The Republican Nomination For President: The Race For The Race For The White House

Posted at 03:41 PM ET, 08/15/2011
Note to pundits: The problem isn’t the GOP field. It’s the GOP.
By Jonathan Bernstein

Here’s what you need to know about the Republican candidate field: this is it. No one starts running for president in August, less than six months before the voters start getting involved in Iowa and New Hampshire, and has any chance at all. At least, it’s never happened since the modern process has been fully in place (say, by 1980). And there’s no reason to expect it now.

A number of Republican pundit types and party actors have been holding out hope that there’s still time for a “savior” candidate to emerge. But the notion that this is still possible rests on a misunderstanding of the process. Candidates begin running for president long before they make a formal announcement. For example, Rick Perry didn’t start running for president on Saturday. He may not have totally committed to it months ago, but everything about his book and the issues he stressed during the recent session of the Texas legislature (abortion, immigration) suggested that he was actively getting ready to run. In a completely different way, the same thing is true of Sarah Palin. The Sage of Wasilla may or may not finally decide to run in 2012, but she’s been at least half-heartedly running for 2012 all along.

But that’s it. There’s no one else out there on the horizon who has been doing the sorts of things one has to do to run for the Republican nomination for president. Anyone else — Chris Christie, Paul Ryan, whoever — would be starting from scratch, very late in the game.

The other thing I’d say to Republicans disappointed in the current choices (as Ross Douthat says he is today) is this: What you’re upset with isn’t the candidate — it’s the party. It’s inconceivable that anyone could get the Republican nomination while using anything but solid Tea Party rhetoric on pretty much every issue. They’re all going to claim that taxes should never, ever, ever be raised no matter what, that half of what the government does is evil or unconstitutional or whatever, that the scientific consensus on climate is some sort of crazed conspiracy, and so on down the line. I’ve been saying for some time now that the odds are against Republicans actually nominating a candidate who believes crazy things — but the odds of them nominating someone who says crazy things has gone up.

Of course, there’s no way of knowing what a candidate really thinks, but I suspect that Rick Perry fits that latter mold perfectly — as does Mitt Romney. And so would any other candidate who wanted to have any chance at the nomination. That’s what the Republican Party is right now, and that’s what their nominee is going to say. So no saviors need apply.

By Jonathan Bernstein | 03:41 PM ET, 08/15/2011

Rick Perry’s Serious Unforced Error
John Podhoretz | @jpodhoretz 08.15.2011 - 11:12 PM

Today in Iowa, Rick Perry was asked about the Federal Reserve and, in a halting 45-second answer, went off on chairman Ben Bernanke: “If this guy prints more money between now and the election, I dunno what y’all would do to him in Iowa but we would treat him pretty ugly down in Texas. Printing more money to play politics at this particular time in American history is almost teacherous…treasonous in my opinion.” The clip is here. Liberals on Twitter exploded immediately in outrage after Think Progress posted it, with the economist Nouriel Roubini actually comparing Perry to the Norwegian mass murderer and saying he should be put in a mental institution.

I think it’s pretty clear from the clip that Perry was trying to play folksy straight-talkin’ populist guy while taking up a complicated issue, using colorful dirt-kicker language to connect to his al-fresco audience as he might in his home town of Paint Creek. And in the early going on Twitter, I suggested the harrumphers were knowingly making a mountain out of a molehill to bring him down a notch. I was wrong.

He’s trying to be the next president, and he needs to be judged on that standard. What Perry did was make a thoughtless blunder, an unforced error; we’re now going to spend a couple of days discussing whether he was summoning violence on Ben Bernanke’s head or not, which is of absolutely no use to Perry. He is, or was, moments away from becoming the race’s frontrunner, and what is in his interest is to harness the excitement of his late entry with qualities of leadership and control that will rally the majority of Republicans unhappy with the choices facing them to his side. Rick Perry made that more difficult today; this was a serious rookie mistake on the national stage.

Taking up the issue of the Fed’s behavior is entirely legitimate. Many think the Fed’s loose-money policy has been, at worst, ineffectual; others are more worried about it and fearful of a third round of money printing. And it’s not an outre wild-man idea at all; Bill Kristol and I share a friend, a prominent businessman and investor of unimpeachable reputation, whose eloquent thoughts about what he believes to be Bernanke’s gross irresponsibility can be read here. But if Perry is going to talk about these things, he needs to do it with care and not like a caller to a radio show.

Interesting that the advocates here of the Democrats, who have controlled the major part of our government for the past (nearly) three years, are not arguing on the basis of all the good things the Democrat incumbency has brought our country, but are instead intent on demonizing any and all candidates who may arise among the opposition.

Don't you think that this might be reasoned by the thread's title: "The Republican Nomination For President"?

“If you’re a tractor driver, if you drive your tractor across a public road, you’re gonna have to have a commercial driver’s license. Now how idiotic is that?” he thundered to the fair crowd in Des Moines, with the rejoinder, “What were they thinkin’?”

...

Last Wednesday, the agency moved to put the issue to rest. The guidance the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration put out did exactly opposite what Gov. Perry said. It told the states “the common sense exemptions that allow farmers, their employers, and their families to accomplish their day-to-day work and transport their products to market” should remain in place.

“We have no intention of instituting onerous regulations on the hardworking families who feed our country and fuel our economy,” Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, himself an Illinoisan and a Republican, said in the agency’s statement Aug. 10.

Indeed the entire release appears calculated to put to rest the kind of rhetoric that Mr. Perry has employed this week.

“We want to make it absolutely clear that farmers will not be subjected to new and impractical safety regulations,” said U.S. Transportation Deputy Secretary John Porcari.

Um, Mission UnAccomplished. WSJ

Perry gets 29 percent of the vote in the poll, topping second place Mitt Romney by over 10 percent; Romney draws 18 percent of the vote. Michele Bachmann takes third place with 13 percent, and Ron Paul gets nine percent.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/08/16/perry-leads-first-gop-primary-poll-since-ames/#ixzz1VDhnLuF1

Another example of Rick Perry talking out of his ass.

WASHINGTON, D.C., August 10, 2011 – The American Farm Bureau Federation is pleased the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration listened to farmer and rancher concerns regarding changes to agricultural transportation regulations and commercial drivers license provisions.

As a result of comments received from AFBF and others, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said today that the FMCSA has no intention to propose new regulations governing the transport of agricultural products, and that the agency has released guidance to states so they clearly understand common-sense exemptions “to allow farmers, their employees, and their families to accomplish their day-to-day work and transport their products to market.”

“This public announcement and the guidance sent to states today by the FMCSA is great news for America’s farm and ranch families,” said AFBF President Bob Stallman. “The key word is common-sense, and it was refreshing to see that our federal authorities heard the concerns we expressed. It lifts a big cloud of uncertainty in farm country and the action is greatly appreciated.”

Stallman said he was pleased by Secretary LaHood’s clarity in stating the department “had no intention of instituting onerous regulations on the hardworking farmers who feed our country and fuel our economy.”

“Operating and moving the machinery necessary to tend and harvest crops and care for livestock is a vital part of farming and ranching,” Stallman said. “Long established protocols are in place at the state and local levels to ensure that safety is paramount, and that farmers are able to do their jobs and transport their goods to market.”

There is no one more gaff prown than is Bidden, the vice president. This have never kept him from being elected. Also, there is no better time than now to behave unlike a profesional Washington politician..not being polished is prob a plus at the moment.

“What were they thinkin’?”

Here’s what they were thinking. Earlier this year, the State of Illinois began regulating certain kinds of farmers as commercial motor vehicle drivers, a move that caused a lot of consternation in the Illinois farming community, seeing as it would require stiff new driving tests, periodic drug testing and other hurdles. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration stepped in to clarify whether the states had the right to do what Illinois had done, and on May 31, the U.S. Department of Transportation issued a public notice asking for comment on the commercial licensing of farm equipment.

Many in the farm community saw that notice as evidence that federal regulations were brewing, and the rumor went viral. That speeded up the process in Washington. Last Wednesday, the agency moved to put the issue to rest. The guidance the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration put out did exactly opposite what Gov. Perry said. It told the states “the common sense exemptions that allow farmers, their employers, and their families to accomplish their day-to-day work and transport their products to market” should remain in place.

“We have no intention of instituting onerous regulations on the hardworking families who feed our country and fuel our economy,” Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, himself an Illinoisan and a Republican, said in the agency’s statement Aug. 10.

Indeed the entire release appears calculated to put to rest the kind of rhetoric that Mr. Perry has employed this week.

“We want to make it absolutely clear that farmers will not be subjected to new and impractical safety regulations,” said U.S. Transportation Deputy Secretary John Porcari.

Um, Mission UnAccomplished.

Also, a big problem for Perry is the fact that his office isn't claiming he mis-spoke, or was incorrect in any way

Yes I do. But then their comments have little to do with the interactions among the candidates or their various prospects for winning -- the presumprive subject of the thread topic.