(and also my hope) Romney beats Huckabee.
I've been a Romney fan since I read this book last spring. I already submitted my Georgia absentee ballot for him in the primary.
Romney may not be as ideologically pure as some of the other candidates, and if I would go on voting records alone, McCain would be my man. Unfortunately, McCain chooses the wrong issues to be bi-partisan on, such as judicial nominees, campaign finance reform, and immigration. (Doesn't mean I wouldn't vote for him if given a choice between him and any Democratic candidate in a general election.)
Romney has demonstrated in the past that he is someone whose success is based upon laying out a plan and sticking to it. He rescued the Salt Lake City Olympics from the red and brought it into the black. He built up and ran the venture capital firm, Bain Capital, which earned him his reputed $1 Billion fortune. He's proven he can get elected to executive power in liberal states (which might actually make him, rather than Obama, a better candidate for "uniting" people). And plus, he looks like a president straight out of central casting.
He is incredibly smart, and when he comes up against something he's never encountered before, he gathers all the top specialists of all persuasions and from all points on the ideological continuum to give him the lowdown from their perspective.
For the most part, the British press have been ignoring him, either because they are so enthralled to the Democratic front-runners and Rudy Giuliani, or because they'd rather not think about another potential Republican president.
Romney's detractors say his record is not conservative enough and that he flip-flops. So what. Most of the candidates have hove to the right. And unlike any of the others, if you are speaking from a "socially" conservative standpoint, I believe he is the only one who has been married to the same woman for most of his life. So at least he lives these values (and if the Kennedy machine couldn't find any personal dirt on him when he ran for Senator against Teddy in Mass back in 1994, I'd wager there isn't any to be found) even if he may not have voted them as governor of an ultraliberal state.
He is the first candidate I heard (way back in Spring) speak openly and loudly of the Islamofascist threat. He and Rudy are probably the only candidates running for president who have read all the right books on it, too, such as America Alone and Looming Tower.
Speaking of which, this is why I will be voting Republican, no matter what, in a general election: not a single Democratic candidate has mentioned the Islamist threat at all, not a one. All the Republicans, except Ron Paul, have named it specifically.
Anyway, because he doesn't enjoy a national reputation like Rudy or McCain or Thompson, Romney needs to win Iowa and then New Hampshire. If he wins these two states, he will garner enough attention, and money, as a candidate. Otherwise, he's up against Rudy in Florida (home to loads of transplanted New Yorkers) and Thompson in South Carolina.
But if he wins Iowa tomorrow, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict that he will be the next president of the US.
Interesting James, thanks.
I'm sure Romney's Mormonism counts against him in the eyes of the UK/non-US press too. Celebrate diversity, what?
Posted by: Blognor Regis | 03 January 2008 at 21:43
Well, I was wrong, but I do think Mormonism had a lot to do with it.
Posted by: James G | 04 January 2008 at 14:36