Romney: Check with lawyers and notes

January 1, 2008 – 3:27 pm

Mitt Romney made what may prove to be a major league gaffe today. In response to a reporter’s question, perhaps triggered by an aggressive web ad, Romney said:

Mr. Romney: I don’t recall all the things that I said at that time, so I’d just have to go back and look at my notes at that time.

This is, of course, reminiscent of Romney’s statement that he would need to check with lawyers before defending the United States against Iran. At a time when he is falling in the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, Romney cannot afford gaffes that emphasize his inexperience in foreign policy.

While it may be that McCain’s web ad was a little over-the-top, it appears that the Romney campaign fell for the trap, hook, line, and sinker.

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Thompson on Security and Unity

October 5, 2007 – 1:50 pm

Fred Thompson’s campaign’s motto is "Prosperity, Security, Unity". He addressed the first of these during his main speech to the Americans for Prosperity. He addressed the other parts during a speech to the Virginia delegation.

Nothing special, but interesting to see the rest of his message.

I was struck, again, by how much the crowd wants to like him. He did pretty well with this event. He got a big rousing standing ovation.

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Senator Thune introduces McCain at AFP

October 5, 2007 – 9:32 am

Senator Thune introduced John McCain at the Americans for Prosperity reception last night.

I thought it was a very good introduction. It highlighted McCain’s record as a anti-spending guy. Thune calls him the "lobbyist for the taxpayer" in contrast to the "lobbyist for the spending groups."

He also makes the point that McCain is taken seriously by our military and our allies and other international leaders. A similar point was made today by a bunch of former GOP Secretaries of State, Secretaries of Defense, and National Security Advisors. In my travels and exchanges as the International Secretary of the Young Republicans, I have to say that John McCain is deeply respected abroad. A pro-war, hawkish Republican is one of our most respected leaders abroad. That’s an important thing.

I videoed McCain’s speech, but it was really jittery. I think that AFP will have the video later.

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Huckabee on Ron Paul

September 6, 2007 – 1:59 am

One of the more interesting parts of the debate was the exchange between Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul. After the debate, Governor Huckabee offered some reflections on that exchange.

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Interview with ONE campaign volunteer

September 6, 2007 – 1:52 am

When I was at the New Hampshire GOP debate, I ran into a Republican who is a die-hard volunteer for the ONE campaign. Michael is a former Marine and told me a great story about sharing the ONE campaign’s vision with other Marines at a Rudy Giuliani event a couple of days prior. He focuses on national security, madrasas, etc.

UPDATE: I was rushing to get my content out, so I didn’t finish this. I also talked to a number of other volunteers and got some encouraging information about the ONE campaign in New Hampshire. First, they had told me previously that they really were reaching out to churches. It appears that, to some extent, this is true. They have gotten some significant support through the groups associated with the Micah Challenge. And a number of the local volunteers viewed themselves in the Rick Warren/Saddleback sphere. Second, there appears to be significant Republican support, although, interestingly, this seems unrelated to the church groups. Perhaps the veterans and moderate/business parts of the coalition in New Hampshire have been activated, while the conservative churches have not been as active. It does seem that the conservative churches, which are weaker in New Hampshire, just have not engaged. It will be interesting to see what happens here. All in all, they appear to have bodies and a significant degree of activation. And this week, I talked to a DC-based GOP consultant who tells me that the part of the campaign that he is responsible for is quite enormous.  We shall see where this goes.

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Total-ing Romney’s investments in terror

August 15, 2007 – 9:28 am

Mitt Romney released his financial records on Monday. These are neat. You don’t get too many opportunities to see where people with $250m put their money. (BTW, I think that he probably has more. How much is in his foundation?)

I didn’t expect to write on this because I find the whole issue of blind trusts a little obscure and without a clear moral or ethical direction to it. Furthermore, I view it to be a real feature of capitalism that you don’t have to know all the details of things that you make money off of. However, I was shocked by some of the stuff I found in Romney’s financials that, surprise, surprise, do not jive with his public stances or statements.

Now, Romney has recently divested from a number of companies, but two jumped out at me:

  • Total SA (formerly Totalfina and Totalfina Elf), which Romney recently sold stock resulting in capital gains of $15-50k.
  • Lukoil, which Romney recently sold with a cap gains of $50-100k

The Oil for Food scandal was a live issue when I was on the Hill, and I read a lot of documents about it at the time. And, simply put, Total and Lukoil are the bad guys. They have been, repeatedly, vehicles for corruption in their countries and they are both tools of the French and Russian governments, respectively. But back to Iraq for a moment. From a Heritage document about the Oil for Food scandal:

Prior to the regime change in April 2003, French and Russian oil companies possessed oil contracts with the Saddam Hussein regime that covered roughly 40 percent of the country’s oil wealth. French oil giant Total Fina Elf had won contracts to develop the Majnoon and Nahr Umar oil fields in southern Iraq, which contain an estimated 26 billion barrels of oil (25 percent of Iraq’s oil reserves). Russian company Lukoil had won the contract to develop the West Qurna field, also in southern Iraq, which has an estimated 15 billion barrels of oil.

An April 2005 National Review article had this to say about Total, "which NRO readers may remember for its sweetheart deals with Saddam Hussein, also holds major concessions in Sudan." And the Scotsman had this to say about Lukoil:

"Iraqi attempts to use oil gifts to influence Russian policy-makers were on a lavish and almost indiscriminate scale," it says. He targeted a "new oligarch class" and also bribed Lukoil, the oil giant, with oil-for-food vouchers worth $10 million.

These companies are also invested in the Sudan and have been since the mid-80s. They are also deeply invested in Iran. Here are some sample quotes. First, Lukoil and Iran, from Forbes:

Iran and Russia said they plan to step up economic cooperation and are seeking energy deals involving Russian oil and gas giants Lukoil and Gazprom.

Total’s own website says:

With the South Pars project, TotalFinaElf has become the foremost oil company in partnership with Iran

One Congressional Research Service report lists $1.3b in investments by Total in Iran.

Incidentally, another oil company, China Petroleum and Chemicals, (aka Sinopec) that Romney has not divested from is still active in Iran. From an April 2007 article:

Iran is close to a deal with Sinopec of China on developing the Yadavaran oil field, the Iranian oil minister, Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh, said Monday.

Sinopec Group, the state-owned parent of Sinopec Corp., agreed in October 2004 to take the lead in developing the Iranian oil field and to buy 10 million metric tons of liquefied natural gas every year for 25 years in a deal worth as much as $100 billion.

So Romney is extracting income from a state-owned Chinese government oil company investing in Iran. Nice…

Why does this matter?

Well, first Romney is a big advocate of divesting from Iran. At least in the case of Sinopec, it hasn’t happened yet. Now, Romney will argue, somewhat correctly, that this was in a blind trust, and therefore he isn’t accountable for it. Of course, back in 1994, Romney attacked the credibility of this argument, calling it an "age-old ruse:"

You give a blind trust rules. You can say to a blind trust, don’t invest in properties which would be in conflict of interest or where the seller might think they’re going to get an advantage from me.

How about "Don’t invest in companies that are investing in state sponsors of terrorism?"  At the very least, these investments raise questions about the rules that Romney used. What were the rules? And they raise timing questions. Did Romney invest in Total, Sinopec, and Lukoil prior to the blind trust?

It seems that similar questions could apply to his investments in companies that do embryonic stem-cell research, although the political hypocrisy there would have more to do with his actual positions, not his investments.

While he’s at it, why doesn’t he release his tax returns (and Clinton and McCain could do that too), along with the tax returns of his foundation. (which gave the $15k to Mass. Citizens for Life, right?)

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Huckabee’s foreign policy. Neo-isolationist?

August 14, 2007 – 10:51 am

Now that Mike Huckabee is in the first-tier, he is going to need a foreign policy, which he hasn’t articulated much of, as of yet.

My friend David Adesnik dug up some on Huckabee’s foreign policy, as articulated in the Presidential debate two weeks ago:

HUCKABEE: Well, the problem is, George, sometimes when you get what you want, you don’t want what you get. And this is a great case of that happening. I don’t think it’s the job of the United States to export our form of government. It’s the job of the United States to protect our citizens, to secure our own borders, which we have failed to do for over 20 years. It’s the job of our government to make us free and us safe, and to create an enviable kind of government and system that everybody else will want, much in the same way I think we ended up seeing the fall of the Soviet Union. And as far as how do we get there…

In a followup he said:

HUCKABEE: Absolutely not, because I don’t think we can force people to accept our way of life, our way of government. What we can to is to create the strongest America: change our tax system, make it so that people are healthier, create the enviable education system on this planet, make sure that jobs come back to this country rather than disappear from this country.

David, who might even accept the label "neoconservative," finds this troubling. Frankly, I do too, on a certain level. While I wouldn’t accept the "export our form of government" language, it seems clear to me that the United States has a clear role in the world. Some of this is because we are still the strongest superpower, with the strongest economy, the strongest military, and the most dynamic popular culture (which conservatives here and abroad hate)

On a deeper level, I hear in Huckabee an instinct towards the isolationism that Eisenhower fought against. For example:

  • "don’t think it’s the job of the United States to export our form of government"
  • "secure our borders"
  • "make sure that jobs come back to this country rather than disappear from this country" (nevermind the updated "lump of labor fallacy that seems implicit. Where is he on trade?)

Now, I believe that there is a lot of isolationism in the GOP. This was a driving force for Pat Buchanan, and it is certainly not an accident that George W. Bush included language that Pat Buchanan attacked his father with. Much of the Ron Paul energy can be linked to this. And Duncan Hunter’s campaign could be predicated on that too. There is also a tremendous amount of isolationism amongst the Democrats. The response to NAFTA and trade, especially when combined with a deep anti-war sentiment can be read that way.

In any case, Huckabee could try to meld a social conservative message to an anti-globalist energy within the party.

Curiously, there is room for tension between this message and his religion. Huckabee seemingly flip-flopped on immigration from a pro-comprehensive stance, supported by the Southern Baptist Convention among others. Huckabee has also expressed a lot of concern over global warming and international poverty and AIDS. His comments on these have been very similar to the "prophetic voice" and "social justice" language that comes out of the evangelical left on many of these issues. (and that, full disclosure, I am sympathetic too)

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Lefty blogosphere prepares to eat its own

August 14, 2007 – 8:43 am

Matt Stoller is laying the groundwork to attack Democrats over FISA:

I’ve been kicking around the idea with Chris that we should raise the costs of bad decision-making on things like FISA, or when they fold to Republicans on the supplemental or (insert fight here).

It’s not much to put up some google ads criticizing these members for their position on FISA.  The way Google adwords works is that the ad will only show up for the search terms we select.  That means that if we select ‘Chris Carney’, then people searching for Chris Carney (PA-04) will see an ad criticizing Chris Carney for his vote on FISA.  And the people who are searching for Chris Carney are people who want to know more about Carney, like reporters, activists, and constituents.  We can even geotarget his state, so only people in Pennsylvania see the ad. 

I think that this is dumb for a bunch of reasons. The first one is that, on security, there is plenty of evidence, including this very fact, that we have a more conservative country. Second, is their example. Chris Carney represents a pretty Republican district. This was not a "wave" district (NH-1) or a "realignment" seat (CT districts). They guy that he defeated was strangling his girlfriend who was 20 years younger.

There’s another point. Stoller has picked an issue that, according to Rasmussen,  simultaneously divides Democrats and is unpopular:

Seventy-nine percent (79%) of Republicans believe that allowing the government to intercept such calls makes the nation safer. Forty-eight percent (48%) of Democrats agree along with 53% of those not affiliated voters.

This is the kind of thing that the class of 74 Democrats did that destroyed their coalition.

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Stoller’s conservative majority theory: A lesson for 2008

August 10, 2007 – 6:06 pm

Open Left’s Matt Stoller  argues here and here that there is an operative "conservative majority" in Congress right now. His basic thesis is summarized here:

In particular, this comment by Paul Rosenberg is I think accurate, as he argues that we are facing a conservative but not right-wing Blue Dog/DLC bloc combined with an anti-progressive elite consensus in the form of a hostile media establishment, a hostile think tank and academic structure, a hostile regulatory structure, a hostile set of cultural leaders and a set of old world economic incentives for elites.

Most conservatives will roll their eyes at this. But I was struck by this when contrasted with something that Brian Faughn wrote at the Weekly Standard today. Brian breaks down the 56 bills that have passed into law since the Democrats took over:

Of those, ‘only’ 20 are measures that rename federal facilities. Of the other measures signed into law, four would be considered major legislation, while the other 32 would be ranked anywhere between minor and trivial. There’s also one major piece of legislation–the lobbying reform bill–that has been neither signed nor vetoed.

And those four laws are:

  • FY07 Omnibus
  • FISA
  • 9/11 Commission
  • War supplemental

There’s a pattern here. The GOP side prevailed on two of these (War Supplemental and FISA). A populist security proposal succeeded on another (9/11 Commission). And the FY07 Omnibus was just disgusting, but demonstrated that either the Democrats aren’t serious about cutting spending or no one is serious about cutting spending. My money is on the latter.

The point of all this is that there appears to be a pro-security majority, and — still — no willingness to control spending. Now, what’s the point of all this? This is exactly what Newt Gingrich predicted after the election:

First, the obvious outcome of a Democratic-controlled Congress and a Republican White House is the need for bipartisan cooperation in order to get anything done. The key question is: Which kind of bipartisanship will emerge? Will there be a Ronald Reagan approach to bipartisanship which appeals to the conservative majority of the House? Or will there be an establishment bipartisanship which cuts deals between liberals and the White House?

Newt describes what a bipartisan conservative majority would look like:

On the other hand, a conservative populist grassroots strategy would almost certainly make daily interactions with liberal leaders more confrontational as they found themselves nominally chairing committees but losing votes on the floor and having their initiatives rejected by a conservative grassroots coalition. With a conservative populist grassroots strategy it is the 44 Blue Dog Democrats who would find themselves cross-pressured. In the House, some 54 Democrats won by claiming they were much more conservative than Nancy Pelosi, and much more conservative than the San Francisco values she represents. Here, they would be forced to choose between their voters back home and the promises made to them during the campaign, and their leadership.

Sound like DiFi flipping on Southwick? Or 41 House Democrats voting for FISA? Or the President’s veto threats and framing over Iraq funding and timing issues? Or a whole series of Motions to Recommit in the House?

Now, spending is always popular. The real test on economic issues will come when we see the reconciliation bills, private equity, Korean FTA, etc., come up. Still unclear.

There’s a lesson for conservatives here about the popularity of national security as an issue. It still works. There may be an issue here about taxes, but we don’t know yet. Our framing is wining so far.  And the Dems can’t find a position that works for them, as Stoller’s anger indicates. If we really start communicating on taxes, we might be able to succeed there too. (stopping a tax increase is much, much easier than cutting spending, as everyone knows)

Just a thought for your non-Ames weekend.

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Torture in the GOP debate

May 16, 2007 – 8:46 am

Now, I think this whole issue is taken as a proxy for the question, "how much will be protect us?" And law and order is a big principle in the GOP.  But wasn’t this weird?

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney said he would support "enhanced interrogation techniques … but not torture."

Isn’t that just equivocating? "I’m against torture and for it." I understand the "do whatever it takes" answer. I understand McCain’s answer. In general, as the article notes, everyone agreed that torture was bad, but they tried to defend the "enhanced interrogation technique". That position just doesn’t make sense to me.

Now, Romney was much clearer when he talked about doubling the size of Guantanamo.

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