Mitt Romney's Rebound Plan
CBSNews.com Reports: Stung By Iowa Loss, Republican Takes Up Banner Of Change While Going After McCain
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Romney Looks Forward To N.H.
After placing second to Mike Huckabee, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney tells Harry Smith that the results of Iowa signals Americans' greater need for change in Washington.
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Huckabee Revels In Iowa Win
Mike Huckabee is riding high after his Iowa win and only needs to play it cool in N.H. to stay on top. Nancy Cordes reports.
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McCain Focuses On N.H.
Harry Smith speaks with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz, about the results of the Iowa caucuses and what he plans to do to ensure a win in New Hampshire.
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Mitt Romney
He turned around companies, and the Olympics and ran for president pledging to turn around the country.
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The latest list of primary and caucus dates as states continue jockeying for position.
For Mitt Romney, this was supposed to be the easy part.
His original game plan called for him to cruise off a big win in Iowa to the primary in New Hampshire, where voters more focused on fiscal conservatism than social issues like abortion - an issue on which Romney’s shifting views have drawn scrutiny - would reward the former governor of neighboring Massachusetts with another victory and propel him toward the GOP nomination.
In fact, even when Mike Huckabee began his ascendance in Iowa, one that culminated in his convincing victory in Thursday’s caucuses, New Hampshire was still viewed as a firewall for the Romney campaign. Polls there showed him with a solid lead - but that collapsed in the two weeks preceding the caucuses, when John McCain, once beleagured, quickly caught up to Romney, and in some surveys, even passed him.
Winning in Iowa would have been the best way to reverse that situation - and since that did not come to pass, the Romney campaign is now shifting gears by borrowing a page from the book of an unlikely candidate: Barack Obama, whose message of change helped him win Iowa’s Democratic contest.
At an event in Manchester on Friday, Romney seemed to work the “c-word” in at every possible opportunity.
“If you really want to have change, you don’t just want to have a gadfly or somebody fighting for this or fighting for that,” Romney said. “You want to have somebody who will bring change, who will sell the company America has - it’s going to have to be somebody from outside Washington, not a Washington insider.”
Sometimes, he even gets the word in twice in one sentence: “I’ve seen how change can change an industry,” he said, capping off an anecdote detailing his investment in the office supply store that grew into the Staples chain.
But for all the talk of change, some aspects of Romney’s campaign haven’t. Take his advertising. In New Hampshire, the target is different - it’s McCain instead of Huckabee - but in terms of look and structure, his spots in the two states are identical. In both cases, there’s an initial nicety, describing Romney and, most recently, McCain as “two good men.”
After that comes harsh criticism of McCain’s views on immigration and tax cuts - a method McCain has said didn’t work in Iowa and wouldn’t work in New Hampshire.
But the Romney campaign believes the ads weren’t why Romney lost in Iowa, and the results there should not be seen as proof of their ineffectiveness.
“I don’t agree that we lost to Huckabee because we ran ads,” said Romney spokesman Kevin Madden. “I think Huckabee won because he identified with a lot of the core voters out there, such as evangelicals, on a lot of social conservative issues. He had a lot of voters he identified with, with what is a traditional, conservative part of that base out there. He did a good job doing that. We competed with Mike Huckabee on those votes, and we met our vote goals pretty much.”
Besides, Madden said, McCain’s logic is obscured by what they see as hypocrisy: McCain is also airing ads critical of Romney in New Hampshire, including one that uses images of gun-toting terrorists before accusing Romney of having no foreign policy credentials.
“All the messages that’s we’ve put here have been substantive and relevant,” Madden said. “Look at John McCain’s messaging: he’s done nothing but attack us the last couple of weeks.”
The campaign also believes depicting McCain as a “Washington insider” will work, despite the Arizona senator’s reputation for being a maverick unafraid to go against GOP orthodoxy.
“I think what people want is substantive change,” Madden said. “They want a solution-oriented approach, not a maverick-oriented approach. A maverick-oriented approach means you tend to go against the grain, and as we know that’s not exactly going to get anything done, and there hasn’t been a long record of results, of meaningful reform, exhibited by Sen. McCain in 25-plus years in Congress.”
The pitch could work - state GOP chairman Fergus Cullen said McCain’s image in the state isn’t like it was eight years ago, when he defeated George W. Bush in the 2000 primary.
“This time around McCain has made a conscious effort to court the so-called establishment as well as retain a bit of the maverick image,” Cullen said. “He isn’t running against he system the way he did eight years ago.”
McCain isn’t Romney’s only concern, however. Huckabee was trailing badly in New Hampshire before the caucuses, but his win there could give him a boost unlikely to fade with the primary only three days away.
“As a tactical matter, Huckabee’s success in Iowa means there are hundreds of people in New Hampshire who are at least taking a second look at him,” Cullen said.
And the two candidates are running campaigns that couldn’t be more different. Romney often pitches himself to New Hampshire voters as CEO in chief, discussing his success in business, in reviving the 2002 Salt Lake Olympic Games, and in working with an overwhelmingly Democratic legislature in Massachusetts to implement universal health care.
“You’ve only got one guy running for president who’s signed the front of an employment check,” Romney said Friday.
Compare that with a line delivered by Huckabee only hours earlier: “One of the reasons I did well in Iowa, and I’ll do well here, is that people realized that they want a president who reminds them of the guy they worked with, not the guy who laid them off.”
The disparate messages may be emblematic of a growing divide in the Republican Party, which is seeing the coalition built by Ronald Reagan - between blue-collar workers, the business community and Christian conservatives - put under severe distress, said GOP consultant Mike Collins.
“I think it’s more of a universal problem than a Mitt Romney or Mike Huckabee or Fred Thompson solution. We’re battling for the soul of the Republican Party,” he said. “You have very discrete elements of this party that are coming apart at the seams.”
Yet Romney’s campaign maintains that they, alone among the GOP field, have support that is deep and broad enough to keep Republicans unified - an essential for winning in November.
“A lot of the other candidates seem to be working on a slingshot effect - do well in one state and hope it builds momentum for other states,” Madden said. “We have a greater ability to motivate our organization as well as deploy the resources across several states in order to compete.”
But ironically, Romney may now be reliant on the same slingshot effect, even as they maintain they could survive a second-place finish - one that most observers agree would be a devastating loss, given the high expectations driven by campaign’s large organization and vast financial resources.
Romney’s core of New Hampshire supporters isn’t dispirited though, said state Sen. Bruce Keough, who chairs the candidate’s organization in the Granite State.
“Iowa does its thing and now we do ours,” he said. “Historically, New Hampshire people have been independent. We make up our own minds.”
However, despite what the campaigns - and many New Hampshire voters - say, the reality is that the Iowa results, at the very least, can unsettle the field, if not change its order, Cullen said.
“Everyone wants to think they’re immune to outside influences, but that’s just not true,” he said.
By David Miller
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New Hampshire GOP Primary Poll Results (Jan 4/08)
John McCain 31%
Mitt Romney 26%
Ron Paul 14%
Mike Huckabee 11%
Rudy Giuliani 8%
Fred Thompson 5%
Some other candidate 2%
Is Ron Paul still being blackballed from that Fox debate?
My fellow Americans the corrupt folks at CBS have tremdous "HATRED" for Mitt Romney and they along with 90% of the rest of the wolfpack are working together to de-rail Mitt before he can win the GOP nomination. THIS IS THE FACTS AND THE TRUTH.
GO MITT !!!!!
That makes a Silver in Iowa and now a Gold in Wyoming.........great.
Mitt leads all others in the GOP delegate count. Mitt is the most qualified candidate running from either party in 2008, he knows how to "FIX" Washington DC
Did the Iowa women vote for Obama because he is young and good looking? Or because Ophray is their idol? Who knows! It surely wasn''t because Obama is qualified.
Huckabee%u2019s win is a different story. For instance, if the caucus had been held in the State of Utah, would it have been of any surprise that Mitt Romney would have prevailed? Of course not. Huckabee is a "former Baptist Preacher" a notation pointed out to the point that one wonders if his last name isn''t "former Baptist Preacher". The Iowa population is a predominantly evangelical state and so it is natural for them to vote for "their kind". Some would call it bigotry. I wouldn''t, unless a person voted against Romney solely on the fact that he is Mormon.
The Iowa results means nothing more.
I did laugh at Edwards "acceptance speech" and how he pointed out the plight of the poor, the 200,000 veterans "living homeless on the streets", etc. About how we need to do something about it. And then he went home to his 20,000+ sq ft mansion.
So you must love John Edwards
Doesn''t matter how stupid or futile it is,every other year another member of the elite has to show us just how little respect has for the common man.Also,me thinks this guy''s brain has reached such a level of sclerotics(degenerate disease)that he can''t even manage to think in other way.Blame it on living too long in corporate circles.
Go make some yourself for once in your life. I''m worth over $1.5 Mil. How about you?
Iraq for 100 years or a 1000 years.....Nice huh!!!! McWar needs to put his own kids in Iraq and in the front
lines!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sadly, I think one of McCain''s kids did join the military and will probably be at war sometime soon. family tradition thing, I guess. I was in the military too, but now I think it was a big mistake and I wish I''d never joined. We have a warfare mentality and economy. We''re quick to criticize other countries, but the truth is we export more arms and more direct military intervention than any other country. America exports war. America tortures prisoners. I wish it was different and we took care of more problems at home, but we just don''t because big business has too much at stake for peace to prevail.
You said it. Just look at all the GOP candidates out there harkening back to the good old days under Reagan, as if there were any. It''s a mirage they''re trying to create. Reagan the GOP patron saint died dried up and senile, unable to distinguish his own dork from a pickle at a salad bar. I think a good bit of that crept into his last term in office too, when his handlers learned not to let him out of their reach for fear he''d say something stupid in front of the media. He was a sham anyway, with his fake cowboy image and Devo plastic hair.
lets keep the separation of church and state and keep these insane pricks out of washington
Posted by michaelt302 at 08:37 PM : Jan 05, 2008
sorry, michael, but only a lesbian would use the term "hyper-feminized" -- are you trying to tell us something?
About 120,000 residents took part in the GOP caucus this week, a 36 percent increase over the last contested GOP event, in 2000.%u2019
this is a 2:1 turnout ratio of dems to repubs- many have suggested this includes many former repubs who have gone democrat. this is something the GOP is worried about bigtime.
the GOP is digging its own grave by pushing candidates like romney and mccain and giulliani (to a lesser degree fred who i dont think anyone really understands what he is doing) with the same old establishment message or even worse. the public showed thier dismay for a party failing to admit to huge errors, an inability to hold themselves accountable which turns into distrust, plain old arrogance, and a new way out. this is likely the reason hillary did so poorly also.
interesting that the big issues of the day are the war in iraq and the economy and yet the candidate who receives more donations from active duty servicemen, and the candidate who fights hardest for saving the dollar from crashing and saving us from over taxation is being excluded from the jan 6th fox news debate.
http://www.ronpaul2008.com/veterans/
Forget about it, Willard.
White boys can"t jump.
Is there any candidate who looks like and acts like the OTHER 95% of Americans... you know...
...someone who goes shopping on their own, drives their own car, washes their own dishes and clothes, mows their own lawn, and vacuums their own carpet of a house that is less than 3,000 square feet?!
USAyesterday
No, there isn''t. That''s because it takes so much money to buy high office in the U.S. Those that get there are spending their own wealth and or corporate/special interest money. We need to buy our Democracy back by locking out corporate/special interest money and publicly financing viable candidates.
Posted by micma at 12:24 PM : Jan 06, 2008
...............
That is clearly the solution.
But the big question is, how can this change be implemented, and who can lead implementation of this change?
To simply say "get involved by voting" is extremely elementary. Why our democracy is corrupt and crumbling is NOT because of the lack of people voting...
...it is because those who vote are (mostly) uneducated about the politicians they are voting for.
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! GET RID OF THESE ILLEGAL ALIEN INVADERS, NOW!
McCain is just a democrat. No wonder the press likes him so much. He will bring change - the change in your pocket. Personally I would like to keep my change, that is why I am voting for Mitt Romney. He knows how to generate jobs and trim government.
http://aafla.org/SportsLibrary/Olympika/Olympika_2002/olympika1101b.pdf
he outwhine ron paul.
and his polls slip to single digit (gallop poll) and his campaign staff thinks he will still win.
do they really believe american voters are that stupid?
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by trinitron01
January 7, 2008 10:29 PM PST
- Hello People! You have a real chance to get the best man in office with a perfect record in congress-- none of them come close to Dr. Ron Paul. I have compared them. I didn''''t know who was who and didnt trust the media machine. Look up ronpaul2008.com and his issues and record, and you will see for yourself. Don''''t be fooled by the imitators, there is only one guy that can really make a difference for the people. Also Dr. Ron Paul is on TONIGHT WITH JAY LENO - Tonight!!!
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