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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ann Corrigan who wrote (8440)	9/25/2006 9:17:36 AM
From: Peter Dierks	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71588

Romney Rides High A Mormon from Massachusetts wows social conservatives. Monday, September 25, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT WASHINGTON--Right now John McCain is the front-runner for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination. But everyone expects that a single major competitor will emerge to challenge him from the right. The question hung in the air of this past weekend's Family Research Council summit in Washington: Who will that candidate be for the GOP's powerful social conservative base? FRC officials says they invited Mr. McCain to speak, but he declined. But another potential candidate benefited greatly from showing up. Surprisingly, it was Massachusetts' Gov. Mitt Romney, a Mormon with a Harvard M.B.A who governs the nation's most liberal state. The 1,800 delegates applauded him frequently during his Friday speech and gave him a standing ovation afterward. Mr. Romney detailed his efforts to block court-imposed same-sex marriage in the Bay State and noted that the liberal Legislature has failed to place a citizen-initiated referendum on the ballot. He excoriated liberals for supporting democracy only when they think that the outcome is a foregone conclusion that favors their views. He certainly picked up fans at the summit. "I believe Mitt Romney may be the only hope social conservatives have in 2008," says Maggie Gallagher, author of a book defending traditional marriage. The tall barrier many see as blocking his acceptance by evangelical voters--the fact that many Americans view Mormonism with suspicion or worse--may prove to be a mirage. "Everyone I talked to said they didn't have a problem with it," one attendee told me. "If enough people say that to each other, Romney creates a virtuous circle in which evangelical activists decide he's acceptable." Ralph Reed, the former head of the Christian Coalition, notes that something similar has happened in recent years as devout Catholic and evangelical Protestants have increasingly focused on areas of agreement. "Romney won't be the ideal choice for evangelicals, but against a McCain in the primary or a Hillary Clinton in the general election there's no doubt where most would go," he says. Recently, the person most likely to be viewed as the conservative alternative to John McCain would have been Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist or Sen. George Allen of Virginia. But Mr. Frist has lost support as he has failed to herd the unruly cats of the Senate and been viewed as a Washington insider. As for Mr. Allen, he was welcomed by delegates, who sympathized with the hazing he's gotten over his use of the term "macaca" to describe an Indian-American working for his opponent. Almost no one seemed to care about the recent discovery of his Jewish ancestry. But Mr. Allen has clearly suffered from his accident-prone Senate re-election campaign. One noted that he has gone from twice being named the front-runner for the 2008 nomination in National Journal's semi-annual poll of 100 GOP "insiders" to being a beleaguered incumbent in his home state. Now he's even facing fire from the right. "I'm disappointed Sen. Allen has chosen to attack [Democratic opponent] Jim Webb for once opposing inappropriate roles for women in the military," says Elaine Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness. "He's pandering and panicking." Other social conservatives addressed the FRC summit and received warm greetings. They included Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas, Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas and former speaker Newt Gingrich. But for now all are viewed as either too little known or carrying too much baggage to win the nomination. That said, Mr. Gingrich was given a rock star's welcome at the summit's closing banquet. "He is on Fox News so much that conservatives have forgotten his fall from power and now think of him as a statesman," says Fred Johnson, a prominent social conservative from Iowa. "When he said the U.S. was now in World War III against terrorism, every talk show ran with it." Mr. Romney's can't match Mr. Gingrich's rhetorical flair or Mr. Huckabee's down-home homilies. But he impressed three separate and distinct audiences in Washington last week in a 24-hour speaking blitz. On Thursday about one out of eight House Republicans came to hear him address a weekly luncheon hosted by Rep. Jack Kingston of Georgia. Mr. Kingston told the Boston Globe that Mr. Romney made a very positive impression and was clearly positioning himself for the role opposite Mr. McCain that Mr. Allen once occupied. Immediately afterward, Mr. Romney went across town to address a group of K Street lobbyists and economic conservatives. "He was impressive in explaining how he governed as a conservative in Ted Kennedy's home state," said columnist Robert Novak. The next morning, Mr. Romney appeared before the Family Research Council's summit. "He won over a lot of people when he recalled how as a businessman he had rescued the 2002 Olympic Games in Salt Lake City," says Chris Butler of Americans For Tax Reform. That experience helped solidify Mr. Romney's reputation as a can-do manager who knows how to delegate. "He is the only elected official I've met with who gave me a detailed power-point briefing on my area of expertise," says Bob Moffit, a health-care expert at the Heritage Foundation who worked with Mr. Romney to craft a law mandating that everyone in Massachusetts buy health insurance. That's not to say Mr. Romney doesn't have critics back home. Even Romney allies acknowledge that should Democrat Deval Patrick win this fall's gubernatorial race to succeed the retiring Mr. Romney, his health-care plan could become a bureaucratic nightmare. Larry Cirignano, the head of the Boston-based group Catholic Citizenship, faults Mr. Romney for not allowing local officials to deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples. He also criticizes the governor for reversing a decision to replace a state advisory commission on gay and lesbian youth with one representing all youth. Only a few hours after the announcement, Mr. Romney changed his mind. Commission chairman Kathleen Myers said she is convinced he reversed course after being "inundated" with protest calls. "It wasn't a profile in courage from a conservative's point of view," notes Mr. Cirignano. But sniping from his home state isn't the greatest challenge facing Mr. Romney. While he is well known in the early primary state of New Hampshire, he still has scant organization in Iowa, which will vote before New Hampshire. Reporters will continue to dog him over his position on abortion. Mr. Romney says he is now "very firmly pro-life" after having frequently expressed pro-choice views. Last year, Mike Murphy, a strategist for his 2002 governor's race, raised further questions when he told National Review that, all along, Mr. Romney has been "a pro-life Mormon faking it as a pro-choice friendly." Mr. Romney said Mr. Murphy was speaking only for himself. But Mr. Romney also has many advantages. He is perhaps the only candidate who can plausibly claim a base in several states. He has a contributor base in Massachusetts; a large reservoir of political goodwill in Michigan, where he was born and his father served as governor in the 1960s; and the loyalty of many Mormons in Utah and neighboring states. He has a built-in corps of volunteers and contributors in any state where Mormons, the fastest-growing religion in America, have a real presence. And then there is the charisma and poise that Mr. Romney seems to exude naturally. "Many people say he certainly looks like a president--sort of a cross between Ronald Reagan and John F. Kennedy," says Genevieve Wood, who founded the conservative Center for a Just Society. Anyone who draws comparisons to those political genes merits further watching. opinionjournal.com

To: Ann Corrigan who wrote (8440)	8/26/2007 2:44:22 AM
From: Peter Dierks	Respond to of 71588

Michael Vick and the business of sports. Saturday, August 25, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT Way back when, professional sports was often a family business, populated by men still playing boys' games for fun and money. It's a much bigger, more serious business now, as Michael Vick's 10-year, $140 million contract attests. When he signed in 2001, it was the largest in NFL history. With this kind of money at stake, the bottom line moved to the top of concerns in most pro sports, even as all involved still chose to call what they did a "game." The Vick story is no game, for himself or for professional sports. Mr. Vick, now suspended from the NFL, is likely to plead guilty to some of the federal charges against him Monday, even as he denies some of the acts of which he's been accused. Sports have long had commissioners, realizing that any sport dominated by young men who are suddenly exposed to new money but who may have had poor backgrounds is going to have player troubles. Baseball got retired judge Kennesaw Mountain Landis after the 1919 "Black Sox" game-rigging scandal. Judge Landis was a man of principle, who fiercely defended the integrity of the game and set the tone for baseball commissioners for decades. Baseball and the White Sox lost "Shoeless" Joe Jackson, one of the game's best hitters. But the sport's reputation was saved. We would not support the idea that sports today need outsiders as monitors or Congressional oversight or a Department of Sport, at least as long as they have strong commissioners willing to act to maintain the reputation and standards of the sport. The problem with baseball in recent years has been that the commissioner, unlike Landis, has had too little power. Bud Selig recently won more from the owners, but the steroid scandal blossomed because the owners and particularly the unions wouldn't act for years. Only when the story blew up with the Balco-Barry Bonds probe did Mr. Selig get enough clout to make the unions bend; his appointment of the probe led by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell will probably give him more. This is all to the good. Football and the NBA have had better records in part because they have had stronger commissioners. Pete Rozelle set the tone by suspending Paul Hornung and Alex Karras for the 1963 season for gambling. Paul Tagliabue maintained the strong-commissioner model. New NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has sent a proper message by warning the Bengals that their player problems won't be tolerated and by suspending Tennessee Titan Pacman Jones for the season. Last night, with a criminal sanction imminent, Mr. Goodell suspended Mr. Vick indefinitely. It's hard to see how the NBA could have done more to prevent the case of the crooked referee. David Stern has asked an outsider to inspect the league's officiating standards and monitoring, a good idea. In the past, he has been tough on fighting and other lapses. There really is no better alternative than a league commissioner willing to enforce standards of behavior on and off the field, court or gridiron. Sports are entertainment too, of course. Fans pay for the thrill that athletic spectacle provides. The continuing popularity of these sports is that they create a world in which talented people are permitted to free-wheel, improvise and do wondrous things--but always within a clearly defined and enforced set of rules. Everyone involved knows and agrees on the rules of the game. In the real world today, rule-breaking itself has become a kind of entertainment. Starlets sent to jail for drunk driving or drug possession become fodder for lifestyle pieces. It's supposed to be regarded as all fun and games "as long as no one gets hurt." And it has been noted that sports fans, whether in San Francisco or New York, seem willing to look past pretty much anything the boys do, so long as they keep putting up numbers on the scoreboard. "Bread and circuses" has a long pedigree. The Vick case, however, suggests that tolerance even in our time has its limits. Whether Mr. Vick will ever play again after paying his debt to society is something the league--and the fans--will decide. But Mr. Vick would seem to have a larger reckoning in store with the norms and values of the society that so richly rewards him for his running and passing. It is the civilizing rules of that world he has flouted, and it is to that larger society, as much as to his fans or his team, that a debt is now owed. opinionjournal.com