1. Last week, Barack Obama’s reelection team released a “Life of
Julia” slideshow which was supposed to undermine Mitt Romney’s
support among women by documenting the cradle-to-grave goodies for
the fairer sex that Ryan/Romney Republicans would supposedly undo.
Whatever Julia’s long-term impact, in the short term the propaganda
piece was
widely ridiculed: “An e-mail from the Republican National
Committee urged conservatives to use the Twitter hashtag #Julia to
mock the timeline. And mock they did. Throughout the day, Twitter
was filled with sarcastic messages that described “Julia” as a ward
of the government.”
It was widely ridiculed precisely because it was ridiculous.
Ross Douthat
summarizes its underlying assumptions: “It offers a more
sweeping vision of government’s place in society, in which the
individual depends on the state at every stage of life, and no
decision — personal, educational, entrepreneurial, sexual — can be
contemplated without the promise that it will be somehow subsidized
by Washington.”
2. The “Party of Julia” may be in the White House, but this was
overall a pretty libertarian weekend. In Nevada, Ron Paul
supporters
ousted two Romney backers from the Republican National
Committee and
captured a majority of the state’s delegates to the national
convention. The RNC had
warned against the latter move, but the Nevada delegation
should be fine as long as those bound to Romney vote for him on the
first ballot.
When evaluating Paul’s delegate accumulation strategy, the key
question is this: How many people are going to Tampa as
first-ballot Ron Paul delegates and how many are Paul supporters
who are legally bound to Romney and other candidates? This matters
since the vote is unlikely to proceed beyond the first ballot.
Either way, a strong Paul presence could make itself felt in the
same way that it does at gatherings like CPAC.
3. Former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson won the Libertarian
Party’s presidential nomination with over 70 percent of the vote at
their national convention in Las Vegas. (Where else?) Judge Jim
Gray was nominated for vice president. Johnson joined the LP after
he failed to gain any traction — or major debate invitations —
running for president as a Republican. I had wondered if Johnson
would face any blowback from his recent Republican history,
especially in light of the Bob Barr
experience in 2008. Johnson took that issue
head on:
Somewhere between 2000 and 2008, Bob Barr fell out of bed, hit
his head, and became a libertarian. I’m glad it happened.
This is not 2008. I don’t have any of that baggage hanging in
back of me.
Johnson also
zinged Romney about the resignation of gay foreign policy
adviser Richard Grenell: “I believe the majority of Americans could
care less about whether or not there is a gay individual working in
the Romney campaign.”
4. Grenell’s departure from the Romney campaign was a hotly
contested issue in Washington. Many Romney critics seized on a
report by Romney supporter Jennifer Rubin that Grenell was
“hounded from Romney campaign by anti-gay conservatives.” Sources
close to the campaign counter they were merely waiting for a
controversy over Grenell’s tweets — pushed mainly by the left, not
the right — to blow over before pushing him front and center again
but he resigned on his own against their wishes. Whomever you
believe, Gary Johnson probably has this right: a majority of
Americans could care less.
5. Never count your chickens before they’re hatched or count
your votes before they’re cast. But the noise emanating from
Indiana doesn’t sound good for longtime Sen. Richard Lugar. He
faces a Tea Party primary challenge from state Treasurer Richard
Mourdock. State polling can be unreliable, but Lugar is
behaving like he believes his Senate seat is at risk. The
Indianapolis Star portrays him as pleading for crossover
votes.
6. Newt Gingrich ended his Republican presidential campaign last
week. Gingrich fought hard in the era of Bob Michel Republicanism
to ascend from the backbenches to the House leadership. He was
instrumental in the GOP congressional takeover of 1994 and thus
deserves substantial credit for the Republican majority’s real
policy accomplishments between 1995 and 1997. But once he got House
Republicans to the top of the mountain, he did not seem equal to
the task of delivering on his revolutionary promises. His personal
weaknesses helped ease him out of the speakership.
Gingrich’s presidential run went much the same way. He did more
with less than most candidates and fought back from the political
dead at least twice to look like he had a legitimate shot at the
GOP nomination. Undisciplined and disorganized, he was no match for
the fine-tuned Romney machine and a news cycle that is even faster
and less forgiving than it was in the '90s.
