Tag: Political Advice

Republicans must choose a hispanic for Vice President

In 2007 I thought Romney/Rice was going to be the ticket that faced off against Clinton/Obama and I was thrilled and excited to see it play out. The first female president and first black vice president vs the first Mormon president and the first female AND black vice president. Woulda been awesome. didn’t happen.

This year, when Republicans finally get their shit together and realize that they have no hope with Governor Perry or former Speaker Gingrich and correct their mistake they made in 07 and nominating Romney to the position he deserves this time – their only choice is for a hispanic VP.

You’ve got to have SOMEthing to counter the history of the first black president (yes, I know he’s only half black so he’s just as white as he is black but he’s the first with dark skin so dont send me dumb messages or comments on that) and “first Mormon” isn’t a landmark. no one outside of the LDS faith cares if we have a Mormon president or not and no one should. who cares?

To counter the affirmative action that took place in skyrocketing a state senator to the Washington Senate for only 2 years of accomplishing nothing but making good speeches and being charismatic and putting him in the Presidency – the Republicans need to counter with a minority pick that ISN’T an affirmative action choice.

That rules out Herman Cain, who has never been elected to any public office, and it’s not good for the parties optics to choose a black VP this cycle anyway. Answering the first black president with the first black Vice President is a lame move, won’t gain votes and should be avoided unless the possible candidates for VP who happen to be black are just so good that it can’t be avoided and that doesn’t apply this year, as congressmen Allen West (FL) and Tim Scott (SC) were only just elected in 2010.

So where to next? Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana just won reelection in November by a landslide and remains super popular. He does well in interviews that could excuse his terrible performance in the Republican response to Obama’s state of the union speech a few years ago but it’s still a stretch. The dude may be president some day but he’s super young (just turned 40 a few months ago) and has time. He’s not THAT good of a speaker to completely erase the poor teleprompter read delivery of that infamous GOP response.

That leaves Republicans with asians in the sense of what people think of when they hear asian and hispanics. Republicans have no prominent asian elected officials from which to choose so that leaves the latter and there are excellent people to choose from. Here are the top 5 with their pros and cons, ranked in order of their net-gains in my estimation from least to most:

  1. Jaime Herrera Beutler: Congresswoman from Washington’s 3rd District.
    PRO: Womanandhispanic. ha cha chaaa.
    CON: House members are usually not tapped for the VP slot and she’s too unknown/unremarkable for this to not be seen as a ploy. That could be overcome but with the “unknown” part of the equation, we just don’t know if the dame is up for it. too risky with not enough reward.
    …
  2. Brian Sandoval: Governor of Nevada.
    PRO    : Nevada went for Bush 2004 but Obama in 2008. A Sandoval nomination could secure the state back into the Republican column and help out in neighboring New Mexico and Colorado which also changed their 04 Republican votes to 08 Democrat ones.
    CON: Short term as Governor. Endorsed Rick Perry. Is pro-choice, which won’t sit well with Republican base. in fact, it won’t be possible with Romney as the nominee because of all the smears against his abortion postion which evolved over the years from “I’m against it but it should be legal” to “I’m against it and it shouldn’t be”. Romney won’t need Sandoval on the ticket to win Nevada, either. So Sandoval’s out.
    …
  3. Susana Martinez: Governor of New Mexico.
    PRO    : Border state that voted for Obama in 08? Useful. Her last name? REALLY useful. A Romney/Martinez ticket, sharing the values of hard work capitalism and socially conservative values hispanics are polled to favor by a majority would switch over vast numbers of mexican-americans who had only been voting Democrat because they’ve been told that Republicans hate them and want them to fail. Argument becomes invalid when a Mexican-American is on the ballot for Vice President of the freakin country.
    CON: Palin problem: she is being attacked in her home state and struggling to deal with the onslaught + personal life stuff will be dredged up with no guarantee that  she will be able to handle the press and constant accusations of being stupid (the “go to” attack line against Republican candidates) which are key to being an effective candidate.
    …
  4. Marco Rubio: Senator from Florida.
    PRO    : An excellent speaker. A picture perfect family. Does well in interviews and speeches. Articulates American ideals exquisitely.
    CON: Aside from him constantly saying he does not want the job and would rather get work done in the Senate to which he was only recently elected to in 2012: He’s Cuban and Cubans are already Republicans because their country was freakin destroyed by Communism and constantly has people attempting to escape it for that reason. The GOP’s problem is with Mexican hispanics, so Rubio’s hispanicanism isn’t a guaranteed help there. Plus, the last name Rubio is not immediately identifiable as hispanic like the other contenders’ names are and Rubio is very fair skinned so his Cubanism may be more of a sidenote fun-fact than the major selling point the GOP needs. Might be better to keep him in the senate where he wants to be until he runs for President in the future.
    …
  5. Luis Fortuño: Governor of Puerto Rico.
    PRO    : Unless he killed a hooker and paid off someone who saw it go down? Everything. From the accent mark over the “N” in his name to his record as Governor – dudes a winner. He does well in interviews and like Rubio, articulates small-government, pro-freedom ideals articulately and effectively.
    CON: Although also not a Central or South American hispanic, he has the last name, skin tone and Spanish speaking cred that makes for such great optics and Rubio lacks, which could make up for it.

More:

UPDATE: Fortuño has endorsed Romney for president. As you can imagine, I received the news while in an office that was lit only by the light shining through descended but angled Venetian Blinds to which I responded by tenting my fingers and saying “excellent…” in a soft but sinister tone.

UPDATE: Romney wins the Puerto Rico primary by a whopping 75%

UPDATE: Okay.. brief flirtation with confidence that Fortuno would be a top tier pick is dwindling… going back to being confident that it will be Rubio…

My 2012 Presidential Ticket Advice

The 2012 presidential election is starting early as the Republicans choose who they want to be their nominee to run against Obama a year and 7 months from now. Here’s my analysis on how each party can win and not suck immediately after their winning:

DEMOCRATS:

Barack Obama is the sitting President and thus will be his parties nominee. but what can he do to ensure his re-election?

There has been a lot of talk about him swapping out Vice President Joe Biden with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. During the 08 election, this was considered and Jill Biden, Joe’s wife, let it slip on Oprah that Obama straight up offered Biden either job for him to choose. Pundits have said this will never happen and the Whitehouse says it will not happen and it won’t. But it should. It would be a breath of newness, add excitement and make the 2012 election another history-maker with the first elected female Vice President.

He also needs to shore up his cratering support with white voters by energizing Latinos with something big before the election. I would also like to see him actually do something to help the black community and the shithole urban areas they mostly reside in and/or generally do something other than just being president and forever being the “see? you CAN do it, so quit whining about the man holding you down” example, but that appears unlikely as he hasn’t done anything yet and his approval among black voters remains around the 94% of the vote he got from them in 08 (but that’s not racist because…idk why). Sadly, this probably won’t happen, because like black voters, Democrats know they have hispanic voters in the bag and don’t need to offer anything positive as long as they offer enough negativity in convincing people that Republicans are anti-hispanic.

Cabinet appointments that should be made and changed: #1 priority should be to get in a capable and effective White House Press secretary. The Obama Administrations first Press Sec, Robert Gibbs was a disaster. I have no idea how he kept that job so long. The guy who replaced him I guess is doing okay since I haven’t been seeing him in the news like I did Gibbs with his gaffe-o-minute record, but having a guy do just an adequate job seems super lame considering Obamas effectiveness as a communicator. He should have someone in the job doing somewhere around at least half as good a job as he does himself.

REPUBLICANS:

It’s between the two Mormons, Jon Huntsman and Mitt Romney to get the nomination, and if they eff it up, then the party will be stuck with the snoozefest that is former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, who will then go on to lose to Obama, in part because America is not ready to elect Harland Williams clone president of the country (remember Rocketman? lol).

Romney is smart and capable but so not people-savvy that it borders on being a social disorder and his failed bid at the 2008 nomination beat up his reputation badly. A lot of the attacks against him are wildly unfair and some are just plain silly (like that he’s not pro-lifey enough. oh please, evangelicals, give it a rest already). His campaign logo also looks ridiculously like a swath of Aquafresh toothpaste, so I’m going to give the odds to Huntsman at this point.

Jon Huntsman is basically Mitt Romney without the baggage and a few more plusses in his column. While Romney has his health care reform to deal with that, like Obama’s health care reform, required citizens to purchase health insurance (something conservatives believe is unconstitutional, claiming it is every persons right to engage or abstain from commerce without the Government forcing ones hand either way), Huntsman also reformed health care but in the opposite (ie: conservative) way:

As governor, Huntsman listed economic development, health-care reform, education, and energy security as his top priorities. He oversaw large tax cuts and advocated reorganizing the way that services were distributed so that the government would not become overwhelmed by the state’s fast growing population. He also proposed a plan to reform health-care, mainly through the private sector, by using tax breaks and negotiation to keep prices down.

He’s also a former successful business man, former 2 term Governor of Utah (Romney only served 1 term as Gov in Massachusetts) during a time when the states economy boomed while the rest of the countries crumbled, and he has the same “problems” as Romney with Social Conservatives in that he favors civil unions for homosexuals – which is the same position George W Bush and Barack Obama have on the issue, btw – although it’s extra interesting that the 2 Mormons in the race are the candidates with the most pro-gay policy history. Interesting because Mormons have been relentlessly attacked for being the reason Prop 8 (resolution to define marriage as between one man and one woman) passed in California in 2008.

A Huntsman/Romney ticket would be great in that you would get all of Romney’s positives and none of his negatives if he were on the bottom of the ticket, however that would spell death for the party as an all-Mormon ticket, though a perfect pairing would do more than piss off Huckabee supporting Evangelicals, – it would lose votes and get distractingly bad press.

If Huntsmans the nominee, I think he needs to choose between Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Florida Senator Marco Rubio and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie as his veep.

If Romney is the top half, I think his choices are the same, but swap Christie for 3rd term Governor of Texas, Rick Perry (or someone else with Social-con and Tea Party cred).

Either one of them should appoint former NY Mayor Rudy Giuliani as Attorney General and Herman Cain to…something. and pull someone from talk radio like Salem Radio Host, Hugh Hewitt (a big time Romney supporter) to be press secretary. Tony Snow was amazing – truly the best at that gig. It might be a tasteless phrase to use since he’s since passed away, but he really did kill it, every day. Would like to see someone that capable again.

Predictions:

-Donald Trump, Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin will choose to keep their jobs as media commentators instead of running for the nomination that they will not get.

-Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann runs, and Jon Huntsman I think (obviously) will run even though he’s not declared an exploratory committee or anything yet.

-Newt Gingrich will run but drop out early (UPDATE: exactly as last nights Saturday Night Live sketch depicted him doing. lol!).