Frum writes: "The most quoted speech at CPAC this year was Mitt Romney's, but my vote for the most significant goes to Grover Norquist's. In his charmingly blunt way, Norquist articulated out loud a case for Mitt Romney that you hear only whispered by other major conservative leaders."
GOP rainmaker Grover Norquist speaks at the conservative Americans for Prosperity 'Defending the American Dream Summit' in Washington, 11/05/11. (photo: Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images)
Norquist: Romney Will Do As Told
14 February 12
Is Mitt Romney so weak he won't be able to stand up to Congress?
he most quoted speech at CPAC this year was Mitt Romney's, but my vote for the most significant goes to Grover Norquist's. In his charmingly blunt way, Norquist articulated out loud a case for Mitt Romney that you hear only whispered by other major conservative leaders.
They have reconciled themselves to a Romney candidacy because they see Romney as essentially a weak and passive president who will concede leadership to congressional conservatives:
All we have to do is replace Obama. ... We are not auditioning for fearless leader. We don't need a president to tell us in what direction to go. We know what direction to go. We want the Ryan budget. ... We just need a president to sign this stuff. We don't need someone to think it up or design it. The leadership now for the modern conservative movement for the next 20 years will be coming out of the House and the Senate.
The requirement for president?
Pick a Republican with enough working digits to handle a pen to become president of the United States. This is a change for Republicans: the House and Senate doing the work with the president signing bills. His job is to be captain of the team, to sign the legislation that has already been prepared.
This is not a very complimentary assessment of Romney's leadership. It's also not a very realistic political program: congressional Republicans have a disapproval rating of about 75%. If Americans get the idea that a vote for Romney is a vote for the Ryan plan, Romney is more or less doomed.
To date, sad to say, Romney has worked hard to confirm this image of weakness.
Nobody wants a president who acts as the passive instrument of even generally popular groups like labor unions. (Did you know that - despite decades of declining popularity - unions still have an approval rating of 52%? I didn't until I looked it up.)
But a candidate who appeases the most disliked people in national politics? That guy will command neither public affection nor respect.
Mitt Romney badly needs his Sister Souljah moment. Instead, he's running as Jim DeMint's doormat.
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"Country First", huh? D'uh!
unfortunately when israel hits iran and iran hits back...I suspect we will at best have martial law under a democrat and at worst a right wing military coup
He was up to his eyeballs with Jack Abramoff and yet did not get charged with any crimes. Jack took the fall for him.
I guess being a leader of the neo-cons is not so hard to do. they are programmed to follow any sort of idiocy.
Quite a vision for the future, though I must say, not entirely original. At least in recent memory, we have Reagan and Bush as examples.
But it does get to who exactly is it, then, that Republicans want the country run by? The Republican Senate, clearly owned by the corporations, the banks, and the very wealthy, would be your answer.
And this is their vision for America? A country with an increasingly uneducated, stupid (and powerless) middle class that will be forced to work for minimum wages at the hands of people like the Koch brothers? A country where even the president is only a puppet?
Even George Orwell (were he alive) would surely blanch at what Republicans are fashioning for America's future. Dystopia indeed.
Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821) wrote in 1811: “Toute nation a le gouvernement qu’elle merite.” ("Every nation has the government it deserves.")He was in favor of restoring the monarchy after the French revolution. A nation of sheep will be governed by shphards. The sheep will eventually be led to sheering and when the wool is not enough, to the slaughter house.
Can you imagine a Lobbyist leading the country?. It's already happening in the Senate and House for the Republicans. They are afraid to say no or stand up against him. That's why Boehner can't get a budget done.
No people "deserves" to be beaten into submission by its dictator (most of whom couldn't succeed were it not for US assistance)
It would benefit Mr. Grover Norquist to spend some quite time with Cannon's book before he and the GOP talk themselves into (another) corner.
Why would anyone not in the grip of Republican Derangement Syndrome think the Congressional Republicans are leaders?
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