On a morning when Mitt Romney should be celebrating his big win yesterday’s Florida primary, his campaign is instead trying spin remarks he made in an interview CNN’s Soledad O’Brien:

I’m in this race because I care about Americans. I’m not concerned about the very poor, we have a safety net there. If it needs repair I’ll fix it. I’m not concerned about the very rich, they are doing just fine. I’m concerned about the very heart of America, the 90-95 percent of Americans who are struggling.

Ouch, talk about squandering your victory lap.

Even taken in context Gov. Romney’s remarks are cringe inducing, his reasoning plays directly into the Democratic Party’s ‘Republicans don’t care about the poor’ narrative. Not that the context even matters, the only thing people are to take away from that interview, the only thing people are going to remember is Mitt Romney saying “I’m not concerned about the very poor.”

The campaign ads practically write themselves.

Frankly, Jonah Goldberg is right:

“… the under-emphasized dynamic in this race isn’t that Romney isn’t conservative enough (though that’s obviously a real concern out there) it’s that he’s simply not a good enough politician. He may be the most electable on paper. He’s certainly a nice guy, decent father, smart, successful etc. But, every time he seems to get into his groove and pull away he says things that make people think he doesn’t know how to play the game.”

And that more than anything else is why I think he’s the wrong candidate, for all his strengths, he has the uncanny ability to look and sound like a frighteningly bad caricature of a disconnected, elitist country club Republican.

Overall, this gaffe probably isn’t fatal, but it’s worrisome — make no mistake this gaffe is going to come back haunt him. This is still Romney’s campaign to lose, he’s going to have to sharpen his focus and make sure he doesn’t fall into the class-warfare trap. This election is about the economy, the focus should be on fixing the economy so that everyone benefits not pitting one group of Americans against another, the way Barack Obama has.

From CNN:

Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank, a 16-term Democrat, will announce Monday he does not intend to seek re-election in 2012, according to a statement from Frank’s office.

Good riddance, don’t let the door hit you on the way out Congressman.

H/T: Weasel Zippers.

Update: Matt Mackowiak tweets:

With Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) retiring, next in line on the Dem side of the House Financial Services Committee is Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA).

Ouch, would it be wrong of me to say I hope Rep. Frank reconsiders?

Ron Paul said Monday that President Barack Obama’s targeted killing of Anwar al-Awlaki might be an impeachable offense.

Asked at a Manchester, N.H. town hall meeting about last week’s killing of the American-born Al Qaeda leader, the Texas congressman said impeachment would be “possible,” but that he wants to know more about how the administration “flouted the law.”

Paul called the killing a movement toward “tyranny.”

“I put responsibility on the president because this is obviously a step in the wrong direction,” Paul said. “We have just totally disrespected the Constitution.”

The comments once again put Paul at odds with his Republican rivals over foreign policy and the war on terror in the latest indication of how his foreign policy views stray far from Republican orthodoxy even in a GOP that’s taken on an increasingly isolationist bent. Candidates like Michele Bachmann and Mitt Romney — who included the president in a list of people he commended in a statement released Friday — have generally been supportive of the killing. No one else in the field has spoken out against it.

But Paul’s stuck with the civil libertarians who’ve criticized the targeted killing of an American citizen without public due process.

With all due respect to Congressman Paul… I for one am not going to shed any tears over the killing of a two-bit terrorist thug like Anwar Al-Awlaki.

Mr. Al-Awlaki made a  choice, he chose to travel to a foreign country, and he chose to take up arms against the United States of America. As far as I’m concerned he was a traitor who renounced his citizenship and waived his right to due process the moment he made that choice… and he paid the price for it. Congressman Paul is, of course, entitled to his opinion, I doubt he’ll find much support for it outside the fever swamps inhabited by his most ardent supporters though.

H/T: Weasel Zippers.

I like it.

H/T: Weasel Zippers.

Ron Paul, makes a lot of sense when talks about monetary policy, or the need for great transparency at the Federal Reserve, but Allen West right, his foreign policy ideas are dangerously isolationist, and frankly, naive. And for that reason I can’t support him for President.

H/T: The Blaze… Video courtesy of the Shark Tank.

Related

• Why We Can’t Afford to Have Ron Paul as President – Confederate Yankee
• Ron Paul: The GOP’s Henry Wallace - Spyridon Mitsotakis, Big Peace

For this round are (in no particular order): Herman Cain, John Bolton, Thaddeus McCotter, Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich, Gary Johnson, Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney, Ron Paul and John Huntsman

Changes from round three:

1. I’ve removed anyone who isn’t already declared candidate or at least hinted that he or she many get into the race.

The results from round three are here.

No link yet, I’ll update this as soon as I have more.

Update: Ok here’s the Fox News story on Gov. Pawlenty’s withdrawal… The Associated Press has more here.

Personally, I’m a little disappointed to see Gov. Pawlenty withdraw this early in the race. I know many people like to minimize the importance of the Ames straw poll, but the fact is Gov. Pawlenty made sizable investment Iowa, he worked the ground game over a year, and poured most of his remaining campaign funds into this effort and still finished a distant third.

Frankly, I don’t see how he go back to potential donors after this and convince them to pour more money into an effort that hasn’t gained much traction.

Edit: A few random thoughts in no particular order:

• As I said I’m sorry to see Gov. Pawlenty drop out this early in the race, but he always struck me as a bit of long shot and he never seemed generated the kind of buzz a presidential candidate needs.
• I’m going to go out on limb with this, but I suspect Herman Cain may be the next to withdraw. Mr. Cain has generated enough buzz to keep his campaign going for a while longer, but his disappointing showing in the Ames Straw Poll makes me wonder if he’ll make it to the New Hampshire primary.
• Former Senator Rick Santorum’s surprisingly good showing in Ames breathes new life into what seemed like a lost cause.  It’s worth keeping an eye on him to see he can capitalize on his success in the Ames Straw Poll… He may turn out to be the campaigns new dark horse.
• Sarah Palin, I think she’s running… If she is she has to make it official sooner rather than later. I won’t claim to speak for all of her supporters, but personally, I’m getting a little bored with all the flirting, if you’re running, quit screwing around and make it official… If not get off the stage and stop stealing the spotlight from the real candidates.

From the Wall Street Journal:

None of the 16,892 votes filed at Iowa State University in Ames will count toward the Republican nomination, but the straw poll is likely to separate the top contenders for the nomination from candidates unable to muster the organization or the passion to make a final charge.

Mrs. Bachmann garnered 4,823 votes. Mr. Paul was close behind with 4,671.

Mr. Pawlenty received 2,293 votes after pouring money and time into organizing for the contest.

Rick Santorum was fourth followed by Herman Cain.  Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who just announced his candidacy this afternoon received 718 write-in votes (3.6%) and finish ahead of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Here’s the final numbers:

1. Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (4823, 28.55%)
2. Congressman Ron Paul (4671, 27.65%)
3. Governor Tim Pawlenty (2293, 13.57%)
4. Senator Rick Santorum (1657, 9.81%)
5. Herman Cain (1456, 8.62%)
6. Governor Rick Perry (718, 3.62%) write-in
7. Governor Mitt Romney (567, 3.36%)
8. Speaker Newt Gingrich (385, 2.28%)
9. Governor Jon Huntsman (69, 0.41%)
10. Congressman Thad McCotter (35, 0.21%)

It was a bullshit question, first of all unless those spending cuts are immediate they’ll never materialize… particularly when the baseline for negotiations is that the taxes increase are made in the first year, while the spending cuts are made over 10 years. Everyone remember President Reagan’s 3:1 deal? Heh, yeah, we’re still waiting for those spending cuts to be made. At least Republicans learned that lesson.

Second, the notion that we can tax our way out if this debt debacle is pure lunacy. As I’ve explained previously, this is not a revenue problem, it’s spending problem… The federal government spends roughly a $1 trillion more each year than it collects in revenue. President Obama and the Democrats in Congress argue that we can close that gap by raising taxes on the “rich”.

But what does that get us? Blake Ellis answered that very question at CNN Money.com recently:

President Obama has defined the nation’s wealthy as those who make $200,000 or more a year.

According to a recent report from the Internal Revenue Service, that leaves out about 97% of the tax-paying population.

The report, which provides a complete breakdown and analysis of returns for the 2009 tax year, found that only a mere 3% of tax returns were filed by people earning a gross adjusted income of $200,000 or more.

Americans earning $1 million or more were even more rare, comprising just 0.2% of total tax filers and accounting for a mere 236,883 of the 140 million tax returns received in 2009.

The wealthiest taxpayers — those earning $10 million or more in adjusted gross income — are even less prevalent. There were only 8,274 people belonging to that elite club, according the IRS.

Out of the nearly 4 million “rich” people making more than $200,000 a year, 1,470 didn’t pay any income tax whatsoever in 2009. But the people who did pay taxes earned a total of nearly $2 trillion in income — about 26% of total taxpayer income in 2009.

President Obama’s tax proposals — which many Republican’s call “job-killing” tax hikes — include getting rid of some corporate tax breaks enjoyed by oil and gas companies and corporate jet buyers, and restoring some Bush-era tax rates for high-income households. If the Bush tax cuts expire as planned in 2012, the top two income tax rates will revert to 39.6% and 36% from 35% and 33%, respectively.

Yet, even though these high-income earners are a minority, Obama says the proposed tax increases would boost revenue by $750 billion over a decade.

Does anyone else see the fallacy of the President’s argument? The simple truth is there no way in hell we’re going to balance the federal budget on the backs of just 3% — three percent of income taxpayers. $750 billion in new revenue over a decade — $75 billion a year doesn’t even begin to put a dent in the annual budget deficit much less the debt.

As you can see, the idea that raising taxes on a small minority of taxpayers can solve our budget problems is just… its nuts!

If we’re going to talk about our nations budget problems and tax policy, let’s do it, let have serious adult conversation about it. Not simply toss around the same old, worn out class warfare rhetoric.

Step 1, amend or repeal the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 to eliminate baseline budgeting and force the federal government to live by the same Generally Accepted Accounting Principles as everyone else.

You may not realize this, but baseline budgeting automatically increases the federal budget every year. What Congress likes to do is use a bit of smoke and mirrors to make spending cuts that aren’t really cuts at all. For example if program is scheduled to see and 8% increasing in spending Congress will reduce it to 3% and call it a cut when it’s still a 3% percent increase over the previous year. Frankly, if a publicly traded company managed its finances the way the federal government does it would a) go bankrupt and b) the management would be indicted for fraud.

Step 2, undertake comprehensive tax reform that broadens the tax base and flattens rates. Personally, I’d scrap the entire current income tax code and replace it with a simple, no deductions, no loopholes 15% flat rate income tax. In short, it would work like this everyone would keep the first $10,000 they earn each year income tax-free. After that everything, earned income, interest, dividends, capital gains etc. would be taxed the same 15% rate. In other words someone who earns $30,000 a year would pay an income tax of 15% of 20,000 or $3,000… Someone earning $300,000 would pay an income tax of 15% of $290,000 or $43,500. I’d follow a similar model for the corporate income tax rate.

Step 3, undertake comprehensive regulatory reform with an eye toward merging or eliminating agencies with overlapping jurisdictions and reducing regulatory impediments  to economic growth.

And that’s the bottom line, if we’re going to get out of this hole we have to get our economy moving again… The goal of the federal government should be creating an environment where 5% GDP growth year over year is the norm.

Related

• Debate flashback: Which candidates would support a 10:1 mix of spending cuts and tax hikes? – Hot Air

Ouch, I love it!

It’s about time Republican candidates started calling the sound bite media on the carpet for wasting everyone’s with time trivial, tabloid gotcha questions instead of asking substantial policy questions. Newt was absolutely right to go after Chris Wallace the way he did tonight… and judging by the crowds reaction they agreed with the former Speaker.

H/T: Jim Hoft.