I really want to like Tim Pawlenty, but so far he’s making all the same mistakes that soured me on Mitt Romney when he ran for President the first time. T-Paw is a blue-state Republican Governor who has a successful record to run on, is conservative without needing to be a dick aboot it, and started off with a great message by a) pointing out to people that they are more conservative then they realize, and b) while liberals have a great message of telling voters they’ll give them all this free stuff, you and I both know nothing is free.
But instead of running job creation, the economy, and other kitchen table issues that Governors deal with on a regular basis (like Romney should have), he’s trying to turn himself into the “real conservative” in the race (like Romney tried and failed miserably at) by attacking Olympia Snowe, attacking Mike Huckabee on his latest clemency blow-up, and even attacking Romney on “RomneyCare.”
And though while my original excitement for Pawlenty has turned into a sense of “meh,” he appears to have picked up one key endorsement…kinda. I give you Dick Armey…
My favourite moment in the health care “reform” debate was when John Mackey, the CEO of Whole Foods, wrote an editorial supporting free market health care, resulting in open minded and tolerant progressives going apeshit over him expressing an opinion they disagreed with (and who frequent Whole Foods). This led to liberals and the Democrat Party’s employers in the labor unions calling for boycotts, while conservatives called for a “buy-cott” to show support.
I was over the sister’s house celebrating the fact that she was two years older than her husband last night, and because everyone knows I follow the politics, I usually wind up fielding between one to three questions on vital political issues n’ stuff. The most common question is who I think is going to run against President Hopeandchange in 2012. My most common response is ::shrugs shoulders::
George Bush was an utter failure as a fiscal conservative. Whenever there’s a criticism of Obamanomics, the President’s followers follow his lead by deflecting blame to George Bush, so let’s just do it right off the bat. Bush was a failure as a fiscal conservative, the House GOP dropped the ball by not speaking out against him, and don’t get me started on John McCain not taking a stand against TARP while he had the chance.
