This morning at the gym, as I enjoyed one of my favorite parts of the day (working up a sweat during MSNBC's Morning Joe), I had a realization: something inside me subconsciously really wants Mitt Romney to be the Republican nominee. Every time another candidate battles with him at the top of the polls, I find myself really frustrated and hating the competing candidate. This is not without good reason, of course: how can you not hate Herman Cain? [Caveat: Looks like he is finally taking himself out of the race. Who wants to bet on when he formally withdraws? I say Monday. Also, his campaign is terribly managed. Obviously he is too incompetent and made too many mistakes to stay at the top of the polls for long, but dropping out is like a not-so-subtle confirmation of the White affair.]
I wasn't sure I could despise someone more than Herman Cain, but then along came Newt Gingrich. When Newt started surging in the polls, I didn't take it too seriously. Newt's personal background is not exactly the clean picture of Christian morality that most Republican candidates would like to paint, and he is more of a Washington insider than Obama - the president. Putting my personal assessment of Newt aside, the most important and relevant consideration is whether or not he proves to have staying power. The Romney campaign recently decided to make a concerted effort to directly and indirectly attack Newt on his policies and flip-flopping, a significant change from its strategy thus far. In the past few months, all Mitt Romney and his campaign had to do was sit back and wait for the "flavor of the week" (Bachmann, Perry, Cain) to shoot himself or herself in the foot enough times to fizzle out. But now, this obvious shift in strategy to actually attack the front runner could potentially be interpreted as some kind of validation of the competitiveness or legitimacy of Newt Gingrich and his electability. Is the Romney camp actually afraid that Newt could actually stay on top for another month?
If they are afraid, they shouldn't be - and they must have missed the last ridiculously arrogant and offensive remarks good ole' Newt made. The fact that Newt was a lobbyist seems pretty indisputable, to me, but he has been defending this claim for weeks. In his most recent explanation of receiving over $1.5 million to give advice to Freddie & Frannie, Newt said that he didn't even need that money: he was raking in $60,000 per speech. And on top of that, he alluded to being a celebrity.
I talked about this in my last post, so apologies for repeating myself, but Newt Gingrich is the exact opposite of what the Republican base thinks it wants. He has championed himself on being the most "professorial" politician in decades; Republicans have not stopped criticizing Obama for being professorial since he entered office. He has considerable ties to big bankers; Republicans won't lay off Obama for receiving money from Wall Street. He brags about his income when the very people the Republican party is trying to attract are those that are struggling in this difficult economic time! And beyond the absolute hypocrisy of it all is the fundamental insensitivity of these types of comments. If I stay at this job for a full year, I will have made less than half of what Newt bragged about making from a single speech. More now than ever, income is a touchy subject for most Americans. So why would someone running for president think it was a good idea to basically throw something like this in the face of millions of Americans? The implications of candidates' mistakes, missteps, and scandal usually take about a week to be reflected in the polls, so I guess we'll have to wait and see if Newt's remarks had as big an impact on Republican voters as they did on me, but I can only hope this was his bullet in the foot.
This brings me to the second half of my blog title: "My Illogical Support for Romney." Again reiterating a previous post, I have been somewhat critical of Obama and largely disengaged from the political scene for the past couple of years but, more recently, my Democratic fervor has intensified, making me somewhat obsessed with following every move on the campaign trail and here in Washington. In addition to simply being fascinated by this roller-coaster ride of a primary season, I am genuinely concerned about the future of our country. To say that Obama inherited a colossal mess is an understatement. Despite his efforts, Obama has not been able to help our country rebound quickly enough - resulting in his current historically low approval ratings. With a still struggling economy and job market and Republican-controlled House unwilling to compromise on anything, Obama has been set up for a rougher road to reelection than most incumbents face.
But what I have come to more whole-heartedly believe is that America desperately needs Obama to win in 2012. A Republican president would only add to the deficit, widen the gap between the rich and poor and lead us blindly into another war. With these fears in mind, you would think I (and other Democrats) would be inclined to support the most ridiculous Republican candidate out there, the one with the smallest chance of defeating Obama. So why, then, have a become a subconscious Romney supporter? Aside from Huntsman, Romney stands the best chance at beating Obama: he's competent, good looking, and moderate enough to win over independents and maybe fiscally-conservative Democrats. But if he's the best competition, shouldn't I (shouldn't we all) be rooting against him?! Maybe my fear of Newt or Rick Perry as president far outweighs my fear of Obama being beaten. I don't usually push for comments on my blog (as I assume very few people read it), but I wonder: Is it more logical to indirectly "support" Romney or to vehemently oppose and hate the one person who has a fighting chance at beating Obama?
