He's right, of course, so he's ignored.
--more--"
"Romney money edge washed away in Fla." January 26, 2012|Brian C. Mooney, Globe Staff
Fueled by the Adelson family’s second $5 million donation to assist Newt Gingrich, spending in the final week of presidential primary campaigning in Florida is expected to top $16 million.
Virtually overnight, the contribution from Miriam Adelson wiped out much of the money edge that Mitt Romney enjoyed in Florida just days ago. Like an earlier $5 million donation from her husband Sheldon, a casino magnate, the latest infusion went to a super PAC supporting Gingrich.
The donation - massive even by today’s inflated standards - provides the most graphic example of how wealthy individuals can have an outsized influence on political campaigns under the new rules since the US Supreme Court decision allowed unlimited donations to political action committees not officially affiliated with a candidate.
It’s not just wealthy GOP donors who have Romney in an unexpectedly close contest. Two labor groups and a pro-Obama super PAC have poured in more than $1 million to attack Romney. The two-front assault has the onetime front-runner from Massachusetts fighting to stave off a devastating defeat in next week’s Florida primary.
“For Romney, if he doesn’t win Florida, his campaign may pretty much be over, and Gingrich is looking for a knockout punch,’’ said Darryl Paulson, professor emeritus of government at the University of South Florida. “They will do whatever it takes to win.’’
The Adelsons’ $10 million to the pro-Gingrich super PAC is, while generous, not a record contribution from one family. It is, for example, far short of the $23.7 million billionaire hedge fund manager George Soros contributed in the 2004 election cycle to Democratic and liberal organizations. But those groups, known as 527s after the section of the tax code under which they operated, had restrictions on the timing and content of their electioneering messages. Those constraints were eliminated by the recent US Supreme Court ruling.
The Adelsons’ contributions to the pro-Gingrich super PAC have kept him in the ad war in Florida, an expensive venture by any campaign standard.
Winning Our Future, the super PAC backing Gingrich, says it will spend $6 million before next Tuesday in Florida, though as of yesterday the organization had purchased less than $3 million in broadcast, cable, radio, and Internet ads. A flight of ads mixing spots critical of Romney and promoting Gingrich was scheduled to start running today.
Rick Tyler, a spokesman for the super PAC, said that the total spending of $6 million would be on a variety of media, including Internet and social media, and that reports would be filed with the Federal Election Commission as early as today.
Gingrich and the Adelsons have been friends for many years and share a passion for the security of Israel. Last September, Forbes magazine rated Adelson the eighth-wealthiest American, with an estimated net worth of $21.5 billion built from casinos in Las Vegas, Singapore, and the Macao district of China.
Until now, the Romney campaign and an allied super PAC, Restore Our Future, had dominated the Florida airwaves, outspending the Gingrich campaign and its friendly super PAC by a more than 20-to-1 ratio dating back to December....
The Romney campaign may be getting some help in Florida from an unlikely source, a super PAC supporting Ron Paul, who is basically bypassing Florida. Endorse Liberty announced it will spend $1.4 million in Florida with what appears to be a mix of ads boosting Paul and attacking Gingrich, initial reports filed with the Federal Election Commission indicate.
Paul’s campaign is concentrating on caucus states and open primaries where independents can vote. Only Republicans may vote in the upcoming Florida contest....
--more--"
"GOP rivals make cases to Hispanics in Florida" January 28, 2012|By Glen Johnson
DORAL, Fla. - Hispanics, especially Cuban-Americans and Puerto Ricans, are being wooed by all four GOP candidates heading into Tuesday’s Florida primary....
Gingrich, repeating some of the promises he made earlier to a Latin Builders Association meeting in Miami, told the crowd he would reorient the US vision from the Middle East to points south.
Talk about pandering!
He not only urged the US military to move supervision of Mexico from its Northern Command headquarters in Nebraska to Southern Command in Miami, but he also called for rallying opposition to Fidel Castro in Cuba and Hugo Chavez in Venezuela....
Earlier, during his appearance before the Latin Builders Association, Gingrich called on Congress to immediately pass a part of the Dream Act that would put the children of illegal immigrants on a special path to becoming US citizens if they serve in the nation’s armed forces.
“I think there is no opposition to that part of the Dream Act,’’ he said. “I think it should go through immediately.’’
Those are the troops that will be marching south!
The Florida-based trade association is heavily populated by Cuban-Americans....
Cubans would be less affected than other Hispanics by either Dream Act change because they get special residency status if they flee the island and reach US shores.
The builders later endorsed Rick Santorum, who spoke after Gingrich....
Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!
--more--"
Also see:
Romney's returns open a window on the wealthy
Romney aides explain trusts
"Romney leads in Fla., but obstacles loom large; Campaign heeds lessons learned in 2008 failure" by Michael Kranish, | Globe Staff, January 29, 2012
MIAMI - Florida’s voters effectively ended Mitt Romney’s presidential dream four years ago. He won in only about one-third of the 67 counties, gained the support of only 9 percent of Cuban Americans, rejected advice from local advisers, and misplayed the ideological landscape.
Now the political battlefield, the issues, and the competition are different - but the stakes in Tuesday’s vote are even higher as the one-time front-runner battles to regain his primacy against the candidate who has emerged as his chief challenger, Newt Gingrich. After Romney was sent reeling by Gingrich’s victory a week ago in South Carolina, he has used a barrage of attacks in debates and television commercials to pull ahead in several recent Florida polls.
In order to win, analysts said, Romney must find a way to pick up support in what are considered several states within the state. There are swaths of traditionally conservative areas that may be most hospitable to Gingrich; condos filled with snowbirds from the north and Midwest that could be tilted to Romney; economically distressed suburbs and cities along the state’s midsection that are up for grabs; and a Hispanic community that is diverse and divided.
Until just a few weeks ago, Romney’s team thought it had everything in its favor in Florida. Romney had spent millions of dollars on television campaign ads, versus nearly nothing from Gingrich. But Gingrich’s 11th-hour support from a pro-Gingrich super PAC and his own recent fund-raising success may have cut into that advantage....
The result is that Romney and Gingrich go into Tuesday’s primary on a more even playing field than either anticipated, with Rick Santorum striving to hang on and Ron Paul mostly focusing elsewhere. Romney now hopes his early advantage in organization and money, an expected edge among absentee ballots cast before Gingrich won South Carolina, and his forceful debate performance Thursday will give him an advantage.
Brett Doster, the senior adviser of Romney’s Florida operation, said in an interview that the campaign has worked for months to gear messages to the diverse constituencies of the state. “We have the right message and the right kind of organization to take Mitt Romney’s message to every corner of Florida,’’ Doster said in an interview.
Yet Romney’s second-place finish in Florida in 2008 demonstrates how large his challenge may be. Romney lost by a 36-to-31-percent margin to Senator John McCain of Arizona and dropped out of the race after a lackluster showing in primaries held a week later. His top Florida advisers complained later that they had been ordered by Boston strategists to write seven campaign plans and that their suggestions on how to spend money had been rejected by the Boston team. Romney’s strongest areas then were around Jacksonville, in counties north of Orlando, and along affluent sections of the Gulf coast. But he lost by nearly 2-to-1 margins in much of southern Florida and trailed even farther behind in some counties bordering Georgia, where his state team had wanted more money to be spent. He picked up only 14 percent of the Hispanic vote, including just 9 percent of the Cuban-American vote, according to exit polls.
For Gingrich, the political landscape presents some unique opportunities. Gingrich hopes to win easily in rural areas and in the Panhandle that borders Georgia and Alabama, as well as among Tea Party movement members and working-class voters in cities and suburbs that have been hard hit economically.
Unlike four years ago, when the focus was on foreign policy, terrorism, and social issues, this election is mostly about economic concerns in a state with a 9.9 percent unemployment rate and a high number of home foreclosures.
Focus was on that? Not the way I remember it.
Much of the pro-Gingrich super PAC’s money is being spent to convince Floridians that Gingrich is the true conservative in the race while trying to persuade the Republican Party base that Romney is too moderate. That is the inverse of the challenge Romney faced in 2008. In that campaign, Romney’s strategy was to win over conservatives and hope that two key rivals, Senator John McCain and Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, split the more moderate vote. The strategy failed when Giuliani’s campaign disintegrated and Mike Huckabee drew away some of the conservative vote that Romney was counting on.
“In 2008, Romney faced two moderate Republicans, and this time he is facing a real conservative,’’ Rick Tyler, a former Gingrich spokesman who is overseeing the pro-Gingrich super PAC, said in an interview.
At the same time, analysts said, the Gingrich campaign has positioned itself slightly to the left of Romney on issues that are important to key groups of Floridians, including Medicare and immigration. On other issues, such as Gingrich’s proposal to build a colony on the moon, Romney has accused him of pandering to state interests.
“Gingrich has been extremely attentive to the push-button issues among various groups,’’ said Susan MacManus, professor of political science at the University of South Florida in Tampa. Tyler put it more bluntly: “You would have to be an idiot if you are running for president and not be aware of the state’s concerns.’’
For example, Gingrich courted senior citizens in the debate last Monday when he boasted about his role pushing for passage of a Medicare program that helped senior citizens buy prescription drugs, known as Part D. “I’ll say this in Florida: I’m proud of the fact that I publicly, openly advocated Medicare Part D. It has saved lives,’’ Gingrich said. About 3.3 million of Florida’s 18.5 million residents are enrolled in Medicare.
But some conservatives have said the prescription drug program was a mistake, in part because Congress didn’t provide for a way to pay for it and it has bloated the deficit. Romney called Gingrich’s support of the prescription plan “influence peddling’’ because he was working for health companies at the time, and Romney has been critical of the cost of the program.
Romney and Gingrich are also vying for the votes of Hispanics, who make up about 11 percent of registered Republicans. A poll by Latino Decisions released last week showed that Romney is making progress compared to four years ago; he led among Hispanic Republicans by a 49-to-26-percent margin over Gingrich.
Romney also must convince voters he is a true conservative. In 2008, he was the winner among Florida voters who said in polls that they were “very conservative.’’ But this time, Gingrich, Santorum, and Paul all seek such votes. A potential problem for Romney is that independents, who typically are more moderate than registered Republicans, cannot vote under Florida’s rules.
The contest could be determined by a factor that didn’t exist in 2008: the Tea Party movement. Romney, who has run as a Washington outsider even though he is embraced by much of the Republican establishment, has kept a wary eye on the antiestablishment Tea Party. Gingrich, even though he was an insider as speaker of the House and consultant to Freddie Mac, has run as an outsider who embraces the Tea Party message.
Florida voters in 2010 rejected a moderate Republican candidate for governor, Bill McCollum, and elected Tea Party favorite Rick Scott of the GOP. But Scott’s success provides a mixed message for the Republican presidential candidates. He is both a very wealthy former businessman, like Romney, and a fiery grass-roots candidate, like Gingrich. Scott - like other key players such as Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, former governor - has remained neutral in the race, underscoring the uncertainty that voters must resolve on Tuesday.
--more--"
"Rivals keep sniping as Florida vote nears; Surrogates on attack as well in 2-man fight" by Matt Viser and Michael Levenson | Globe Staff, January 29, 2012
PANAMA CITY, Fla. - Newt Gingrich launched a frontal attack on Mitt Romney’s integrity yesterday as the former Massachusetts governor, content to let a barrage of ads and a growing cadre of Republican lawmakers blast away at Gingrich, reached out to voters to help him reestablish the primacy of his candidacy with a win Tuesday in Florida.
“You cannot debate somebody who is dishonest,’’ Gingrich told reporters, in explaining his lackluster performance in Thursday’s debate. “I can’t debate somebody who won’t tell the truth.’’
Then stop debating yourself.
Gingrich’s attempt to splatter the core of Romney’s image echoes his most recent ad, which refers to him as untrustworthy, and is expected to be a focus of his efforts to regain his footing in Florida after a pair of weak debate performances and sagging poll numbers. With its winner-take-all 50 delegates at stake, the primary probably will determine whether Romney regains an aura of invincibility or whether the race to the nomination becomes a drawn-out battle of attrition.
That effort has spawned a backlash by anti-Washington Tea Party supporters, including former vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, who last night said in an online post that the GOP establishment were cannibals seeking to “kneecap’’ Gingrich.
Also last night, former rival Herman Cain, who dropped out late last year amid several accusations of unwanted sexual advances, endorsed Gingrich. The former Godfather’s Pizza executive said Gingrich was the right person to address the “crisis of leadership in the White House.’’
Of the other two candidates, former senator Rick Santorum returned to his home in Pennsylvania and Representative Ron Paul is focusing on caucus states that vote next month, a strategy that plays to his strength of passionate supporters and a strong organization....
Romney was joined at the Fish House restaurant in military-rich Pensacola by an unusual trio of actor Jon Voight, Senator John McCain, and Governor Bob McDonnell of Virginia. Both Voight, a noted conservative, and McCain, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, were unsparing in their assessment of Gingrich.
“I do not understand - do you? - why anyone would attack a person who’s successful in business, in the free enterprise system!’’ McCain said, alluding to Gingrich’s criticism of Romney’s career at Bain Capital....
Meanwhile, the campaign by many Republicans to paint Gingrich as alarmingly ill-suited to be president continued. At one of Gingrich’s events, at a putting green at the PGA Museum of Golf in Port St. Lucie, Romney sent three Republican members of the US House - Charlie Bass of New Hampshire, Connie Mack of Florida, and Mack’s wife, Mary Bono Mack of California - to serve as his own “truth squad.’’
“He’s a great thinker and a great historian,’’ said Bass, who served when Gingrich was speaker. “But the president is an administrator, not a philosopher. And a lot of times, he has to make decisions about hiring and firing. And Newt is a thinker, and it isn’t a fit.’’
R.C. Hammond, Gingrich’s spokesman, confronted both Bass and Connie Mack, sparring with them as reporters held out their audio recorders.
“Congressman, did you regret asking Newt for his endorsement earlier this year?’’ Hammond asked Bass. “He wrote a very nice op-ed in one of your papers asking that you be reelected.’’
Bass just smiled and said it was good to see Hammond, who is from New Hampshire.
Asked about the members of Congress bird-dogging his events, Gingrich said it does not reflect well on Romney....
--more--"
"Gingrich shows strength in conservative North Florida" by Michael Levenson | Globe Staff, January 29, 2012
MACCLENNY, Fla. - Far from the Cuban cafes and Art Deco nightspots of Miami sits this rural county seat named for a Confederate senator, where locals like bass fishing and dirt-track auto racing and identify more as Southerners than as Floridians.
“This isn’t Florida,’’ said Travis Barton, who owns Trav’s Barber Shop, a spacious strip-mall establishment where the mounted head of a deer that he shot greets patrons and the television is tuned to Fox News. “This is south Georgia.’’
Mitt Romney won deeply conservative Baker County in the 2008 Republican primary. But back then, he was running to the right of John McCain. Now, it is Newt Gingrich who may have the upper hand here, thanks to his Georgia roots and fiercely populist pitch. Romney’s Mormonism also concerns many in the heavily Baptist and Pentecostal county.
Stretching from the Gulf Coast city of Pensacola in the panhandle to Jacksonville on the Atlantic, the area includes liberal Tallahassee yet is still one of the most Republican regions of the state, where Tea Party movement activists and Christian conservatives play an outsized role in elections.
In Macclenny, the seat of Baker County, 30 miles west of Jacksonville, Gingrich is the talk of the town. Lois Adcock, who works at Studio One salon, estimated that 8 out of 10 of her customers - who include cattle ranchers, corrections officers at nearby Florida State Prison, and laborers at Northeast Florida State Hospital - are voting for the former House speaker.
“I would say Newt Gingrich would have the pull in Baker County, based on what I see and what I hear,’’ Adcock said during a cigarette break.
Unlike Romney, she said, “Newt can talk on both levels, because in Baker County, you don’t have a lot of wealth. You’ve got a few, but we’re more just everyday workers, middle-class people. And I think he cares about the middle class.’’
The county’s unemployment rate is 10.4 percent, compared to 9.9 percent in the state as a whole and 8.5 percent nationally. This month, the Food Lion grocery store announced it was closing, forcing 38 employees to scramble for new work. Downtown, some shops are plastered with “For Rent’’ signs.
“Nobody in Washington cares about the poor people!’’ said Lou Webber Sr., 78, pounding his fist on the counter in his auto shop, Webber Tire, where business is down 35 percent since last year.
Many worry that an effort by state lawmakers to privatize Northeast Florida State Hospital, the county’s largest employer, could lead to job cuts there. The Baker County Chamber of Commerce has been fighting the effort, despite its probusiness inclinations....
Ringed by fast food outlets and chain stores, Macclenny’s streets rumble with pickup trucks, and its small downtown includes a Christian thrift store, a Dixie Outfitters shop selling camouflage hats and Confederate flag T-shirts, and a Bargain Channel radio station where listeners can buy giant cans of boiled peanuts and discounted jewelry.
In 2008, Romney won Baker County, easily beating McCain, Mike Huckabee, and Rudy Giuliani. In the general election, McCain carried the county with a whopping 78 percent of the vote, compared to 21 percent for Barack Obama. Of Florida’s 67 counties, only two others gave McCain a larger margin of victory.
These days, Romney has not stirred much interest in the city of 14,000.
“There’s something about him that just doesn’t pan out,’’ Adcock said. “I don’t know if it’s his faith that worries me, because I don’t know anything about the Mormons. But he just doesn’t interest me, even when I listen to him. Newt does.’’
Barton said his customers don’t care that Romney has a stable family while Gingrich has a history of marital infidelity.
“They’d rather forgive a Christian for all his dishonest relationships than go with a Mormon,’’ he said. “North Florida is the Bible Belt.’’
******************************************
Romney’s strength in the area lies in Jacksonville, the financial heart of the region, and St. Augustine, a resort haven, which have more “Chamber of Commerce Republicans’’ than the rural communities of North Florida, said Matthew T. Corrigan, chairman of the political science department at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville.
Romney, he said, has tapped into former governor Jeb Bush’s fund-raising networks in the area, rounding up prominent backers such as John D. Rood, a wealthy Jacksonville investor and former ambassador to the Bahamas.
“Romney has financial connections here, in terms of fund-raising, he has an electoral history here, and if he doesn’t win here, I think it’s going to be a tough day for him,’’ Corrigan said of North Florida.
One Romney supporter in Macclenny, Tom Rumsey, an 82-year-old retired activities director at Northeast Florida State Hospital, said he likes the former Massachusetts governor’s combination of business and government experience.
He said he was dismayed, but not surprised, that Romney’s Mormonism is a stumbling block in the community.
A Pennsylvania native, Rumsey recalled that when he started working at the hospital more than two decades ago, two employees threatened to “take me out’’ because he was not from the area.
“There is prejudice here - it’s all over the country - but here it’s just more blatant,’’ he said. “It’s changing, but it’s a slow process.’’
Like a lot of small communities in North Florida that vote Republican in presidential elections, registered Democrats outnumber Republicans in Macclenny. That is a vestige of the era before Civil Rights, when conservative Democrats ruled the South. Since the 1980s, when the Democratic Party began embracing abortion rights and gay rights, Republicans have been gaining here.
************************************
“Historically, the rural South has been registered Democrat, and it’s taken people a while to get around and change their registration,’’ said Donald Marshall, chairman of the Baker County Republican Party. “For the most part, the people that live in Baker County are extremely conservative, and that’s the way they vote.’’
As the primary draws near, interest in the race is rising. About 100 voters a day have been streaming into the local elections office, in a former bank, to cast early ballots. On Wednesday, Dorothy Horton, 64, cast her vote for Gingrich. She made up her mind during the last debate in South Carolina, when Gingrich blasted CNN host John King for asking about his marital history.
Gingrich “got a little bit angry,’’ and showed “he’s somebody who’s going to fight for us,’’ Horton said.
“I was in the living room with my husband,’’ she said, “and I said, ‘I got my man.’ ’’
--more--"
Related: Mitt Romney jumps ahead in Florida
The Republican presidential candidate has a double-digit lead in Florida with the primary just two days away, new polls show.
Also see: Romney could have edge with Fla.'s early, absentee voters
