Mitt Romney Stepping Up His Techniques

Mitt Romney has been stepping up his techniques when it comes to accusing his rivals. In recent days, he has become more and more apt to attack his biggest rival Mike Huckabee. He is now accusing him of being soft on crime.  

Mitt Romney, who has shown small gains recently in polls done by www.USAElectionPolls.com, has been making claims against Huckabee’s record on crime. However, this could lead to bigger problems for Mitt Romney, because the more he brings up Huckabee’s record on crime the more his own record on crime is coming under fire. 

Romney put out an ad, which is titled “Choice: Judgment”. This ad attempts to compare and contrast his own record with Huckabee’s record. The announcer on the ad says that Romney was tough on drugs, and had never pardoned a single criminal. The announcer also said that Huckabee had granted many different pardons and communications of sentences. Romney is using this ad to switch support from Hucakbee to himself.

However, Romney has now opened the door to discuss his own past. Because his ad claims that he has done certain things and has not done other things. Because he has stated all of these things, he is leaving the door open for people to begin to question his own past and what he has done and has not done. Therefore, it is very important that each of the things in his ad were completely true. Otherwise, he is going to run into some problems.

This is all we supperters of Mike ask… dig down and get the facts. As Mike says often: “the truth is my friend” 

ATTENTION BASHERS, Just for the record, Huckabee record in Arkansas mostly praised

“…55 percent of Arkansas voters last year said they still liked Huckabee — 10 years after he first took office.”

The truth is that Mike Huckabee encourages everyone to look at his record, while Mitt Romney hopes everyone can forget all about his – that’s the basis for the relentless misleading attacks, otherwise people may actually inspect his record and ask “what in the world is this guy doing running as a Republican?” 

Now for the article….. 

By Mike Madden (text highlights are my own)
Gannett News Service

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Mike Huckabee may have been an unknown commodity to most of the country until a few weeks ago, but not here.

As governor for more than 10 years, Huckabee kept a high profile in Arkansas, whether he was pushing for highway improvements or exhorting his fellow citizens to lose weight. As lieutenant governor, the Republican Huckabee moved up in July 1996, when Democratic Gov. Jim Guy Tucker resigned after a fraud conviction. Huckabee then won two terms of his own.

He left the statehouse in January and started what looked like a long-shot presidential campaign. Now, propelled by support from evangelical Christians in Iowa, Huckabee leads polls there and is second to former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani in most national surveys.

For those who knew him here, Huckabee’s sudden rise in the GOP presidential campaign mirrored his career in Arkansas politics, where he blended social conservatism with economic populism and used his quick wit and roots as a Southern Baptist preacher to win over voters.

“The fact is that he placed himself squarely where most Arkansans are,” said Janine Parry, a political science professor at the University of Arkansas, who runs the school’s Arkansas Poll.

Parry noted that 55 percent of Arkansas voters last year said they still liked Huckabee — 10 years after he first took office.

“(That’s) pretty respectable, especially for anyone who’s served more than six to eight years in public life,” Perry said.

On the campaign trail, Huckabee, 52, talks frequently and proudly about his accomplishments here — how he pushed for badly needed improvements to the state’s highway and road infrastructure; how he expanded ARKids First, the state’s health insurance program for children in poor and working-class families; how he championed school reforms that consolidated some rural districts, though he disagreed with the Democratic Legislature over the final shape of that plan.

He was occasionally more liberal than his campaign positions are now. On immigration, he pushed to allow in-state tuition for some illegal immigrant kids who graduated from Arkansas high schools, though he lost that fight. He recruited the Mexican government to open a consulate in the state, and he opposed a Republican bill in the Legislature that would have denied health care for illegal immigrants.

But throughout his tenure, Huckabee was a Republican governor in a Democratic state, with a constitution that limited the power he could wield on his own. That left him with a narrow margin to operate from in the state.

“He was a pragmatic conservative, not an ideologue, and I saw that as his strong point,” said Rex Nelson, Huckabee’s spokesman for most of his gubernatorial term and a former Arkansas political journalist.

Some of Huckabee’s pragmatic politicking infuriated the Republican base in Arkansas, especially his support for a variety of tax increases that helped fund some of the improvements he advocated. Huckabee campaigned aggressively for diesel and gas tax hikes to pay for road projects, for a sales tax increase to improve state parks and for a tax on nursing homes to cover Medicaid shortfalls. Though his campaign frequently touts the 90 taxes he cut overall, the state’s tax revenues increased during his tenure by almost $500 million.

“He thinks about government as running a business, and he needs more revenue to run his programs, and he doesn’t think twice about increasing those taxes,” said Patrick Briney, head of the Arkansas Republican Assembly, a conservative group that has been loudly critical of Huckabee’s tax record.

The Club for Growth, a national anti-tax organization, also has blasted Huckabee’s tax policy, buying hundreds of thousands of dollars of advertising in New Hampshire and other key early primary states to attack him.

In debates and in stump speeches, Huckabee’s jokes and one-liners have helped him attract attention on the presidential trail. He also employed wit during his days as governor. But critics said he frequently took disagreements personally and that he could flash a temper that, so far, hasn’t appeared much in his national campaign.

He once ordered his press office to take the Arkansas Times, a Little Rock alternative weekly paper, off the list for news releases, and called conservative Republicans who differed with him on financial issues “Shiites,” implying they were radicals.

“If you did not agree with him on a policy issue, he took it personally,” said Randy Minton, of Ward, Ark., a former GOP lawmaker who was one of Huckabee’s critics during his four years in the Legislature. Minton campaigned for Huckabee during elections in the 1990s but split with him on taxes.

Huckabee mostly shrugs off such attacks, saying the taxes were necessary to pay for popular programs.

His allies point out that Minton and other critics are so conservative that they’re marginalized in Arkansas politics, a point analysts agree with.

“This is the scrutiny that I’ve been going through since I first put my name on the ballot in 1992, and for me, it’s sort of like, ‘Gosh, do they not have anything new?'” Huckabee said last week while campaigning in Iowa.

And among Arkansans, the affable nature that Huckabee displays on the campaign trail mostly helped keep him popular.

“He’s like a common guy,” said Ron Platzer, 65, a boat salesman from Hot Springs, Ark.

PRICELESS -Russert to Mitt on Meet the Press: “Can you assure the voters you won’t flip…”

Romney defends changing views on abortion, same-sex rights

CLICK HERE to see the Meet the Press Interview Dec. 16th

WASHINGTON — Republican Mitt Romney sought Sunday to deflect charges that he is a flip-flopper, insisting he had learned from experience and could be counted on to keep his campaign promises if elected president.

Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, also called on his top rival Mike Huckabee to apologize to President Bush. In an article in the journal Foreign Affairs, Huckabee criticized Bush’s foreign policy as an “arrogant bunker mentality.”

Huckabee said no apology is necessary and that Romney should read the article. (and Huckabee’s response about America needing a President that can think on his own was priceless – talk about mud dripping from Mitt’s face)

Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” a somewhat defensive Romney acknowledged that he has shifted positions on some issues and explained that he did so after learning from experience. He said it would be a mistake if a candidate “stubbornly takes a position on a particular act and says, ‘Well, I’m never changing my view based on what I’ve learned.’ “

“If you’re looking for someone who’s never changed any positions on any policies, then I’m not your guy,” Romney said.

At the same time, Romney insisted that as governor he kept all of his campaign promises despite changing some views, and said he would stick to his promises if elected president.

“Bottom line: All the positions you laid out today as a presidential candidate, can you assure the voters you won’t flip back to some of the positions you had when you were governor of Massachusetts?” asked NBC moderator Tim Russert.

“Of course,” Romney responded.

Among the issues:

• Abortion. Romney acknowledged changing his views in 2004 from supporting abortion rights to opposing abortion. He said he did not entirely betray abortion-rights voters, either, because he did not seek to change Massachusetts abortion laws.

• Taxes. Romney said he promised not to raise taxes as governor and did not go back on his word by raising fees by about $240 million to help balance the budget. (Talk about hypocricy – bash Huckabee but don’t look in the mirror – another flaw you will not be forgiven for!) The fees were on services such as gun licenses and training to combat domestic violence. He explained that because the fees were not on broad-based services, such as driver’s licenses, they did not “have a sense, a feeling like a tax.” “I ran as an individual who would not raise taxes, and I didn’t,” he said.

• Same-sex rights. Romney acknowledged that he initially supported federal efforts to ban discrimination based on sexual orientation, but now only supports such laws at the state level. In an unsuccessful Senate run in 1994, Romney promised to be “more effective on gay rights in the Senate than Ted Kennedy.”

Romney’s talk-show appearance came as he is trying hard to overtake Huckabee in Iowa and reclaim the lead he enjoyed for much of the year. Huckabee recently moved to the front of the Republican presidential field in Iowa, with the state’s caucuses less than three weeks away on Jan. 3.

Romney has defended Bush against Huckabee’s criticisms of his foreign policy. On Sunday, he went a bit further, labeling the charge “an insult” and calling on Huckabee to tell the president he was sorry. Huckabee leveled his criticism in an article in the journal Foreign Affairs.

“Mike Huckabee should apologize to the president,” Romney said in response to a question. (I guess Mitt’s now against free speech too???)

Huckabee said Romney should read the article.

“It would really help if he would do that. Because if he did, he would see that there’s no apology necessary to the president,” Huckabee said on CNN’s “Late Edition.” Huckabee said he stood with Bush on tax cuts and sending more U.S. troops to Iraq when Romney did not.

“So, you know, I don’t have anything to apologize for. But I’m running for president of the United States. I’ve got to show that I do have my own mind when it comes to how this country ought to lead, not only within its own borders but across the world,” he said.

 Governor Huckabee’s response doesn’t come any clearer than that!! Nice job Governor!