UPDATE:

On my way home from work tonight I heard the following exchange between Hannity and Ann Coulter, with Ms. Coulter arguing in part what I state below: judicial activism is not a court finding a law unconstitutional, but finding new rights or failing to enforce existing constitutional rights. Often she’s a bit extreme to be taken completely at face value, but I think she’s right to point out the judicial activism that concerns the right is not what apparently concerns the left:

ORIGINAL POST:

If you thought the open mic comment to new Russian President Medvedev was pretty bad, President Obama has created some competition for himself in the gaffe department. Or was it another window to his soul?

You may have heard that Monday President Obama appeared to warn the Supreme Court regarding its pending decision on Obamacare. His comments were as follows:

I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress. And I’d just remind conservative commentators that for years what we’ve heard is, the biggest problem on the bench was judicial activism or a lack of judicial restraint — that an unelected group of people would somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law. Well, this is a good example. And I’m pretty confident that this Court will recognize that and not take that step.

Yahoo called the remark a “challenge” to the Court. Others weren’t so kind. Among other problems with the President’s statement, you may recall that whether Obamacare was passed by a “strong majority” can be called into question. It was a purely party-line vote. But I digress.

I’m willing to assume President Obama, as a constitutional scholar, understands the concept of judicial review, and that courts overturning unconstitutional laws is not “unprecedented.” As a liberal, he may even be among the first to re-affirm that Marbury v. Madison is still good law. But the tone and chosen wording of the President’s comments caused the White House to have to defend itself from some of those “unkind” remarks yesterday. White House Press Secretary Jay Carney (the guy distributing the Obama Kool-Aid) tried to make the case the President was “clearly” referring only to commerce clause cases, and with respect to those only those of the past 80 years. Neither qualification, of course, was actually included in the President’s initial comments. When pushed as to whether the president was clarifying his remarks, Carney said “Only because a handful of people didn’t understand what he was referring to.”

Here’s a link to the video should you care to watch. Today he added that the President had been speaking in “short-hand.” I hope that flexibility is accorded both sides in campaign season. We’ll see.

The president’s statement caused Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post to write:

Obama’s assault on “an unelected group of people” stopped me cold. Because, as the former constitutional law professor certainly understands, it is the essence of our governmental system to vest in the court the ultimate power to decide the meaning of the constitution. Even if, as the president said, it means overturning “a duly constituted and passed law.”

And she makes clear she’s on his side otherwise. Read more…

The Romance of Delegate Math

If you’re like me you find yourself looking at polling data and calculating delegate counts in your head. If Mitt takes so many delegates in DC, Maryland and Wisconsin, that puts him at a new total of X, extending his lead over Santorum by Y, and making Rick need Z percent of the future delegates to win…. Okay, maybe you’re not like me.

It may sound boring to the uninitiated, but it’s the math behind propelling the most qualified candidate in the race to his party’s nomination, step one in replacing Barack Obama.

What’s at Stake Tuesday: Long View

What Obamacare teaches us. In case you don’t think replacing Barack Obama is a big deal, reflect back on the biggest political story of this week. Okay, not the open mic incident. I’m referring to our hearing our president’s Solicitor General argue to the Supreme Court why Obamacare’s Federal mandate is constitutional. The traditionally conservative justices asked for a rationale that could possibly limit Congress’ power under the commerce clause should they accept his argument. Meanwhile, the traditionally liberal justices tried their best to supply that rationale. Based on the impressions of those reporting, the decision appears headed for a familiar 5-4 vote against the law, with the four traditional conservatives on one side, the four traditional liberals on the other, and middle-of-the-road Justice Kennedy likely voting with the conservatives. But time will tell.

Shape of the Court to come. As someone concerned about finding real limits to Congress’ power (history proving we need limits to preserve our freedom), and knowing the general police power was intended to be reserved to the states (making the difference between Federal Obamacare and state Romneycare night and day), I thank my lucky stars we had presidents Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush to appoint the four conservative justices currently on the court. The liberal justices? Two from Clinton, two from Obama. By way of preview, the next president may have a chance to replace not only the lead conservative on the court in Scalia (currently 76 years old) and a staunch liberal on the court in Ginsburg (79), but iconic swing justice Kennedy, who has made the difference in many 5-4 decisions (currently 75 years old). In other words, who the president is matters, a lot, not just in signing and vetoing laws, but in appointing justices to the court who can protect the Constitution for a generation to come (a combined half-century now for Scalia and Kennedy).

MORE REGARDING THE SUPREME COURT AND AN ESTIMATE OF DELEGATES AWARDED TUESDAY BELOW! Read more…

This issue has been hashed over time and again. Yet Rick Santorum and the Democrats continue to state that Romney supported a health care mandate for the whole country. Rick Santorum has even gone so far as to say that “there is no difference between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney,” and that “if the choice was between Mitt Romney or President Obama, we might as well stay with President Obama.”

These claims about Romney’s stance on health care by Rick Santorum and the Democrats are demonstrably false. Many independent and non-partisan groups called “fact-checkers” have recently researched the truthfulness of these claims and found that Rick Santorum and the Democrats are knowingly repeating falsehoods.

Lets first talk about what the FactCheckers at the Washington Post have written recently about Santorum’s claim that “Romney supported a health care mandate for the whole country.”

The Washington Post’s main fact-checker, Glenn Kessler, concludes: 

In other words, it is ridiculous to claim that Romney ever supported a national mandate when he ran for president in 2008.

Mr. Kessler gave the statement “four pinocchios” which the worst rating a statement can get, a true “whopper” of a lie.

Josh Hicks of the Washington Post comes to the same conclusion when analyzing Rick Santorum’s frequent statements that Romney “supported a mandate for the whole country” saying:

There does not appear to be a single example of Romney saying “we need to force the nation to buy insurance” or anything along that line. In fact, he has said as far back as 2007 that states should decide for themselves what types of health-care policies to implement.

In addition, a 2007 New York Times article explaining Romney’s health-care plan used the headline “Romney to Pitch a State-by-State Health Insurance Plan,” noting that his approach “departs significantly from the universal health care measure that he helped forge as governor of Massachusetts.” And his campaign literature from 2008 made clear that he wanted a “federalist” approach to universal health care.

Rick Santorum needs to recognize the truth that is so obviously before him and stop repeating what is known to be untrue. Even though Santorum is in a tough spot these days by being so far behind in the delegate count, he needs to exemplify some of that “strong moral character” that he talks about so frequently and admit when he’s wrong.

[Editor's Note: Here would be a good place to plug our RomneyCare info page. Ben (author of this post) poured many weeks of research, writing and editing into the extremely informative page. Since Santorum and others continue to (incorrectly) fault Romney for various aspects of RomneyCare we urge you to review the facts and become informed on the details.
Find it ---> HERE]

NOTE: See “Feelings about Mitt Romney” below the fold, at the end of this post.

Chris Wallace is one of my favorite political interviewers. He is tough and will generally stay with a line of questioning until he gets answers. Yesterday he interviewed David Plouffe, one of Obama’s senior advisers. The interview spanned a number of topics, the most important being unemployment and gasoline prices.

This video clip is over 14 minutes, but at 13 minutes, five seconds, Wallace put up a chart that shows the unemployment rate at the time three incumbent presidents lost an election “seeking another term” over the last 36 years. The implication of course being that a key reason each of these one-term-only presidents lost reelection was due to the unusually high unemployment rate.

The unemployment rate today is 8.3 percent, not including those who want to work, but who stopped looking — that the government stopped counting. Following were the unemployment rates at the time of the presidential elections:

• Gerald Ford — 7.8%
• Jimmy Carter — 7.5%
• George H. W. Bush — 7.4%

The future does not look good for Mr. Obama if history is any indication!

Of course, many things factor into the ability of any incumbent president to win reelection, but the unemployment rate is a very important number and Obama knows it. You can tell by Plouffe’s demeanor and answer that the Obama Administration knows it. Top that off with high and rising gasoline prices and we have a current political climate that is worse than that of President Carter when Governor Reagan beat him with a mandate. We have seen both Gingrich and Santorum become desperate in their rhetoric; I will venture a guess that their desperation will pale in comparison to Obama’s in October and November.

Kimberly A. Strassel WSJ Op-Ed

Many editorials have emerged these past two weeks basically advising Gov. Romney to get out ahead of the opposition and provide more details to illustrate how his Massachusetts health-care plan is different from ObamaCare. In my opinion, the differences are many and very important — but I believe Gov. Romney’s lack of focus on healthcare in his speeches right now is a good strategy. He is succeeding without it and the risks associated with bringing it up are not worth it right now.

That said, Ms. Strassel makes some valid points in her Op-Ed. The first half of the piece discusses how she feels Gov. Romney’s lack of clarity in describing/defending his health-care plan against charges from Santorum and others has hurt him, but then she ends the piece by arguing Romney can turn it to his benefit (see Paul Johnson’s excellent article below to compliment this point). Strassel: Read more…

An interesting op ed piece appeared on Politico today from Paul Goldman and Mark J. Rozell, posing the question whether “Romneycare” is an asset or liability for Mitt. They conclude the former.

The traditional analysis, which has become the sole remaining justification for a Rick Santorum candidacy, is that Mitt Romney’s being the author of Romneycare somehow disqualifies him from pointing out the flaws in Obamacare in the general election. But the op ed authors take exception to the traditional analysis:

This conservative faith is wrong, however. To the extent that attacks on President Barack Obama’s health care reform are good politics, the candidate best able to make them is Mitt Romney.

Since he orchestrated and then signed the Massachusetts health care law, Romney is uniquely qualified to lead the GOP attacks against the federal health care reform bill.

Why would Mitt be uniquely qualified?

He would be the first GOP nominee in nearly 50 years with a proven track record on health care who has been praised by Democrats — including the president — as fair and compassionate. He can’t be demonized as an out-of-touch, uncompassionate, hard-right ideologue on this issue.

Americans have been telling pollsters since 1965 that they favor Democrats over Republicans when asked whom they trust on health care issues. That was when President Lyndon B. Johnson and congressional Democrats passed the historic Medicare program — over the objections of many high-profile Republican opponents, including future President Ronald Reagan.

This political landscape meant GOP presidential nominees have regularly been put on the defensive, sometimes even demonized, on health care issues. Rick Santorum and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich are typical in this regard.

Romney is the exception.

Read more…

Illinois, you know the future of the country is in your hands.

The GOP All Agree: It’s Time to Replace Barack Obama

The GOP nearly unanimously agrees that our four year experiment with an inexperienced Senator at the helm has been a disaster. I read yesterday an article at Politico whose headline was “CBO: Exploding debt under Obama policies.” That article says public debt is expected (under CBO rules of prognostication) to increase from $10.1 trillion in 2011 to $18.8 trillion in 2022. For the current fiscal year:

…CBO is now projecting a shortfall of $1.3 trillion. In fiscal 2013, the deficit will still hover near the $1 trillion mark — about $977 billion. And while it will fall to 2.5 percent of GDP by 2017, it then begins to grow again to 3 percent of GDP by 2022.

With 5 more years of Barack Obama, without threat of losing a re-election bid, one can imagine how bad it could get. How long has it been since the Senate proposed a budget? How much time do we have to repeal Obamacare before the contraception controversy becomes par for the course, and the Federal government begins telling religious institutions what it must buy for its employees?

And this doesn’t even consider foreign policy.

Picking the Replacement

So our choices to replace Barack Obama are now clear. Ron Paul, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum or Mitt Romney.

Ron Paul.

While there’s much of Ron Paul’s philosophy on the appropriate constitutional size of government I find appealing, he won’t win an election against Barack Obama. The last two elections in which the GOP nominee was elected were decided by the slimmest of margins. I don’t believe that American citizens are ready to make the radical changes Ron Paul would advocate. And I’m not ready for his approach to foreign policy.

Newt Gingrich.

I’ve written before that while Newt Gingrich seems to be an idea machine, he doesn’t know the difference between a good one and a bad one, which is not a good trait for a president. As an attorney for executives, I have observed that some people actually get things done, and others like to pontificate and tell others what to do. I see Newt in the latter role: wanting to be the professor and tell everyone else what they should do rather than actually getting it done. That is not what I’m looking for in an commander-in-chief.

Rick Santorum.

As for Rick Santorum, there’s a lot about his conservative social stands that I like. But I disagree that Rick draws a sharper conservative contrast with Obama than Mitt Romney, that Rick is the “true conservative” in the race, or that Mitt’s having endorsed health care reform in Massachusetts is a handicap. David Axelrod, Obama’s Communications Director, doesn’t hesitate to point out the many differences between Mitt and Obama. Saying Mitt is in any way like Obama is clearly misleading. Santorum calling himself the “true conservative” is also misleading. There are serious arguments to be made that Santorum is not a fiscal conservative at all. And while he attacks Mitt on social issues (principally abortion and Romneycare), Santorum is just as much a convert to the pro-life movement as Mitt is, and Mitt has made it very, very clear that he is both pro-life and intends to repeal Obamacare. When Santorum claims he “never supported the individual mandate,” that’s not true. He supported Mitt Romney as the “true conservative” candidate in 2008, after Romneycare was adopted. Rick’s conversion on health care reform came very recently, and very opportunistically. And we should not forget that Santorum’s endorsement of liberal Arlen Specter is what allowed Obamacare to pass in the first place, since Specter cast the deciding vote. Rick’s habit of compromising his principles has already harmed our country enough.

Mitt Romney.

Meanwhile, in my mind, Mitt has a number of strengths that make him the compelling choice.

Turnaround experience.

Mitt has decades of true executive experience, something unmatched in any other candidate. Mitt has been a governor. He has been a CEO. He led the Olympic games. Mitt’s executive experience has also often been leading organizations needing a turnaround. He’s credited with saving the 2002 Olympics. He’s credited with saving Bain Consulting. He’s credited with balancing the budget in Massachusetts without raising tax rates.

Read more…

Liberal websites like Talking Points Memo, Huffington Post, as well as Romney’s rivals such as Rick Santorum and blogger Erick Erickson have been buzzing recently about a 2009 op-ed written by Romney in USA Today. In the USA Today op-ed, Romney’s detractors allege that “Romney advocated a federal/nationwide mandate requiring citizens to buy health insurance.” This claim has been brought up again and again by Romney’s opponents, and while we here at Mitt Romney Central are certainly grateful for the increased traffic these websites and bloggers have brought to our site, we certainly feel it necessary to set the record straight.

For those interested in reading the op-ed in question, be my guest, but before you do, you may want to read the op-ed Romney wrote for Newsweek magazine just two months prior where Romney explains much more clearly his proposals on health care.

In the Newsweek op-ed, Romney provides a much more detailed explanation about his health care plans as well as what he meant when he said “penalties” would help people purchase health insurance. The Newsweek op-ed, aptly entitled Health Care: The Answer is Unleashing Markets – Not Government, states:

The right answer for health care is to apply more market force, not less. Here’s how:

1. Get everyone insured. Help low-income households retain or purchase private insurance with a tax credit, voucher or coinsurance. Use the tens of billions we now give hospitals for free care to instead help people buy and keep their own private insurance. For the uninsured who can afford insurance but expect to be given free care at the hospital, require them to either pay for their own care or buy insurance; if they do neither, they would forgo the tax credit or lose a deduction. No more “free riders.”

Notice that Romney states quite directly what he means by “using penalties to encourage people to buy health insurance.” What Romney is saying is that those who don’t purchase health insurance lose the opportunity to gain a “tax credit” or “deduction.” In much the same way, homeowners get a tax deduction for the interest paid on their house payments, or how students can get a tax credit on certain student loans. Romney is not advocating a “mandate” of the type Obama used where people are fined for not purchasing insurance, and Romney is certainly not advocating a FEDERAL mandate of any kind if you read the next paragraph of the Newsweek op-ed which states:

6. Center reforms at the state level. Open the door to state plans designed to meet the various needs of their citizens. Before imposing a one-size-fits-all federal program, let the states serve as “the laboratories of democracy.”

How much clearer can Romney be? This op-ed, written just two months before the op-ed in question, shows that Romney wanted health care reform to be at the state level, and for states to enact tax deductions or credits as incentives for people to purchase health insurance. (Just for the record, this is exactly the same plan Ronald Reagan was looking into).

Fact-Checkers Also Support Romney

Read more…

Our beloved MittRomneyCentral.com website is receiving lots of traffic now from several sites linking to an old Op-Ed and selectively quoting two parts of it and reading between the lines that Romney wanted a mandate to purchase health insurance at the federal level. This is patently false. I just want to link back to some posts I wrote several months back about RomneyCare in case any readers click over here to our homepage.

In Part 2 of the three part series I wrote on the issue (Part 1 and Part 3 links) I suggested how Romney could smoke Obama in a debate when ObamaCare/RomneyCare came up with the following words/ideas.

Mr. President, when we reformed Health Care in Massachusetts we spent two years working toward a consensus. We had overwhelming public opinion support, input from the entire political spectrum (From The Heritage Foundation to Ted Kennedy), and finally passed a 72 page bill with a vote of 198-2 in the state legislature . . . getting whopping majorities from Republican, Democratic, and Independent lawmakers.

Contrast that to the bill you rammed through Congress in a matter of a few weeks and foisted upon the American people . . . a 2,700 page monstrosity that we were told would have to be passed before we could know what’s in it. A bill that squeaked through Congress by the slimmest of margins (219-212; meaning that it would have failed if only four Representatives had voted differently) only after well-documented strong-arming and promised political favors (“Louisiana Purchase” and “Cornhusker Kickaback”) . . . all this with not a single Republican voting in favor of it and 34 members of your own party voting against it. A bill that is a ugly stain on the fabric of our nation both for the ends that it aims to achieve AND the means by which it became law.

Mr President, based on the current unpopularity of your bill, and, in light of the 2010 repudiation of your party at the ballot box, I think it’s clear which type of leadership the American people prefer. Leadership that is deliberate and wise, that is not in a rush to score a political victory no matter the cost, that respects their voices and works for THEIR best interests. Wouldn’t you agree?

Make sure to check them out … and, of course, check out our site’s comprehensive and accessible page on healthcare, written up by Ben.

For a candidate who is not even in office yet, Romney’s Medicare plan is attracting a lot of attention from leaders of congress. Just last week, Senators Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) joined the growing ranks of conservative leaders who have co-sponsored legislation supporting Romney’s Medicare plan. 

The media, preferring to focus on “RomneyCare” and how it relates to “ObamaCare,” has largely omitted any discussion of Romney’s achievements on Medicare reform. Romney’s success in crafting a workable plan to reform Medicare has been an unrecognized and significantly under-reported topic in the mainstream media.

As you may recall, Romney’s Medicare reform plan is to give seniors more options on where they can purchase medical insurance by allowing seniors to choose between traditional Medicare or purchasing private insurance with government vouchers. Such a plan would introduce greater competition among insurance companies but also allow seniors to craft health care plans that are more customized to their specific needs. 

Sens. Burr and Coburn liked that idea so much they were willing to attach their names to it by co-sponsoring legislation supporting the idea. Sens. Burr and Coburn also adopted Romney’s proposals on how to reduce the cost of Medicare by gradually increasing the age when seniors are eligible to receive Medicare and by requiring the richest seniors to pay more of their health care expenses than the poor. 

Recently, Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) also teamed up to co-sponsor Romney’s idea on reforming Medicare. Paul Ryan’s endorsement of Romney’s proposal sends a powerful message to Republicans who might wonder how conservative Romney is on health care reform given Romney’s key role in passing RomneyCare. If Paul Ryan, who is one of the most influential and popular conservatives in Washington, is co-sponsoring Romney’s proposals on Medicare reform, then conservatives in general can trust Romney on this issue. 

But the fact that a Democratic Senator, Ron Wyden, also co-sponsored the bill is quite impressive. The Ryan/Wyden bill reveals an important aspect about how Romney creates political goals: namely, that Romney creates bold ideas that are also practical and workable. Romney is not a politician with his head in the clouds, dreaming up “fantasy legislation” that appeals only to one side of the political sphere. He’s a pragmatic conservative who understands the realities facing America, whether those realities are economic or political, and can work within those realities to get things done.

It is important to remember that these leaders in congress who are co-sponsoring Romney’s plan aren’t just expressing vocal support for Romney’s Medicare reform plan. They are taking their support to the highest level by co-sponsoring actual bills that use Romney’s proposals. Any one of Romney’s rivals for the Republican nomination would kill to have Paul Ryan and three other U.S. Senators co-sponsoring legislation about their ideas.

So, in order to get a more complete and accurate picture of how conservative Romney is on health care issues, we must look not just at RomneyCare but also Romney’s Medicare reform plan which is garnering a host of endorsements and co-sponsors from the most respected and popular conservatives in Washington.

What is the connection between Rick Santorum, Arlen Specter, Obamacare and the difference made by ONE VOTE?

Governor Mitt Romney adroitly underscored a very revealing part of Rick Santorum’s political history during CNN’s GOP presidential debate Wednesday evening in Mesa, Arizona…

In 2004, while serving in the United States Senate, Santorum supported and campaigned for incumbent, liberal Senator Arlen Specter over conservative challenger Pat Toomey. Specter would later go on to cast the ONE VOTE DIFFERENCE – the vote that enabled the passage of Obamacare.

Yesterday, FOX News’ Megyn Kelly (host of America Live) conducted a post-CNN debate focus group. Among the debate segments she aired was the one vote difference exchange between Santorum and Romney. The entire video is worth viewing (the general consensus was thumbs-up for Romney!). Note the conversation @ :50 – 1:08:

A look back:

In 2004, conservative Congressman Patrick Joseph Toomey ran for the senate seat in the Pennsylvania primary race against fellow-Republican incumbent Senator Arlen Specter. Toomey’s campaign focused on Specter’s well known non-conservative leanings – especially on fiscal issues. Rick Santorum not only supported Specter, he appeared in a television ad for him. Santorum’s support for Specter proved crucial. In the end, although election results were close, Toomey lost the Republican primary to Specter.

How calamitous was Specter’s victory?

In April 2009, with the Tea Party movement in full swing, Senator Specter sensed he would be defeated at the polls. Working closely and covertly with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Obama was licking his chops), Specter switched political parties. He became a Democrat. In the process, he rewarded liberals with a likely filibuster-proof Senate majority – a 60th vote.

Arlen Specter and Rick Santorum way back when...

They’re nothing if not prompt. Voting has begun on HR 3590, the Senate’s health care bill. It only needs 50 votes to pass; the only suspense is whether or not it will receive all 60 Democratic votes. C-SPAN is using the special running tally it reserves for important votes.

That’s it. Arlen Specter, the former Republican, secures the 50th vote needed for passage.

When Specter won in 2004, given his history, it was easy to predict that he would vote with Democrats on key issues. Had Pat Toomey won in 2004, Democrats wouldn’t have garnered a 60th vote in 2009. Obamacare would not have passed.

Santorum actively labored to defeat Toomey.

More…

Read more…