Over on CNN.com Bill Schneider wonders if a Republican from a blue state can win the party’s nomination. Social conservatives are already saying that McCain, Romney, and Giuliani aren’t conservative enough, and have promised a fight.
Some social conservatives aren’t buying it. Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, a prominent social conservative group, recently said “I think Giuliani is unacceptable from the outset.”
Giuliani’s response? Let’s talk about the war on terror.
“We learned from Ronald Reagan that the way you achieve peace is through strength, not weakness,” Giuliani told Fox News’ Hannity.
As far as Romney goes, he was governor of Massachusetts, a very blue state.
Recently, letters and debate clips have surfaced showing that Romney supported gay rights and abortion rights in 1994, when he was running against Ted Kennedy.
The Family Research Council’s Perkins also has a problem with Romney. “You know, a lot of things coming out about him that are troubling,” Perkins said.
Romney’s response? I have seen the light — like other converts.
“On abortion, I wasn’t always a Ronald Reagan conservative,” Romney said earlier this month at a conservative convention in Washington. “Neither was Ronald Reagan, by the way.”
Arizona is not a blue state, but in 2000, McCain won blue-state primaries in New Hampshire and Michigan. He denounced Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson as “agents of intolerance.”
McCain’s response to conservatives who won’t forgive him? He gave the commencement address at Falwell’s college. He’s hired former Bush campaign staffers.
For years we’ve heard that Democrats in the Northeast can’t win the Presidency. Now, apparently Northeast Republicans can’t either. I’m not sure that I buy into this new narrative, but it’s interesting to see it get some play in the media.
Source Schneider, Bill. “Can a blue-state Republican win the ‘08 nod?”. CNN.com. 2/12/07
2 responses so far ↓
When an election cycle starts a full year before the first vote is cast, you find the media fumbling for a narrative. You find articles, like this, which make superficial claims. This is in the same category as the “Obama inexperience” questions, once you spend three seconds thinking about it you realize that he has more foreign policy and national political experience than two of the three Republican frontrunners, even though they have not received similar criticism. The story is not that a Northeast Republican can’t win, the story is the struggle for the soul of the Republican party. If a middle of the road Republican can win, which three of them look in awfully good position to do, it could go along way towards reforming the party’s image in the northeast, if not, the Republican Party may be relegated to a permanent minority for a generation or more.
I’m a social conservative and I’m pleased with the Republican candidates.
I think that you can make the case that the winner of the Republican primary next year will not necessarily be too far to the right of “moderate independents.” Given that the Democrats are leaning to the far left, driving moderates like Warner and Bayh away, the situation is far from bleak as far as I’m concerned.
When Ginsberg and Stevens leave the Supreme Court, I believe that Bush/McCain/Giuliani/Romney will replace them with Scalia/Alito/Thomas/Roberts-types. And Roberts will probably still be the Chief Justice when I die, so I’m comfortable with the belief that justices will stop acting like legislators for the rest of my life.
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