By Mark Greer

Like many of you, I’ve watched this Republican Primary season with a great deal of amazement. Proving to be the campaign that breaks all the molds, we’ve witnessed a chain of events that seems to defy assumptions, turn tradition on its head, and cast supposed realities to the winds. Yet as we approach what will be a critical juncture in the GOP Primary, now is the time to set some things straight.

Forget about who you thought would win the nomination, or who you really wanted to run. Forget about how hard you may have worked for a particular candidate, or how passionate you may have been about someone who is no longer in the race. Forget that one or more of the remaining candidates may not be your favorite. That you may not especially like them, or they fall short of the standards of perfection.

None of that matters anymore.

What does matter is that we make the right decision that will advance conservatism and put our Nation back on the right course. Thus the choice that remains is whether Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum will carry the mantle of conservatism and be able to successfully take on President Obama in the general election. Conservatives had better take a hard look at both candidates and realize that one would be our best hope of not only beating Obama, but bringing about real and meaningful change; while the other would be a disaster in a general campaign. Rather than keeping you in suspense till the end of the article, I’ll tell you right now that Senator Santorum has absolutely no chance of winning against President Obama. Now before some of you get upset, let me tell you why I’ve come to that conclusion and we may just come to some common ground before we’re finished.

Let’s take Rick’s strength of support. While much has been made of his recent surge in the polls, taking a closer look at what’s behind it leaves much cause for concern. In fact, the motto of Santorum’s campaign should really be “timing is everything.” Going back to Iowa, he clearly benefited from being the right guy at the right time. We watched the rise and fall Michelle Bachmann, Herman Cain, Rick Perry, and eventually Newt Gingrich, who took the hardest and most thorough pounding of any of the candidates, primarily from Romney’s Super PACs, when it seemed as though he would run away with the Caucus, a frightening thought to the GOP establishment.

There was Rick, the last man left standing, who to his credit, capitalized on the moment and barely edged out Romney in a state that favored conservatives. If Mike Huckabee would have been in the race, he would have lapped the field in Iowa. Santorum won Iowa by 34 votes, hardly a vote of confidence. I’m not trying to disparage Santorum’s Iowa win, but we have to objectively look at the outcome. It wasn’t as though Rick’s message propelled him to victory, but rather that Gingrich was seen as damaged goods, too badly marred by the onslaught of negative ads to be a viable choice. Rick was there to pick up the pieces, just at the time where no one else was left to steal his thunder or level attacks that could take him down like the rest of Romney’s opposition. What it gave us was a candidate who won Iowa without being vetted, without having even one glove landed on him. I fully expected that would change after Iowa, but interestingly enough, it didn’t. Romney’s campaign continued to go after Newt, sending out its establishment surrogates to tell everyone why Newt wasn’t a conservative, didn’t like Reagan, was too angry, and far too big a risk. With all the pressure on Gingrich, you would think that Santorum would have shined and taken the spotlight as the new front-runner, but that didn’t happen. Instead Gingrich pulled off what seemed to be an impossible comeback. Bolstered by what still remains to be the two most impressive debate performances of the primary season, Newt won South Carolina in resounding fashion, winning 44 of its 46 counties. Santorum came in third with 17%, 10 points behind Romney. Finally, Romney’s campaign decided they had to finish Gingrich off before it was too late, so they threw everything, including the kitchen sink, at him in Florida. It worked, Romney won big in the State, and it looked as though once again Newt was dead in the water. Thus began Santorum’s reemergence.

Are we noticing a trend here? While it may be fine to overlook the fact that Rick only seems to surge after Newt gets hammered, it won’t be a trend that will repeat itself in a general contest. The media certainly won’t be hammering Obama, but will focus all its attacks on the Republican nominee. If that turns out to be Santorum, we’ll have a debacle of epic proportions.

Now that the Romney campaign has decided to go after him, and people are really starting to look at Rick Santorum’s record and history of controversial statements, many are beginning to see just how much of a flawed candidate he would really be against Obama. It’s the reason why the idea is being not so subtly floated around that should Santorum beat Romney in Michigan, it may be time for a new candidate to enter the race.

Looking at some of Santorum’s past remarks, you’d think you came across a wish list for the Obama campaign. Here are just a few (and believe me, I could add more) that would easily be leveled against him, and effectively so, in a general campaign:

1. “One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is I think the dangers of contraception in this country…. Many of the Christian faith have said, well, that’s okay, contraception is okay. It’s not okay. It’s a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be.” (Interview with CaffeinatedThoughts.com, Oct. 18, 2011)

Considering the vast majority of women (and men) have used some form of contraception, this doesn’t exactly appear to be a winning argument for Santorum. Can you imagine the firestorm that would be ignited when voters heard the Republican nominee believes contraception is “harmful to women” and our society? Perhaps Rick doesn’t realize that married women use contraceptives as well, and they might not respond well to the notion that they’re ‘harming’ society and themselves.

2. “I don’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else’s money; I want to give them the opportunity to go out and earn the money.” (Iowa campaign stop, Jan. 2, 2012)

Rick really stepped in it here. Speaking about welfare programs, Santorum singled out black Americans as the recipients of “somebody else’s money.” Of course we all know that the majority of people on welfare are white, not black, but Rick chose to highlight blacks as the people waiting around for a handout instead of earning their own money. I don’t have to tell you how that would play out against Obama. Some might argue that the statement may not matter much, since the African American community overwhelmingly voted for Obama, but they would be wrong. With high unemployment in the black community, including an increasing dissatisfaction with President Obama, there is an opportunity for a candidate who can effectively articulate the conservative message to make inroads into the black community. Santorum ruined his chances of doing that with his foolish remark. Even worse, he tried to deny making the comment, maintaining that what he actually said was “blah” people, not “black” people…Really Rick? As a blah conservative, I mean, black conservative, I can assure you that won’t go over well with blacks should you get the nomination.

3. “If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual [gay] sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does. It all comes from, I would argue, this right to privacy that doesn’t exist in my opinion in the United States Constitution, this right that was created, it was created in Griswold — Griswold was the contraceptive case…That’s not to pick on homosexuality. It’s not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing.” (AP Interview, April 7, 2003)

Regardless of what you may think about homosexuality, I think most of us can agree that comparing it with incest, pedophilia, and bestiality may be a bit extreme. In the same interview, Santorum went on to say: “And that’s sort of where we are in today’s world, unfortunately. The idea is that the state doesn’t have rights to limit individuals’ wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire. And we’re seeing it in our society.” Here’s a newsflash to GOP voters: this isn’t the platform you want to run on if you want to win the White House in November. Santorum, in taking a shot at Newt Gingrich, made a point of telling voters that they didn’t need to nominate a candidate they’d have to worry about what he would say next. Well I’d be willing to assume the majority of voters would worry about a candidate like Santorum, who thinks contraceptives are damaging to society, blacks are the ones responsible for the growing welfare system, and the government has a right to regulate the sexual activity of its citizens, far more than they would fear a guy like Gingrich who thinks we should expand the space program and build a colony on the moon.

As for Newt’s baggage, of course he has some, and would be attacked by the left-wing press in a general election, as would any Republican nominee. The difference is that Newt knows how to answer the criticism to his own advantage. When the media went after him in the two debates leading up to the SC primary, Gingrich turned the tables in dramatic fashion, making what originally seemed as strong negatives into positives. Positives that helped him turn the race upside down and win South Carolina in a landslide. That is exactly the formula the GOP will need in order to beat Obama in the general campaign, and Newt already proved that he can pull it off. If we want to look at records, I’ll take the guy who ushered in the Republican Revolution of 1994, passed Welfare Reform, balanced the budget four times, cut taxes, presided over a 4.2% unemployment rate, and actually shrunk the size of government any day.

Conservatives have a clear choice, one I hope they’ll consider long and hard before they vote for the latest surge in polling trends. If we want to beat Obama in 2012, we cannot nominate Rick Santorum. We must support Newt Gingrich. Forget about the head to head poll numbers with Obama for any of the remaining candidates. Ronald Reagan was down by 30 points to Jimmy Carter in early 1980. But Reagan had the vision, courage, and message that got the American people to believe in their own resiliency and ingenuity once again. Gingrich has that same message and those same qualities, which is why I support him. What we can’t afford is a nominee who will be DOA after securing the nomination. Santorum would be such a candidate.

For a party who seems to have mastered the art of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, I hope my appeal makes you think twice about the choice that remains for conservatives. I’m reminded of Santorum’s own appeal in 2008, which he made in support of Mitt Romney, who he now characterizes as a liberal: “If you’re a conservative … if you’re a Republican … there is only one place to go right now, and that’s Mitt Romney.” Rick was wrong then, and he’s wrong now.

Here’s hoping my appeal is more effective than his was four years ago.

Conservatives, don’t blow it…

In the 2008 Presidential election, this unabashed-pro-life-orthodox-Catholic-conservative-mom-of-seven had the audacity to say “nope” to ‘Hope’. Truth trumps ‘Hope’ all day every day!

As grateful American, I cherish the self-evident Truths enumerated in our Declaration of Independence; that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”.

As a faithful Catholic, I also cherish the immutable Truths enumerated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, that teach “from the moment of conception…a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person — among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.”

So in 2008, armed with the self-evident Truths of my Founding Fathers and the immutable Truths of my Mother the Church, I brought the audacity of “nope” into the voting booth with me.

I AM THE 46 PERCENT …of Catholics who said “nope” to Barack Obama, by not voting for him! This put me in the minority, as 54 percent of my fellow Catholics (in name only!) did!

Ultimately, it was the Catholic vote that secured victory for America’s most radical-Planned-Parenthood-promulgating-pro-abortion candidate! Saying “nope” to Church teaching, these Catholics brought a different kind of audacity into the voting booth with them.

A few Sundays ago, I had a sickening but enlightening encounter with one such Catholic.  Coming out of Mass, I noticed a mini-van emblazoned with an “Obama 2012” bumper sticker. My heart sank; then I recognized its owner, a respected and devoted member of the church community, who I’ll call Mrs. Pew.

“Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act!”  Emboldened by the words of Christian hero and Holocaust martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I knew I had to speak up.

”Mrs. Pew, I notice you have an Obama 2012 bumper sticker on your car. Would you be willing to have a discussion with me about President Obama’s record on abortion?” I asked.

“NOPE!” said Mrs. Pew, “I’m very comfortable with where I am.”

“Mrs. Pew,” I asked, “Did you know that President Obama is the most anti-life President in history and that as an Illinois State Senator he was the only one to vote ‘no’ three times on the Born Alive Protection Act, a law that would protect the life of a baby who survived a (late-term) abortion?”

Mrs. Pew remained unmoved. Among her breathtaking retorts was this tongue-in-cheek remark, “Abortion is God’s fault because He gave us Free Will.” Only a liberal could utter such madness!

Mrs. Pew continued to close her ears to reality with a truth-drowning cacophony of mythical-mainstream-media-Michael-Moore-esque talking points.

Mrs. Pew’s response rang eerily familiar to this true and tragic story…

“After a speech, pro-life activist Penny Lea was approached by an old man. Weeping, he told her the following story:

‘I lived in Germany during the Nazi holocaust. I considered myself a Christian. I attended church since I was a small boy. We had heard the stories of what was happening to the Jews, but like most people today in this country, we tried to distance ourselves from the reality of what was really taking place. What could anyone do to stop it?

A railroad track ran behind our small church, and each Sunday morning we would hear the whistle from a distance and then the clacking of the wheels moving over the track. We became disturbed when one Sunday we noticed cries coming from the train as it passed by. We grimly realized that the train was carrying Jews. They were like cattle in those cars!

Week after week that train whistle would blow. We would dread to hear the sound of those old wheels because we knew that the Jews would begin to cry out to us as they passed our church. It was so terribly disturbing! We could do nothing to help these poor miserable people, yet their screams tormented us. We knew exactly at what time that whistle would blow, and we decided the only way to keep from being so disturbed by the cries was to start singing our hymns. By the time that train came rumbling past the church yard, we were singing at the top of our voices. If some of the screams reached our ears, we’d just sing a little louder until we could hear them no more. Years have passed and no one talks about it much anymore, but I still hear that train whistle in my sleep. I can still hear them crying out for help. God forgive all of us who called ourselves Christians, yet did nothing to intervene.

Now, so many years later, I see it happening all over again in America. God forgive you as Americans for you have blocked out the screams of millions of your own children. The holocaust is here. The response is the same as it was in my country – SILENCE’!”[1]

Amid thirty-nine years of Roe v. Wade, history repeats itself in Mrs. Pew’s audacity of NOPE…

Tara Kozub is a wife and mom of seven who loves the happy chaos of her family life.  Despite living in the liberal Mecca of Massachusetts, she is an unabashed conservative and independent thinker dedicated to spreading her MinuteMom logic to women, most especially moms, everywhere. As a contributing writer for Smart Girl Nation, her commentary has been featured on both The Blaze and in MinuteMom Magazine.  She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science and Education and a Master’s Degree in Education from Simmons College in Boston, MA.

[1] http://www.abortionfacts.com/literature/literature_909sl.asp

Photo by Andrew Feinberg

by D. Edwards

I have been mystified by candidate Mitt Romney’s walk in the Pro-Life movement.  He claims at the young age of 58 to have been a convert to the Pro-Life cause.  Yet I have not seen Romney do anything to further the cause than just espouse a few sentences here and there.

David Brody writes an excellent rebuke of Romney for his declining the invitation to speak at the Greenville, South Carolina Pro-Life event  on January 18th. Some highlights from the rebuke:

“I understand that he’s concerned that candidates and folks in the audience will probably attack his past support for abortion rights but he’s changed now right? That’s what he keeps saying so you would think he would go to an event like this to prove it and shut everybody up. Wouldn’t he be proud of the fact that he went from pro-choice to pro-life? Isn’t that something to shout from the rooftops as a conservative? Instead, he ditches the event. This isn’t the first time he’s ducked a pro-life event and it won’t be the last.

By the way, believe it or not evangelicals can actually walk and chew gum at the same time. They can be pro-life and be fiscal conservatives. The two are not mutually exclusive.”

Yes, Romney also did not attend Mike Huckabee’s screening of The Gift of Life film and forum on December 14th.  The film highlights adults whose life resulted from biological mothers’ choices of life over death and how their lives have been a shining example of why more should do the same.

There were no gotcha question/answer sessions at this event.  Each candidate was given an opportunity to share their Pro-Life message before the film was presented.  Then the candidates sat with the audience and enjoyed the film.  Was Romney afraid of having his speech taped at this Pro-Life event?  Was he afraid that it would be used against him in the general election if he were to become the nominee?

What about the Value Voter Summit of 2010?  How much time did Romney give to the Pro-Life cause in his speech to voters who emphasize life, family and God?  In Romney’s speech he only mentioned the value of life and marriage in passing and instead emphasized the economy: “If he (President Obama) or any of his economic advisers had any experience in the real economy, he would have known that the first three rules of any turnaround are focus, focus and focus.” Compare that sentence to the one sentence that Romney stated about Values: “This room is filled every year by citizens-modern patriots–who are passionate about America’s values. These values include the sanctity of life and the preservation of marriage.”  That’s it.  That is all he said to this Values Voter crowd who specifically came to hear the speakers talk about  family, marriage, and the gift of life.  Compare that to Mike Huckabee’s speech or Mike Pence’s speech.  They linked moral values to fiscal values and showed how getting it right on the moral issues will lead to getting it right on the fiscal issues.  But Romney only threw the crowd a one sentence bone:  These values include the sanctity of life and the preservation of marriage.

In 2008, Romney tried to convince voters in Iowa, South Carolina and other Red states that he was all three legs of the Reagan Conservative stool.  Voters did not buy his story as it had no history to back it up.  Romney bowed out of the race after Super Tuesday so that he could fight another day.

Now he is again fighting for the votes from all three legs of the stool.  Yet he fails to show up for events that represent the Social Conservative leg of that stool.

Romney may, in the end, win the Republican party’s nomination.  But will  those social conservatives-who tend to be the grassroots activists within the party, fight for him in the general?  I would imagine that they will give to Romney the attention to detail that he gave to their cause.  Romney, the PLINO will get ballots cast by Values Voters, but that is all he will get.  A check of the box on election day.

What a difference being a frontrunner makes…

Yet while the surge in attacks was clearly predictable, and many would characterize it as fair game in this heated political environment, one constituency I didn’t (perhaps naively so) expect to see such indignation from was the Evangelical community. Over the past several weeks I’ve witnessed some of the harshest attacks on Gingrich from those who call themselves Christians.

You know, the people who are supposed to know a little something about a thing called…forgiveness?

I’ve watched in amazement at the vigor with which some Christians have deemed Gingrich an immoral, toxic, phony, untrustworthy serial adulterer. I’ve even been chastised by some friends for having the audacity to support Newt. After all, how could Christians genuinely support a man with such past indiscretions?

If this is to be the benchmark set for Newt Gingrich, then why not apply it to other notable Christians of the past? At least we should be impartial with our criticism right? According to these standards, we should overlook those first five books of the Bible. I mean they were written by Moses, the man who murdered an Egyptian, and whose disobedience kept him from entering the Promised Land. Or maybe we should discount Jacob, an incorrigible swindler who deceived his own father to steal the blessing that belonged to his brother Esau. Surely David should draw our scorn for his actions. The King who had Bathsheba’s husband Uriah killed in battle to fulfill his own lusts (Not exactly a pro-family conservative I suppose). And we can’t forget his son, Solomon, who turned from God to worship idols. Why not just throw out the Psalms and Proverbs? Haven’t they been tainted by the men who wrote them? Or the Apostle Paul, who made a living persecuting Christians and attending to their deaths before his storied trip to Damascus. We should probably write off those two-thirds of the New Testament he penned. Of course I could go on, but who needs to hear more about Peter, who cut off Malchus’s right ear, or Rahab, the prostitute, or the woman caught in adultery, whom Jesus pardoned?

Am I trying to defend Newt’s past mistakes? Of course not. Gingrich himself isn’t even doing that. He’s publicly acknowledged his past sins and said he’s gone to God for forgiveness. Who am I to withhold the same? Yet it seems that many Christians would prefer to look down their noses at Gingrich and polish their own badges of consistent virtue. I’m reminded of the scripture in Luke chapter 18:

9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: 10 “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed[a] thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

It seems we Christians need a little reminder on the topics of grace and mercy. Rather than shun Gingrich for his past, we should embrace him for his contrition. I’ve heard Christians tell others of their faith how they would lose all credibility if they endorsed Gingrich. I say we Christians lose all credibility if we don’t afford the same forgiveness that we ourselves have graciously received from Jesus Christ. There are no perfect candidates, as there are no perfect people, but I respect those who see the failures of their pasts and learn from them. Newt Gingrich is such a person. He’s shown wisdom, courage, and yes, humility. He hasn’t tried to play the silly game of “I’m more conservative than you are” that many of his opponents tend to enjoy. Nor has he decided to adopt the tactics of ‘tear your opponent down if you want to beat him’ politics. Frankly, the forthright, solution oriented, and honest manner in which Newt has campaigned causes me to respect him much more than his rivals, many of whom proudly tout their own ‘consistent, conservative, family values’ at every turn, all while bashing their opponents and distorting their records to get ahead.

Evangelicals should give Newt another look. Perhaps when they take an objective look, they’ll realize Newt Gingrich is their best chance to not only prevent a Romney nomination, but to defeat President Obama in the general election. Will I support a man who balanced the federal budget 4 consecutive years, brought about welfare reform, cut taxes, lowered unemployment, has a lifetime Pro-Life rating of 98.6 from the NRLC, and can beat Obama hands down in a debate? You bet I will, and gladly so.

For those who still can’t seem to look beyond Newt’s faults, perhaps you should try pulling that beam out of your own eye first. I hear it works wonders for your vision…

Photo by Jeffrey Beall.

Despite Tim Tebow having the 3rd highest passer rating in the AFC among active quarterbacks at 87.9, Denver continues to limit his throwing attempts particularly in the first half. Just 40% of Tebow’s passes this year have come in the first half (I excluded the 10 passes he threw in the San Diego game in which he did not start). Compare that to what we see from Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Aaron Rogers, and Ben Roethlisberger:

Now some may say, the Broncos are just throwing the ball more in the second half because they are down and that if they were leading we would see equally low passing in both halves. While that may be the plan, the first half plan isn’t working as the Denver offense in Tebow’s starts has averaged 4.3 first half points compared to 13.4 second half points.

Often these later-down and late-game situations see young players crumble but Tebow has been virtually mistake free at these times. That said, Tebow’s stats so far this year still show him throwing best on first down with a rating of 111.3 on first and 10. And that stacks up well against the very best in the game.

If Denver was able to score in the first half what they were scoring in the second half, they would have scored 29.8 points a game since Tebow took over. Below is the math that. I did not touch defensive or special teams scoring performance.

29.8 points a game would put the Broncos 4th in scoring after only the Packers, Saints, and New England. Considering Tebow’s continued development as a passer, it would be wise for the Broncos to become less reliant on the run in the first half and take advantage of Tebow’s already evident success throwing on first down.

The Broncos coaching staff have done a good job in building an offensive plan around Tebow and as the offense continues to evolve I hope they look at what is leading to their second half success. It is easy to pin the second half success on Tebow magically coming alive but that overlooks that fact that Tebow flourishes most when he gets the chance to throw the ball a bit more frequently and on first down.

Photo by Jeffrey Beall.

By David Schmidt

In the wake of a series of unconventional win by the Tim Tebow led Denver Broncos, the internet and sports can’t stop talking about this. ESPN articles about Tebow regularly hit “5000+” comments — which is as high as their comment counter goes.

A Tim Tebow sports sub-culture is developing which I have noticed appearing in sports discussions. What do I mean? For example, Chuck Norris-like jokes with Tebow as the hero are popping up. (What is a Chuck Norris joke.) Here is a sampling of the humor that appeared on ESPN.com courtesy of user comments:

swincher4391: LeBron + Tebow = All four quarters

Porething: Sunday Tebow was seen walking on Rivers

bangkokbill16: John Madden is on the cover of Tebow 2013is

Kobeisking24xx: Tebow may start getting flagged for roughing the tacker

Broncomeister7: I have offically converted…from this day foreword I will do EVERYTHING Left Handed

Tomy_007: Need a flashlight? Ask Tebow to hold a lightbulb.

allentrenton74: I saw Tebow at the gas station and put that on my resume.

SoxBruins007: Tebow was kicked off of his high school swim team for running across the pool.

UWGo_Dawgs: I don’t always watch football..but when I do..I prefer the Tebow..stay Tebowing my friends.

onlyone666: Chris Broussard reports that Tim Tebow was the one that ended the NBA lockout.

bladeium77: Tebow once sent $2000 to a Nigerian scammer, and actually received his $2.7 million inheritance

Photo by John Trainor.

by Dan Webb

Herman Cain has an amazing life story: A black man raised by hardworking parents in the segregated south. They taught him the valuable lessons of diligence and of no excuses. Cain applied these lessons throughout his life, specifically while climbing the corporate ladder at Coca Cola and Pillsbury.

At Pillsbury he worked his way up to Vice President. After a while, knowing that he would need more managerial experience to be a CEO, he changed course in his career and moved to a fast track program with Burger King (a subsidiary of Pillsbury). Over a 15 month period Cain worked just about every position imaginable, from a line manager in the back of a local Burger King all the way to regional manager for the Philadelphia area.

With his success as the regional manager Pillsbury invited him to be the CEO of the struggling Godfather’s pizza chain. He led Godfather’s away from the brink of bankruptcy towards profitability in about a year.  After that year, Pillsbury decided to sell Godfather’s pizza despite the turn around. Cain and his Vice President took the bold step and successfully negotiated a buyout of the pizza chain from Pillsbury.

Throughout Cain’s book he fights the notion that to overcome an obstacle you play the victim card, something that I believe many American’s can learn from. Cain’s optimism & trust in God is a constant reminder to the reader and serve as a great motivation. I learned practical leadership lessons as well as goal-orienting techniques (Cain’s refrain of being the CEO of self is a great self-motivational tool).

In addition to Cain’s tale of corporate success, the story of his fight with colon cancer is one hope for those who have any experience with that hardship. Throughout Cain’s truly inspirational life story, he explains how he would fix the ills facing the nation.

After I finished the book, I went through some self-denial. I wanted Cain to be the nominee based on how he carries himself. I want to prove the “Republicans are racist bigots” meme wrong with a strong Conservative black candidate. His honesty when answering questions is a breath of fresh air in the smog of politics (For political smog see Romney). But when it came down to it, his depth of knowledge on the issues facing the United States seem to be lacking. Though bold in his proposition of ideas, they often skate the line of Constitutionality. I don’t want this to be true but I cannot deny that his book led me to this conclusion.

Is it bad that I was less inclined to support Cain after I read his book? I answer that question with a very big “yes!” The purpose of a presidential candidate writing a book is to allow the candidate to expand on his campaigns themes. A five minute cable interview or a thirty second debate talking point is just not enough. He failed to convince this reader (and I was REALLY trying to be convinced) that he has a deep grasp on the issues facing us today.

Granted, knowledge can grow and he certainly has the intelligence to learn the information. I hope he either proves me wrong or takes to learning the subjects deeply. If not I’ll have a hard time supporting his nomination. That’s just my take.

Attention America:

No need for you to vote. We’ve already decided upon a winner for you. Besides, we’re much smarter and more refined than you anyway, so it’s best you leave this part to us. We will choose the winners and losers so you can simply follow our lead instead of thinking for yourselves. So don’t panic or worry your silly little heads. We’ll take care of the important things, so you can devote more time to whatever it is you do. No thanks required, that is all.

Best Regards,
The Media

What you’ve just read is a secret memo from our friends in the elite media. No, of course they would never come right out and say it, but I thought it would be nice to leak it out there so everyone had a little better understanding of just how slow the press really thinks we are…

The GOP primary season is just heating up, yet you’d think everything is all over if you listen to most news outlets today. I’ve frankly been getting tired of hearing the non-stop bloviating of media talking heads who have decided this race is over without a single vote being cast. They fancy themselves king makers, sitting atop their ivory towers, dictating to an ignorant and unreasonable public who clearly needs their direction. Yes, our friends in the elite media have already decided upon a candidate they deem acceptable, so that should be enough for the rest of us, right?

Not so fast.

After all just a few weeks ago all we heard was that this was a two-man race: Rick Perry or Mitt Romney were our only choices for the nomination. Well now, after a few slips and less than stellar debate performances by the Texas Governor, it’s a one man race, you know, the best kind of races to participate in, at least if you’re that one man. In this case, Mitt Romney. I know, I know, some of you out there are thinking: well what about Herman Cain! He’s surging in the polls and even leads Romney nationally in the latest NBC/WSJ poll. While that’s true, rest assured the press has been working overtime to put out the little brush fire they see as the Cain ‘phenomenon,’ or any momentum building with other candidates for that matter.

I happened to be watching the O’Reilly Factor this week and saw the effort fully on display. It seems Bill’s show has become the Mitt Romney appreciation hour here lately. There he sat with a parade of commentators, (most of whom openly support the aforementioned Romney) spelling out for the ‘folks’ as Bill O’Romney, I mean O’Reilly, likes to call them, why Mitt Romney is clearly the guy who is going to win the nomination, and while the surge of Herman Cain was “interesting,” as O’Rom O’Reilly put it, it was nothing more than a momentary blip of anti-Romney sentiment, and most ‘serious-minded’ Americans would soon realize that Mr. Cain or any of the remaining third-string benchwarmers have any chance of defeating President Obama next November. These serious-minded Americans, like O’Reilly (I’m getting the hang of it now), Charles Krauthammer, Karl Rove, Bernie Goldberg, Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, and believe me, I could go on (and I will in an upcoming article), have the coronation, I mean the race, all mapped out. We’ve been told that Romney is the only one who can win independents, the only ‘serious’ candidate who can realistically defeat Obama, the most ‘presidential’ of the GOP field, and the one with the most money, organization, and establishment support of the Republican field.

Rick Perry? He’s DONE. Cain? Interesting, but come on. Gingrich? Who’s that? Oh yeah, the smart guy who makes us look foolish when he speaks, well no one remembers him anyway. Bachmann? Don’t make us laugh. The ‘rest?’ Whatever.

Well I for one would like to tell all our highly esteemed friends in the press that it’s we the people, not you the media who get to decide elections. I saw the same thing happen in the 2008 race. Mike Huckabee, the only GOP candidate that actually inspired genuine and enthusiastic grassroots support across the country was written off as unelectable, while the moderate maverick John McCain was clearly the one who could win independents and become the next President. Well, we all know how that worked out. So this time we’re sending a message to the elite media that we won’t be forced into supporting their choice of candidates, but we’ll actually ascribe to the funny notion that we should make up our own minds and actually vote on our principles, not according to the dictates of a news anchor, political commentator, or even a talk-radio host. I know we’re nowhere near as smart as these guys, but I think we’ll manage to survive despite our public university educations and back-water sensibilities.

Photo by Gage Skidmore.

There’s been some intriguing chatter going around that former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee might be reconsidering his decision not to run for President. Huckabee stunned the political world in May when he announced he wouldn’t enter the 2012 race. After all he was leading most of the national polls, was the clear frontrunner in Iowa, dominated the field across the southern states (the bedrock of the GOP), and even led the polls in states like New Jersey, Maine, and Pennsylvania. It seemed nearly everything was lined up for Huckabee to take the race by storm, but his heart said “no,” quite a surprise coming from the front-runner of the Republican field.

Yet now it appears Huckabee may be rethinking that decision. The media’s chosen front-runners: Rick Perry and Mitt Romney, have stumbled, floundered, or failed to ignite any passion or enthusiasm from the Party’s base. If the press is so adamant to call this a two-man race, it seems not many fans are cheering in the stands or waiting at the finsh line. There was some speculation that NJ Governor Chris Christie might enter the race as well, but he reaffirmed his previous statements that he wouldn’t be throwing his hat into the ring.

All this uncertainty and dissatisfaction leaves quite an opening for a Huckabee reemergence. The American electorate is looking for leadership, not politics. Courage, not cowardice. Vision, not focus groups. Principles, not posturing. We need a real leader with bold ideas, and one who has the wisdom to govern, not just run a campaign. When I watched the 2008 Presidential race, Mike Huckabee showed himself to be that kind of leader, one the country deperately needs today. His candid, forthright, and amaiable approach would be a welcome addition to the current field, which frankly could use breath of fresh air and originality. While his decision remains to be seen, I for one am hoping he reconsiders.

Perhaps this time, his heart will say “go.”

From “Obama Rejects Obamaism”, New York Times:

Yes, I’m a sap. I believed Obama when he said he wanted to move beyond the stale ideological debates that have paralyzed this country. I always believe that Obama is on the verge of breaking out of the conventional categories and embracing one of the many bipartisan reform packages that are floating around.

But remember, I’m a sap. The White House has clearly decided that in a town of intransigent Republicans and mean ideologues, it has to be mean and intransigent too. The president was stung by the liberal charge that he was outmaneuvered during the debt-ceiling fight. So the White House has moved away from the Reasonable Man approach or the centrist Clinton approach.

Remarkably, Brooks ends his article with the “hope” that there will still be “change” in Washington, while acknowledging that his belief in that is likely irresponsible.

The White House has decided to wage the campaign as fighting liberals. I guess I understand the choice, but I still believe in the governing style Obama talked about in 2008. I may be the last one. I’m a sap.

Read “Obama Rejects Obamaism”, New York Times