The Mitt Romney -Glen Johnson Exchange: What The News Media Are Ignoring
There's been lots of attention to this story, about Mitt Romney's on-camera exchange with Glen Johnson. The video is here. This is the only part of the discussion that matters:
I don’t have lobbyists running my campaign,” Romney said. “I don’t have
lobbyists that are tied to my … ”
“That’s not true, governor!” Johnson suddenly interjected. “That is not
true. Ron Kaufman is a lobbyist.”
This is the fact that the MSM coverage is obscuring: McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, is a former lobbyist. Mike Allen documents that here.
So: The man running John McCain's campaign is a lobbyist. On the Romney side, Ron Kaufman is an unpaid advisor to Romney's campaign.
Do you see the difference? I hope someone does. So Romney's statement was absolutely correct and a good dig at McCain's campaign. It seems the MSM doesn't like that.
posted by Lowell Brown at 7:57 AM
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3 Comments:
My truthful reaction? At the risk of having the Romney Campaign repossess my Mitt Romney for President water bottle, it was a dumb issue to raise. We are Republicans. We were against McCain-Feingold--that's why we are so lukewarm about John McCain. Unlike the folks on the other side, we don't consider lobbyists to be inherently evil. The businesses and other interest groups that hire them are exercising their First Amendment rights. So if a former lobbyist heads up McCain's campaign, or if a present lobbyist is a friend of and advisor to Mitt, it should be a non-issue. As for Lowell's distinction, one could argue with some conviction that it is less suspect to be paying a former lobbyist to head one's campaign, since his salary purchases his loyalty, than to have an unpaid lobbyist as an advisor. The volunteer still has a mortgage to pay and probably is earning his keep from his lobbying clients. Having said that, I return to my main point--for Republicans, it should be a bogus issue.
Ralph: Let me just say that I wish Mitt would just talk about what he wants to do. He is just not very good at criticizing other candidates, perhaps because it's so counter to his nature.
Exactly, Lowell. Mitt's greatest strength is that he is simply the best and most qualified candidate in either party. He is incredibly smart, incisively analytical, and has energy that puts me to shame. Morever, he knows how to manage. He has an extraordinary ability to look at a problem, analyse it, reason toward a solution, and then put the solution into effect. He can manage and move a bureaucracy. It is those skills, and their application to specific problems facing our country, that he should be selling to the voters. From now on he should strictly adhere to Ronald Reagan's Golden Rule, Thou Shalt Not Criticize Another Republican, and leave the cheap shots to folks like McCain and Huckabee.
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