If you like the Illinois GOP, you’ll love Mitt Romney…
Folks, there are no “moderate” solutions to the problems we face. I forget the source of the following – it’s probably an email from the Gingrich campaign – but the content is excellent.
Why would Mitt probably be another failed Republican president? Look at his health care reforms in Massachusetts, his support for universal health insurance and abortion rights, his vote for Democrat Paul Tsongas in his 1992 bid for president and his renunciation of the Reagan/Bush era.
Here is what Romney told a television reporter in 2002:
“I think people recognize that I am not a partisan Republican. That I’m someone who is moderate, and that my views are progressive.”
The Gingrich campaign’s opposition sheet on Romney follows.
FACT SHEET: MITT THE MASSACHUSETTS MODERATE
“Mr. Romney . . . criticized the Republican campaign agenda, the Contract With America, as too partisan. He said he would have gone against the GOP leadership and supported the [1994 Clinton] crime bill, and would oppose a capital gains tax cut.” (Source: Washington Times, 10/28/1994)
“[Romney] modeled himself on Massachusetts Gov. William F. Weld (R) — apparently on an easy path to reelection — striking a conservative stance on fiscal issues, crime and welfare but a liberal position on abortion and other social issues.” (Source: The Washington Post, 10/29/1994)
Romney offered himself not as a conservative, but a Weld-like moderate: frugal on spending and insistent that welfare recipients work for their checks, but supporting abortion rights and gay rights and willing to ban assault weapons. (Source: The Los Angeles Times, 10/7/1994)
“Eager to show that he is a moderate independent and no ideologue, Romney stressed his support for universal health insurance and abortion rights, criticized the Republican Contract With America promoted by the party’s congressional leaders and, at Faneuil Hall, was more outspoken than Kennedy in arguing that the Boy Scouts should not exclude homosexual youths.” (Source: The Washington Post, 10/29/1994)
“Romney has indicated that he would side with the moderate wing. He endorsed the crime bill and refused to back Gingrich’s jejune Contract with America. He told me he would have backed Chafee’s health care bill. ‘I’m willing to vote for things that I am not wild with,’ he said.” (Source: New Republic, 11/7/1994)
As a registered independent, Romney had voted in the Democratic presidential primary in 1992 to support Paul E. Tsongas. (Source: Race 4 2012, 2/16/2007)
“Romney has also done well in the debates, but he is not as conservative as Newt Gingrich.” (Source: Bill O’Reilly, Fox News, 12/2/2011)
Romney’s Chief Legal Counsel at the end of his term, Mark Nielsen, was on record as pro-abortion (as a candidate for Congress in 2000), and saw to it that Catholic Hospitals were forced to give morning-after abortion pills – clearly misinterpreting a new statute and ignoring constitutional religious freedom protections. (Source: Romney Exposed, 6/20/11, )
Governor Romney passed a host of new tax and fee increases, hitting the corporate world hard and devastating job creation. As Peter Nicholas, chairman of Boston Science Corporation, stated, “tax rates on many corporations almost doubled because of legislation supported by Romney.”(Source: Romney Exposed, 6/20/2011,)
The Cato Institute reported that in his first year as Governor, Romney “proposed $140 [million] in business tax hikes through the closing of ‘loopholes’ in the tax code.” (Source: Cato Institute, Annual Fiscal Policy Report Card for America’s Governors, 2004, as quoted in Romney Exposed)
IN ROMNEY’S OWN WORDS:
“Look, I was an independent during the time of Reagan/Bush. I’m not trying to return to Reagan/Bush.”
“I do not take the position of a pro-life candidate. I’m in favor of preserving and protecting a woman’s right to choose.” (Source: The Rolling Stone, 10/5/2011 )
“We’ll plug corporate tax loopholes so companies will pay their fair share.” (Source: Stateline, 2/25/2003, )
“We first have to get a budget in balance before we may have substantial tax cuts.” (Source: Harvard Crimson, October 21, 1994)
“Everybody in our state has to have health insurance. We`re not going to have free riders…And that`s a model which I think has some merit more generally.” (Source: PBS, 6/5/2006)
“I’m proud of what we’ve done. If Massachusetts succeeds in implementing it, then that will be a model for the nation.” (Source: Newsweek, 12/2/2007)
“I think you’re going to find when it’s all said and done, after all these states that are the laboratories of democracy, get their chance to try their own plans, but those who follow the path that we pursued will find it’s the best path, and we’ll end up with a nation that’s taken a mandate approach.” (Source: Think Progress, 5/12/2011, ))
“I think people recognize that I am not a partisan Republican. That I’m someone who is moderate, and that my views are progressive.” (Source: Business Insider, 12/13/2011, )
