The former Massachusetts governor and runner-up for the 2008 Republican presidential ticket is poised to seize his party’s 2012 nomination for the White House. TIME looks at his vibrant family life, business career and political trials.
2012 Election
Romney at the Center of a Tea Party Spat
FreedomWorks, the big-time Tea Party booster run by seasoned Washington insiders, has been a co-sponsor of the latest cross-country bus tour organized by the Sacramento-based Tea Party Express, a sign of the uneasy peace that has mostly prevailed between the myriad Tea Party factions. But Mitt Romney’s planned appearance on the tour has …
Team Obama Finds Hope for 2012 in a History Lesson
Weeks before the debt-limit showdown came to a head, White House chief of staff Bill Daley held an unannounced retreat for his senior staff at Fort McNair, an Army base near the southern tip of the District of Columbia. The …
“Businessman” Romney vs. “Career Politician” Perry
The early cold war between Mitt Romney and Rick Perry has turned into real political skirmishing, and speaking in a speech in Perry’s home state on Tuesday, Romney took his most direct shots yet at the Texas governor. The opening battle is over management experience. Both men claim that they know how to get the economy moving again. …
‘Best Governor We’ve Ever Had’: Evangelical Leader Rick Scarborough Backs Perry
Last weekend, Rick Perry privately met some 300 conservative evangelical leaders at long-time supporter Jim Leininger’s home near Fredricksburg, Texas. And on Monday afternoon, reported-attendee and evangelical leader Rick …
In New Memoir, Dick Cheney Tries to Rewrite History
Early critics have argued that Dick Cheney’s forthcoming memoir, held under strict embargo until its official release on Aug. 30, is a predictable reprise of old arguments. Like most examples of the genre, In My Time has plenty …
Newtmentum!
Newt Gingrich represented Georgia in Congress for 20 years. He announced the beginnings of his 2012 presidential campaign in Atlanta. And in the run-up to Georgia’s little-noted Republican presidential straw poll this weekend, his campaign was boasting about the many state GOP officials backing his candidacy. “I think the campaign here …
President Bachmann
Quote of the Day:
“I don’t know how much God has to do to get the attention of the politicians. We’ve had an earthquake; we’ve had a hurricane. He said, ‘Are you going to start listening to me here?'”
I hope the moderators of next week’s Republican debate will ask Michele Bachmann’s rival candidates if they also think that natural …
Memo to Mitt: Remind Voters That Perry Was a Democrat
I’m skeptical about Rick Perry’s sudden lead in Republican primary polling, which has some people declaring Mitt Romney’s campaign in a state of emergency. For one thing, Romney has lain awfully low this summer, whereas Perry’s …
Why Jon Huntsman Is Struggling to Break Through
Jon Huntsman, who is running last in the latest Gallup poll and first in the magazine-profile primary, earned another encomium this week, this one from Michael Brendan Dougherty of The American Conservative. The piece does a good …
Radtke and RedState: A Brewing Tea Party Feud
Jamie Radtke announced she was running for a U.S. Senate seat in Virginia last December, a month after five Tea Party upstarts swept into the chamber in the anti-incumbent wave. A rising star at the center of the commonwealth’s thriving Tea Party movement, Radtke “was supposed to be the Tea Party’s next giant-killer,”
Health Care Problem Creeping Up on Romney Again
Mitt Romney was slow to dive into close-contact retail campaigning–for months Romney snuck along with a frontrunner campaign, popping up occasionally to bash the President’s “failure” on the economy– and we’re starting to see why. The political media seemed to lose interest in RomneyCare ever since since the former Massachusetts …
Ron Paul Can’t Get Any Respect
Texas Congressman Ron Paul is running within 2 points of Barack Obama in this week’s Gallup poll. In a Rasmussen survey, he trails by 1 point. He’s rising against his primary rivals and raking in money, netting $1.8 million in a …