Posted by
Steve on Friday, February 10, 2012 1:46:57 PM
This weekend is the CPAC convention. It is the convention where conservatives get together and discuss the important issues of the day. Today, Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich will be speaking to the convention. By the time I am writing this, Rick Santorum is most likely finished and Mitt Romney is probably speaking.
Early on in the convention Mike Huckabee said that, “We are all Catholics now”. That is a statement used by Glenn Beck for the last couple of weeks. But it brought the convention to its feet. Everyone thinks that Mike Huckabee is great because of this statement. I agree the sentiment is great. We are all Catholics now that Obama has decided to declare war on the first amendment to the Constitution. But, I still have a bad taste in my mouth over Mike Huckabee. I bet if the Mormons were targeted instead of the Catholics, he would never have said, “We are all Mormons now”. He would rather die than say something positive about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
On the talks for today, I am sure that Rick Santorum will talk a lot about family values. That is his issue and he does well when he discusses family values. His problem is that he will never be able to ride that one issue to the Presidency. At some time he has to widen his discussion to include other topics. This speech to CPAC would be a great time to do just that.
Mitt Romney is not a great speaker. He is a good speaker, but not great. He can bring crowds to their feet, but generally does not. He needs to lie out why he is a conservative and what he intends to do to defeat Obama in the fall. He should not attack any of the other candidates. Let the other candidates hang themselves with their own words. He should target his speech to Obama and give the crowd the red meat it wants. If he does this he can come out of it with a very positive message. He might even be able to pull off a straw poll victory tomorrow. If he gives a stump speech he will be soundly defeated during the straw poll tomorrow. He needs to give the crowd what they want in a candidate.
Newt Gingrich is a great speaker. Unfortunately he has a thin skin and holds grudges. He most likely will try and skewer Mitt Romney and probably Rick Santorum more than he will attack Barack Obama. If he does that he will sound petty and diminish his showing in the straw poll tomorrow.
CPAC has a great opportunity to hear the three main nominees for the Presidency in one setting. This will allow them to evaluate and compare each candidate. They hold a straw poll before the close of the convention to get a sense of where the conservatives feel the party is headed. It will be interesting to see how the candidates do in the straw poll this year.
After Santorum’s victories in Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri, he is now very much in the thick of the race. It remains to be seen how long he can hang with Romney as he is still grossly underfunded. That may change if people perceive him having a real chance, but at least for now, funding is his most pressing problem. That could hamper his ability to pull a miracle out of his hat.