Romney: Victim of Bigotry?
This is in response to Jordy’s post. Though it quickly degrades into rant, it comes full circle to my main point.
If you follow my blog, you know I’m fairly anti Romney. Yet that’s not to say I’m anti Mormon, as I am one. Which begs the question, “Is Romney’s failure truly a reflection of religious bigotry?” Of course I’m one person, and this is all anecdotal. I would like to say that had Romney been truly conservative instead of merely “more” conservative than McCain, that he might have done better, stayed in the race, maybe won. Alas, I can see this is not the case. If Romney had been truly conservative, he’d likely be in the same boat as the true conservative. Perhaps not, for if he was in that boat he would have jumped ship long ago. Maybe that’s unfair, calling him a quitter, but I digress.
So here Romney runs as the “conservative” choice, as well as the shrewd businessman that can turn around the heaviest, most sluggish, most doomed of vessels. I almost wonder if he dropped out (or suspended) because he was sacrificing more and more of his true conservative values for the sake of media acceptance, the campaign, and the party. C’mon, we all know his loyalties lie with the party above all else. The theory goes he could not do it anymore, he couldn’t keep sacrificing his principles to keep the campaign going, but he endorsed McCain, the antithesis of conservatism… so much for that theory.
You may think with all this ranting I’m bashing Romney and may yet give him a whopping slap in the face. Well, you may be right. That depends on how you interpret it. Above I was merely conjecturing, posing possible reasons behind his suspension as well as reasons behind the reason for his suspension, another reason, you might say the reason… his lack of support. Funny definition of lack of support though, I think he really had a shot still, he was the runner up! Though I digress yet again.
There is a point to all this. Regardless of why Romney was losing, regardless of what tactics were used against him, regardless of what he really does believe in, the fact remains that he dropped out. This is the slap in the face, so brace yourselves. I truly sympathize with all you Romney fans out there. Whatever the reason you supported him, you were counting on him. You were counting on him to keep McCain out. You were counting on him to save our dollars. You were counting on him to bring God’s blessing upon our great nation. You were counting on him to bring his conservative values to the white house. Whatever it was you were counting on it, and he has let you down. And for what? For “the party.” And now he jumps behind McCain “for the party.” I’m truly sorry. If my main man did that to me, if my candidate of choice (you know who he is) so much as hinted at dropping the race, I would be dismayed beyond consolation. My heart goes out.
He was the runner-up, but McCain had a big lead that was getting bigger. From what I read, the chances weren’t good that he’d pull ahead – he basically had to sweep the rest of the country (that might be a slight exaggeration).\r\n \r\n Now, if he were running a marathon and quit because he wasn’t going to win, he’d be a quitter. But coming in second place gets you nothing in a presidential race. And if you are drawing votes away from someone who, to you, is a better choice than the Democratic candidate, then dropping out is a strategic necessity for the good of the country (as you believe). You would be perfectly happy to see a runner-up libertarian drop out to give the leader more votes, if there were enough libertarian votes to make it an issue.\r\n \r\n Unless you believe that the leader is a worse choice than the opposing party, or that you are so totally awesome that you just have to try to win or the country will self-destruct in the next four years, so you can’t wait until next time (McCain ran 8 years ago, remember), then when it’s apparent you’re losing the prudent and MORAL thing to do is drop out. Unless of course you don’t believe your party is more aligned with your beliefs than another party. But wouldn’t that be hypocritical?\r\n \r\n I think I would have preferred Romney to McCain. It makes me sad that he had to drop out. But I believe he did the smart, prudent, and moral thing according to his beliefs, goals, and understanding of the situation. Certainly he has more perspective on that than we do, in any case.
22 Feb 17:22 by
Good post, Von -\r\n \r\n I should note that Ron Paul is my first choice, and has been ever since I heard of him. I plan on voting for Ron Paul even if I have to write him in, but that doesn’t change the dynamics of how Mitt Romney was treated by the media. For the liberal media, Mitt’s Mormonism was a much bigger pill to swallow than his quasi-conservatism —or at least it was portrayed that way. It should have been quite the reverse; were it so we might not have McCain (the most liberal of them all) as a clear front runner.
23 Feb 08:15 by
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