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Sam Stein and Karen Finney had a great conversation with Alex Wagner on The Last Word about Ann Coulter’s remarkable call for donors to withhold fundage to Mitt Romney’s campaign — “big donors” — until Andrea Saul is fired for citing Romneycare in Massachusetts as a possible solution for a dead lady cited in the new (controversial?) pro Obama PAC’s ad.
There was lots of discussion about whether Andrea Saul should take the hit — and be fired, as Ann Coulter demanded! — for mentioning the GOP standard-bearer’s primary governmental accomplishment while governing Massachusetts. But more critical to me is this: what hold does the crazy, Ann Coulter-following, Erick Erickson-admiring, rabid right wing have over the Romney campaign?
Will Mitt Romney obey Ann Coulter? Or will he back up his spokesperson, who (after all) merely cited his own signature accomplishment as governor? Ann Coulter calls this action by Andrea Saul “snatching defeat from the jaws of victory” as Coulter sees the purported dishonesty of the pro-Obama ad as the potential turning point in the campaign. But now that Mitt is cruising into his convention, ready to pick a running mate and at the 90-day point where he actually must start winning news cycles, does he want one of them dominated by the message that the rabid right wing can dictate firing decisions in his campaign?
And — if Ann Coulter can tell Mitt Romney who to fire — will Ann Coulter, Erick Erickson and the rabid right wing of the GOP have veto power over Mitt Romney’s Cabinet picks, should it come to that? Does the forced-birth wing of their party get to pick the next HHS secretary? Does the Liberty Counsel get to vet Mitt’s Attorney General? Do Mitt’s SCOTUS appointments need to pledge fealty to vote with Antonin Scalia?
How enmeshed is the right wing crazy aspect of their party in Mitt’s future? Does the campaign owe anything to them? Can they succeed without them? Will they ignore Coulter? Can Mitt afford to ignore her and Erick Erickson, and come even close to defeating Obama?
22 Comments
Their assault on reason finally comes back to bite them.
I believe that in the GOP chain of command, Willard Romney ranks immediately below Rush Limbaugh.
Ann Coulter has a staff position, not a line position.
Offhand, I’d say the hold that the republican wingnuts have over Romney is equivalent to the hold that Wall Street and the Fortune 500 have over Obama. In fact, if I were a republican, there is practically no issue that might cost Romney the election that I would worry about surfacing, for the simple reason that the fatcat hiney’s are going to be well-covered, no matter which one of these tools gets elected.
I think Alex Wagner looks good in prime time. She is definetly not as boring as Lawrence O’Donnell.
Mitt is going to have to kiss some far right butt to get elected. The only way he looks good to the far right is when they stand Obama beside him and I dunno if that’s enough to get them to the polls.
I doubt Mitt has the guts to stand up to Ann. I also doubt Mitt has the guts to fire the lady. But she might well have the guts to “resign to pursue other opprtunities” and remove the pressure. Mitt will say publically it was her decision and privately he’ll tell Ann she was fired.
Boxturtle (Spineless politics at it’s best!)
The more immediate question is how the hold that wingnuts have over Romney rates against the hold that Wall Street and the Fortune 500 have over Romney and the corporate-funded wingnut leadership.
I wonder if this election is even more of a battle within the PTB than usual, this time between the wealthy Obama backers who want to continue the mostly-under-the-radar approach with wealthy Romney backers, who think it’s time to move to a more blatant stage of corporate ownership of the US population.
I think Mitt has a staff position, too. He sure doesn’t do well getting GOPers to do his bidding.
If he becomes president, he’ll have to clear everything with Rush before the house would vote on it.
Boxturtle (Or Bibi)
BT, I wouldn’t worry about it. Do you think he’s going to be elected?
I’m staying away from national politics and getting involved with neighborhood politics.
Hopefully this will have a positive benefit not only on my outlook by my blood pressure as well.
And, thanks, Teddy.
Andrea Saul has been accused of telling the truth, a first for a member of Team Romney.
And as a result, an outraged Ann Coulter paid a visit to FOX PAC and promptly “melted down“.
Unbelievable — I didn’t think this was possible without throwing a bucket of water on her.
Hi ya, labman.
Pointing out flaws, mistakes, immorality is not the same as name calling.
We don’t want to look and act like Those People, do we?
Just pointing that out.
I think both parties are essentially prep-schools for staffers at the FED and it’s too-big-to-jail subsidiaries.
Romney, as candidate is sort of like the Under-Cover Boss on TV, the CEO working in disguise in the mailroom;
“God, I didn’t know it was so hard to run for president, I’m going to be a lot less demanding of Barak once I get back to my office.”
Last sentence in first graph impossible to read. (Rest is great!)
If I had to bet right now, I’d say no. But Rmoney is just one good ad away from winning Ohio. If he picks Portman as VP, that mIGHT be enough itself. Portman is very popular to the GOP base here.
Boxturtle (He’s such a tool. I’ll bet he has a tatoo that reads “CRAFTSMAN”)
This morning, doucheboro spent 15 minutes haranguing to his morning jokers about the ‘burton ad’ that Saul was referencing. So there is some clean up on the GE mini faux outlet to dis, an unnecessarily hyperbolic ad.
This will blow over, I find it hard to believe the wing nuts won’t regroup to their default nuclear position and attack the ad, if they spend any time on it at all, or transcripts, marxism, or birth certificates..
The dials are already at 11, 90 days out,they will find some way to focus their hysterical misdirection.
Wonder where Ann Coulter will vote this fall?
Google: Ann Coulter,voter fraud 2008,2010
Great indignation by Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh. But neither of them accused her of saying something that wasn’t correct (in the sense of true). They were concerned that what she said was indeed correct, which makes it incorrect as a GOP tactic. These people will lie as often as possible, because telling the truth might become habit forming, and then where would the GOP be?
This is just Coulter desperately trying to say something to make her voice relevant and if that costs Willard, well that’s perfectly alright. I see this one as a lose-lose for Rmoney: Obey Coulter and Erickson and be even more of a laughingstock or ignore them and further enrage the unstable teabaggers.
Nor does she have LO’S's insider-y and bombastic tone. A great improvement.
She was quite incensed (or plays one on teevee) not even letting Hannity complete his sentences. Spittle was flying.
Um, there’s only one sentence in the first paragraph. It’s long, and embeddedly parenthetical, but I think it scans.
She was saying there’s no point to go to Tampa, no point to Hannity broadcasting every night, if Mitt continues to keep morons on his team. And that people who give big money (some of whom she presumably knows) should stop.
That’s dangerous mid-summer talk. That’s primary talk. And she’s not alone. Other denizens of the red precincts are also angry at Saul, for telling the truth. And repeating something Mitt says on the campaign trail.
It’s a puzzle.
I don’t think it’s a puzzle at all Teddy. Consider: Conservatives and especially conservative talking heads are some of the most self centered, nihilistic, greedy, narcissists to occupy the planet. Also consider that the rich are fully cognizant of getting even richer faster during the Obama administration, plus things like weapons sales and conservative fund raising have skyrocketed. If Rmoney gets elected, that fund raising will largely dry up, while his bumbling, puerile and naive attempts to govern will turn the Republican Party radioactive before the midterms. Nope, I honestly think some of these people are trying to sabotage Willard.