Down in polls, Huntsman tries to turn around White House bid by casting opponents as extreme

[alp227]

Source: The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — Meet Jon Huntsman — Mr. Mainstream.

It’s been downhill since the day he announced his White House candidacy. His official presidential coming-out tour was riddled with mistakes, and he’s faced campaign staff turnover. With some moderate views, he has struggled to gain traction with a GOP primary electorate pushed to the right by the tea party. And he’s lost ground in some national polls, eclipsed by Rick Perry, Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann.

Now Huntsman’s trying to turn it all around — by painting his opponents as extreme.

“He’s the anti-circus, anti-carnival candidate,” John Weaver, Huntsman’s senior strategist, said of the newfound strategy.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/campaigns/down-in-polls-huntsman-tries-to-turn-around-white-house-bid-by-casting-opponents-as-extreme/2011/09/02/gIQAmdKpwJ_singlePage.html

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Well, it's 35 years too late. The last time a moderate won the Republican convention was when Ford beat Reagan in 1976...when Huntsman was in high school. And wasn't Huntsman a fiscal conservative as governor of Utah anyway?

[MADem]

1. Dismiss him at your peril.

If he gets his shit together, and the Sunday talkers continue to give him free air time, he could be trouble. The middle is a big place, and he's a relative tabula rasa.

I want to see him in a substantive debate (as opposed to a clusterfuck beauty contest of soundbites) before I breathe easy.

[russspeakeasy]

3. The Sunday talkers only want the extreme, so he won't get much play.

I don't think the middle is such a big place anymore...so I am going to dismiss him, even if it is at my peril. (what's a tabula rasa?):toast:

[MADem]

7. They've been giving him a seat over the summer, when no one else wanted to play

If he's been charming and a good guest, they'll have him back--even if it's just to criticize the extreme POV of his opponents. I couldn't be bothered to watch, had too much going on, but I know he made a number of appearances.

He's young, he's got that Ken Doll thing going on, he's male, he's white, he rides a MOTORCYCLE....and he's Mormon but not Mitt Romney. He's got a lot of "Q" factor for middle Americans.

A tabula rasa is a BLANK SLATE. You can project your heart's desire on him, and it won't be occluded by too many pesky facts (yet, anyway). When you have a short record, that's the best time to run--you don't have to run on an often contradictory (common with a long and nuanced career) record.

If he gets good staff, and can debate, he's a dark horse--and a cause for concern.

[No Elephants]

13. "You can project your heart's desire on him, and it won't be occluded by too many pesky facts..."

You're right. He is dangerous.

[alp227]

9. Jake Tapper (ABC) interviewed him

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x611089

[Turbineguy]

10. Compared to the rest of them

he's positively sane.

[MADem]

12. My sense is he wants the top slot, but he'll take the Number 2 job. nt

[CBHagman]

18. That's what I had been thinking until...

...I noticed he was singing from the same page as the rest of the GOP choir. Very disappointing, because initial news stories suggested he would take the high road. But the more I hear from him, the less I think he has anything to distinguish himself from the rest. See below.

http://jon2012.com/campaign/Aug-12-2011/Governor-Jon-Huntsman-Statement-ObamaCare-Ruling-Appeals-Court-11th-Circuit

Governor Jon Huntsman today issued the following statement on the recent ruling on ObamaCare by the Appeals Court of the 11th Circuit:

"The individual mandate included in ObamaCare is an unconstitutional assault on the individual liberty of the American people, and I support today's ruling by the Appeals Court of the 11th Circuit.

"When I was Governor of Utah, I signed free-market healthcare reforms designed to help small businesses and individuals, rather than burden them with mandates, fines and massive bureaucracies.

"As President, I will repeal ObamaCare and put an end to the economic uncertainty that it has created."


There is no such thing as "ObamaCare." That's just a term employed by the kvetching, whingeing, whining, sneering pundits and pols and others who apparently don't care that the U.S. has an overly expensive health care system that makes billionaires of CEOs while impoverishing and sometimes killing people. It's pretty hard to enjoy liberty (or, to state the obvious, life) without access to medical care.

And spare me the "free market" spiel. The free market has no morality, and it doesn't care if you or a loved one are bankrupted due to medical bills or dropped by your insurer during chemotherapy or far, far worse.

As for the promise of repeal, I'd remind Huntsman that spite is not a policy position. It's a character flaw.

Mind you, there is no way he could be as singularly unpleasant as Newt Gingrich or Michele Bachmann, but few people can manage that. ;-)

[Turbineguy]

21. In order to win the primary

you have to be crazier and more dangerous than the rest. Winning the general election is a different matter.

[MADem]

23. And if those GOP nutcases all win 'just a few' well, they could all end up at the Convention,

scratching and clawing. You'll then have a first tier of crazies, none of whom will give an inch, and a second tier led by Huntsman, looking sane by comparison. If no deal is reached, the delegates (who can vote any way they want, really, pledges be damned) just might say "Fuck this" and go with the one they think can win the general--after being worked over by backroom operators, of course--or getting votes from clear also-rans who just don't have enough to get over the hump in exchange for, oh, VP, State, Defense, what-have-you.

That's how a total card-shark, drinking, womanizing, sponging-off-his-old-lady, corrupt loser named Harding became president (but hey, he looked "handsome" in his pics, and women had just gotten the vote and no one in the voting public had a clue as to his true nature), and he wasn't the only one who ever came out of a convention as a compromise candidate. Since we've started doing primaries all over the country, instead of just a few "showboat" primaries, we haven't seen floor fights or backroom deals as in the past, but who's to say, with such a large field of people who are extreme and don't want to buckle, if they all get mired in their own hubris and a second stringer ends up prevailing because the delegation says allright already, enough is enough--let's pick a damn winner?

I'm not saying it is a likely scenario at all--just that hey, it actually could happen. Stranger things have. Huntsman would need a good team and a few primary wins and a good debate showing, as well as a willingness to kiss ass in the right places. If he gets that, he can find money, and if he finds money, well, he's scary....IMO.

[AlinPA]

17. The crazies rule the GOP now. He has no chance against the likes of Perry, Palin, Bachmann, Paul. n

[rocktivity]

26. He's the only candidate that truly scares me

But like Romney, he's a Mormon -- thank god.

:headbang:
rocktivity

[LonePirate]

2. Judging by his society destroying jobs plan earlier this week, he is as extreme as the other Rethugs

[0rganism]

4. casting opponents as extreme... like hitting the broadside of a barn at 10 paces?

It may not win him the primary, but he won't have to bend over backwards to do it, either.

Congratulations Guv, you found the easy path and took it, even if it didn't lead to the top.

[Psephos]

5. Poor sap doesn't grok that saying that will HELP his opponents. n/t

[jzodda]

6. Pooe bloke just does not get it does he?

He just does not seem to realize that its not that his opponents are extreme (they clearly are) its that the party he identifies with IS extreme and is made up of extreme people. His opponents just reflect that simple truth but he seems to think there is a silent majority of centrist republicans out there when there clearly is not.

[dimbear]

8. By show of hands, who here hates circuses and carnivals?

Evidently his chief advisor is tone deaf.

[SoapBox]

11. Huh? He says the GOPBaggers, RushTurds and RadicalizedThugs are "extreme"?

Uhhhh...ya!

All ready knew that!!

[No Elephants]

14. Is casting opponents like casting asparagus?

"Huntsman appeals to people who want to vote for Romney, but fear Romney has too much name recognition."

Colbert.

[davidwparker]

15. I heard his jobs plan. He is no moderate. n/t

[BeyondGeography]

16. Actually, the Republicans always nominate someone who at least pretends to be moderate

Just in the last 20 years or so, we've had both Bushes (the father was routinely reviled by the faithful for his squishy ideology and his son peddled compassionate conservatism), Dole and McCain. Of these, Bush the Younger was more conservative than his main opponent (McCain), but he spent a lot of time in 2000 at least trying to run from his roots. His father and Dole both beat back challenges from Buchanan on the right. McCain beat Romney, but both were seen by the party as moderates. Ask them, and they'll say you're quite wrong about Ford being the last moderate nominee. For all of their so-called purity, electability regulalry trumps ideology. That's more of an argument for Romney than Huntsman, but there's a chance that this is one of the exceptional cycles where they actually do go with the less marketable nut (Perry).

[alp227]

28. so in 1996 there were two moderate candidates v the paleoconservative Perot? n/t

[mother earth]

19. Not a damned one of them would be a threat, if we had a

strong dem in the WH. That's the real issue behind the worry...why worry...I'd say it's a given we will have more of the same divisive BS and do nothing gov't. The game is rigged to serve the power players and influence buyers and peddlers.

[DFW]

20. Casting Perry, Bachmann and Gingrich as extreme

That should be about as complicated a casting water as "wet."

IF he gains traction, he might be a threat, but only so long as he gives the Republican money men
the impression that he'll be obedient and do their bidding if elected. If not, they'll just find
someone else.

Still, I do NOT want this guy picking Ruth Bader Ginsburg's replacement on the Supreme Court. If
the man elected in 2012 picks another John Roberts, we'll have a right wing majority on the Court
for the next 10-20 years, and what civil rights we now have left will be only memories in British
history books.

[vssmith]

22. He has my good wishes

[Roy Rolling]

24. "Casting Opponents as Extreme"?

That is a very short cast . . . If that is his strategy, he doesn't even need to "cast"---he can just scoop them up in a net from the shore.

[Ter]

25. Dole was somewhat of a moderate

Certainly not extreme-right.

[Thor_MN]

27. Silly Con. One needn't explicitly cast current Rethugs as Extreme. That's implict. .