Misadventures in Politics

Signs the GOP Primary Is Over

As if the inevitable “would you consider the VP slot?” question (answer: “I’ll do whatever is necessary to help our country”) weren’t bad enough, Rick Santorum is facing a serious case of media neglect. Despite an attempt to infuse excitement into what was billed as a “major foreign policy speech” by delivering it at the Fairfield, CA, headquarters of Ronald Reagan’s favorite candy (Jelly Belly), the Washington Post’s front page led with a different story: “Mitt Romney Prepares to Challenge Obama on Foreign Policy.” On page A4 of the Wall Street Journal (and on the splashpage of the WSJ website for most of the evening), there was “Romney’s Hawkish Stands Are Drawing Attention.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And the Jelly Belly backdrop may not have been as helpful as Santorum wished. What little coverage his speech did receive focused not on his familiar foreign policy talking points (Iran is evil! Obama hates Israel!) but on the candy company itself. FYI: Three tons of jelly beans were consumed during Reagan’s 1981 inauguration. Most distressing for Jelly Belly lovers, however, may have been this tidbit from the Times:

The rally Thursday was hosted by Herman G. Rowland Sr., chairman of the board of Jelly Belly Candy Company, who calls himself “an ultra conservative” and whom Federal Election Commission records show has contributed to the campaigns of Mr. Santorum’s opponents: Newt Gingrich, Mr. Romney and Gov. Rick Perry of Texas. When asked about it, Mr. Rowland said a check for Mr. Santorum “is sitting on my desk, and he’s going to pick it up today.”

Time to find a new favorite candy.

Unhelpful Endorsements

Romney, George H.W. Bush, and Barbara Bush (Photo: Donna Carson/Reuters)

George H.W. Bush officially endorsed his “old friend” Romney on Thursday, saying that “He’s a good man, he’ll make a great president, and we just wish him well.” Now, some endorsements are worthwhile: Marco Rubio, the Florida senator much-beloved by the Tea Party, may firm up support for Romney among Hispanics and social conservatives, despite his unenthusiastic recommendation (“There are a lot of other people out there that some of us wish had run for president, but they didn’t. I think Mitt Romney would be a fine president, and he’d be way better than the guy who’s there right now”). A nod from Jim DeMint, who is backing Romney but not officially endorsing him, will give the candidate credibility among fiscal conservatives.

As for Thursday’s announcement, few endorsements could be more counterproductive. Republican voters suspicious of Romney’s constant flip-flops on everything from abortion to health care will not be comforted by the sight of Romney standing alongside George “Read My Lips, No New Taxes” Bush. It’s the equivalent of Jimmy Carter endorsing President Obama — anyone spooked by Iran’s saber-rattling or long-term economic malaise will not be reassured. Worse endorsements are certainly imaginable (French president Nicholas Sarkozy publicly backing any Democrat, for example), but not by a whole lot.

Creative Accounting

Paul Ryan’s Friday endorsement of Romney, however, was a big get. The far right is in love with Ryan and his austere “Path to Prosperity” budget, which preserves the Bush tax cuts, prunes billions from domestic programs, and eventually balances the budget by 2040. Romney is on record as supporting the proposal. Calling it a “bold and exciting effort” that is “very much needed,” Romney offers the ultimate praise: “It’s very much consistent with what I put out earlier.” Disregarding the ridiculousness of competing over who had a bad idea first, Romney’s endorsement of a plan that pares all discretionary federal spending to 3.75% of GDP by 2050 (currently, it’s over 12%) defies logic. “Discretionary” spending includes everything — defense, infrastructure, food stamps, education — except Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. As Ezra Klein notes at Wonkblog, “Consider that defense spending has never fallen below three percentage points of GDP, and Mitt Romney has promised to keep it above four percentage points of GDP.” Per Romney’s own website:

Mitt will begin by reversing Obama-era defense cuts and return to the budget baseline established by Secretary Robert Gates in 2010, with the goal of setting core defense spending . . . at a floor of 4 percent of GDP.

For a businessman who excelled at wringing every cent of savings out of the companies snapped up by Bain Capital, Romney apparently has some difficulty with math.

4.00% > 3.75%

Enough said.

Mitt’s Beach Cabin

Romney, whether describing $374,000 as “not very much” money or joking about his father shutting down a factory in Wisconsin, already has a reputation for being out of touch with the 99%. A recent Bloomberg News article quoted a former classmate as objecting to the Romney’s rich-guy image. “When he’s in an environment with people he knows and likes, he’s just like everybody else,” says Howard Serkin, who now runs an investment bank in Jacksonville, Florida. To which I can only say: Well, of course he’s “just like everybody else” when “everybody else” is a room full of financial-sector millionaires.

Otherwise studiously attentive to his image — see the everyman Wrangler jeans and shellacked Ken-doll hair — Romney seems to be clueless when it comes to his wealth. Case in point: Plans on file with the City of San Diego detail the Romneys’ proposal to renovate their 3,000-square-foot beach house, more than doubling its dimensions and adding what Politico calls a “split-level, four-vehicle garage that comes with a ‘car lift’ to transport automobiles between floors.” (Presumably those autos include Ann Romney’s multiple Cadillacs.) The family even hired its own lobbyist to guide the project through the San Diego permit process.

News of the potential water-feature and 3,600-square-foot basement is music to Democrats’ ears, however. Such a nice house, and so far from Washington . . . . It certainly doesn’t sound as if someone is counting on moving into the White House.

I Hear Kid Rock Is Available

NJ Gov. Chris Christie

In other, non-Romney news, the inexplicable Republican enthusiasm for Bruce Springsteen continues. While media accounts regularly cite Springsteen’s patriotic, love-your-country music as appealing to both sides of the aisle, the singer is not exactly shy about his liberal politics. Yet the AP reports that brashly conservative New Jersey governor Chris Christie is “calling on native son Bruce Springsteen to step up and help Atlantic City by performing at the new Revel casino on Labor Day weekend.” You have to wonder whether Christie, who has apparently seen Springsteen perform over 100 times, has actually listened to any of the lyrics. From Springsteen’s latest album, “Wrecking Ball”:

Send the robber barons straight to hell
The greedy thieves who came around
And ate the flesh of everything they found
Whose crimes have gone unpunished now
Who walk the streets as free men now

It gets worse:

They destroyed our families, factories, and they took our homes
They left our bodies on the plains, the vultures picked our bones

Hey, Christie — I don’t think he’s talking about the teachers unions.