By Shailagh Murray and Michael D. Shear
Washington Post staff writer
Sunday, February 21, 2010; 12:16 PM
The Senate's top Republican promised Sunday morning that he and his members will attend President Obama's health care summit on Thursday "ready to participate" but said the Democrats are being "arrogant" by refusing to scrap their legislation and start over.
"You know, they are saying, "Ignore the wishes of the American people. We know more about this than you do. And we're going to jam it down your throats no matter what," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on Fox News Sunday.
Republicans have accused the president of using Thursday's summit as political theater, and had raised the prospect of not attending. McConnell dismissed the idea of a GOP boycott, saying that "we're discussing the -- sort of the makeup of the room and that sort of thing, but yeah, I intend to be there and my members will be there and ready to participate."
McConnell said, however, that his party will continue to oppose Democrats if they try to use the parliamentary tactic called "reconciliation" to pass parts of their health care agenda without 60 votes in the Senate. He acknowledged that there are "a variety of different options" that Republicans could use to try and slow that process.
"The only thing bipartisan about it would be the opposition to it, because a number of Democrats have said, "Don't do this. This is not the way to go," McConnell said.
"We believe that we think a better way to go is to, step by step, move in the direction of dealing with the cost issue, targeting things like junk lawsuits against doctors and hospitals, interstate insurance competition, small association health plans," he added. "There are a number of things you can do without having the government try to take over one-sixth of the economy."
White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer said in response that "the upcoming meeting is an opportunity to get beyond oft repeated and completely false talking points like these. . . . The President is coming to the meeting with an open mind and he hopes the Republicans do as well."
Obama warned lawmakers on both sides of the aisle Saturday not to turn the health-care summit into "political theater," but rather "to seek common ground in an effort to solve a problem that's been with us for generations."
The Thursday event, scheduled to be televised live on C-SPAN, could prove a pivotal moment in the year-long struggle to overhaul the health-care system. The White House is expected to publish Obama's health-care blueprint on its Web site Monday, a proposal drawing from the two Democratic bills now stalled in Congress.
Obama has challenged Republicans to post their own proposals for lowering costs and expanding coverage to uninsured, to lay the groundwork for Thursday's discussion.
According to the White House, the summit is an effort to revive the legislative process by bringing Republicans to the table to identify areas of common ground. Some Republicans, however, have derided the event as a political ploy and have declined to say whether they will attend.
Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R) urged Democrats Sunday to abandon their comprehensive health care efforts in favor of smaller, targeted changes. Speaking on Fox News Sunday, Barbour said the bills pushed by Democrats would "drive up the cost of health insurance. We shouldn't put a huge unfunded mandate on states that would make me raise taxes $150 million in Mississippi. We shouldn't put a huge tax on small business."
But California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R), speaking on ABC's "This Week" program, urged members of his party in Congress to work with Obama and Democrats to make changes in the health care system.
"I think that Republicans should be at the table with health care reform and bring their ideas, whatever it may be," Schwarzenegger told host Terry Moran. "This is what compromise is all about. You've got to have two opposing point of views. You try to bring them together and try to find out where is the sweet spot here? And there's the also the sweet spot. If there is a will, there's a way. If you really want to serve the people and not just your party, I think you will find that sweet spot and you can get it done."
Democratic Pennsylvania Gob. Ed Rendell, also on "This Week," said the Republican response to the president during Thursday's summit could have a profound effect on the political fortunes of members of Congress, who are up for reelection this year.
"The Republican Party has a very difficult task ahead," he said. "They can't just say no on Thursday. The American people are watching and they are watching clearly. They've got to come up with some ideas, and they've got to say what you said. You take some of our ideas; we'll take some of your ideas. We may not love your ideas, but we'll take them. If they don't do that, I think this whole dynamic of this political year could turn around."
In his weekly radio address Saturday, Obama reminded lawmakers, "We know the American people want us to reform our health insurance system. We know where the broad areas of agreement are. And we know where the sources of disagreement lie."
But what the summit might produce remains uncertain. GOP lawmakers have so far expressed little interest in teaming up with Democrats to pass legislation. And while the parties agree broadly that the health-care system is broken, they have found little consensus on more detailed questions, such as how best to provide insurance to people who don't have access to affordable coverage through an employer.
In broad strokes, the plan Obama will post Monday is expected to be similar to the current legislation, by providing subsidies to people who can't afford coverage, incentives for businesses to offer insurance, and expanded Medicaid coverage for the poor. Obama also has endorsed an excise tax on high-value insurance plans, along with a series of Medicare changes, to pay for his proposal.
But the plan's publication may rile partisan tensions. Republicans have demanded that Obama scrap the existing bill as evidence he is willing to bargain in good faith to find bipartisan consensus.
McConnell noted that Obama held a similar White House summit at the outset of the current process. "Nearly one year ago, the President moderated a health-care summit that kicked off a national debate that has led us to where we are today: a partisan bill devoid of support from the American people and diminished faith in this government's capacity to listen," McConnell said in a Friday statement. "Let's not make the same mistake twice."
Obama signaled Saturday two areas where he may be willing to meet Republicans in the middle: creating rules that would allow people to buy insurance across state lines, presumably at more competitive prices, and offering incentives to encourage small-business owners to provide coverage.
"I think both of these are good ideas -- so long as we pursue them in a way that protects benefits, protects patients, and protects the American people," Obama said.
Other potential areas on consensus, senior Democratic aides said, include expanded coverage for kids, insurance reforms to prevent people from losing coverage, allowing young adults to remain on their parents' plans and improving Medicaid to capture more of the millions of people who are now eligible for the program but haven't enrolled.
"Next week is our chance to finally reform our health insurance system so it works for families and small businesses," Obama said. "What's being tested here is not just our ability to solve this one problem, but our ability to solve any problem."
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Mitt Romney at CPAC
Romney's gearing up for 2012 with lessons from '08 on his mind
By Dan Balz
Sunday, February 21, 2010; A02
For most of the past year, Mitt Romney has been off the stage. While Sarah Palin has commanded headlines, while other Republicans have jumped into intraparty controversies over purity and as GOP leaders have vied with one another to bash President Obama the loudest, Romney stayed largely out of the fray.
That is about to change. The former Massachusetts governor has spent much of the past year working on a book called "No Apology" that will be published next month. He is now preparing to reemerge, with an eye on a possible 2012 presidential campaign. The question is what he learned from his failed 2008 campaign.
He marked the beginning of his reemergence with an appearance at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, which wrapped up three days of rhetoric Saturday. There he delivered a full-throated attack on Obama's policies, and he offered praise for former president George W. Bush and former vice president Dick Cheney.
For that he drew an enthusiastic response from an audience that has become emblematic of the party's most conservative wing. It didn't hurt that he was introduced by the newest darling of Republicans, Sen. Scott Brown (Mass.), whose victory in the special election for the seat once held by the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D) dramatically changed the political calculus in Washington and around the country.
Brown's election provided Romney with one of his best laugh lines. "For that victory," he said, "that stopped Obama-care and turned back the Reid-Pelosi liberal tide, we have something to say that you'd never think you'd hear at CPAC, 'Thank you, Massachusetts!' "
Romney wore his Massachusetts experience uncomfortably in the last presidential campaign. To compete for the nomination, he was forced to change some of the positions he had taken in two statewide campaigns in the Bay State-- one unsuccessful, one successful. He moved sharply to the right on abortion and gay rights and ran away from the health-care overhaul that he signed as governor and that bears resemblance to many of the ideas Democrats have pushed over the past year.
To win over social conservatives, he overcompensated. His 2007 speech at CPAC was replete with references to their issues. "I have stood in the center of the battlefield on every major social issue," he said that year. On Thursday, his speech contained no references to abortion, same-sex marriage or some of the other issues that became touchstones in his effort to win the hearts and minds of skeptical conservatives.
Romney has not abandoned any of those 2008 positions, and one speech is hardly representative of the body of his thinking or the themes he will strike to win support of conservatives, if he chooses to run again in 2012. But as a small indicator, the speech Thursday at least hinted that Romney and his advisers concluded that he had emphasized those issues far too much, for too little gain.
In his first campaign, Romney struggled to present himself in an authentic way. Many conservatives doubted his conversion. Moderates were disappointed that he seemed to have put on a new suit of clothes. His rivals ridiculed him as a flip-flopper. The media made Romney's shifting positions central to their coverage of his candidacy.
Most damaging was that Romney robbed himself of what many advisers and admirers had long thought was his most attractive attribute: that the former business executive knew how to fix problems, particularly with the economy. If he runs in 2012, it likely will be as a conservative Mr. Fix-It, rather than a convert to the cultural wars.
As much as Romney labored with his presentation, his campaign became an often undisciplined battleground of its own. Romney hired many top party consultants but was unable to find a way to get the most out of them. His campaign team was at times paralyzed -- and demoralized -- by the fact that no one could resolve or end constant warring among his media consultants.
Romney has taken steps to fix that problem. Last week he named Matt Rhoades as the new executive director of his political action committee. Rhoades ran Romney's communications operation in 2008 and before that was research director and deputy communications director at the Republican National Committee.
His appointment was seen by Romney loyalists as a sign that the former governor wants a well-executed plan for using his time and money in behalf of Republican candidates this fall, with a particular eye on preparing for another presidential campaign. Rhoades, by his own words, will not tolerate chaos in the Romney organization.
Better than most around Romney, Rhoades understands and can manage the two wings of Romney's political operation -- his Boston-based team of longtime advisers and the high-powered Washington consultants who came aboard for the 2008 campaign. "Rhoades commands the respect of everyone who is counted as part of the Romney team, and that matters a lot to the governor," said Kevin Madden, who was Romney's 2008 campaign press secretary.
Another Romney adviser from 2008 said of Rhoades's arrival, "I think it means the ramp-up will be quick and that 2010 will be a professional effort from day one -- a long way from the Commonwealth PAC," Romney's former political action committee.
It was clear from his CPAC performance that in terms of polish, he will start the 2012 cycle in better shape than the last campaign and ahead of many first-timers in the contest for the Republican nomination. Whether he has found his true voice will be answered in the months ahead.
Mitt Romney: President Obama has 'failed' the American people
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney addressed a gathering of conservatives in Washington today. Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty ImagesFormer Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney derided President Barack Obama for having "failed" to deliver on the promises of his administration and sought to paint Republican obstruction as a beneficial thing for the country in a speech today at a gathering of conservatives in Washington.
"President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and their team have failed the American people, and that is why their majority will soon be out the door," Romney told the audience at the CPAC conference, an annual get-together of conservative activists and leaders.
In the speech, an early copy of which the Fix obtained, Romney used the word "fail" no fewer than a dozen times to describe the shortcomings of the current president and the opportunity before Republicans. "The people of America are looking to conservatives for leadership, and we must not fail them," Romney said.
The main thrust of Romney's "failure" argument focused on the idea President had taken his eye off the ball in the early days of 2009, choosing priorities out of step with the American public.
"[Obama's] energy should have been focused on fixing the economy and creating jobs and to succeeding in our fight against radical violent jihad," said Romney. "Instead, he applied his time and political capital to his ill-conceived heath care takeover and to building his personal popularity in foreign countries. He failed to focus, and so he failed."
Romney's indictment of the Obama Administration is rightly regarded as one of the first salvos of the 2012 presidential race. The former Massachusetts Governor has made little secret of his plans to run for the Republican nomination in two years time -- following his unsuccessful primary bid in 2008 -- and has been laying the financial and organizational groundwork for such a bid for quite some time.
And, Romney sounded every bit the leader of his party in the speech, defending the policies of former President George W. Bush -- "I am convinced that history will judge President Bush far more kindly," he said -- and pushing back on the idea that Republicans are the "party of no", more willing to obstruct than do work for the American people. (The speech also had the well-choreographed feel of Romney's events during the 2008 campaign -- right down to his surprise introduction by new Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown.)
"It is right and praiseworthy to say no to bad things," Romney argued, noting that Republican opposition to cap and trade, the Employee Free Choice Act and "government health care" were in line with the opposition of the American people to such proposals. "You see, we conservatives don't have a corner on saying 'no'", Romney said. "We're just the ones who say it when it is the right thing to do."
Romney also outlined -- albeit briefly -- his own governing vision based on three thematic pillars: strengthening the economy, strengthening security and strengthening the family. (Close observers of Romney's rhetoric that these three pillars once made up his three-legged stool during the 2008 campaign.)
On the economy specifically, Romney proposed cutting taxes, making the dollar stronger and "opening markets to America goods" and, broadly, encouraging invention and innovation in the private sector.
"We will insist on greatness from every one of our citizens and rather than apologizing for who we are or for what we have accomplished, we will celebrate our nation's strength and goodness," Romney said at the speech's close.
CPAC 2010: candid pics
Photo Gallery from CPAC 2010 in Washington DC
Wanted to embed here but was unable but the pictures are pretty good.
Conservative Political Action Conference begins in Washington
By Philip Rucker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 19, 2010; A01
Emboldened by a belief that their political fortunes are on the rise, conservative activists descended Thursday on the capital city they love to hate, seeking to stoke what they consider a grass-roots uprising against President Obama and Democrats in Congress.
The annual Conservative Political Action Conference was once a venue for the right fringe of the Republican Party, but in recent years it has drawn more mainstream party figures and now provides a stage for presidential aspirants to prove their conservative credentials.
This year's CPAC, which began Thursday and will run through Saturday, had a festival atmosphere, as thousands of jubilant activists turned the Marriott Wardman Park ballroom into a hive of old-guard conservatives and Don't Tread on Me "tea partiers" hungry for new leaders and messages that can carry the GOP out of the political wilderness.
It was, in the words of one speaker, "our Woodstock."
Featured speakers in the opening session included former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who sought to turn the page on his 2008 presidential campaign by casting himself as a populist and every bit the conservative standard-bearer. He defended the policies of former president George W. Bush and his party's lockstep opposition to Obama's agenda, saying that Obama had "failed" and that the Democratic majority in Congress would "soon be out the door."
"If these liberal neo-monarchists succeed, they will kill the very spirit that has built the nation -- the innovating, inventing, creating, independent current that runs from coast to coast," Romney said. Pounding on the lectern as the audience leapt up, he declared: "And we won't let 'em do it."
The attendees stomped and screamed at the appearance of the surprise guest who introduced Romney: Scott Brown. "I'm the newly elected Republican senator from Massachusetts," Brown said. "Let me just say that one more time. I am the Republican senator from Massachusetts."
Former vice president Richard B. Cheney also made an unscheduled appearance, bounding out from behind the dark curtain with his daughter Liz. He received a hero's welcome, to cries of "Run, Dick, run!"
"Knock it off," Cheney quipped. "A welcome like that's almost enough to make me want to run for office, but I'm not gonna do it."
Since the days of President Richard M. Nixon, CPAC has served as an annual gathering of conservative thinkers. But now it is an important venue for any ambitious Republican, and this year's agenda features potential presidential hopefuls. In addition to Romney, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Rep. Mike Pence (Ind.) will speak Friday, while former senator Rick Santorum (Pa.) and former House speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.) will speak Saturday, before the results of a presidential straw poll are released. Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin is not expected to attend.
The gathering continues to draw its share of firebrands. Dana Loesch, a St. Louis radio host and a tea party leader there, challenged conservatives to organize in unexpected ways -- over burgers and brews at bars where liberals congregate or by starting "flash mobs." Longtime National Rifle Association leader Wayne LaPierre gave an impassioned tribute to Charlton Heston, the late actor and NRA president.
And at a time of strife within the Republican Party, which lacks a clear national leader and is struggling to unite behind a common agenda as the November midterm elections approach, one theme emerged in each speech Thursday: Attack Obama.
"When it comes to pinning blame, pin the tail on the donkeys," Romney told the thousands who had gathered for his speech.
By 10:30 a.m., the conservative movement had already seemed to crown its latest darling: Marco Rubio, 38, a son of Cuban immigrants who is running an outsider's campaign in Florida for U.S. Senate. The audience showered Rubio with applause as he ruminated in a keynote address about American exceptionalism and his own improbable journey.
"It's sometimes easy to forget how special America really is," Rubio said, making his debut on the national stage. "But I was raised by exiles, by people who know what it is like to lose their country, by people who have a unique perspective on why elections matter, or lack thereof, by people who clearly understand how different America is from the rest of the world. . . . What makes America great is that there are dreams that are impossible everywhere else but are possible here."
Rubio is running in a hotly contested GOP primary campaign against Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, a race that has pitted the conservative grass roots, which have embraced Rubio, against the more moderate party establishment.
Rubio's assaults on Obama's economic policies and his administration's handling of national security enthralled the activists.
"We will do whatever it takes, for however long it takes, to defeat radical Islamic terrorism," Rubio said. "We will punish their allies like Iran. We will stand with our allies like Israel. We will target and we will destroy terrorist cells and the leaders of those cells. The ones that survive, we will capture them. We will get useful information from them.
"And then," Rubio continued, trying to speak over the boisterous crowd, "we will bring them to justice in front of a military tribunal in Guantanamo -- not a civilian courtroom in Manhattan."
Romney sounded similar themes as he defended his party against allegations from Democratic leaders that Republicans have become "the party of 'no.' "
"Before we move away from this 'no' epithet the Democrats are fond of applying to us, let's ask the Obama folks why they say no -- no to a balanced budget, no to reforming entitlements, no to malpractice reform, no to missile defense in Eastern Europe, no to prosecuting Khalid Sheik Mohammed in a military tribunal, and no to tax cuts that create new jobs.
"You see, we conservatives don't have a corner on saying no," Romney continued. "We're just the ones who say it when that's the right thing to say."
After distancing himself from the Bush administration during his 2008 campaign, Romney on Thursday defended the Bush-Cheney record, drawing hearty applause from the audience. "I am convinced that history will judge President Bush far more kindly," he said, adding: "He kept us safe. I respect his silence even in the face of the assaults on his record that come from this administration. But at the same time, I also respect the loyalty and indefatigable defense of truth that comes from our 'I-don't-give-a-damn' vice president Dick Cheney."
GOP speakers court key group at conservative conference
By Philip Rucker and Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, February 20, 2010; A03
The second day of the Conservative Political Action Conference turned into a call to arms Friday as aspiring national leaders and other favorites of the movement's grass roots warned that President Obama and his party have ushered in an era of American decline.
As they exhorted activists to help overturn the Democrats' congressional majorities in November, speaker after speaker took the dais and touched familiar chords of conservatism: smaller government, lower taxes, limited federal spending and a muscular assertion of American power abroad. They rallied a few thousand partisans who had arrived at the Marriott Wardman Park ballroom encouraged, even giddy, by the prospect of Republican successes in the midterm elections and beyond.
Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) received one of the most thunderous ovations so far in the three-day conference when he delivered a stinging assault on Obama's agenda and a plea to deliver the nation from "the bondage of big government." Pence said, "This is our moment" -- not just for a Republican majority on Capitol Hill, but for a conservative one.
"Now's the time," Pence said. "It's time for all of us to do all we can to preserve what makes this country great. If you can give, give. If you can speak, speak. If you can write, write. And if you can run, run."
The loudest applause for Pence came when he mentioned the upcoming trial of Sept. 11 terror suspect Khalid Sheik Mohammed. Pence said the U.S. intelligence community should be given the tools to fight terrorism as a war and then called on the Obama administration to alter its plan to try some terror suspects in civilian courts.
And when Pence updated a line used by conservatives at past gatherings, he brought down the house: "A recession is when your neighbor loses his job, and a depression is when you lose your job, and a recovery is when [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi loses her job."
Pence was among a handful of Republicans mentioned as potential 2012 presidential candidates who hoped their speeches at CPAC might endear them to this important part of the Republican electorate. On Thursday, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney addressed the convention, and Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Rep. Ron Paul (Tex.) joined Pence on Friday's roster.
In his speech, Pawlenty delivered a forceful rebuke of Obama's first year in office, saying repeatedly that conservatives "will fight back." He embraced the grass-roots revolt against the Democratic leadership in Washington, drawing a parallel with Ulysses S. Grant, the scrappy Union general who went on to become president after the Civil War.
"The implication is, we're kind of bumpkins," Pawlenty said. "Well, history is on our side. The Constitution is on our side. We're on the side of freedom. We're on the side of individual responsibility. We're on the side of free markets. We're on the side of rule of law. We're on the side of limited government. And, like Grant, we fight."
Pawlenty, who is considering a 2012 candidacy, sharply attacked Obama, suggesting that his administration was making the United States "a beggar nation" because of the increasing reliance on foreign debt. He went so far as to compare Democrats to embattled golfer Tiger Woods, saying that "we can learn a lot" from Woods's news conference Friday.
"Not from Tiger, but from his wife," Pawlenty said. "She said, 'I've had enough.' She said, 'No more.' I think we should take a page out of her playbook and take a nine-iron and smash the window out of the big government in this country."
CPAC speakers largely focused their remarks on fiscal conservatism and a strong national defense, but Friday's speeches also included pointed language on abortion, same-sex marriage and other social issues. Pawlenty, seeking to burnish his conservative bona fides, embraced religion as the first of four principles that conservatives should follow.
"God's in charge," he said. "There are some people who say, 'Oh, you know, Pawlenty, don't bring that up. You know it's politically incorrect.' Hogwash."
"That's right," some in the audience shouted.
"These are enshrined in the founding documents and perspective of our country," Pawlenty continued. "In the Declaration of Independence, it says we're endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights. It doesn't say we're endowed by Washington, D.C., or endowed by the bureaucrats or endowed by state government."
Throughout the conference, several speakers blamed Democrats for an America they said is on the wane. Pence quoted former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, who, as she was coming to power, described her country as on its knees. "America is not yet on its knees, but it's bowed," he said.
Pence then asserted, without naming names, that "officials in this administration" say privately that they see their job as "managing America's decline." He then said, "The job of the American president is not to manage American decline. The job of the American president is to reverse it."
An hour later, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) went further, suggesting that Obama -- through economic policies she labeled "Bailout Nation" -- is leading the country toward an economic collapse on the scale of 1920s Germany and 1940s Argentina.
"People can indulge in Fantasy Football, but you can't indulge in Fantasy Economics," Bachmann said. "It just doesn't work."
"The joy of being an American is that we get to choose," she added. "We get to choose our destiny. Whether it's decline or whether it's greatness, it's in our hands to make the choice. . . . It sounds to me like someone is choosing decline."
Bachmann, a "tea party" heroine, was treated like a rock star when she burst onto the stage to Tom Jones's "She's a Lady" -- a cheeky reference to Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) having admonished her recently on the radio to "act like a lady."
She did not disappoint her fans with her speech Friday, taking them on a journey through American colonial history and speaking passionately of liberty, the right to life and the pursuit of happiness.
"It is of this suffering and of this self-sacrifice that our nation was built upon," she said, her voice quivering with emotion. "They chose greatness for us, rather than decline. That is our history. That is the American story."
Possible Republican candidates for president 'try out' before CPAC, governors
By Liz Sidoti
Sunday, February 21, 2010; A03
Republicans who might want President Obama's job flocked to Washington this weekend and repeatedly ripped into the Democrat, an early tryout of sorts for their party's nomination.
"Barack Obama has created at least three jobs that I know of: Bob McDonnell, Chris Christie and Scott Brown," former House speaker Newt Gingrich told a fawning crowd Saturday, referring to the GOP candidates who prevailed recently in the governor's races in Virginia and New Jersey and the U.S. Senate contest in Massachusetts.
He predicted that Republicans would take control of Congress this fall and added: "We'll elect a new president in 2012."
In appearance after appearance, possible GOP presidential contenders used two national platforms -- a caucus of conservatives and a gathering of governors -- to promote their credentials and test their strength in an incredibly fluid field a full two years before the GOP chooses its nominee.
Along with Gingrich, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, Indiana Rep. Mike Pence and former senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania courted conservatives with long speeches at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour held court at the National Governors Association meeting as chairman of the GOP governors, and Govs. Mitcell E. Daniels Jr. of Indiana and Bobby Jindal of Louisiana attended. Minn. Gov. Tim Pawlenty plugged away at both events.
Among possible candidates missing: 2008 vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin and South Dakota Sen. John Thune. Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee's presence was limited to a video shown to a small group of conservatives.
No Republican has announced a bid. Several are considering it or are laying the groundwork. They are putting campaign teams in place, visiting early primary voting states and using political action committees to sow goodwill -- and money -- among the party's candidates.
GOP hopefuls are emboldened by Obama's weakened poll numbers just a year into office, and they see an opportunity to capitalize on anger rippling through the electorate over his policies.
"If you see me losing 40 pounds that means I'm either running or have cancer," said Barbour, a former lobbyist and GOP chairman who Republican insiders say would be a formidable candidate. He said he would focus this year on helping fellow Republicans in governor's races. "If after these elections are over there's anything to think about, I'll think about it then," he said.
Still, he added: "I think it is unlikely that I'll run for president, but that does not qualify as ruling it out." He made a brief stop at the conservatives' meeting Friday.
None of the would-be candidates speaking before that crowd mentioned running for president. Nonetheless, signs of the next White House race were everywhere.
Each speaker delivered what could only be described as early versions of a routine campaign address, testing messages before an important part of the base in Republican primary contests. Potential campaign advisers gathered in the ballroom corners.
Supporters encouraged attendees to vote their way during a 2012 straw poll. Texas Rep. Ron Paul, a libertarian who has railed against spending and the Federal Reserve, won the most support, followed by Romney, Palin and Pawlenty. The results mean little more than bragging rights for the winner.
After his address Friday morning, Pawlenty shook hands, signed autographs and posed for pictures along what appeared to be a makeshift "rope line" of the kind presidential candidates are accustomed to; aides were close by.
Pawlenty is far less known nationally than Romney, so Pawlenty's speech was intended to introduce his biography, outline his vision and take on Obama. He did all three.
As the RGA's vice chairman, Pawlenty had a high profile role at the governor's gathering and was appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday. Barbour was booked on "Fox News Sunday." On Saturday, Santorum, looking for a political comeback, played off Obama's hope-and-change campaign slogan, saying: "Mr. President, America is the hope. And you can keep the change." Gingrich, who was the last to speak, made a grand entrance into the standing room only ballroom from a side door. He shook supporters' hands as he made his way to the stage as "Eye of the Tiger" played loudly and the audience chanted "Newt."
-- Associated Press
Wanted to embed here but was unable but the pictures are pretty good.
Conservative Political Action Conference begins in Washington
By Philip Rucker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 19, 2010; A01
Emboldened by a belief that their political fortunes are on the rise, conservative activists descended Thursday on the capital city they love to hate, seeking to stoke what they consider a grass-roots uprising against President Obama and Democrats in Congress.
The annual Conservative Political Action Conference was once a venue for the right fringe of the Republican Party, but in recent years it has drawn more mainstream party figures and now provides a stage for presidential aspirants to prove their conservative credentials.
This year's CPAC, which began Thursday and will run through Saturday, had a festival atmosphere, as thousands of jubilant activists turned the Marriott Wardman Park ballroom into a hive of old-guard conservatives and Don't Tread on Me "tea partiers" hungry for new leaders and messages that can carry the GOP out of the political wilderness.
It was, in the words of one speaker, "our Woodstock."
Featured speakers in the opening session included former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who sought to turn the page on his 2008 presidential campaign by casting himself as a populist and every bit the conservative standard-bearer. He defended the policies of former president George W. Bush and his party's lockstep opposition to Obama's agenda, saying that Obama had "failed" and that the Democratic majority in Congress would "soon be out the door."
"If these liberal neo-monarchists succeed, they will kill the very spirit that has built the nation -- the innovating, inventing, creating, independent current that runs from coast to coast," Romney said. Pounding on the lectern as the audience leapt up, he declared: "And we won't let 'em do it."
The attendees stomped and screamed at the appearance of the surprise guest who introduced Romney: Scott Brown. "I'm the newly elected Republican senator from Massachusetts," Brown said. "Let me just say that one more time. I am the Republican senator from Massachusetts."
Former vice president Richard B. Cheney also made an unscheduled appearance, bounding out from behind the dark curtain with his daughter Liz. He received a hero's welcome, to cries of "Run, Dick, run!"
"Knock it off," Cheney quipped. "A welcome like that's almost enough to make me want to run for office, but I'm not gonna do it."
Since the days of President Richard M. Nixon, CPAC has served as an annual gathering of conservative thinkers. But now it is an important venue for any ambitious Republican, and this year's agenda features potential presidential hopefuls. In addition to Romney, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Rep. Mike Pence (Ind.) will speak Friday, while former senator Rick Santorum (Pa.) and former House speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.) will speak Saturday, before the results of a presidential straw poll are released. Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin is not expected to attend.
The gathering continues to draw its share of firebrands. Dana Loesch, a St. Louis radio host and a tea party leader there, challenged conservatives to organize in unexpected ways -- over burgers and brews at bars where liberals congregate or by starting "flash mobs." Longtime National Rifle Association leader Wayne LaPierre gave an impassioned tribute to Charlton Heston, the late actor and NRA president.
And at a time of strife within the Republican Party, which lacks a clear national leader and is struggling to unite behind a common agenda as the November midterm elections approach, one theme emerged in each speech Thursday: Attack Obama.
"When it comes to pinning blame, pin the tail on the donkeys," Romney told the thousands who had gathered for his speech.
By 10:30 a.m., the conservative movement had already seemed to crown its latest darling: Marco Rubio, 38, a son of Cuban immigrants who is running an outsider's campaign in Florida for U.S. Senate. The audience showered Rubio with applause as he ruminated in a keynote address about American exceptionalism and his own improbable journey.
"It's sometimes easy to forget how special America really is," Rubio said, making his debut on the national stage. "But I was raised by exiles, by people who know what it is like to lose their country, by people who have a unique perspective on why elections matter, or lack thereof, by people who clearly understand how different America is from the rest of the world. . . . What makes America great is that there are dreams that are impossible everywhere else but are possible here."
Rubio is running in a hotly contested GOP primary campaign against Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, a race that has pitted the conservative grass roots, which have embraced Rubio, against the more moderate party establishment.
Rubio's assaults on Obama's economic policies and his administration's handling of national security enthralled the activists.
"We will do whatever it takes, for however long it takes, to defeat radical Islamic terrorism," Rubio said. "We will punish their allies like Iran. We will stand with our allies like Israel. We will target and we will destroy terrorist cells and the leaders of those cells. The ones that survive, we will capture them. We will get useful information from them.
"And then," Rubio continued, trying to speak over the boisterous crowd, "we will bring them to justice in front of a military tribunal in Guantanamo -- not a civilian courtroom in Manhattan."
Romney sounded similar themes as he defended his party against allegations from Democratic leaders that Republicans have become "the party of 'no.' "
"Before we move away from this 'no' epithet the Democrats are fond of applying to us, let's ask the Obama folks why they say no -- no to a balanced budget, no to reforming entitlements, no to malpractice reform, no to missile defense in Eastern Europe, no to prosecuting Khalid Sheik Mohammed in a military tribunal, and no to tax cuts that create new jobs.
"You see, we conservatives don't have a corner on saying no," Romney continued. "We're just the ones who say it when that's the right thing to say."
After distancing himself from the Bush administration during his 2008 campaign, Romney on Thursday defended the Bush-Cheney record, drawing hearty applause from the audience. "I am convinced that history will judge President Bush far more kindly," he said, adding: "He kept us safe. I respect his silence even in the face of the assaults on his record that come from this administration. But at the same time, I also respect the loyalty and indefatigable defense of truth that comes from our 'I-don't-give-a-damn' vice president Dick Cheney."
GOP speakers court key group at conservative conference
By Philip Rucker and Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, February 20, 2010; A03
The second day of the Conservative Political Action Conference turned into a call to arms Friday as aspiring national leaders and other favorites of the movement's grass roots warned that President Obama and his party have ushered in an era of American decline.
As they exhorted activists to help overturn the Democrats' congressional majorities in November, speaker after speaker took the dais and touched familiar chords of conservatism: smaller government, lower taxes, limited federal spending and a muscular assertion of American power abroad. They rallied a few thousand partisans who had arrived at the Marriott Wardman Park ballroom encouraged, even giddy, by the prospect of Republican successes in the midterm elections and beyond.
Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) received one of the most thunderous ovations so far in the three-day conference when he delivered a stinging assault on Obama's agenda and a plea to deliver the nation from "the bondage of big government." Pence said, "This is our moment" -- not just for a Republican majority on Capitol Hill, but for a conservative one.
"Now's the time," Pence said. "It's time for all of us to do all we can to preserve what makes this country great. If you can give, give. If you can speak, speak. If you can write, write. And if you can run, run."
The loudest applause for Pence came when he mentioned the upcoming trial of Sept. 11 terror suspect Khalid Sheik Mohammed. Pence said the U.S. intelligence community should be given the tools to fight terrorism as a war and then called on the Obama administration to alter its plan to try some terror suspects in civilian courts.
And when Pence updated a line used by conservatives at past gatherings, he brought down the house: "A recession is when your neighbor loses his job, and a depression is when you lose your job, and a recovery is when [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi loses her job."
Pence was among a handful of Republicans mentioned as potential 2012 presidential candidates who hoped their speeches at CPAC might endear them to this important part of the Republican electorate. On Thursday, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney addressed the convention, and Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Rep. Ron Paul (Tex.) joined Pence on Friday's roster.
In his speech, Pawlenty delivered a forceful rebuke of Obama's first year in office, saying repeatedly that conservatives "will fight back." He embraced the grass-roots revolt against the Democratic leadership in Washington, drawing a parallel with Ulysses S. Grant, the scrappy Union general who went on to become president after the Civil War.
"The implication is, we're kind of bumpkins," Pawlenty said. "Well, history is on our side. The Constitution is on our side. We're on the side of freedom. We're on the side of individual responsibility. We're on the side of free markets. We're on the side of rule of law. We're on the side of limited government. And, like Grant, we fight."
Pawlenty, who is considering a 2012 candidacy, sharply attacked Obama, suggesting that his administration was making the United States "a beggar nation" because of the increasing reliance on foreign debt. He went so far as to compare Democrats to embattled golfer Tiger Woods, saying that "we can learn a lot" from Woods's news conference Friday.
"Not from Tiger, but from his wife," Pawlenty said. "She said, 'I've had enough.' She said, 'No more.' I think we should take a page out of her playbook and take a nine-iron and smash the window out of the big government in this country."
CPAC speakers largely focused their remarks on fiscal conservatism and a strong national defense, but Friday's speeches also included pointed language on abortion, same-sex marriage and other social issues. Pawlenty, seeking to burnish his conservative bona fides, embraced religion as the first of four principles that conservatives should follow.
"God's in charge," he said. "There are some people who say, 'Oh, you know, Pawlenty, don't bring that up. You know it's politically incorrect.' Hogwash."
"That's right," some in the audience shouted.
"These are enshrined in the founding documents and perspective of our country," Pawlenty continued. "In the Declaration of Independence, it says we're endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights. It doesn't say we're endowed by Washington, D.C., or endowed by the bureaucrats or endowed by state government."
Throughout the conference, several speakers blamed Democrats for an America they said is on the wane. Pence quoted former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, who, as she was coming to power, described her country as on its knees. "America is not yet on its knees, but it's bowed," he said.
Pence then asserted, without naming names, that "officials in this administration" say privately that they see their job as "managing America's decline." He then said, "The job of the American president is not to manage American decline. The job of the American president is to reverse it."
An hour later, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) went further, suggesting that Obama -- through economic policies she labeled "Bailout Nation" -- is leading the country toward an economic collapse on the scale of 1920s Germany and 1940s Argentina.
"People can indulge in Fantasy Football, but you can't indulge in Fantasy Economics," Bachmann said. "It just doesn't work."
"The joy of being an American is that we get to choose," she added. "We get to choose our destiny. Whether it's decline or whether it's greatness, it's in our hands to make the choice. . . . It sounds to me like someone is choosing decline."
Bachmann, a "tea party" heroine, was treated like a rock star when she burst onto the stage to Tom Jones's "She's a Lady" -- a cheeky reference to Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) having admonished her recently on the radio to "act like a lady."
She did not disappoint her fans with her speech Friday, taking them on a journey through American colonial history and speaking passionately of liberty, the right to life and the pursuit of happiness.
"It is of this suffering and of this self-sacrifice that our nation was built upon," she said, her voice quivering with emotion. "They chose greatness for us, rather than decline. That is our history. That is the American story."
Possible Republican candidates for president 'try out' before CPAC, governors
By Liz Sidoti
Sunday, February 21, 2010; A03
Republicans who might want President Obama's job flocked to Washington this weekend and repeatedly ripped into the Democrat, an early tryout of sorts for their party's nomination.
"Barack Obama has created at least three jobs that I know of: Bob McDonnell, Chris Christie and Scott Brown," former House speaker Newt Gingrich told a fawning crowd Saturday, referring to the GOP candidates who prevailed recently in the governor's races in Virginia and New Jersey and the U.S. Senate contest in Massachusetts.
He predicted that Republicans would take control of Congress this fall and added: "We'll elect a new president in 2012."
In appearance after appearance, possible GOP presidential contenders used two national platforms -- a caucus of conservatives and a gathering of governors -- to promote their credentials and test their strength in an incredibly fluid field a full two years before the GOP chooses its nominee.
Along with Gingrich, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, Indiana Rep. Mike Pence and former senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania courted conservatives with long speeches at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour held court at the National Governors Association meeting as chairman of the GOP governors, and Govs. Mitcell E. Daniels Jr. of Indiana and Bobby Jindal of Louisiana attended. Minn. Gov. Tim Pawlenty plugged away at both events.
Among possible candidates missing: 2008 vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin and South Dakota Sen. John Thune. Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee's presence was limited to a video shown to a small group of conservatives.
No Republican has announced a bid. Several are considering it or are laying the groundwork. They are putting campaign teams in place, visiting early primary voting states and using political action committees to sow goodwill -- and money -- among the party's candidates.
GOP hopefuls are emboldened by Obama's weakened poll numbers just a year into office, and they see an opportunity to capitalize on anger rippling through the electorate over his policies.
"If you see me losing 40 pounds that means I'm either running or have cancer," said Barbour, a former lobbyist and GOP chairman who Republican insiders say would be a formidable candidate. He said he would focus this year on helping fellow Republicans in governor's races. "If after these elections are over there's anything to think about, I'll think about it then," he said.
Still, he added: "I think it is unlikely that I'll run for president, but that does not qualify as ruling it out." He made a brief stop at the conservatives' meeting Friday.
None of the would-be candidates speaking before that crowd mentioned running for president. Nonetheless, signs of the next White House race were everywhere.
Each speaker delivered what could only be described as early versions of a routine campaign address, testing messages before an important part of the base in Republican primary contests. Potential campaign advisers gathered in the ballroom corners.
Supporters encouraged attendees to vote their way during a 2012 straw poll. Texas Rep. Ron Paul, a libertarian who has railed against spending and the Federal Reserve, won the most support, followed by Romney, Palin and Pawlenty. The results mean little more than bragging rights for the winner.
After his address Friday morning, Pawlenty shook hands, signed autographs and posed for pictures along what appeared to be a makeshift "rope line" of the kind presidential candidates are accustomed to; aides were close by.
Pawlenty is far less known nationally than Romney, so Pawlenty's speech was intended to introduce his biography, outline his vision and take on Obama. He did all three.
As the RGA's vice chairman, Pawlenty had a high profile role at the governor's gathering and was appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday. Barbour was booked on "Fox News Sunday." On Saturday, Santorum, looking for a political comeback, played off Obama's hope-and-change campaign slogan, saying: "Mr. President, America is the hope. And you can keep the change." Gingrich, who was the last to speak, made a grand entrance into the standing room only ballroom from a side door. He shook supporters' hands as he made his way to the stage as "Eye of the Tiger" played loudly and the audience chanted "Newt."
-- Associated Press
Glen Beck Key Note Speaker at 2010 CPAC Convention
Dana Milbank: At CPAC, Glenn Beck scolds the Republican Party
By Dana Milbank
Sunday, February 21, 2010; A03
After three days of liberal bashing, 10,000 right-wing activists attending the Conservative Political Action Conference used their final night in town to give a sharp rebuke to . . . the Republicans?
First came the results of CPAC's presidential straw poll, in which the runaway winner was Ron Paul, the antiwar libertarian gadfly who is only nominally a Republican. At 31 percent, he polled far better than more conventional candidates such as Mitt Romney (22 percent), Sarah Palin (7 percent) and Tim Pawlenty (6 percent). A majority of voters said they wished the Republicans had a better field of potential candidates.
Then it was time for the keynote speaker, the wildly popular Fox News host Glenn Beck. "I voted Republican almost every time," he said, and "I don't even know what they stand for anymore. And they've got to realize that they have a problem: 'Hello, my name is the Republican Party, and I've got a problem. I'm addicted to spending and big government.'"
The audience in the Marriott Wardman Park gave a huge cheer.
"But as of yet I haven't heard anyone say that," Beck added. "All they're talking about is: 'We need a big tent. We need a big tent. Can we get a bigger tent? How can we get a big tent?' "
"What is this, a circus?" Beck asked.
A screwdriver to the eye
For most of the three-day conference, the conservatives took aim at their favorite targets, President Obama, congressional Democrats, the media and Hollywood. By Saturday evening, the hot air and the overflow crowd had warmed the ballroom to an uncomfortable temperature. Coats came off and speakers perspired. Someone brought Beck a white towel midway through his address.
But there was something different about the message of the final session, as the activists sent an unmistakable message to the Republicans that they can't be taken for granted.
The straw poll was one sign. Approval for Obama was, naturally, all of 2 percent -- and those people probably like him because he's been helpful to Republican electoral chances. But 37 percent said they disapprove of congressional Republicans. And Michael Steele, the Republican national chairman, was viewed favorably by only 42 percent.
In overall popularity, Beck and Rush Limbaugh, at 70 percent apiece, were second only to Senate conservative Jim "Waterloo" DeMint (73 percent) and well ahead of Republican leaders John Boehner and Mitch McConnell.
The Ron Paul victory got a mixed reaction of cheers followed by boos in the hall. But there was no such division when Beck, likened to Babe Ruth in the introduction, entered the room to pounding music and a strobe effect from flashes. He had a roving microphone and called for his blackboard to teach his listeners about the evils of progressivism.
"It is still morning in America," Beck said. "It just happens to be kind of a head-pounding, hung-over, vomiting for four hours" morning. "The question is what made us sit there in the john vomiting for four hours?"
He scribbled "progressivism" on the board and said it afflicts Republicans as well as Democrats. "I'm so sick of hearing people say, 'Oh, Republicans are going to solve it all.' Really? It's just progressive-light.
"It's like somebody sticking a screwdriver in your eye," he continued, "and somebody else pulls it out and puts a pin in your eye. I don't want stuff in my eye."
'A socialist utopia'
In an apparent reference to John McCain, Beck condemned a "guy in the Republican Party who says his favorite president is Theodore Roosevelt." He then read disapprovingly the Roosevelt quote that "we grudge no man a fortune in civil life if it is honorably obtained and well used . . . so long as the gaining represents benefit to the community."
"Is this what the Republican Party stands for?" Beck demanded. He was answered with boos and cries of "no!" "It's big government, it's a socialist utopia and we need to address it as if it is a cancer."
Obama, no doubt, will be delighted to learn that he has been joined in the conservatives' ire by the Hero of San Juan Hill.
Beck went on. "It's not enough just to not suck as much as the other side."
The CPAC activists gave this line a standing ovation.
The barrage continued. "One party will tax and spend; one party won't tax but will spend: It's both of them," he said. And as for George W. Bush's presidency, "anybody who thought that George Bush was spending and it made any kind of sense was a madman."
"I'm a recovering alcoholic, and I screwed up my life six ways to Sunday," Beck said. "I believe in redemption, but the first step to getting redemption is you've got to admit that you've got a problem. I have not heard people in the Republican Party yet admit that they have a problem."
The CPAC activists went off to party, but Republican leaders were the ones likely to have headaches on Sunday morning.
Rush Limbaugh Gives Speech at CPAC
He states in his first sentence that Fox news is going to telecast his speech and then he says "This is my first ever address to the nation." he really thinks so highly of himself......barf, barf
Ron Paul at CPAC Convention
Ron Paul wins CPAC straw poll
Paul, who ran for president in 2008, took 31 percent of the vote. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney had won the past three CPAC straw polls but placed second this time with 22 percent. Romney is considered the current frontrunner for the 2012 nod.
No other candidate scored in double digits. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who did not speak at CPAC, took third place with seven percent. (Full results are below.)
Be careful not to read too much -- or much at all -- into these results. Paul's supporters are loyal and loud but not, ultimately, that large a group as proven by the fact that he did not win a single primary or caucus in 2008.
2010 CPAC Straw Poll Results
Ron Paul 31%
Mitt Romney 22%
Sarah Palin 7%
Tim Pawlenty 6%
Mike Pence 5%
Newt Gingrich 4%
Mike Huckabee 4%
Mitch Daniels 2%
John Thune 2%
Rick Santorum 2%
Haley Barbour 1%
By Chris Cillizza | February 20, 2010; 5:42 PM ET
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)