Please.  He sees a “sudden swell” of support for Fred Thompson among values voters.  Fred Thompson is a fine man and a great Senator.  That said, Blumenthal allows himself to be used as a shill by AFA’s Michigan chapter president Gary Glenn who believes values voters would rather stay home and allow Hillary to complete her coronation run rather than elect Mitt.  What a waste of bandwidth. 

The Economist has an in-depth profile of Mitt.  Well worth the read.  In all their research they can only find religion and the fact that Mitt doesn’t swear or drink anything stronger than Vanilla Coke as reasons to “not be smitten.”  I always say, you takes the compliments you gets. 

GoUpstate.com’s Jason Spencer sat down with Mitt to get his take on ways to eliminate poverty.  Mitt relies on common sense, a trait foreign to most democratic candidates.

 

I have long admired the dynamic duo of John Cox and Allen Forkum.  You will not find a better matched team in the Blogosphere and in reality they are in a league of their very own.  The cartoon above pulls no punches and reminds me that the war against the spread of radical islam won’t be won by diplomacy.  Evil must be opposed and try as they might, the Democratic side of the aisle is unable and mostly unwilling to do that.

Gov. Romney performed superbly during tonight’s debate.  I want to highlight a couple of comments he made.

On (illegal) immigration: 

My view, you have to secure the border, number one, have an employment verification system, number two, and number three, say to those that are there illegally, get in line with everybody else; you’re not going to have a special doorway, any particular advantage, by having come here illegally, to become a permanent resident.

Mitt understands that first you need to stem the tide of illegal immigration.  Then work to find a solution to deal with the people who are already here illegaly.  Mitt also took the opportunity to compare McCain-Kennedy to McCain-Feingold:

McCain-Kennedy, what it did is said that people who are here illegally get a special pathway… And my fear is that McCain-Kennedy would do to immigration what McCain-Feingold has done to campaign finance and money in politics, and that’s bad. (Applause.)

McCain didn’t care to be singled out like that, and shot back with:

I haven’t changed my position even — on even-numbered years or have changed because of the different offices that I may be running for.

Senator McCain may be correct, but he didn’t mention that he’s happy to do whatever it takes to get praise and adoration from the media (the media, as reliable as a 7th grade crush). 

In short, a strong showing by Governor Romney tonight.  Will his debate performances, advertising campaign, and recent press coverage increase his poll numbers?  Time will tell, and the clock is ticking.