Posted by
Bert Chapman on Thursday, February 07, 2008 7:47:30 PM
Mitt Romney, the GOP's most intellectually qualified presidential candidate, sadly decided to suspend his candidacy today. He was done in by intellectual pygmies who couldn't accept that he has evolved into a genuine social, economic, and national security conservative from earlier more centrist positions. Unfortunately, there are some uptight anal retentive pricks within the conservative movement, who remain fixated on past mistaken positions of individuals and don't examine the positions they hold now and are likely to hold in the future and incorporate into their policymaking. You would think pro-life conservatives and those favoring traditional marriage would be thrilled that Romney had moved to accept those positions based on his experiences as Massachusetts governor. Unfortunately, some conservatives have forgotten the wisdom expressed by Jesus in Luke 15:7 and remain maniacally obsessed by positions Romney took in earlier political campaigns. Is it a requirement for prospective conservative officeholders that we have to hold the exact same position on political issues from conception until we announce our candidacy for public office?
Romney's speech today was a wonderful assessment of the need to make our economy more market oriented, of the imperative of aggressively fighting Jihadist terror, and of the importance of having a moral culture to achieve economic growth. He was the only candidate to stress the dangerous consequences of illegitimate births on society and the need for stable marriages and two-parent families as being essential prerequisites for societal growth and development. He would have been a much more effective communicator of conservative values against the egregiously flawed ideology of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Hopefully, Romney will get the opportunity to serve our country in national office of some kind.
As a loyal Republican, I will support John McCain because the prospects of a Clinton or Obama presidency are exceedingly hideous. I cannot support McCain with any enthusiasm at this point. I hope over the next few months he will be able to demonstrate that he is committed to conservative governance and public policy and that he has sound conservative beliefs at the core of his political and governing philosophies and is not interested in power for its own sake or because he feels he's entitled to the presidency because of his military service or congressional service. McCain's CPAC speech today had some small steps in the right direction, but it will take much more sustained work on his behalf to convince me as a full spectrum conservative that he will seek to implement conservative policies and not curry favor with congressional or other east coast Democrats.