Article VI Blog

Sarah Palin . . .

. . . signed with FOXNews last week at the same time “Game Change” showed us she thought her Veep nomination was “God’s will.”  What can we conclude?  She is not running – I repeat – she is not running – at least not for real.  People run for POTUS for a lot of reasons, and in the last decade we have seen a new one arise – running for media credibility.  It seems clear that both Palin and Huckabee, if they throw their hat in the ring, will be doing so simply to accumulate the kind of cred that delivers five-to-six figure speaking fees and TV time.

Media is rapidly becoming about niche marketing.  Develop an audience and hit its pockets over and over again.  That is what both Palin and the Huckster are up to.  You can make a lot of money that way.  But becoming president is still about broad appeal, and that is what Romney and Pawlenty are up to – maybe Thune?  (I still say that if Thune throws in it’s a “practice” round.)

What’s sad is the ridicule the behavior of someone like Palin of the Huckster sets the rest of us up for.

The Whole “Double Standard” Thing . . .

Everybody was talking about how the media was cutting Harry Reid a break over his racist comments in re: The One.  The comments are reported in “Game Change.”  Of all the comments, Cal Thomas hit the salient point for this blog: (HT: Jay Evensen)

Reid belongs to the Mormon church, which waited until 1978 to announce a “revelation” that black people were welcome in that denomination. That is mostly ignored by the media, though reporters kept bringing up Mitt Romney’s Mormon beliefs — even questioning what undergarments he wore — during the last presidential campaign.

Watch what happens here.  Not only is no one mentioning Reid’s faith – they are not pointing out the Mormon church’s troubled history with race.  But have no fear.  Reid is about to get his head handed to him when he stands for re-election this year.  He will then become a discredited political figure.

Once that is done, if Romney runs again, you can bet we will hear all about Reid, his racism, and his Mormon faith – as a cudgel to beat Romney.  Mark my words, the swami has spoken.

The Invisible Primary . . .

Frum is trying to cause trouble here, but he does not have to work very hard at it.  When it is all said and done, I think we are going to find a close correlation between the Tea Party people and the “don’t vote for a Mormon” people.  I heard one on Michael Medved Friday say he would rather have his “conscious right with God” than vote against “his principles.”  That is just a rephrasing of the “Damn the environment, bring on the apocalypse” mentality that many on the left accuse we religious folk of having.  We really can be our own worst enemy.

Is Romney a health care hypocrite?  Tough call.  Ask Lowell, the Mass. healthcare plan kept me in the purely-academic, not-supporting-Romney mode for a long time last cycle.  It is the only thing I do not like when I look at Romney.  That said, it is a far cry better than anything that has been considered by the Fed to date.

But this I will say, the word “hypocrite” carries with it religious overtones.  Don’t be surprised to see Romney’s faith and “healthcare hypocrisy” wrapped up into a nonsensical, but somewhat effective, ball sometime in the future.

And while we are in Massachusetts, Mitt Romney is now firmly in front of the Scott Brown parade and Barack Obama the Martha Coakley death march.  In both cases it’s a huge bet on a Senate race for president or presidential candidate.  For a president there is no up side – only the preservation of existing political capital, or not.  For a candidate, the upsides are tremendous, and the downside is to look like a loser in your home state.  But at this point the “loser” label has fled the race.  Should Brown lose, which is looking less and less likely, there will be moral loss and moral victory only.  Romney comes out of this smelling like a rose, regardless.

UPDATE: Politico says Romney is missing from the Brown campaign?  Maybe he failed to appear as predicted in the link above, but if my email is any measure Romney is doing everything he can to help Scott Brown.  Why just yesterday I got emails for support activities for Brown from the Romney operation BEFORE I got them from Brown’s campaign.  And of course there are the Romney TV appearances discussing Brown that are buried in the story.  Politico is shooting at Romney here — I wonder why?  Back to the original post.

Ya gotta love it.  We laugh, but on reflection, Huck’s comment that Romney “has no soul,” is so ugly that laughter is the only viable response.   To question someone’s essential humanity is, in the end, contemptible.  I can come up with a list of negative adjectives in re: the Huckster much longer than my arm, but he is a human being – a wrong one – but a human being nonetheless.  Shame on Huckabee.

Deep Thoughts . . .

Bias and ignorance are close kin.

Using freedom to deny it.  Interesting concept.

Finally . . .

We have added MLK’s “I Have A Dream” Speech to our video widget at left – apropos the day and the raison d’être for this blog.

Lowell adds . . .

Viewing Mike Huckabee’s comments in “Game Changer” charitably, I suppose he was using “soul” in the sense of “a moral compass,” or “integrity.” Still . . . it was a most unfortunate choice of words by a candidate who everyone knows was a Baptist preacher in a religion-charged campaign. The most telling aspect of the Huck-Romney rivalry as it now stands is that Huck is the only one still taking shots at the other guy.

As for Romney’s involvement in the Scott Brown campaign, here’s an analysis that finds Romney’s fingerprints everywhere:  “Largely overlooked in assessing Brown’s prospects [is] the hidden hand of Mitt Romney.”  Read the whole thing; it describes a lot of the political bridge-building Romney is doing.  I don’t see any other candidate doing anything comparable.

Romney and healthcare:  is he a hypocrite?  The answer is no, but understanding that  requires more than a superficial understanding of what Romney did in Massachusetts.  Here’s what you need to know:  Romney’s plan was for Massachusetts, not the USA.   He has always said that he would not be in favor of the Massachusetts system (including the “individual mandate” requiring everyone to have health insurance)  being imposed nationally.  That said, 96% of Massachusetts’ citizens have health insurance.  Not a bad feat; I wish California could come even close to that.

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