It’s clear that Mitt took one look at the McCain campaign, did an immediate cost-benefit analysis, and then had only one question — how do I hold these losers off at arm’s length and at the same time, maintain my position within the party?
We’ve seen this kind of “throw them under the bus,” Mitt-looking-out-for-Mitt attitude before. Remember how he did everything he could to undermine first Swift, and then O’Brian, in the gubernatorial race? Remember how he said that he wanted to increase the number of Republicans in the Legislature, but then didn’t actually campaign for anyone who was at risk of losing? Remember his speech stating that “he’s accomplished everything he wanted to do as governor” immediately prior to running — two years into his term?
Same old, same old — but now it’s on a national stage. We’ll see how it goes down with other players if McCain loses.
A couple of months ago Mitt didn’t hesitate to state that he would not be interested in serving in a McCain cabinet because he did not want a President’s young minions telling him what to do the way Nixon’s aides ordered his father around. I’ve yet to see him look comfortable speaking up in support of a McCain/Palin proposal related to the economy — in fact, some of his tap dancing around answers has been rather amusing. The quote about not wanting to make any appearances unless there are cameras present certainly rings true — it is completely in character with how he conducted himself here.
The national Republican Party is apparently hell-bent on driving out whatever moderates and dissenters are left in it (witness — Chuck Hegel, Larry Pressler, Kathleen Parker, Christopher Buckley). It’s going to be left with a Romney wing of neocon economic hawks and a Palin/Huckabee/religious right wing that doesn’t trust Romney in particular or Mormons in general — and the shivs are already out on both sides. If McCain does in fact lose, there’s going to be a nasty bloodletting all around — but who will survive in the end? Anyone want to place a bet?
Palin will throw in with Huckabee I bet. They’ll form the 2012 Power Hour ticket, finally peeling the religious right away from the GOP.
I don’t pretend to understand all this, but I notice that fundamentalist Protestant Christianity seems to consist of lots of tiny churches. In a sense, this resembles how, in Islam, believers gather around scholars. In both cases, that leads to a bit of diversity. What’s literal? What’s not? How to apply ancient teachings to modern times? How much historical scholarship to apply or not? And so on.
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p>Even so, don’t some of Palin’s beliefs lie a bit outside the mainstream of conservative, Bible-inerrant Christianity?
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p>Or do these guys just accept a lot of doctrinal fuzziness as long as the proponent is deemed upright and righteous?
It’s a shame Romney ran against Huckabee in the primaries since I think he would have gotten the nod from the Republican party and beat McCain. In light of the financial crisis, Romney would have brought a true business acumen and financial expertise to a crumbling Wall St and been able to explain the typical American what went wrong and how to fix it.
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p>Hopefully he will stay in politics and be there for the next election. Should Obama win this election, the country will be so angry for change that Mitt would be welcome by left, right and center. 6 more days!