Advice overload precedes Romney's debate
After getting off his message and taking hits in the polls, Mitt Romney is shifting his campaign strategy. / Alex Wong
This article originally appeared on RealClearPolitics.
For starters, Noonan had some counsel of her own.
"He should stick to speeches, and they have to be big -- where America is now, what we must do, how we can do it," she wrote. "He needs to address the Mideast too, because it isn't going to go away as an issue and is adding a new layer of unease to the entire election."
Since the day Romney launched his second run for the presidency nearly a year-and-a-half ago, a steady stream of such guidance has come his way from conservative media figures, the messages focused on what he has been doing wrong and how he needs to change his trajectory.
Now, amid his slide in the polls and just one week until the first Romney-Obama debate, that stream of advice has become more like a waterfall.
"He needs to hone his message," RedState.com's Erick Erickson wrote on Tuesday. "He needs to focus on the failings of this administration."
Newt Gingrich -- who knows a thing or two about Romney's debating strengths and weaknesses after facing off against him 21 times during the GOP primaries -- offered some pugnacious instruction of his own on Wednesday.
"Be assertive and be on offense against both Obama and his media," he wrote. "You can be on offense without being offensive. The strongest reactions I got to my debates came from people who were desperate for someone to stand up to the media and redefine the questions and reframe the assumptions. Americans are sick and tired of the unending liberalism and suffocating groupthink of the elite media."
Some of the unsolicited advisers may have their own reasons for bestowing such guidance publicly, but that doesn't change one essential fact: the seemingly unending flow of it.
In addition to the public counsel Romney has received ahead of the debate in Denver, he has been besieged with even more well-intended coaching from wealthy donors at private fundraisers, from rank-and-file Republicans who speak up at post-rally rope lines, and during phone calls with key Republican leaders, according to a campaign aide.
And that is to say nothing of the specific guidance Romney has received from top advisers during the several days of official debate preparation he has already engaged in.
Undoubtedly, the barrage of advice must at times seem contradictory to the presidential challenger as he tries to digest it all.
Numerous prominent Republicans, for instance, have called on him to be more specific about his vague proposals for cutting government programs. But longtime GOP debate coach Brett O'Donnell, who guided Romney before some of his primary debates, suggested to Robert Draper in a recent GQ story that getting bogged down in data was a potential hazard for Romney.
"Debates aren't a game of 'Jeopardy!' -- it's not about question-and-answer," O'Donnell said.
The conflicting counsel could become particularly distracting for Romney as he prepares for what might be his last best chance to change the direction of the race: the debate next week with Obama.
According to Bruce Buchanan, a historian of presidential politics at the University of Texas, Romney would be wise to largely ignore much of the advice coming from his right flank as he seeks to win over the independents and previously undecided voters who have swung to Obama recently after having voted for him in 2008.
"He's up against someone the country likes personally more than they like him," Buchanan said. "I think what Romney could do is strike a reasonable tone, rather than the aggressive tone he displayed when debating against Republicans, which would help humanize him."
In an interview that aired Sunday on "60 Minutes," Romney told CBS News' Scott Pelley that his campaign "doesn't need a turnaround." In addition, top campaign officials continue to insist publicly that the GOP nominee remains on track to win a neck-and-neck race.
But with Romney falling farther behind in a host of new swing-state polls released this week and trailing Obama nationally by 4.0 percent in the latest RCP Average, the temptation for him to swing for the fences at the first debate likely will be strong.
Though the need for him to change the race's dynamic remains apparent, the peril of trying to do too much too quickly is evident in recent presidential political history: There are no examples of a candidate using a single debate performance to turn a lagging effort into a come-from-behind victory.
Romney's best bet, Buchanan suggested, is to lay out his overall case in a manner that is designed to make inroads incrementally, rather than attempting to do it all with a memorable sound bite or a well-timed cutting remark.
"You can work on your negatives and you can try to portray a plausible alternative," Buchanan said. "Even if it's a very clever, classic putdown such as Lloyd Benson's putdown of Dan Quayle, those things are not usually game changers so much as they are entertainment makers. So I don't think there's any way to hit a home run in that sense."
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(1) The economy is coming back one way or the other, as once the election is done, there will be a clear direction; and voters want to give Obama more time, given the depth of the challenge Obama faced and the GOP's anti democratic tactics the past 4 years, and
(2) Now that people are forced to crystallize their views in the election, Obama is increasingly seen for what he is, a solid, seasoned leader who, as Clinton put it, is cool on the outside and burning for America on the inside;
(3) Mitt & Co. & GOP are now being seen for what they are, and it isn't pretty.
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/13017922/image/94804771-there-you-grow-again
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/12989871-from-breaking-to-building-a-nation-the-change-is-you
What is Mitt's interest in the presidency? What is his vision? Does he really "Believe in America"? Why does he want, as he says, to "take the presidency"? Is he being honest? See here or links below.
Truth is, Mitt is not the right man for the Presidency. He is not the business man he advertises. He is a pirate, dressed in a business suit! He started Bain to bust and raid the treasuries of umpteen hundreds or thousands of companies. And he's buried his treasure in the Caribbean.
Mitt's just doing what he does best - taking personal advantage of an opportunity. He's looking to buy the White House as his new home office. The Presidency can help create greater fortune for himself, for his family, for his friends and perhaps his Church. Once these super wealthy people corner America's money, they'll decide whether to trickle it down.
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/12903382-michele-obama-and-bill-clinton-lay-out-at-the-rnc-just-how-much-obama-believes-in-america-does-mitt-romney-believe-in-america-or-something-else
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/13017922-its-the-dishonesty-stupid
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/12889195-footprints-at-the-republican-national-convention-in-tampa-florida
NOW the GOP wants to micromanage in the 4th quarter. Like they say in politics, you define yourself early on and you make the focus and contrast more apparent as you go. You don't pick the best of the worst, say you don't like him and give him lots of advice late in the game.
That they are all scrambling down to the drunks in the bars, telling him what his arguments should be on this issue or that... you mean he doesnt know for himself? or he forgot the script? ~ Can you say Puppet gone Rogue?? ~ Aye!!
And btway, the only advice Obama needs is to not forget, he's got the majority of support, right there is validation you are made of better stuff. Let him have his hand-outs, you can't pull off what you can't make for yourself.
On the first, absolutely Romney does. Most of us haven't a clue what he proposes on matters which concern us most. He's been to vague. Only eluding to concepts rather than presenting anything firm.
As for the second, focusing on the failings of his administration. Romney has for the vast majority part done only that. Americans have already made their mind up on their opinion of how Obama has or hasn't done. We've been bombarded already with "what the other guy did wrong" until we're deaf to hearing more.
Over the last couple months Romney has made some tragic errors. Ones that shouldn't take place at this point. He's cemented in the minds of to many Americans an image which is cringe worthy.
Romney has been sinking his own ship lately. He appears to pander to whichever group he happens to be addressing. If its the poor, his heart is breaking for their lost jobs. If its the middle class his heart is breaking for the tax rates they pay although just the other day he himself said his tax plan wouldn't be likely to provide them any relief. On China and jobs Romney talks sternly about how many American manufacturing jobs Americans have lost to China. Yet we know now he was a part of the problem. Now he wants us to believe he's the solution. Romney presents he's for smaller government yet wants the goverment to rule and police our citizen's moral values. To hold them to a religious ideology which many American's don't believe in. He created Romneycare but condems Obamacare saying the uninsured are fine because they have access to emergency rooms for treatment of illnesses which likely wouldn't have gotten the upperhand had the individual had acess to the much less expensive and health saving preventitive care.
When Romney speaks to his wealthiest contributors he slights and condems those very struggling individuals who he now claims his heart is breaking for.
Romney's problem is he's all over the place. He doesn't provide us with a clear image of not only his intentions but how he intends to get those implemented.
They define truth as unending liberalism and journalists seeking answers as suffocating group think.
They never run on the real issues that are important to the American people, they use their "Big Lie"--Tell lies, even preposterous lies and repeat them over and over to convince, fool, and even brainwash the American people for their vote and their vote only.
These Republi-Cons can not run on a record of positive political accomplishment because there is none.
Who is primarily responsible for the really, really large National Debt?
"10 things the GOP doesn't want you to know about the debt"
http://www.perrspectives.com/blog/archives/002214.htm
Who is primarily responsible for creating the Great Recession we are in and prevent a larger recovery in Congress by obstruction and sabotage of the economy just so they can blame President Obama and the Democrats?
The Criminal Enterprise of bush/cheney with their narrow minded ideology of totally unregulated capitalism sanctioned criminal greed by the Corporate Fraudsters in the Housing and Financial sector of our economy.
The Housing Fraud Bubble bursting resulted in the loss of $34 Trillion of America's wealth that took over 220 years to create and will take decades to recover.
Source:Las Vegas Sun Editorial on 7-9-11
Obstruction and sabotage of economy:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/09/did-republican...,
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/09/bad-economy-blame...
Like every Republican, Romney wants to protect the rich and preserve every possible tax break and loophole that benefits him and the other robber barons. Their trickle-down philosophy has been refuted repeatedly yet they continue beating the dead horse myth that they are the "job creators." Ordinary Americans with money in their pockets and disposable income create jobs, not the super-rich parasites like Mitt and Ann. Wake up America, before these oligarchs destroy any chance for ordinary people to make any real progress.
How is the Weeper of the House going to cry himself out of this one? Republicans failed! Now go somewhere and cry. Krugman said it best: "the Republican electoral strategy is, in effect, a gigantic con game: It depends on convincing voters that the bad economy is the result of big-spending policies that President Barrack Obama hasn't followed (in large part because the GOP wouldn't let him), and that our woes can be cured by pursuing more of the same policies that have already failed.
Please... Conservatives and Republicans are the biggest fakes the world has ever known. Republicans don't really care about spending. Republicans only care about money that we spend on education and healthcare (things that actually improve society).....but spending three trillion dollars we borrow from China on unnecessary war in Iraq.....Halliburton and Karl Marx approved! 4500 dead Americans and 100,000+ innocent Iraqi civilians' deaths later and now Republicans care about "life"? I think not.....
They might be able to rouse the bigots and some religious zealots telling others who they can't marry but the Republican policies of lowering taxes and deregulating have unequivocally failed all but maybe 5% of Americans. Republicans don't actually stand for anything, and funny thing is, no one asks them to. Especially their hacks in the payola media, and the people who vote for them. It's time America votes in the Democrats to send the Republicans a message; it's time to get real.
Barrack Obama isn't perfect, but he is a thousand times the man Romney will ever be. This time around, Obama and Democrats get my vote, the choice is simple. For the love of country and all people; register to vote and vote as much as you can!