Thoughts On Why Mitt Is Out

Now that I have had, oh about 48 hours for it to sink in, I can offer my thoughts on why Mitt Romney is out of the Republican presidential hunt.
I must write this first.
He showed me why I became a supporter early on. The speech at CPAC was a stemwinder and the reasons that he became a candidate in the first place. I think that in that speech, which should have been made a lot sooner, he summed up why he is a legitimate conservative and that there are many issues that will be the focus of the presidential campaign. But, in talking about the War Against Islamofacsist Terror, he summed up the reason to leave now and eventually support Sen. John "F--- You" McCain.
Now, on to why he is not where Sen. "F--- You" McCain is today.
If it could be all summed up in one word, it would be Massachusetts.
Regretably, for many Republicans, nothing good comes out of Massachusetts. And, most of the time that would be correct. After all, Sen. John F. Kerry was the Democrat nominee for president in 2004 and look at how well that turned out. In 1980, Democrats almost made the mistake of throwing then President Jimmy Carter over the bridge with the winner of the 1969 Massachusetts Safe Driver Of The Year, Sen. Edward "Teddy" Kennedy, from ta da da da! Massachusetts. And, maybe more than the fact Mr. Romney is a Mormon, he was from Massachusetts, which might as well be a foreign nation to most Southerners. It is also true that most people from Massachusetts think that the South is still the Confederate States of America.
So, I think that they never got the real Romney record as governor and it was a conservative one. I think that many thought he legalized same-sex marriage in Massachusetts, not a state supreme court in which he had no nominations. Or that he was in favor of state funding of embriotic stem cell research. Mr. Romney vetoed that bill, but it was overidden. And while it is true that he did raise fees, which had not been raised in years, he did not raise taxes and did cut taxes. So, Mr. Romney did have a conservative record. Much of what seemed unconservative was when he ran against said Sen. Kennedy in 1994. For whatever reason, he thought that he would win trying to blur differences. It did not work and he lost in an otherwise Republican years as we all know.
Another reason is that a large enough minority just could not vote for a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the Mormons.
I still believe that it was a small minority. But, even in the rightviewfromtheleftcoast household, there was spirited discussions between Mrs. rightviewfromtheleftcoast and myself. In the end, I did persuade her that if Mr. Romney was the nominee, she would vote for him.
And some of the most strident opposition I encountered came from liberal, Democrats and Christians. Several people at my church and I had spirited disscussions. It was amazing to see how judgmental these liberals are in reality. And, these people would not even be partiicipants in the California Republican primary.
Bottom line is that it was there and can not be denied. And, it did not help that the Rev. Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas fuled the anti-Mormon sentiments in a now infamous interview with the New York Times Sunday Magazine.
I think the worst thing was that he was not able to communicate the same message in every place that Sen. "F--- You" McCain and the Rev. Mike were. It seemed to change depending on where he was campaigning in earnest. I think that is due to the fact this was the first time on the national stage and the grueling death march of a primary season. But, it is not an excuse, just an explanation. Mr. Romney needed to hammer home his stand on the War Against Islamofacsist Terror and how he would handle big government and the economy at home. Muddled messages meant that voters bought the analysis that he was nothing but a flip-flopper. And, he was not, but that was only noticable to political junkies like myself.
Because so many Republicans and conservatives bought the DDBMSM narrative on Mr. Romney, they realized that it was all false when it was too late. And, that in part is the fault of Mr. Romney and his advisers.
But, by graciously bowing out this past Thursday in a speech at the CPAC conference, I think that many really belived that he was a solid conservative, which I knew he was all along. And that will make others take a second look. And one maybe the Republican nominee for president, Sen. John "F--- You" McCain.