Bryan Fischer
It will be Perry for the GOP
By Bryan Fischer
Follow me on Twitter: @BryanJFischer, on Facebook at "Focal Point"
Gov. Rick Perry will win the GOP nomination for the presidency.
Here's why. Mitt Romney is a certified RINO, a ruling class Republican of the type that spawned the Tea Party. There would be no Tea Party were it not for big government, country club Republicans like Mitt Romney.
Herman Cain does not have the money or organization to go the distance, Newt Gingrich is too flawed personally, Michelle Bachmann is out of gas, and Ron Paul is and will always be a fringe candidate. Rick Santorum has yet to gain any real traction and that is unlikely to change.
Rick Perry, on the other hand, has the organization, experience, resources and, most of all, the values to go the distance.
Gov. Perry has helped himself by not throwing Robert Jeffress under the bus for expressing sentiments about Mormonism with which most evangelicals agree. Perry said Friday that he's not going to be the one to tell Dr. Jeffress what to say and what not to say, and that will help him with evangelicals, who are looking for someone who won't fold on faith issues at the first sign of a stiff breeze. Gov. Perry is unapologetic and open about being a man of conservative, authentic, sincere and genuine Christian faith, and that's what the pro-family community is looking for.
Plus the hypocrisy of the left here is particularly ugly and in fact nauseating. The very same people who are all over Dr. Jeffress for saying such mean things about Mormonism could not contain their vituperation toward Romney's church in 2008 when Mormons helped push Proposition 8 over the top in California.
There was nary a complaint then from the sainted souls who are now grievously offended by Dr. Jeffress when LDS temples were being vandalized and the Book of Mormon was being burned during that campaign. They celebrated when an Olympic gold medal gymnast, Peter Vidmar, was forced off the Olympic committee because, as a Mormon, he supported Proposition 8. The stench from the hypocrisy of the left is enough to make you want to throw up.
I like Herman Cain a lot, and so do most Americans. He is winsome, funny, genuine and altogether likeable. He can light up a room like no one since Sarah Palin, and is greeted enthusiastically by conservatives everywhere he goes. He was clearly, by light years in fact, the most popular speaker at last weekend's Values Voter Summit.
Yet Herman has two liabilities that will likely keep him from winning the nomination. One is that he lacks the "mother's milk" of politics, money. He was down to just several hundred thousand dollars early last week, and had to loan the campaign $500,000 of his own money to stay afloat this summer. Donations are certain to increase with his newfound status as the frontrunner, but it's unlikely he'll have the resources necessary to run a campaign that will get his message out in enough primary states to win the nomination.
Herman was on a book tour as of last week, which makes one wonder if his sudden surge has taken even him by surprise. It doesn't look like he was ready for it, and it'll be difficult for him to tool up in time to take full advantage of it.
The other liability is his "9-9-9" plan, to which he is now indelibly and irretrievably attached. I predict we will soon see businessmen all across the fruited plain come out against the national sales tax component of this plan because of the impact it will have on retail sales, which of course have been sluggish at best for the last four years. People in many places will be paying nearly 20% in combined sales taxes under his plan. For instance, in my home town, the sales tax on every burger we buy will be 18.5%.
Of course, that will be offset by lower taxes everywhere else, but people are going to feel the pinch of Herman's sales tax every time they pull out their wallets but will only feel the relief once a year.
And I think even Tea Party folks are going to start pushing back on the idea of creating a whole new pipeline to channel revenue to the federal government. The thought of laying a new nationwide grid to pump confiscated money to Washington, D.C. is going to wind up being a non-starter. Folks will be reminded, as they should be, that Europe wound up with a 20% value added tax because folks got so good at gaming or avoiding a national sales tax at the retail level.
Herman would have been better served if he'd left that "9" out of his program, and gone with a "14-14" program — 14% corporate flat tax, 14% flat income tax — or something similar. It's too late now.
Bachmann is out of steam, and I see no way for her to generate any more. Newt has at least one too many divorces in his background for the pro-family crowd, and Ron Paul wants to legalize cocaine and prostitution and de-legalize marriage, fatal positions for social conservatives.
Paul is a conservative on the pro-life issue, but a libertarian on virtually everything else. America needs a candidate who is libertarian on economic issues but a conservative on everything else, including social issues, and Ron Paul is not that candidate. Paul will always have a core, committed base but has no chance of expanding that base to a level that gives him a crack at winning the nomination.
So we're down to Romney and Perry. It's a wonder that Romney is anywhere near the top of the polls, given his past support for same-sex marriage (he imposed it on Massachusetts by executive fiat), special rights for transgenders, abortion (he ran as a staunchly pro-abortion candidate in 2002 and was pro-abortion as late as 2005), and for the crackpot theory that man is causing catastrophic global warming. He stood in front of a coal-fired energy plant and said twice in the space of 30 seconds that such plants "kill" people. If you like Solyndra, you'll love Mitt Romney.
We just recently discovered that three of his advisers on RomneyCare met a dozen times with White House officials and once with President Obama himself to make sure that ObamaCare was a carbon copy of the plan Romney hatched in Massachusetts with the help of his good friend, Ted Kennedy. RomneyCare provided the cheapest abortions in the United States, just $50 a pop out of pocket. One of Romney's advisers was paid $368,000 to help Obama do to America what Romney did to the Bay State.
Romney's support from conservative quarters is mystifying to many. One suspects that money may have something to do with it. Romney is certainly in a position to throw liberal donations at conservative non-profits, who are always challenged for funding, and Romney naturally and rightly expects, and may have received, something in return. Who knows?
Despite the fact that even some conservatives support Gov. Romney, he has not been able to crack the 25% threshold of support. That is likely to be his ceiling. He has about all the conservative support he's going to get. At 48%, Perry has the most solid support of primary voters who have already made up their minds, and that's something he can build on.
Gov. Perry, of course, is saddled with Gardasil and in-state tuition for illegals. He's admitted he was wrong about the Gardasil mandate, and there isn't anything else he can do about that. He can overcome the illegal immigration problem by laying out a comprehensive plan for border control, which he has begun to do, a plan involving double-layer security fences in metropolitan areas, boots on the ground everywhere else, an improved E-Verify plan, support for states like Arizona and Alabama and their immigration laws, and active support of the Secure Communities program.
His roll-out of his energy plan yesterday was well-received, and he promises more to come. His biggest asset, of course, is the inescapable fact of Texas' record of job creation over the last decade. His opponents will do everything in their power to give everybody but the governor credit for it, but there it will stand like the Rock of Gibraltar no matter how many arrows they launch.
The two leading pro-life groups in Texas give Perry unqualified praise for his support for the sanctity of life, and he made a point of publicly celebrating Texas' marriage amendment by holding a signing ceremony with pro-family leaders. He initiated a nationwide call to prayer, "The Response," well before he even began thinking about a run for the White House. His bonafides on life, marriage and faith are beyond question.
Bottom line: it's down to Perry and Romney, and at the end of the day, it'll be Perry.
And it better be. If Romney wins the GOP nomination, if the GOP gives America another John McCain to vote for, it will be curtains for the GOP. Tea Partiers will abandon ship in droves, never to return, there will be a third party candidate who will suck votes from Romney, and Barack Obama may win back the White House. And if that happens, there may not be an America left to save by 2016.
(Unless otherwise noted, the opinions expressed are the author's and do not necessarily reflect the views of the American Family Association or American Family Radio.)
© Bryan Fischer
October 16, 2011
Follow me on Twitter: @BryanJFischer, on Facebook at "Focal Point"
Gov. Rick Perry will win the GOP nomination for the presidency.
Here's why. Mitt Romney is a certified RINO, a ruling class Republican of the type that spawned the Tea Party. There would be no Tea Party were it not for big government, country club Republicans like Mitt Romney.
Herman Cain does not have the money or organization to go the distance, Newt Gingrich is too flawed personally, Michelle Bachmann is out of gas, and Ron Paul is and will always be a fringe candidate. Rick Santorum has yet to gain any real traction and that is unlikely to change.
Rick Perry, on the other hand, has the organization, experience, resources and, most of all, the values to go the distance.
Gov. Perry has helped himself by not throwing Robert Jeffress under the bus for expressing sentiments about Mormonism with which most evangelicals agree. Perry said Friday that he's not going to be the one to tell Dr. Jeffress what to say and what not to say, and that will help him with evangelicals, who are looking for someone who won't fold on faith issues at the first sign of a stiff breeze. Gov. Perry is unapologetic and open about being a man of conservative, authentic, sincere and genuine Christian faith, and that's what the pro-family community is looking for.
Plus the hypocrisy of the left here is particularly ugly and in fact nauseating. The very same people who are all over Dr. Jeffress for saying such mean things about Mormonism could not contain their vituperation toward Romney's church in 2008 when Mormons helped push Proposition 8 over the top in California.
There was nary a complaint then from the sainted souls who are now grievously offended by Dr. Jeffress when LDS temples were being vandalized and the Book of Mormon was being burned during that campaign. They celebrated when an Olympic gold medal gymnast, Peter Vidmar, was forced off the Olympic committee because, as a Mormon, he supported Proposition 8. The stench from the hypocrisy of the left is enough to make you want to throw up.
I like Herman Cain a lot, and so do most Americans. He is winsome, funny, genuine and altogether likeable. He can light up a room like no one since Sarah Palin, and is greeted enthusiastically by conservatives everywhere he goes. He was clearly, by light years in fact, the most popular speaker at last weekend's Values Voter Summit.
Yet Herman has two liabilities that will likely keep him from winning the nomination. One is that he lacks the "mother's milk" of politics, money. He was down to just several hundred thousand dollars early last week, and had to loan the campaign $500,000 of his own money to stay afloat this summer. Donations are certain to increase with his newfound status as the frontrunner, but it's unlikely he'll have the resources necessary to run a campaign that will get his message out in enough primary states to win the nomination.
Herman was on a book tour as of last week, which makes one wonder if his sudden surge has taken even him by surprise. It doesn't look like he was ready for it, and it'll be difficult for him to tool up in time to take full advantage of it.
The other liability is his "9-9-9" plan, to which he is now indelibly and irretrievably attached. I predict we will soon see businessmen all across the fruited plain come out against the national sales tax component of this plan because of the impact it will have on retail sales, which of course have been sluggish at best for the last four years. People in many places will be paying nearly 20% in combined sales taxes under his plan. For instance, in my home town, the sales tax on every burger we buy will be 18.5%.
Of course, that will be offset by lower taxes everywhere else, but people are going to feel the pinch of Herman's sales tax every time they pull out their wallets but will only feel the relief once a year.
And I think even Tea Party folks are going to start pushing back on the idea of creating a whole new pipeline to channel revenue to the federal government. The thought of laying a new nationwide grid to pump confiscated money to Washington, D.C. is going to wind up being a non-starter. Folks will be reminded, as they should be, that Europe wound up with a 20% value added tax because folks got so good at gaming or avoiding a national sales tax at the retail level.
Herman would have been better served if he'd left that "9" out of his program, and gone with a "14-14" program — 14% corporate flat tax, 14% flat income tax — or something similar. It's too late now.
Bachmann is out of steam, and I see no way for her to generate any more. Newt has at least one too many divorces in his background for the pro-family crowd, and Ron Paul wants to legalize cocaine and prostitution and de-legalize marriage, fatal positions for social conservatives.
Paul is a conservative on the pro-life issue, but a libertarian on virtually everything else. America needs a candidate who is libertarian on economic issues but a conservative on everything else, including social issues, and Ron Paul is not that candidate. Paul will always have a core, committed base but has no chance of expanding that base to a level that gives him a crack at winning the nomination.
So we're down to Romney and Perry. It's a wonder that Romney is anywhere near the top of the polls, given his past support for same-sex marriage (he imposed it on Massachusetts by executive fiat), special rights for transgenders, abortion (he ran as a staunchly pro-abortion candidate in 2002 and was pro-abortion as late as 2005), and for the crackpot theory that man is causing catastrophic global warming. He stood in front of a coal-fired energy plant and said twice in the space of 30 seconds that such plants "kill" people. If you like Solyndra, you'll love Mitt Romney.
We just recently discovered that three of his advisers on RomneyCare met a dozen times with White House officials and once with President Obama himself to make sure that ObamaCare was a carbon copy of the plan Romney hatched in Massachusetts with the help of his good friend, Ted Kennedy. RomneyCare provided the cheapest abortions in the United States, just $50 a pop out of pocket. One of Romney's advisers was paid $368,000 to help Obama do to America what Romney did to the Bay State.
Romney's support from conservative quarters is mystifying to many. One suspects that money may have something to do with it. Romney is certainly in a position to throw liberal donations at conservative non-profits, who are always challenged for funding, and Romney naturally and rightly expects, and may have received, something in return. Who knows?
Despite the fact that even some conservatives support Gov. Romney, he has not been able to crack the 25% threshold of support. That is likely to be his ceiling. He has about all the conservative support he's going to get. At 48%, Perry has the most solid support of primary voters who have already made up their minds, and that's something he can build on.
Gov. Perry, of course, is saddled with Gardasil and in-state tuition for illegals. He's admitted he was wrong about the Gardasil mandate, and there isn't anything else he can do about that. He can overcome the illegal immigration problem by laying out a comprehensive plan for border control, which he has begun to do, a plan involving double-layer security fences in metropolitan areas, boots on the ground everywhere else, an improved E-Verify plan, support for states like Arizona and Alabama and their immigration laws, and active support of the Secure Communities program.
His roll-out of his energy plan yesterday was well-received, and he promises more to come. His biggest asset, of course, is the inescapable fact of Texas' record of job creation over the last decade. His opponents will do everything in their power to give everybody but the governor credit for it, but there it will stand like the Rock of Gibraltar no matter how many arrows they launch.
The two leading pro-life groups in Texas give Perry unqualified praise for his support for the sanctity of life, and he made a point of publicly celebrating Texas' marriage amendment by holding a signing ceremony with pro-family leaders. He initiated a nationwide call to prayer, "The Response," well before he even began thinking about a run for the White House. His bonafides on life, marriage and faith are beyond question.
Bottom line: it's down to Perry and Romney, and at the end of the day, it'll be Perry.
And it better be. If Romney wins the GOP nomination, if the GOP gives America another John McCain to vote for, it will be curtains for the GOP. Tea Partiers will abandon ship in droves, never to return, there will be a third party candidate who will suck votes from Romney, and Barack Obama may win back the White House. And if that happens, there may not be an America left to save by 2016.
(Unless otherwise noted, the opinions expressed are the author's and do not necessarily reflect the views of the American Family Association or American Family Radio.)
© Bryan Fischer
The views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
