By Gregory W. Wallace (@gregorywallace)
SALEM, N.H. — It may be harder to find more ardent proponents of the Tenth Amendment than the current G.O.P. presidential crop.
“I believe in the Constitution and all the amendments,” former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts said in Keene, N.H., on Aug. 24., “and there’s one in particular that those of us who serve in state government really like, it’s the Tenth Amendment.
“It says that those powers not specifically granted in the Constitution to the federal government are reserved by the states and the people,” he continued.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry agrees: "I will make Washington as inconsequential in your lives as I can," he said to applause at a recent town hall-style meeting.
And the principle of the thing may be the two rivals' only common ground. What is one man's Tenth Amendment-permissible remedy is another man's overreaching hand of government.
Each would prefer to ignore the policy skeleton in his closet which has been no small source of grief lately. Romney is defending reforms to his state’s health care system, criticized as a state takeover of health care and the predecessor to national reforms passed last in March of 2010. Perry is facing questions about his state’s tuition benefit for undocumented young adults which is said to save an individual tens of thousands of dollars over a college career.
Both have stood by their policies and returned the focus to jobs and the economy, expecting a message of fiscal conservatism will carry the G.O.P. primary — and perhaps mindful that a socially moderate stance on some issues may help in the general election.
As the two pull each other's policy skeletons into the spotlight, they offer both similar offenses — that the opponent's policy undercuts his claim to conservatism — and similar defenses — that his policy is a tenth amendment, state solution for a state's unique issue.
Not surprisingly, neither is buying the other's argument.
Romney, who held a town hall meeting here, signed a 2006 health care reform law which requires every individual in the state have coverage, whether through private insurance, Medicare, or Medicaid, and establishes a quasi-public agency to administer free programs for the remainder. Romney tells voters here that portion who had to be covered by the public program was small — 8 percent — yet had been a drain on the system when they were uninsured.
The issue comes up occasionally in town hall meetings, and when it does, Romney says the plan was a fit for Massachusetts, but would not work in states like Texas which have a larger uninsured rate.
Romney has been holding New Hampshire town-hall style meetings for years, and has found previous opportunities to diffuse the question, but for Perry, a candidate untested in Granite State waters, the questions from voters this weekend were tougher.
He sought to frame himself as a stalwart against illegal immigration.
"There's not anybody standing on that stage asking you for your vote as the Republican nominee that has any stronger record on immigration than I do," he said in Manchester. His evidence: opposition to allowing illegal immigrants drivers' licenses, support of a Texas voter ID law, an support for sanctuary cities legislation, which did not pass the state legislature but would have prevented local governments from contacting federal authorities regarding an individual's immigration status. He also cites his support for investments in border security.
"We have spent over four hundred million dollars in our attempt to secure our border because of the absolute failure of the federal government to do that duty for us," Perry said.
The choice for the tuition break was clear cut, he said, and overwhelmingly supported by the state legislature. “Here was our choices: we either kick them to the curb and pick p the cost of whatever that’s going to be later down the road, and we analyzed that they were going to cost us more money if we did not allow them to be educated and become part of the workforce in the state of Texas,” he said.
The Romney campaign says Perry is entitled to his policies, but that Romney does not see eye to eye on them.
“Gov. Romney doesn’t disagree with Gov. Perry’s right to push for liberal immigration policies,” Ryan Williams, a spokesperson for Romney, said “but Gov. Romney doesn’t agree with it.”
But Perry’s spokesperson says the two are programs are very different, pointing to allegations Romney suggested the program could be a national model.
“There’s a fundamental difference between the two,” Robert Black, a spokesperson for Perry, told reporters on Saturday. “In Gov. Romney’s book — at least the first version — he said that this would be a great model for the rest of the country.” On Perry, he continued: “The Governor has always said this is a special situation and it’s a Texas issue.”
Romney “never described” the Massachusetts health care plan “as a model for the entire nation,” Williams said. The state plan “deals with just his state while President Obama passed a national health care policy which casts a one-size fits all” net.
Perceptions of similarities between "Obamacare" and "Romneycare" raised questions of Romney's electability early in the contest, highlighted by a short-lived attack on "Obamaneycare" by former Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota -- who eventually dropped out and endorsed Romney. The topic became the fodder for jokes, including some by President Barack Obama.
“There’s a vicious rumor floating around that I think could really hurt Mitt Romney," Obama joked at the White House Correspondents' dinner this spring. "I heard he passed universal health care when he was governor of Massachusetts. Someone should really get to the bottom of that.”
Perry’s skeleton, too, has a perceived similarity with an Obama policy. The president supports the Dream Act, legislation with a path to citizenship for undocumented young adults pursuing higher education. The bill, introduced at least twice in the last decade, has not passed Congress. Perry is opposed to the federal Dream Act.
He has seized upon changes made to Romney’s book, No Apologies, between the hardcover and paperback editions to discredit his rival. “From now on, no one in Massachusetts has to worry about loosing his or her health insurance if there is a job change or loss in income; everyone is insured and pays only what he or she can afford,” the book read. “It's portable, affordable health insurance -- something people have been taking about for decades. We can accomplish the same thing for everyone in the country, and it can be without letting government take over health care." In the paperback edition, the last line was eliminated, and in it’s stead: “And it was done without government taking over health care.”
After being accused of by Perry of flip-flopping, Romney recounted a reporter’s question and his own response: “He said, ‘Is this a plan that if you were president you would put on the nation, have the whole nation adopt it?’ I said, ‘absolutely not.’ I said, ‘this is a state plan for a state, it is not a national plan.’ ”
The change in text reflects “changes in the climate,” Andrea Saul, a spokesperson for Romney, said the next morning.
Their campaign went on the offensive against Perry when they posted a web video showing the former president of Mexico, Vicente Fox, praising Perry for the policy. Perry retreated last week from his assertion on the debate stage that to oppose the policy is to be heartless.
“If you say that we should not educate children who have come into our state for no other reason than they've been brought there by no fault of their own, I don't think you have a heart," he said at the Fox News/Google debate in Orlando, Fla.
Voters say are split on their interpretations and understanding of the candidates’ argument.
"You have to be practical about the way you solve problems," Jim McConaha of Perry after a Manchester town hall this weekend. "When you're governor of a state you deal with real problems. You have to be practical about it, sensible about it."
McConaha says "Romney is doing a better job explaining the parameters of it," of the Massachusetts law as compared to Perry.
Phil Whittmann of Alton, N.H., says the health care plan is a significant blow to Romney. "We think its a bunch of bunk and we don't think he can win against Obama," Wittman said, standing next to his wife.
“Much as it offends purists, it is the pragmatic thing to do,” said Mike Rogers, who supports Herman Cain but will vote for the Republican nominee next year. The root of the problem—immigration—must be addressed, he said, because once a child arrives in the U.S., the nation has a moral obligation to care for and educate her.
David Connor, an undecided Republican of Hampton, N.H. thinks it is unfair to students to hold them back based on their immigration status. "I don't care what crime a child's parents commit, that child suffers," he said after hearing Perry speak.
This weekend was Perry’s first, second, and third New Hampshire town hall-style meetings, and he faced questions about immigration — as well as Social Security, which he has called a “Ponzi scheme” — at each stop. Romney may have an easier job parrying attacks against his state’s health care reforms here. Much of southern New Hampshire is in the Boston media market, meaning half of the state’s population may have been exposed to the discussion in Massachusetts five years ago.
But Perry has work to do, all to convince voters which message the in-state tuition rate was right for his state. “There was a clear message that that was how Texas wanted to deal with that issue,” Perry said at a town hall meeting this weekend in Manchester. “If New Hampshire or Oklahoma or Arizona chooses to do that in their way, I respect that, because of the Tenth Amendment and our great respect for that part of the Constitution.”
Monday, October 3, 2011
Relegated to Wings, Paul Vies for Third Place
By Gregory W. Wallace (@gregorywallace)
MANCHESTER, N.H. — While Mitt Romney and Rick Perry trade jabs on the debate stage over each others’ books, Ron Paul stands behind his podium on the wing and watches.
The Texas congressman says he is not offended that other candidates have joined him in skepticism of the Federal Reserve, a topic on which he was once a lone wolf.
When other candidates echo his views at debates, “I don't think much about it,” he told college students and supporters at a town hall-style meeting on Monday in Manchester. “To me, it’s a reflection that they know you’re out there and you’re not going to be bent by what they say.”
As Paul is finding his politics increasingly mainstream, the race for bronze in the Republican nominating contest is heating up. The spot behind Perry, the Texas governor, and Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, looks as though it would be a downright cozy perch, especially as the two frontrunners seek to debilitate the other and earn the upper hand. The third place position means underdog status in relation to them, a platform of visibility, a sense of competitiveness, and a level of safety from attack.
Minnesota congresswoman Michele Bachmann is slipping from relevance in New Hampshire, a state which she has not visited in months. Herman Cain, the businessman from Georgia, has been absent since loosing his sole New Hampshire staffer, and Newt Gingrich has not held a traditional town hall-style meeting on one of his few New Hampshire visits. Rick Santorum was last in New Hampshire in mid-August. Former Gov. Jon Huntsman of Utah is making a win in the state his primary objective.
These contenders for bronze bear very different strategies, positions, and differing natural bases. The primary victor builds a base of G.O.P. support and mobilizes enough independent voters to put the campaign over the top.
Paul’s staff says they will make a strong play for those independent votes.
“I think we see a shift in the narrative,” his national campaign advisor, Jessie Benton, said. Paul has “run a strong third place” and is “knocking on the door” of the frontrunners.
“Independents are going to decide this New Hampshire primary, there’s no doubt about it,” he said after his candidate spoke at a Concord financial firm last week.
Paul, who rejects the Keynesian economic model and advocates an Austrian, laissez-faire approach, may have once been more likely to find supporters on this Manchester university campus than among the middle-age financial professionals. He stood behind a podium and spoke for 15 minutes, laying out his economic philosophy, but when he opened the floor to questions, something different happened: a mother asked him about health care and her disabled son. Another asked about troops serving abroad. Another, who called herself a “political junkie” relished in the opportunity to ask a candidate a follow-up question.
And suddenly Paul was connecting with an unlikely set of voters.
That’s not to say they will all go to the polls in January — or whenever the primary does land — and vote for him. But Paul’s effort this year is challenging conventional wisdom.
The libertarian Republican who has served on and off in the U.S. House since 1976 and who finished fifth to Arizona Senator John McCain in the 2008 New Hampshire primary is thriving off the perception that he speaks truth to power in a way that other candidates do not. Despite having spent two decades in Washington, D.C., no voters interviewed for this story suggested he is a beltway insider.
Young professionals and college students — likely too young to remember his 1988 presidential bid and switch from Libertarian to the Republican party — are joined at his town hall meetings with others who have voted — or could have — several times and are frustrated with the political discourse.
Liz Comeau of Dover discovered Paul a few years ago when she was a liberal Democrat and her then-16 year old son emailed her clippings about the candidate. She described the transition, from supporting, and eventual disillusionment, with President Bill Clinton, to voting for McCain — “before he turned into a real neo” — to eventually supporting Paul.
She had “never organized for candidates before,” she said, but “he made me believe that there is someone out there.”
Comeau is among those who University of New Hampshire politics professor Dante Scala says are looking for an alternative.
“Among the true independents I think Paul has some appeal because he is such a maverick,” Scala said last week. “The question is one, whether he can actually reach out beyond his voters and second, how much he’ll work to get those voters.”
So far, Paul has stretched only marginally beyond his base of support in the 2008 campaign. He scored 8 percent in the 2008 New Hampshire primary, and September Granite State surveys show him at 13 and 14 percent. He lags far behind the 40 percent of New Hampshire G.O.P. voters who favor Romney. Paul, Scala points out, “is usually not someone’s second choice.”
Andrew J. Manuse, a state Representative from Derry, has endorsed the candidate because “in general, Ron Paul will live and die by the Constitution.” He is especially attuned to fiscal policy, recognizing, “If our dollar is not stabilized, then we’re going to continue loosing jobs and our economy.”
Paul’s economic message — he proposes returning the U.S. dollar to the gold standard, abolishing the Federal Reserve, and market rather than government regulation — may resonate in an election driven by economic frustration.
The candidate, unknown to some, is finding an opportunity to air that message in televised debates. Aaron Schieding of Londonderry says his debate arguments are “simple and clear.” Jon Damicl, a Massachusetts resident who came to Manchester to hear Paul and have his yard signs autographed, has watched debates and says “the other candidates are saying what he did in 2008.”
There are debates, there are appearances, and there is television advertizing, which reflects a monetary commitment to a serious bid in New Hampshire. Scala points out that Paul did not “spend all that much in New Hampshire” in 2008. Paul has New Hampshire campaign staff, and time will tell if the campaign launches a sustained advertizing buy.
The campaign fundraises in part through weekend “moneybombs,” a concentrated effort to bring in significant amounts of cash in a short time frame. Paul says he receives more contributions from active-duty military than any other candidate.
Last month, current events comedian Jon Stewart, known for his distain of George W. Bush and other Republicans, warmly hosted Paul and asked about his supporters. “It’s a very enthusiastic group,” he said. “The enthusiasm for your candidacy is very strong. Can you broaden that out?”
As the in-studio audience laughed and clapped, Stewart observed, “Your fifteen percent or ten percent or twelve percent will yell harder than Romney’s thirty percent.”
But making noise is one thing, maintaining a solid third place is another, and building the serious coalition required for a New Hampshire upset victory is altogether different. The question, Scala says, remains, “Is he just going to be happy with his 10 percent?”
MANCHESTER, N.H. — While Mitt Romney and Rick Perry trade jabs on the debate stage over each others’ books, Ron Paul stands behind his podium on the wing and watches.
The Texas congressman says he is not offended that other candidates have joined him in skepticism of the Federal Reserve, a topic on which he was once a lone wolf.
When other candidates echo his views at debates, “I don't think much about it,” he told college students and supporters at a town hall-style meeting on Monday in Manchester. “To me, it’s a reflection that they know you’re out there and you’re not going to be bent by what they say.”
As Paul is finding his politics increasingly mainstream, the race for bronze in the Republican nominating contest is heating up. The spot behind Perry, the Texas governor, and Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, looks as though it would be a downright cozy perch, especially as the two frontrunners seek to debilitate the other and earn the upper hand. The third place position means underdog status in relation to them, a platform of visibility, a sense of competitiveness, and a level of safety from attack.
Minnesota congresswoman Michele Bachmann is slipping from relevance in New Hampshire, a state which she has not visited in months. Herman Cain, the businessman from Georgia, has been absent since loosing his sole New Hampshire staffer, and Newt Gingrich has not held a traditional town hall-style meeting on one of his few New Hampshire visits. Rick Santorum was last in New Hampshire in mid-August. Former Gov. Jon Huntsman of Utah is making a win in the state his primary objective.
These contenders for bronze bear very different strategies, positions, and differing natural bases. The primary victor builds a base of G.O.P. support and mobilizes enough independent voters to put the campaign over the top.
Paul’s staff says they will make a strong play for those independent votes.
“I think we see a shift in the narrative,” his national campaign advisor, Jessie Benton, said. Paul has “run a strong third place” and is “knocking on the door” of the frontrunners.
“Independents are going to decide this New Hampshire primary, there’s no doubt about it,” he said after his candidate spoke at a Concord financial firm last week.
Paul, who rejects the Keynesian economic model and advocates an Austrian, laissez-faire approach, may have once been more likely to find supporters on this Manchester university campus than among the middle-age financial professionals. He stood behind a podium and spoke for 15 minutes, laying out his economic philosophy, but when he opened the floor to questions, something different happened: a mother asked him about health care and her disabled son. Another asked about troops serving abroad. Another, who called herself a “political junkie” relished in the opportunity to ask a candidate a follow-up question.
And suddenly Paul was connecting with an unlikely set of voters.
That’s not to say they will all go to the polls in January — or whenever the primary does land — and vote for him. But Paul’s effort this year is challenging conventional wisdom.
The libertarian Republican who has served on and off in the U.S. House since 1976 and who finished fifth to Arizona Senator John McCain in the 2008 New Hampshire primary is thriving off the perception that he speaks truth to power in a way that other candidates do not. Despite having spent two decades in Washington, D.C., no voters interviewed for this story suggested he is a beltway insider.
Young professionals and college students — likely too young to remember his 1988 presidential bid and switch from Libertarian to the Republican party — are joined at his town hall meetings with others who have voted — or could have — several times and are frustrated with the political discourse.
Liz Comeau of Dover discovered Paul a few years ago when she was a liberal Democrat and her then-16 year old son emailed her clippings about the candidate. She described the transition, from supporting, and eventual disillusionment, with President Bill Clinton, to voting for McCain — “before he turned into a real neo” — to eventually supporting Paul.
She had “never organized for candidates before,” she said, but “he made me believe that there is someone out there.”
Comeau is among those who University of New Hampshire politics professor Dante Scala says are looking for an alternative.
“Among the true independents I think Paul has some appeal because he is such a maverick,” Scala said last week. “The question is one, whether he can actually reach out beyond his voters and second, how much he’ll work to get those voters.”
So far, Paul has stretched only marginally beyond his base of support in the 2008 campaign. He scored 8 percent in the 2008 New Hampshire primary, and September Granite State surveys show him at 13 and 14 percent. He lags far behind the 40 percent of New Hampshire G.O.P. voters who favor Romney. Paul, Scala points out, “is usually not someone’s second choice.”
Andrew J. Manuse, a state Representative from Derry, has endorsed the candidate because “in general, Ron Paul will live and die by the Constitution.” He is especially attuned to fiscal policy, recognizing, “If our dollar is not stabilized, then we’re going to continue loosing jobs and our economy.”
Paul’s economic message — he proposes returning the U.S. dollar to the gold standard, abolishing the Federal Reserve, and market rather than government regulation — may resonate in an election driven by economic frustration.
The candidate, unknown to some, is finding an opportunity to air that message in televised debates. Aaron Schieding of Londonderry says his debate arguments are “simple and clear.” Jon Damicl, a Massachusetts resident who came to Manchester to hear Paul and have his yard signs autographed, has watched debates and says “the other candidates are saying what he did in 2008.”
There are debates, there are appearances, and there is television advertizing, which reflects a monetary commitment to a serious bid in New Hampshire. Scala points out that Paul did not “spend all that much in New Hampshire” in 2008. Paul has New Hampshire campaign staff, and time will tell if the campaign launches a sustained advertizing buy.
The campaign fundraises in part through weekend “moneybombs,” a concentrated effort to bring in significant amounts of cash in a short time frame. Paul says he receives more contributions from active-duty military than any other candidate.
Last month, current events comedian Jon Stewart, known for his distain of George W. Bush and other Republicans, warmly hosted Paul and asked about his supporters. “It’s a very enthusiastic group,” he said. “The enthusiasm for your candidacy is very strong. Can you broaden that out?”
As the in-studio audience laughed and clapped, Stewart observed, “Your fifteen percent or ten percent or twelve percent will yell harder than Romney’s thirty percent.”
But making noise is one thing, maintaining a solid third place is another, and building the serious coalition required for a New Hampshire upset victory is altogether different. The question, Scala says, remains, “Is he just going to be happy with his 10 percent?”
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