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Looks like all those endorsements John McCain has picked up in the past couple of weeks come with a cost (other than losing of course), which is flip-flopping Mitt Romney weighing down his his ticket. When it comes to saying all the right things to conservatives, no one did it better this year than Mitt Romney. (No one could boast such an expensive loss, either.)
Now, President Bush and his brother Jeb are both recommending Mitt for vice president, as is another far right-winger, Bill Kristol, who even says he ran it by Karl Rove though it surprises us that Karl doesn't know better.
It's probably pointless to remind everyone that until 2005, Romney was a pro-choice, pro-civil union, universal health-care loving, free-spending liberal, and that all he's done is commit deeply to barking the crazy conservative rhetoric canonizing Reagan and so forth.
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It's true that being willing to say these things in front of the whole country would seem to demonstrate a commitment to the principles behind them, but it will be hilarious come the general election to watch Romney revert back to the center proving his one and only true allegiance: the direction of the wind at any given moment.
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Mitt Romney quit his bid for the Republican nomination in a speech at the Conservative Political Action this afternoon. Romney was trounced by Sen. John McCain in the 24-state primary on Tuesday after pouring tens of millions of his personal fortune into the race. Romney also secured the support of pundit royalty from Sean Hannity to Ann Coulter to Rush Limbaugh. Talk Radio personality Laura Ingraham, at the CPAC conference as a "footsoldier in the Reagan Revolution" who "knows a Reaganite when she sees one," introduced Mitt Romney to eager crowd, but not before taking jabs at Hillary Clinton and the media.
After outlining his his vision for America and challenges facing the next president of the states, relying heavily on proven conservative applause lines. Romney then told the crowd that, for the sake of party unity, he intends to suspend his presidential campaign.
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"If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention, I would forestall the launch of a national campaign and frankly I'd be making it easier for Senator Clinton or Obama to win," Romney said. "And in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign, be a part of aiding a surrender to terror." The feel of the room immediately changed, the crowd letting out a collective groan at Romney's exit, and Romney, in a moment sheer sincerity said, "You guys are great." A few more moments of well wishes and he was off, handing the nomination to Sen. John McCain.
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Every candidate picked up delegates and nobody is feeling compelled to drop out of the race. John McCain claims front runner status on the Republican side, by winning Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New York and Oklahoma, and bringing his total to 613 delegates.Mitt Romney is up to only 269 from wins in Alaska, Colorado, Massachusetts and Minnesota.Mike Huckabee did surprisingly well, winning across the South in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee and West Virginia.
Hillary Clinton won 845 delegates from Arizona, Arkansas, California, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Oklahoma and Tennessee. Barrack Obama was right behind her, bringing his total to 765. He carried Alaska, Alabama, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota and Utah.
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The Democratic race remains locked in a dead heat.Democrats could be headed for a brokered convention to determine their nominee. A crisis could occur if Obama goes into the convention with slightly more delegates than Clinton; the Superdelegates could still make her the nominee.McCain is way out in front of the Republican pack. Huckabee's continued presence in the race will help McCain, hurt Romney
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While John McCain and Mitt Romney are fighting for survival out in California, both of the leading Democrats are spending their Super Tuesday on their home turf, Obama in Illinois and Clinton in New York. Much has been made of the closeness of this race, and last night both candidates were trying to downplay expectations of today's votes yielding an outright victory for either of them. These choices, perhaps, are indicative of the long fight still ahead for the Democratic nomination in a race that has become to close that less is actually at sake for the the Democrats today than the Republicans.
Both had to return home to cast their own ballots, but even so and have deployed high-profile surrogates to do the heavy-lifting for them today, but it's still curious that both Obama and Clinton would chose to stay on safe ground rather than shore up support in battleground areas like California or New Jersey today.
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Hoever, John McCain may not be able to seal the deal on his nomination by the evening either. A new Zogby/C-Span poll released this morning shows Romney pulling ahead of McCain in California, which may mean tighter races for the Republicans in other states as well.
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Today, 24 states will hold their primary elections and caucuses and then, finally then, we will be in the home stretch of this thing ("this thing" being the nominating process). That is, unless, the election remains as tightly locked as it has been previously. In that case, the parties head into "brokered" conventions in August to determine the nominees. In that nightmare scenario, we have to put up with the intra-party battle royal for another six months. But we're not worried, America, because we know you're not going to let that happen.
For a party completely fractured and divided, the GOP looks ready to send John McCain straight to the general election, trouncing his opponent, the frantic and wild-eyed non-contender Mitt Romney in most major contests tomorrow including (but not limited to) California, New York and New Jersey and Connecticut. Romney will walk away with Massachusetts, Utah (where will literally get 99% of the vote) and has a decent shot and taking Georgia.
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Things are not so clear cut on the other side of the aisle. An encouraging sign for 65% of Americans who will vote Democratic in the general election this year, though, is the uncanny ability of both leading contenders to resist the systematic destruction of their own candidacies, an usual feat for Democrats in an election year. Going into Super Tuesday, Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are locked in a dead heat in most important states, with almost every poll yielding nearly essentially worthless results. As of yesterday, Clinton held a narrow lead in coveted California after a sharp decline in the face of Obama's gains. The same holds true for Connecticut, Massachusetts, Missouri, and New Jersey. Clinton can expect to walk away with her home state of New York and Oklahoma. Safely in the Obama column are Illinois and Utah, which makes Hillary and Obama just about even.
But who has the edge you ask? A CNN poll released earlier today shows that Clinton has been overtaken by Obama nationally, and the Junior Senator from Illinois must be confident knowing that going into Super Tuesday, he is in his strongest position ever against the titan Clinton. Also not hurting Obama is the fact that Vanity Fair put his baby pictures up on their website today. Seriously, he's going to be like the most adorable president ever.
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Tomorrow, 24 states hold their assorted primaries and caucuses, which could, though conceivably won't, produce nominees for president from both parties. There is, of course, the demand - whether perceived or real is unclear - on media outlets to provide constant coverage of the race, even when there isn't all that much to cover.
Over the weekend and continuing into today, countless journalists have phoned in state-of-the-race type pieces, each trying to find an angle in this latest race-to-the-finish moment; the fury of the campaigning, the prevalence of anti-Clinton rhetoric, the massive size and expense of the candidates' various ad buys, the unpredictable nature of the race.No event, not even a "transformational," "recording-breaking" and "history-making" election like this one could possibly generate enough actual news to meet the hyper-active, round-the-clock demands of cable news.
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Here's the news: there's a huge vote tomorrow, and no one knows what's going to happen. The race is fickle and has demonstrated that no amount of polling or speculating or punditry can predict the outcome until we're done counting votes. What if the talking heads stopped talking and the blogosphere stopped blogging and everyone was aloud enough quiet to hear themselves think and then go cast a vote? What would happen then?
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WhiteHouse.com Exclusive: In a crazy incident WhiteHouse.com tried to take a picture of Barack Obama's bus to put on the website but was rebuffed by the Secret Service detail at his campaign stop. We traveled several hours by car to see the electrifying Barack Obama in person to get a feel for the electricity he shares with his supporters. The campaign stop held 2500 people but about 3000 people including ourselves showed up. Click on arrow to start video. (Video is 5 Minutes in length)
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We waited outside for about an hour with hundreds of supporters until the Fire Marshall signaled that they would not let anybody else in due to overcrowding concerns. From there we walked around the facility to get a picture of his bus and maybe get a picture of him leaving the facility. We were quickly confronted by police who would not allow us to even stay on a public sidewalk which was 40 feet from the bus.
When we came around to take a photo of the bus for this website we were quickly confronted by a Secret Service person who demanded we not take any pictures of his bus. We felt this was amazing considering as you can see in the video, we have been able to go right up to most of the other candidates. We shook hands hands with several of the candidates and even with President Bill Clinton with Secret Service all around him. We even got a campaign question in to Fred Thompson which he gladly answered at a press conference.
We left, even though we felt we were in the right . We did not want to inflame the situation as we understand special security procedures have been put in place due to Barack Obama's historic run for the White House.
We are asking our audience to comment on whether you would have stayed and protected your Free Speech rights or would you have left as we did. We also want to know if you think the Secret Service were out of line in their actions? Just remember you did not see a picture of his bus on WhiteHouse.com. Click on arrow to start video. You can also adjust sound by clicking on volume control in lower right corner.
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John McCain won a big victory yesterday in Florida. Only registered Republicans were allowed to vote in the Florida primary and by winning the contest McCain cemented himself as the clear frontrunner going into Super Tuesday. Mitt Romney came in second despite spending an estimated 30 million on advertising in the state which was 5 times was McCain spent. Rudy Giuliani came in a disappointing third. Mike Huckabee came in fourth and Ron Paul came in 5th.
On the Democratic site Hillary coasted to an easy victory receiving almost 300,000 more votes than Barack Obama. John Edwards came in third again. Even though on the Democratic side it was only considered a Beauty contest since no delegates were awarded, Hillary came out as the pageant queen as her campaign is using the victory to downplay Obama's lopsided victory in South Carolina.
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On the Democratic side John Edwards isleaving the race and not endorsing any of the other Democratic candidates and on the Republican side Rudy Giuliani is leaving the race and is planning on endorsing John McCain.
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Republicans and Democrats go to the polls today in Florida. The Republican side of the primary shows a dead heat between John McCain and Mitt Romney. The Democratic side which was not really contested should be going big for Hillary Clinton as she has most of the power players in Florida on her side. Obama by getting the Kennedy endorsements should get a boost among Hispanics who respect the Kennedy legacy.
McCain and Romney have been going at it for the last week on comments made by McCain about Romney’s alleged statements about withdrawing from Iraq. Rudy Giuliani who was the clear front runner up until about a month ago when he started fading fast. Different pundits have speculated that Giuliani will leave the race if he comes in third in Florida as projected. Huckabee is running in fourth place and will also be a non factor going forward if he does not improve his poll numbers. Ron Paul has not really resonated with voters in the state.
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It was a much more subdued affair than the fiery Democratic debate just a couple days earlier. Romney came out talking about his economic accomplishments both as a Governor and a businessman and that he would be the best candidate to lead this country on economic issues. He also had the best soud bite of the evening when he was asked about running against the Clinton team, "The idea of Bill Clinton back in the White House with nothing to do is something I can’t imagine" . Giuliani was asked about his hometown paper the New York Times endorsing John McCain and issuing the following scathing analysis of Rudy Giuliani describing him as, "a narrow, obsessively secretive, vindictive man." Rudy was the big loser of the night as he was also asked about his free fall in the polls from the clear leader in Florida to third place and he responded that he expected to win just like his hometown New York Giants did in reaching the Super Bowl.
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McCain really did ntot do much but brought laughter in commenting about remarks made abut thim by his 95 year old mother and actor Chuck Norris. He also defended the war in Iraq. Hucakbaee also brought laughs to the crowd with some of his responses and actually seemed to be the most relaxed candidate on the stage. Ron Paul also took the stage and took his less government message to the crowd.
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Talk about the dead coming to life. Much maligned candidate John McCain has risen from the dead to catch up to Romney in the New Hampshire primary. After critical missteps on the war and on immigration McCain has righted the ship and revived his campaign to become President. The unrest in Pakistan could be drawing voters to McCain due to his seasoning and military background. The political infighting between Huckabee and Romney had also taken its toll on the Romney campaign. Guiliani comes in at a distant third in the latest polls.
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Republican Candidate Mike Hucakbee blasted fellow candidate Mitt Romney as dishonest. Huckabee also said he would not support Romney if he was the eventual Republican presidential candidate. They are tied at the top of the polls in Iowa which is the first primary race. You have to wonder if all the fighting between Hucakbee and Romney may hurt them in the race with most American's being disatisfied with the current feduing that goes on now in Washington. It will remain to be seen if the other candidates will gain at the expense of the two frontrunners when the votes are actually cast.
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