you misunderstood my statement.

Let me break it down for you. First, there are occasionally some liberal hack trolls who come on this site and post usually short statements like “Anyone but Romney!” and then disappear. On the rare occasions when one of these hack trolls (which, by definition is someone with liberal beliefs, so it does NOT include you), will get chatty and will start talking about where he lives, what he does for a living, etc. Inevitably, he will contradict himself, get caught, and get banned.

These bannings a justifiable because the posters are clearly people who spend most of their time on dkos or TPM cafe and have only come here to try to help out Obama’s pathetic presidency.

But if you thought that I was calling every person who is supporting a candidate other than Mitt Romney a “liberal hack troll” then I am sorry that you misunderstood my use of the term. It does not include everyone who supports a candidate other than Mitt Romney. Nor does it include conservatives who will support any Republican who is not named Mitt Romney. It only includes liberals that have come here to try to help Obama.

I had to point out that these hack trolls are almost universally anti-Romney. There is a very good, logical reason why they don’t want Romney to be the GOP nominee. They want to win.

I can give you this caveat, though. You can’t make chicken soup out of chicken crap. And Massachusetts lawyers are mostly chicken crap liberals or moderates.

Ryan Larsen actually had a great response to your accusation that Mitt only put liberals on the court. You should read it and then tell me whether or not Mitt put any conservatives on the court.

You’re forcing me to respond to your accusations, which you provide no specific details for.

At the same time, I’m being asked to respond to Bill S.’s accusations, Streiff’s accusations, etc.

Just provide me some specifics and read my caveat.

Don’t tell me I blindly shill for anyone. I supported Romney back in 2008 when you were probably supporting one of Romney’s liberal opponents.

knowledge of Mitt Romney.

But since you are the one accusing Romney of putting liberals and pro-gay judges on the courts, perhaps you can back that accusation up with a name or an article. Surely you can do that.

Now post it.

If it exists.

I can make statements like that too: “Rick Perry put liberals on the courts in Texas.”

See how easy that was?

Can you defend Rick Perry against the allegation that he put liberals and pro-gay judges on the courts in Texas?

Wouldn’t it be easier to defend Mr. Perry if the person making the allegation backed the allegation up with a name or an article?

In California, Gov. Schwarzenegger had a similar problem that Romney had in Massachusetts: how to pick judges that would be confirmed by the senate.

You may know of some conservative Republicans who could get approved by the Massachusetts senate, but if so, you are withholding valuable knowledge from those who desperately need it.

Schwarzenegger dealt with the problem by negotiating with the Democratic state senate leader and putting as many conservative judges on the courts as he could.

You don’t know how many of Romney’s judicial nominees were liberal and how many were conservative.

If you can show me an example of a decision that one of these judges made, that would bring us closer to the truth. But there is a problem with that, too: it presumes that Romney had knowledge that this particular judge would turn out to be a liberal.

Are you going to try to tell me that Reagan was a bad president because he put Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court? He could not possibly know how she was going to rule on Planned Parenthood v. Terry, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, Lawrence v. Texas or other controversial decisions.

Neither could Mitt Romney. The process is totally different for a president, particularly when his party controls the Senate. Republicans are expected to pick up the Senate next year.

Look, the Republican Party has to run candidates in all 50 states to avoid becoming a “minor party” like the Reform Party or a “regional party like, say, the Prohibition Party.

We need guys like Mitt to run in Massachusetts. We need guys like Ahnold to run in Cali. We need guys like Perry to run in Texas.

Once they get elected, they can choose for themselves whether they will govern as conservatives, moderates, or liberals.

If they govern as liberal Republicans (see William Weld, Mike Huckabee, Nelson Rockefellor, Arnold Schwarzenegger), then they should never aspire for higher office.

But if they govern as conservatives, then they should still be eligible for higher office. Actions speak louder than words.

As for Mitt, he did what he could to put as many conservatives on the courts in Massachusetts as he could. Until you can show me some proof otherwise.

whether or not I trust them to govern as conservatives and whether or not I think that they can beat the liberal who is running against them.

As for Mitt and judges, I responded to this one upthread, but I’ll rehash it for you: Mitt Romney and Arnold Schwarzenegger had the same problem as governor: how to nominate conservative judges that the legislature would approve.

Generally, this is where a lot of ugly horse-trading goes on between the exectuive (governor or president) and the head of the legislature (senate majority leader). George W. Bush was terrible at this game and his dad wasn’t any better.

Romney had to deal with a senate in Massachusetts that could have blocked any of his nominees and faced no backlash from the electorate.

In national politics, the Democrats know that there is a price to be paid if they abuse the filibuster. You could even say that they’ve already crossed that line and that there is no more Rule XXII left to protect the minority’s right to filibuster.

Which means that Romney, or any other Republican president, would have the ability to put conservatives on the court without much threat of a filibuster. Unless McCain gets back together with his Gang of 14 cronies and works out another deal with Satan.

Anyway, I’m 100% confident that Romney would put only conservatives on the courts. I could not say that about GW Bush or John McCain or even Herman Cain. Cain is such a rookie to the game that the Democrats would run circles around him and he wouldn’t know what happened until too late.

Reagan raised taxes as governor of California.

He was a great governor. But he wasn’t the purist that people think he was. Reagan didn’t have to make decisions on abortion or gay marriage because these were non-issues when he was governor.

Romney showed spine by opposing tax increases as governor and by opposing same-sex marriage and civil unions as governor.

He also opposed stem-cell research (human cloning) as governor.

He proved that he has the gravitas to lead. He does not take orders from the far right or the far left. He leads the entire electorate. I’m sorry if your candidate is not doing well.

But you have no justification for calling my defense of Mitt Romney bogus. You’re just spoiling for a fight is all.

You say that Mitt raised taxes. Prove it.

You say that Mitt gave out gay marriage licenses. Prove it.

These are false statements.

You can’t go through life just hating on one candidate. Sooner or later you’re going to have to pick one.

If you don’t like any of the current candidates, then tell me who your dream candidate is.

My dream candidate is Tom Coburn. I think that he has the right attitude about taxes and spending. But he’s not running this year.

I also like Marco Rubio. But he’s not running this year.

Bob McDonnell would be great. But he’s not running this year.

So I like Mitt. Mitt is better than Perry, Cain, and every other candidate that’s running this year. Period.

get more liberal from 2008 to 2012.

That is fine. But for the posters here, especially the moderators and front-pagers to call Romney “unacceptable” as they have done on many occasions and to parse, twist, and take out of context every statement that Romney makes ignores the reality that Romney could have and should have been our “white knight conservative” in 2008 that would’ve kept McCain from getting the nomination and possibly kept Obama from becoming president.

People here, particularly front-pagers, went on and on about Romneycare and about Romney’s flip-flop on abortion and other issues but they didn’t work Thompson over for representing Planned Parenthood as an attorney. Nor did they cut Giuliani off at the knees for being pro-choice and pro-gay rights and pro-tax and pro-regulation, etc.

In other words, the front-pagers and moderators here moved further to the right and probably pulled Romney to the right along with them. But Romney is now opposed by guys like Herman Cain who has no record and Rick Perry who has the benefit of being from a very conservative state. I think that Huntsman’s campaign MIGHT have caught fire had he been from a state other than Utah and had he been something other than a Mormon (although he seems to be a very lapsed Mormon if you ask me).

But that is just idle speculation. We will never know what “might have been”.

I want to hear Streiff’s response to this.

These quotes seem to refute the notion that Romney was hated by Erickson in 2008.

And this bolsters my argument that Romney didn’t move to the left between 2008 and 2012. Rather, some conservatives like the front-pagers here moved further to the right and then suddenly decided that Romney was no longer conservative enough for them to support him.

And that may have actually done some good by pulling Romney further to the right than he would otherwise be. It was very good that George H.W. Bush had to run against Pat Buchanan and Bob Dole in 1988. It pulled the previously moderate Bush to the right.

We ended up winning in like 40 states that year. We can do it again next year.

Add Hugh Hewitt and Ann Coulter to that list.

We’re now seeing how fickle the talk show bunch is.

These guys read blogs like RedState. Don’t kid yourselves about that.

They see people post mean diatribes on RS about Romney that go unchallenged and they assume that supporting Romney would alienate them from the listeners they need to stay on the air.

And the reason why these diatribes are not being responded to is that Romney supporters are being silenced through banning. Phil Larsen was just the tip of the iceberg.

There are a lot more that don’t have the connections to get onto politico with their complaint that they were banned for being pro-romney.

comment here more than once a month.

Maybe I’m underestimating.

Even if it’s 5000 people, that’s still not a lot.

I am always amazed at the polls here that show support for every candidate but Romney.

Liberals have blogs where upwards of 50,000 people post regularly. I guess that’s the nice thing about being unemployed.

What’s your source on that? Is there more traffic here or on free republic?

Imma check that out.

Guys like Erickson didn’t like Romney. So they backed Fred Thompson. Fred didn’t have the money, the skill, or the organization to win in Iowa or any of the early states in 2008.

So we got McCain. Congrats on that one.

This time around, we already know what’s going to happen to Herman Cain. Same thing that happened to Thompson in 2008 and Steve Forbes in 2000. Flame-out.

We can crucify Romney right now if we want to help the Dems. Or we can focus on the positive (pro-life, anti-gay marriage, anti-tax, anti-stem cell research, pro-2nd Amendment) and not give the Dems the ammo they will need to get Obama re-elected.

Sometimes, I think that RS is like a train being driven by a guy whose either drunk, stoned, or just crazy. Everyone who is not the driver is supposed to cheer for the driver no matter how freakin’ scared they are.

If we’re all supposed to get on the Cain Train or the Perry Train, color me scared. I know that any Republican can potentially lose next year. But the polls show that Romney has clear strengths in Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania, Colorado, and other states. And I know better than to pick a guy like Cain who has never held elective office before. I did that with Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2003 and I lived to regret it.

That’s what separates you from me.

You seem to think that Romney can’t be trusted. I feel the same way about Rick Perry and Herman Cain. I have no idea what those guys actually believe in or how they would respond to the horse-trading game that goes on inside Washington D.C.

But I know what Obama would do in his second term. He would expand on the liberal policies of his first term.

Herman Cain joined the circular firing squad by saying that he would never support Rick Perry. Now you’re supporting the same idea by saying that you would vote for Obama, a liberal democrat, over Romney, a conservative Republican.

Keep in mind that Romney had Jim Demint’s endorsement in 2008. I don’t think that Demint would endorse someone that was a liberal in conservative’s clothing. I trust Demint and I trust James Dobson. I also trust Chris Christie and Tim Pawlenty. I believe that Romney will end up with Marco Rubio’s endorsement and Jeb Bush’s endorsement eventually. Sooner would be better than later.

But I think what you’re saying is that Romney supporters and Ron Paul supporters here can expect to be bullied by those who support Cain and/or Perry. Or just those who want “anyone but romney” to be the nominee.

This is a silly, circular firing-squad.

While we engage in this rancor about who the “truly conservative” candidate is (none of them are), the left is preparing to raise taxes, turn illegal aliens into voting U.S. citizens, hand out free or subsidized food, jobs, and/or education benefits to sneak-ins so as to encourage more sneak-ins to sneak in, and turn the traditional American family into a thing of the past.

We can do better than this. And we must.

I’m not “settling”.

I settled for GHW Bush in 1988 and have never regretted it.

But I’m not settling for Romney.

I like Romney. I trust Romney. I don’t trust Cain and I don’t trust Rick Perry.

Maybe it’s because I’m from California. But I’m ok with a candidate saying, “Look, I used to be pro-choice, now, I realize that the position I had was wrong.”

If you want to know the truth, when I was 21, you’d probably have called me a liberal back then. I didn’t consider myself one. I was pro-life and pro-traditional family. But I would have liked a program that helped people like me afford college.

I can understand that the “ABR” crowd is trying to pull Romney to the right. Mission accomplished. Romney would probably rather swallow a live grenade than nominate a moderate or liberal judge to sit on the supreme court.

But if we don’t nominate Romney, then what? Who will pick the judges then?

I can understand your frustration. But this is supposed to be a marketplace of ideas. As long as someone isn’t spouting off racist crap, vulgarity, or outright lies, they should be allowed here.

Maybe he thinks that if he tries to defend himself, he’ll just get banned.

I’m here to prove to both Larsens that as long as they take the high ground and don’t resort to the name-calling and other forms of disrespect that the supporters of other candidates are allowed to engage in, they won’t get banned.

I hope that I am right. I’m turning the other cheek and not repaying wrong for wrong. Hope it works.

If I feel that Herman Cain is getting picked on because of his race, is that race-baiting?

I don’t think so. It’s an opinion. We’ve all got em.

If Ryan was fishing for a persecution story to tell, then he should have stuck around to defend himself.

I can see why Streiff feels that he came here looking for a fight.

But I also agree with Ryan that Phil’s banning was wholly unwarranted. Streiff has yet to defend the decision with anything other than “he was a douchebag” which, in the debate department, is like saying, “I just didn’t like his opinions”.

First, I don’t know what you mean by that. Some explanation is in order there.

Second, when you say that I’m “playing a card”, I say that I’m raising a coherent argument.

It is the same thing that Anita Perry did when she said that people are picking on her husband because of his southern drawl and/or his religion. It is the same thing that Herman Cain did when he said that the allegations against him are based on race.

Why are Romney supporters the only ones here who are expected to just silently take it when their candidate gets hammered.

It gives Democrats all the ammunition they need to say that Romney is hated by the base. Sorry, I’m part of the base. I was part of the base before a lot of the people who post here were part of it, certainly before there was any such thing as a Tea Party.

If Democrats want to meet someone who supported Bush in 2000 and 2004, supported Dole in 1996, supported Reagan (even though I was too young to vote for him) and now supports Romney, I’m right here.

I’m free to say what I believe until some moderator comes along and bans me for supporting Mitt Romney. Which would be unfair, as anyone can tell you.

Streiff didn’t “warn me not to be a douchebag”. He said that Phil Larsen was banned for being a douchebag.

Then Streiff refused to explain what Phil did that made him a douchebag.

Who’s the douchebag now?

It’s all a bunch of dumb name-calling. Kids love name-calling because they can’t articulate their ideas very well.

We should be bigger than that. Hopefully, we’re all adults here.

my request.

Make a note of it. I think that everyone here is best served when the rules are clear. “Don’t be a douchebag” while seemingly intelligible to a few, can lead to a lot of confusion because of it’s lack of clarity.

The term “douchebag”, interestingly enough has moved in pop culture from being a euphemism for “wimp” or “geek” to being a euphemism for “jerk” or “a-hole”. If it is the latter definition that gets people banned, I could see a whole lot of bannings taking place here, but most of the bannings would go to moderators who are currently enjoying sacred cow status due to their position as moderator. Not because they have refrained from douchebaggery. Or douchenozzlery. Or whatever it is.

comment by taking it out of context.

I think that I may have caused some confusion by referring to the beliefs of the people that get hammered here.

What I thought was clear was that I was referring to their political beliefs (i.e. which candidate they support). I did not mean to imply that “Mormons aren’t welcome at RedState”.

But every statement I make has been parsed, twisted, taken out of context, and then turned into an accusation against me.

I’m trying to take the high road by not repaying name-calling with name-calling.

But it is getting kind of 4th-gradish.

I also feel that people have been banned from this site for things that would not have got them banned had they supported a candidate other than Mitt Romney or Ron Paul.

I got tired of the Paul-tards, Paulistians, too.

But not that it is Romney supporters who are getting persecuted, I understand how the Paulistas felt.

At least Romney has a solid base of support. Straw polls aside, I don’t think that Paul had any chance of winning a single primary in 2008 and he won’t win any in 2012. No one is going to bet against Romney winning in New Hampshire, California, New York, Massachusetts, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, or Illinois next year.

The real challenge is how Romney will appeal to enough Baptists, Lutherans, Catholics, Evangelicals, etc. to get over the top in states like Iowa, Florida, and Texas.

He’s been pro-life for at least 7 years. Even before that, he’s always been personally opposed to abortion, unlike, say, Rudy Giuliani who’d pay for your next abortion if it helped him get elected.

And I’ve got way more than one-trick.

There are one-trick ponies here who just say the same things over and over again. But they don’t get banned.

But if you raise the argument that there is some bigotry going on, stand by.

As an attorney, I am well aware of how people make decisions. Jury selection involves picking out people who are not biased against your client. This is difficult because no one ever admits to having a bias.

But, in the real world, people fear and mistrust people of different religions, races, ethnicities, nationalities, accents, genders, sexual orientations, etc.

So I know what people feel on the inside when they have pure vitriol for an individual but they won’t give you a substantive reason for the cause of their vitriol. This is what I see in a lot of the anti-Romneyism that exists. Not all of it, though.

I sympathize with those who just want to be represented by a conservative Republican who can win. That’s all I want, too.

As I have said to you before, not all of the “Anyone but Romney” crowd is a liberal hack troll.

Only those who start contradicting themselves and then get banned for being liberal hack trolls.

Ask rightwingmom about this. She’s seen a few of them come and go.

They are more likely to be anti-Romney than anti-Cain or anti-Perry.

I believe that there is a reason for this. Polls in Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania, and other states support my beliefs.

I’m willing to concede that there was a recent poll in Wisconsin that shows that Cain would be slightly better than Romney in Wisconsin against Obama. But still within the margin of error. And this poll was taken before the big Cain-gate implosion.

Please don’t misquote me or mischaracterize my statements. If you have a question about what I am saying, just ask and I’ll explain it to you.

playing the “religion-baiting” or “bigotry” card.

Can I respond to that charge? Or must I just accept it?

That’s what I am uncomfortable with.

It is someone saying “you’re religion-baiting” and then his best friend, who also has protected status, then says, “and if you argue with that assessment, we’ll kick you out of here”.

That’s not fair. That forces people who are not moderators to just swallow these accusations as if they were well-grounded accusations.

Silence is consent. Silence is an admission in many cases. For the record, I have not had any response to my request for clarification on what makes a person a “douchebag” here. Clarification would be great. And I believe that Streiff is the only one who can clarify this since he initially used the term.

Romney supporters who got kicked off for pointing out that there are hidden agendas for some of the anti-Romney crowd.

Just like there may be hidden agendas for some of the anti-Cain and anti-Perry people.

You have to allow people to express these views. You can’t just silence them for not agreeing with you. That’s a totalitarian strategy and it is repulsive to those who believe in the First Amendment and the “marketplace of ideas” concept of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Look it up.

Justice is treating two people the same regardless of which candidate they support.

When someone gets banned who has not done anything worse than what other posters have done, that is unjust.

Streiff inadvertently brought up a poignant concept when he referred to WhyRomney.com as a “circle jerk”.

This description befits any web-blog that has made itself irrelevant by screening out the views of anyone who is not either an editor/moderator of the blog or willing to parrot their views.

Anyone who believes that Romney has no support among the base of the Republican Party just hasn’t mingled with very many Republicans this year.

Jim Demint supported Romney in 2008 and will probably support him again next year. Chris Christie, the conservative darling, has thrown his support to Mitt. Tim Pawlenty (aka “Tea-Paw”) has endorsed Mitt Romney.

James Dobson quietly endorsed Mitt Romney in 2008 (quietly, and too late to stop McCain, but the endorsement was there).

If this site wants to become a “circle jerk” of anti-Romney people, then it can do so.

But be advised that all of the opinions and accusations that are posted here today may come back next year to help Obama get re-elected.

I’ve never seen conservatives so willing to drive off a cliff as they are this year. And every time someone has the guts to say, “Hey, guys, let’s not drive so fast towards that cliff!” he gets banned and the car keeps careening toward the cliff.

unavailable to the public, then do so.

I don’t think that I’m abusing it. I haven’t called anyone a douchebag today. Or come up with any clever nicknames like “Sparky” or “rom-bot”. I don’t think that they’d let me stay here if I resorted to name-calling.

Although given Ryan’s refusal to post a single comment on his own diary, I can see why people like you might think that.

Ryan, if you are withing eyeshot of this comment, please come back and post something, even it is nothing more than “jackdaniels11 is not my alter ego”.

The moderators can see your user ID so they will know that you and I are not the same person (or, at least, that we are not posting from the same location. Which they should already know.)

I will say this though, if it is somehow revealed that I have any connection whatsoever to the Larsens, other than the fact that we all like Mitt Romney, I will never, ever post here again.

In fact, I will leave my house forever and live amongst the forest animals until I die of starvation.

Is that enough for you?

I don’t see you calling Cain’s defenders “spinners” even though they are currently taking on the Herculean task of spinning away the allegations of 3 different women.

I don’t see you calling the Perry-bots spinners even though they are trying to spin the fact that the fickle voters who swam to Perry in desperation in August have now swam away from him just as quickly. Perry was forced to do some very low things to try to convince voters that they needed to vote for him (some religion bashing there, all done by surrogates to keep the candidate’s hands clean), but it didn’t work.

Those same desperate voters then swam to Cain in desperation only to learn what I could have told them 2 months ago: they don’t know anything about Cain. They guy could have a dead body or a drug problem in his closet. He hasn’t been vetted yet.

The vetting really began two days ago and it ain’t over yet. By the time the media gets done with Cain he will look about as appetizing as Bill Clinton trying to get Republican votes.

(1) Fiscal responsibility. This means getting spending under control and not taxing anyone more than their fair share
(2) Defend Americans. This mean protecting Americans from all terrorists, foreign and domestic.
(3) States’ rights. This means keeping the federal government out of areas where the states are sovereign, including regulation of businesses, public lands, and abortion laws.
(4) Common-sense deregulation. Environmental laws should be less onerous on businesses. Common sense should prevail over liberal extremism. This means no carbon tax. No cap-and-trade. No Kyoto Accords. Nothing like it. Just common sense. If you dump stuff into the water, it should not be poisonous for humans or for the kind of fish and crustaceans that humans like to eat. If you dump radioactive stuff into the ground, make sure it’s in a case that won’t leak.
(5) Family values. Let’s lower the number of abortions. Let’s not tell kids that they should wait until marriage and then force them to get a shot to prevent genital warts. If they don’t want genital warts, they can either not have sex or use a condom. Either way. I also think that gay marriage is a bridge too far. I don’t care so much about domestic partnerships. Those are everywhere now. But I don’t want gay marriage because I believe that denegrates marriage.

Mitt agrees with me on all of these issues. I think that Perry and Cain do, too, but to a lesser degree. Let’s discuss this.

a lot better than you can.

If you would read what I have posted today, it is pretty obvious that my intention is to stand up for someone who I believe was unfairly banned by you.

Whether that gets me banned or not, it certainly does not make me a douchebag.

If you want to debate, let’s debate. But let’s stay off of moms, name-calling, threats, and any other juvenile tactics of expressing divergent ideas with other people.

I don’t feel the need to go to pro-Mitt sites or pro-anyone sites. If I want to know about a candidate, I go to wikipedia (with an awareness that a certain percentage of the info there is b.s.)

I’ve never met or heard of someone intentionally trying to get banned from this site so that he’d have a sad story to tell.

What I have seen is Romney supporters getting called “rom-bots” for doing nothing more egregious than advocating for their preferred candidate. As Thirstyboots pointed out, Romney was Erickson’s preferred candidate in 2008 before and after the flash-in-the-pan candidacy of Fred Thompson.

No one accused Erickson of “rom-botting” back then. Thank goodness.

I know some other people who got kicked off of this site for defending Romney passionately and without sycophantic deference to the moderators.

But there has been no demand that the Cain supporters or Perry supporters tow the same line that the Romney supporters or Paul supporters are asked to tow.

What is “disrespect” when A says it to B, is not “disrespect” when B says it to A.

Some people here are allowed to call names and use profanity. Others aren’t. I understand the difficulty that must exist in keeping the liberal Kos kids from hacking in here and then spouting off all sorts of racial/vulgar crap, but that has to be dealt with as it happens.

It makes no sense why the Romney-supporters get dog-piled on and told “You can take your Rom-botting elsewhere”. No one has ever been told to take his/her “Cain-botting” or “Perry-botting” elsewhere. Why the double standard?

Is it that hard to believe that there are actual conservatives who support Romney?

I’m one of them. And I haven’t been banned yet.

I only said that Mitt Romney fought against gay marriage as governor of Massachusetts in 2005.

Do you need a link? Here it is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governorship_of_Mitt_Romney

Here’s the part that you need to read:

from wikipedia.org

Governorship of Mitt Romney

Same-sex marriage

For more details on this topic, see Same-sex marriage in Massachusetts.

When he ran for governor in 2002, Romney declared his opposition to same-sex marriage.[68] “Call me old fashioned, but I don’t support gay marriage nor do I support civil union,” said Romney in an October 2002 gubernatorial debate. He also voiced support for basic domestic partnership benefits for gay couples. Romney won the endorsement of the Log Cabin Club of Massachusetts, a Republican gay-rights group, who in 2005 accused him of reneging on his 2002 campaign commitment to support some benefits for gay couples.[69] He also opposed an amendment, then before the General Court, that would have banned same-sex marriage and outlawed all domestic partnership benefits for gay couples. When campaigning in 2002, Romney’s stated position was that “All citizens deserve equal rights, regardless of their sexual orientation. While he does not support gay marriage, Mitt Romney believes domestic partnership status should be recognized in a way that includes the potential for health benefits and rights of survivorship.”[70]

Romney strongly opposed same-sex marriage during his governorship. He emphasized his desire to “protect the institution of marriage” while denouncing discrimination against gays and lesbians. “Like me, the great majority of Americans wish both to preserve the traditional definition of marriage and to oppose bias and intolerance directed towards gays and lesbians,” Romney said in 2004.[71]

On June 2, 2006, Romney sent a letter to each member of the U.S. Senate urging them to vote in favor of the Marriage Protection Amendment.[72] In the letter, Romney stated that the debate over same-sex unions is not a discussion about “tolerance”, but rather a “debate about the purpose of the institution of marriage”. Romney wrote, “Attaching the word marriage to the association of same-sex individuals mistakenly presumes that marriage is principally a matter of adult benefits and adult rights. In fact, marriage is principally about the nurturing and development of children. And the successful development of children is critical to the preservation and success of our nation.”

Romney’s letter was his second effort to persuade the U.S. Senate to pass the Defense of Marriage Amendment. On June 22, 2004 he testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, urging its members to protect the traditional definition of marriage. “Marriage is not an evolving paradigm,” said Romney, “but is a fundamental and universal social institution that bears a real and substantial relation to the public health, safety, morals, and general welfare of all of the people of Massachusetts.”[73]

Romney attempted to block implementation of the decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court that legalized same-sex marriage in 2003. Romney criticized the decision as harming the rights of children:

We’re back to 1994 again? Can’t you find anything more current than that? In 1988, Rick Perry was an Al Gore Democrat. Can I go there?

Look, Bush was endorsed by the Log Cabin Republicans in 2000 (but not 2004 when they showed their true colors by endorsing John Kerry).

Regardless of what he said to the Loggers in 1994, he said back then, as I indicated in the post upthread that he did not support either gay marriage or civil unions.

Back in 2004, a week before the election, GW Bush “shocked the world” by saying on TV that he would support the decision by states to give civil union rights to gay couples.

So you can’t seriously argue that statements made by Romney to Log Cabin Republicans somehow make him the darling of the lavender left. They HATE Mitt. They LOATHE Mitt. Mitt belongs to the Church whose members donated millions to limit marriage to traditional couples in 2008.

Try again.

endorsement in 2000. So what?

If Romney ever stabbed an ideological group in the back it was the liberals he betrayed, not conservatives.

As Ann Coulter used to say, “He tricked liberals into voting for him. We should reward him for that.”

Honestly, I wish that a Mitt Romney-like guy would run for mayor of Los Angeles and governor of California. Just tell the liberal voters what they want to hear and then govern as a conservative.

I kind of believe what you are saying. I know that when Romney first got elected his plan was to be a great governor and run for re-election.

But the Democrats in Massachusetts kept pushing him to pass stem cell funding, etc.

At some point in time, Romney realized that he could not have his cake and eat it, too. He would either have to go liberal like William Weld, Jane Swift, and Paul Celluci or he would have to govern as a conservative and forget about running for re-election.

He made the right call. The fact that he is now the presumptive nominee attests to this fact. He didn’t stab conservatives in the back. He stabbed dumb liberals in the back. A better way of putting it is that he did the right thing for all Massachusetts residents and the liberals were not happy with it.

I learned a long time ago that every politician was a sell-out. Every one of those guys is for sale. You think that Cain is going to ask the Tea Party’s decision on every issue? Wrong. You think that Perry is going to sell out the center so that the Republican base will be happy? Wrong. Look at George W. Bush, George HW Bush and Ronald Reagan if you want to see presidents who governed from the center and didn’t pay too much attention to the base.

We are still better off with those presidents than we would have been with liberal democrats.

That’s my take. What’s yours?

He told the Log Cabin Republicans that he was for domestic partnerships but not civil unions or gay marriage.

Here’s the quote that you need to look at:

From Wikipedia:

Page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governorship_of_Mitt_Romney

“When he ran for governor in 2002, Romney declared his opposition to same-sex marriage.[68] ‘Call me old fashioned, but I don’t support gay marriage nor do I support civil union,’ said Romney in an October 2002 gubernatorial debate.”

2002 and 2006 encouraging them to vote for the Marriage Protection Amendment and the Defense of Marriage Amendment.

You call that advocating for gay rights? He’s about as popular with the gays right now as George W. Bush.

Mitt is a family values guy.