WASHINGTON, Oct. 21, 2007
Romney: I'm The Consistent Conservative
Former Massachusetts Governor Says He Has Steady Republican Credentials
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Romney On Being Mormon
Mitt Romney talks with Bob Schieffer about his Mormon faith and the role it plays in his presidential campaign. Romney also addresses why Evangelical Christians may have a problem with his religion.
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Romney On Switch To Pro-Life
Mitt Romney tells Bob Schieffer that he has revised his beliefs on abortion and is pro-life. The former Mass. governor also addresses accusations that he repeatedly flip-flops on issues.
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Romney: A 'Real Republican'?
Bob Schieffer questions Mitt Romney about referring to himself as the presidential campaign's 'real Republican.' Also, the former Mass. governor outlines what needs to happen for a Republican win.
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The former Massachusetts governor, who on Saturday won a straw poll of evangelicals at the Values Voter Summit, gave an exclusive interview to Face The Nation Friday night.
"I believe in the principles of my party," Romney told Bob Schieffer. "And I believe that the only way that we're going to take the White House is not by acting like Hillary Clinton, but by holding true to the principles of our party, which is a coalition of social, economic and foreign policy conservatives."
Others in the Republican field, however, have questioned Romney's positions on abortion rights, immigration and gun control. They accuse Romney of running as a conservative in this election but taking more liberal stances in his campaigns for governor and for the U.S. Senate.
"It's not just the abortion issue, although he certainly was passionate in his advocacy for being pro-choice," Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, said last week on Face The Nation. "I mean, look at literally every major issue. Whether it be immigration reform or taxes or immigration or any other issue, there has been changes in his position."
Watch McCain on Face The Nation"Obviously, my position did change with regards to life," Romney said in response. "But on other issues, my positions have been very consistent with my principles and my views."
He pointed to what he saw as the evolving positions McCain has taken on abortion rights and immigration.
Romney said, "I'd note that as I look at the other candidates who are running for president, over time they look at specific areas and say, 'gosh, I was wrong on this. That needs to be adjusted'."
But Romney's critics point his politics in Massachusetts as evidence that he is not as true to the GOP as he is trying to make himself out to be. In 1992, Romney, then registered as an Independent, voted for Democrat Paul Tsongas in the presidential primary. He said Sunday that his vote was a political move meant to undercut the stronger Democrat.
"When there's no contest of significance on the Republican side, when you register as an Independent, you can vote in the Democratic primary and vote against Bill Clinton," Romney said. "I used to vote against Ted Kennedy, all right? So that's something that you get to do."
Romney's critics also look to his unsuccessful 1994 Senate race against Kennedy for more proof that Romney has not always been faithful to the party.
Schieffer pointed out that during that race Romney turned away from the Republican patriarch President Ronald Reagan, saying, "I'm not trying to return to Reagan-Bush."
"There's no question that the older I get, the smarter Ronald Reagan gets," Romney said. "When I was running in '94, I wasn't trying to return to Reagan-Bush, because that was characterized as a very different posture than what I was running for. I was talking about my own vision. I wasn't trying to be a copy of anybody else."
A Quote
Romney's promise in that 1994 campaign to be a stronger advocate for gay rights than Kennedy has also rankled social conservatives who want a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. If I'm president of the United States and put my hand on the Bible, I do what the Constitution tells me, what the rule of law tells me. I certainly don't do what leader of my church or any other tells me to do.
Mitt Romney"For some voters, it might be enough to simply match my opponent’s record in this area,” he wrote in a 1994 letter to the Log Cabin Club of Massachusetts. "But I believe we can and must do better. If we are to achieve the goals we share, we must make equality for gays and lesbians a mainstream concern. My opponent cannot do this. I can and will."
"I also told gays in 1994 that I opposed gay marriage and civil union, because gay rights didn't include - at that time, people weren't talking about gay marriage and civil unions - so I've always opposed gay marriage," Romney told Schieffer. "But at the same time, I don't discriminate against people. I don't discriminate against gay people."
Romney said he has been a "strong advocate" for an amendment that defines marriage as a relationship between a man and a woman.
Religion is another issue that could be an obstacle in Romney's run for the White House. Evangelical Christians, like those who gathered at this weekend's Values Voters Summit, are a major force in the Republican Party, and Romney is a Mormon.
"I'm not going to try and distance myself in any way, shape or form from my faith. It was the faith of my fathers, of my sons, a long tradition in my family," he said. "I'm, as I say, true blue through and through. And so I accept the teachings of our church, and I do my best to live by those teachings."
Romney did not answer specific questions about Mormonism, saying the church would be better at answering them, but he pointed out its similarities with Christianity and Judaism.
"What I can tell you is that the values of my faith are founded on Judeo-Christian principles, and the same kind of philosophy that's associated with other Christian faiths and the Jewish faith and others is very much consistent with ours," Romney said.
Echoing John F. Kennedy, who in 1960 explained how his Catholic faith would impact his presidency, Romney said that his allegiance was to the Unite States, rather than to his church.
"If I'm president of the United States and put my hand on the Bible, I do what the Constitution tells me, what the rule of law tells me," Romney said. "I certainly don't do what leader of my church or any other tells me to do."
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See all 109 Comments"When Republicans start acting like Democrats,
the whole country loses."
So True
.
the whole country loses."
--Posted by MCVett
Pretty funny how this neocon shill posing with a false name to create confusion for the real "McVet" who posts on CBS so unwittingly tells the truth--he just doesn''t tell it all. When Republicans act like Republicans, at least the kind we''ve had for the last 25 years, the country is already lost to the neofascists.
And why don''t you pick an original name, shill?
The most interesting thing about this statement is that it is from the Daily Brownbacker, one of Sam Brownback''s still operable blogs. Many of Romney''s anti-gun comments are posted there. Sam may not be the brightest bulb in the package, but he is consistent and principled.
That''s a joke, right? Romney is a BIG flip-flopper.
Plus, how conservative is it, really, to believe that he will become a God in the next life, if he''s a good little mormon in this one? How "Christian" is it to believe that God had a wife, that he (Elohim) is the Father of Jehovah (the Christian and Jewish God) and of Satan and Jesus. How "Christian" is it to believe that God had *** with the no-longer-a-virgin Mary? How American is it to believe that all dark-skinned people are so marked by God because they are of Satan''s race and are "unfit to enter the LDS temple"?
Mutt Romney: No Thanks!
"Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney said this week that as president he would allow individual states to keep abortion legal, two weeks after telling a national television audience that he supports a constitutional amendment to ban the procedure nationwide."
A well documented easy to Google up article detailing Whirling Mitt''s (too many changes to be characterized as Flip Flop Mitt) multitude of stances on abortion.
Giuliani: "No. Me."
Thompson: "No. I''m more conservative than all of you."
And so it goes.
land of rednecks, war makers, bible thumpers, flag wavers, republican snakes and christian creeps.
ha,ha,ha.
what a bunch of creeps those southerners are.
war, hate, christian creeps, republican snakes...
nothing good comes out of the south.
all you people like this are idiots, the little I know about Mormons is that they love their county because they believe it was formed divinly by God and they will do everything to honour and protect this country and the reasons our fore fathers founded it.
speak some more and show everyone how ignorant you really are. you have no clue to what you are talking about.
Mormons are great with foriegn relations. They love them because they can trust them.
Say why does he refuse to release in income tax returns and why does he say that Scientology novel is his favorite book anyway?
And he managed to avoid the troubles of the Vietnam war when his daddy, a Mormon big cheese, certified boy Mitt as a "preacher man" because he was handing out the usual Mormon crock door to door. This was Mitts service to his country during the draft prone Vietnam affair!
Now Mitts 4 sons are helping his fathers presidential bid. Mitt recently touted this as his sons service to their country to get him elected, similar to US soldiers serving in Iraq. Seems to me we are dealing with a Mormon family of cowards, swindlers, and used car salesmen.
It''s still a year out, with primaries still to come. I am watching and listening, and researching what candidates claim to have done. I am weighing the cost of implementing some ''ideas'' against what I feel is worth the expense to me...because all ideas come with a price tag and those costs will hit me first, not the poor and not the wealthy. I have nothing against people being wealthy and welcome the growth, but I don''t want to be the only one carrying the illegals and poor on my back.
'' ... if mortal suffering seems to evolve toward eternal ecstacsy, then eternal ecstasy prevails, except: survival of less fit hints that less fit killets must occupy 99 plus % of space time to survive, but that''s only from a mortal suffering perspective ... ''
'' ... big business is capable of employing full time staffs devoted to visiting sick beds in order to afford them market share and public awareness; however, a small company would also be capable of paying entitys small and large to provide such staffs temporarily or long term ... ''
'' ... ideally, each folk would visit 33 sick beds each day, but: because that is not likely, averages might be 1.3 billion sick beds visited per day for 43 million to 1.3 billion dollars, with 40 million folk makeing such visits and 1.2 million of those answering lots of questions for 1.3 million to 40 million of the dollars ... ''
'' ... traditional corporate vanagement should be replaced by 3-d realtime journals of traveling journalists paid to keep hundreds or thousands or tens thousands of small companys informed ... ''
Romney vetod a lot of bills just for show, said Richard Tisei (R-Lynnfield), the Mass. Senate minority leader, who is supporting Rudy Giuliani for president. About 90 percent of Romneys vetos were overidden. He never tried to solicit support to sustain them; never talked to our legislative leadership or the Republican rank and file (sound familiar?) Its true as far as it goes - which isnt very far. Almost all those vetoes were overridden by the Legislature and became law. Which makes Mitt not a St. George slaying big-bucks dragons, but an overmatched used car salesman.
If Romney had really cared, he could have gathered the GOPs waning members in one big conference room and at least fought to uphold some of his vetoes. But, Tisei said, I cant remember one time he asked for our support. Which may explain why Romney suffered so many embarrassing shutouts when not a single legislator in one (often both) of the chambers backed him. The House journal9s report last year on 286 appropriations vetoes between July 19 and July 31 shows Romneys utter lack of influence.
All 286 line item vetoes were rejected, most of them by overwhelming margins from both parties. He was overridden unanimously 99 times, getting a goose egg from both House and Senate 32 times, blanked by the Senate another 42 times and shut out by the House 25 times.
Posted by singinrick at 03:12 PM : Oct 21, 2007
Rick, why do you care? Aren''t you going to be raptured out of here soon? I''m counting the minutes.
That''s simple and there''s no anti-liberal jab in there- unless you want accuse them of bad judgment...
Romney campaigned and governed as a Liberal....
Now the Romney camp wants to spin this and say see he''s electable- he got elected in a blue state...
Problem is now the cat is out of the bag... sorry boys...
in the book of Job, things go from bad to worse.
at one time, he had zillions of wives, kids, flocks,
goldmines, emeralds, rubies, everything he could
possibly imagine. then God enlists the aid of
the Lucifer, Morning Star to test his faith.
one by one, it all goes south. and all he''s
left with is a cottonmouth and a pink bra.
not even a job. he hunts for years up and down
everywhere and nobody wants him. and famine
has hit the land, but he stumbles across the gold
plates. hits upon a plan, and soon his inventory
increases miraculously according to a marvelous
work and a wonder. like our time right now.
and the mormons will feed us all? i hope.
yea, even the apache. zion national park, is
our zionist paradise, of the u.s.a. i was there
as a kid, and the river suddenly went into
flashflood. boy we were lucky. coulda been
curtains right there. i returned soon after
9/11/01 to join the mormon militia. but i had
to return to southern california, because i
had stolen my dad''s car to go there. and do
3 years at his house for auto theft. and ya
think parents can''t enforce the Law? teleology.
means to the end were illegal.
---
What GOP principles? As Bush enters his final year in office, GOP candidates are fractured along many lines. Choose your candidate, and guess his principles, in a spectrum ranging from Giuliani to Thompson. All they want is your vote, so don''t ask any questions and move along, please.
Their only recent point of convergence is rabid fear of exposure on the Tavis Smiley-moderated debate on race and other minority issues. All candidates from the GOP spontaneously canceled due to "schedule conflicts"...
Paradoxically, Romney is noted for the damning similarities his healthcare plan does bear to Clinton''s. Only last year, back in Massachusetts, Romney introduced a mandatory, government-subsidized, near-universal-coverage health plan-- in some respects, anticipating Clinton''s approach.
Dismissing the comparison, Romney remains eager to win the nomination, no matter what he must disavow. Julian Zelizer of Princeton warns, however, Romney must realize the difference between what may work at the Minneapolis convention, and what will actually win in 2008 with the American public.
"He has to be careful not to distance himself too much from his own accomplishments," he said.
You need to learn a bit more about the Mormons. They DECLARED WAR on the United States of America in the 1800''s!!! Their sacred prophet said the goal of the LDS church was to take over the government of the USA, and to rule the world. Swearing vengeance against the USA even used to be part of the secret temple rituals!
Mutt Romney, NO Thanks!!!
Posted by antoniof123
yeah, and enough of people so terribly disconnected from the lives of most americans they don''t know what the f*uck a grocery store scanner is. How many are fools enough to think that these are people hassled in the same manner as the masses when using air travel. When Blackwater starts running the check points how many are fool enough to think the neo con party elites won''t have special clearance.
---
Or, perhaps it is telling commentary on how Romney sold himself, in order to win Massachusetts.
More to the point, slogans may be conforting to Bushbots, but you didn''t stop to read the rest of the story. Massachusetts healthcare expenses actually rose after the Romney-supported plan was enacted.
Asked about the possibility of such a rise in state expenditures, Romney said his critics could be right, but rising expenditures, short-term, may very well be offset to a surplus by preventive healthcare measures.
No supporter of Romney, I must give him credit where he appears correct. Most in the medical / healthcare policy sector acknowledge prevention is better (and cheaper) than cure. Reactive policy is almost always more expensive.
As far as Romney changing his views, isn''t that what this country is all about, the personal right to have our own opinion, and when shown a better idea, to adopt that idea instead? Each day, as we become more educated, we see things differently.
I know he seems to change his mind as often as his socks, but at least he isn''t entrenched in his own views. He''s prepared to listen to people and is open about altering his opinion. Isn''t that a good thing?
Anyway, like I said, you can tell me to mind my own business.
"You need to learn a bit more about the Mormons. They DECLARED WAR on the United States of America in the 1800''''s!!! Their sacred prophet said the goal of the LDS church was to take over the government of the USA, and to rule the world. Swearing vengeance against the USA even used to be part of the secret temple rituals!..."
---
Now, Lars, let your excitement subside, and think through this carefully. Note, please, LDS never signed a formal peace treaty with the government of the United States. Technically, that means all Mormons in "good standing" are sworn enemies of this country!
Dogpile Gazette
Dogpile Missouri: We caught up with Drew our hometown champion on the steps of the state capital yesterday and inquired to his campaign for president. He stated that all was going well and that momentum was gathering in his favor. When pressed on issues such as Iraq he replied that he had a concrete plan to end the war inside of six months of his presidency. Asked about the immigration issue he again reiterated that he had the only viable plan. Asked about his plan and details of Drew was quick to respond to our questions with great insight and knowledge of the subject. He spoke fluently to the mixed audience outside the steps of the capitol, which was followed by applause. He promised his plan would indeed provide better security at home and abroad. He then went on to state that he would not only finish the war in Iraq inside of six months but he would also put an end to the war on terror bringing it also to a end inside of two years. Dogpile residents and America will indeed be watching this candiate.
The only candiate not wearing a "poodle skirt".
---
Precisely the point, Stezzer. To central casting, anyone off the street has a chance at a starring role. The question, is there any competence lurking behind the mask?
To most aliens, Bush himself initially seemed "presidential"-- but boy, were they surprised later to find this Tejas country boy (ska aspiring redneck) mouthing the latest neocon slogans he had been sold.
Nominee Romney: "I am a true centrist."
Double your money back guarantee that he will emphasize his moderation if nominated.
He has governed as a Clinton style business friendly liberal.
Vote Ron Paul ''the last true Republican'' for 2008.
Yes, I see your point. However, in England, our politicians are so wishy washy and bland (almost ashamed of being British) that someone like Mr. Romney seems very strong and patriotic. It''s very admirable.
I just can''t help wishing we had a chap like this to vote for.
The Church, in one of it most oppressive times in history, put together a battallion when called upon by the US government. Numerous men left their families vulnerable to the elements to go and serve their country. Today, there are numerous military leaders and soldiers that are LDS, including my late grandfather who faught in WWII and the Korean War. The LDS Church is the epidemy of patriotism.
Posted by proshutterbu at 04:48 PM : Oct 21, 2007
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
According to many reports and articles I have read about Romney, he has changed his standing on far too many issues (which obviously improve his chances to achieve the office he is pursuing at the time), to be simple re-enlightenment.
If He is/has changed his PUBLIC opinion just for political purposes it casts a large shadow over his honesty and character.
Even giving Romney the benefit of the doubt, his being wrong on so many things in so short a time doesn%u2019t bode well for having him as president of the United States.
Haven%u2019t we been through enough of that lately?
Yes I suppose you''re right. I just can''t help liking Mr. Romney.
However, I''m certainly no expert. I''m only basing my opinions on what the man has said and done. I just think changing one''s mind shouldn''t be a problem. Don''t we all change our opinions as we get older?
Posted by akoeppen at 05:44 PM : Oct 21, 2007
Don''t ferget the waggon train massacre and bigomy while you''re sounding off.
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Posted by Stezzer at 05:55 PM : Oct 21, 2007
Churchill switched political parties
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