Mitt Romney didn’t have to cancel his anti-Santorum ads (at least there wasn’t any obvious political pressure for him to do so), but it was the right thing to do. The Romney campaign was set to bombard Rick Santorum with negative ads in Pennsylvania, a state Santorum will have even more trouble winning now that he’s canceled his campaign events for the next few days to stay by his young daughter Bella’s hospital bedside.
ABC News reports:
With Rick Santorum’s young daughter, Bella, in the hospital, Mitt Romney is yanking a negative television ad from the Pennsylvania airwaves “until further notice,” campaign officials said on Monday.
The ad, part of the Romney campaign’s plan to blanket Pennsylvania media markets ahead of the state’s April 24 primary, was originally meant to remind voters of Santorum’s landslide 2006 Senate re-election loss …
“We have done this out of deference to Sen. Santorum’s decision to suspend his campaign for personal family reasons,” Andrea Saul, a spokeswoman for the former Massachusetts governor said in a statement. Saul said the campaign informed television stations to pull the ad Monday morning and that broadcasters would “comply with this request as soon as they are technically able.”
It’s a heartbreaking situation, and Romney really showed a lot of decency with this move. There is a lot at stake for Santorum in Pennsylvania, including pride, home-state redemption and the future of his presidential campaign. But that’s all static at the moment. Santorum is with his daughter, as he needs to be, and Romney is wisely holding his fire.
For some reason, I find myself tremendously unimpressed by this gesture of civility. It shouldn't take an opponent's ailing daughter to wage a campaign on a higher level. n nThis effort to make Romney look chivalrous actually makes him seem creepy instead. Romney didn't show "a lot of decency", as Alana Goodman suggests. He shows the minimum due, and only under the most agonizing travails of his competitor.
Thank you for your thoughtful comment. I'm glad that Mitt Romney showed even "the minimum due, and only under the most agonizing travails of his competitor."
You would be unimpressed if Romney jumped in front of Santorum and took a bullet for him. Your answer would be " He's a glory hog " … ATS, just go crawl back under that rock from which you came.
I would be shocked if such an event were to occur. Anyway, after the Giffords shooting on 8Jan2011, I thought we were all supposed to calm down a bit and use more reason in our comments. Looks like you missed or misread that memo, Harm, ole boy. You kinda blew it on two counts: using a ridiculous assassination scenario to counter my comment, and implying I live under an earthen structure, which is surely an affront to marmots. Please do try to temper yourself a bit. nI think Romney will need to get into the news cycle with words of encouragement and support for Santorum in order to look more humane; if this is all his campaign can get out to the MSM, it will reflect poorly. nPerception is everything, especially when the MSM is crafting it against you. n
Santorum has no business being in the race. He needs to get out, take care of his daughter and pay his debts. If he gets out soon, Mitt will give him a job.
The trouble with your argument, in my view, is there are millions of people in many states who haven't even had a primary yet. It reflects well on those that are able to carry on to actually finish the race: they can impact the focus and message of the party, even if they don't win at the end. It seems lame to sign up for a marathon, then quit and walk away at the first turn, just because a few people were lined up ahead of you.
I don't like the system either, although this is the way it works up till now. Reagan won the nomination, in folklore, after he won NH, with the "I paid for this microphone" one liner. It's a stupid system. They should split it up in 7 or so big contest days, with each contest day containing primaries from states in each region. One contest might have more southern primaries, another contest might have more western and so on.
Doug, I completely agree with your solution to split it into 7 or so contest days, with primaries in states from each region. My formula was 10 dates, with 5 states each, but either will produce a better effort from candidates, state parties, and voters. n nHere in California, we are so far out on the calendar that the voters choice will likely be irrelevant. This has been the case for years, and the result is an atrophied and addled California Republican Party. Dispirited conservatives in the union's most populous state have had to live with decisions made for us up the line, e.g. John McCain in 2008. MSM would love to convince you California is a far left state, but if you look at the county maps in red/blue terms, there are A LOT of real conservatives here – we've just been cleverly divided in rigged districts. If the California primary mattered to the Republican presidential nominee, we'd have better engagement, which would make a better state party, better candidates for state and local office, and west coast voters would enthusiastically put their shoulder to the wheel and move conservatism forward.