Mitt Romney

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. -- Republican Gov. Jim Douglas addressed the Massachusetts delegation to the Republican National Convention Thursday, applauding the Wednesday night presentation given by vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin and expressing optomism for the GOP's chance in November.

"(Palin) is going to bring a great deal of enthusiasm to the Republican team, and I am very optomistic about what the fall portends," Douglas said.

Check back tomorrow morning to view my sketchpad for day three of the Democratic National Convention, and go to my national blog to follow convention coverage by cartoonists from around the country.

If Joe Lieberman and Mitt Romney are, as expected, speakers at the 2008 Republican National Convention in Minneapolis, it will become the first time two former presidential candidates addressed consecutive national political conventions, but of different parties.  Lieberman and Romney spoke at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston.  Romney, as Governor of Massachusetts, welcomed the delegates.

When Mitt Romney’s father ran for President forty years ago, it was a Vermonter who became one of his most vocal critics.

George Romney had gone from running American Motors to becoming the Governor of Michigan in 1962, and was viewed as a top-tier candidate for the 1968 Republican presidential nomination in a field that included Richard Nixon and Nelson Rockefeller.

But in a TV interview in August 1967, Romney announced that after a visit to Vietnam, he had switched from supporting the war in to opposing it.  "When I came back from Viet Nam, I'd just had the greatest brainwashing that anybody can get."

Tonight, the Michigan Primary may decide who is the clear front-runner for the Republican nomination. If John McCain wins then he will be in control and will go to South Carolina with a big bump in the polls and one of his serious rivals Mitt Romney has all but said he is dropping out. Yet if Mitt wins he will likely regain some strength and the muddled Republican race will continue to be cloudy.

But for our Governor, tonight’s results will be a little more personal. Last week, he chose McCain over Romney. He passed over Romney who was his fellow Governor and who he worked closely with at the RGA, the Republican Governors Association. And obviously, Romney was not just a fellow Governor but one of a neighboring state, Massachusetts.

So why did Jim Douglas endorse John McCain’s presidential campaign?

For several reasons, we are told.

The first is that Douglas genuinely likes McCain, the Arizona Republican with an independent streak that has alienated him from some in his party.

Jim Barnett, one of the young guns of Jim Douglas’ campaign and a former National Republican Party opposition researcher has always been able to keep his opponents on the defensive.  Last year, Barnett left Vermont to take a position with John McCain’s campaign.  Originally, Barnett was to act as the Regional Political Director for the Northeast.  He was a natural fit for the position having come from being a well liked and respected Party Chairman.   He is one of the Governor’s guys.   And with few Republicans of any stature left in the northeast following the ’06 elections, Barnett’s value rose.

When Mitt Romney’s father ran for President forty years ago, it was a Vermonter who became one of his most vocal critics.

George Romney had gone from running American Motors to becoming the Governor of Michigan in 1962, and was viewed as a top-tier candidate for the 1968 Republican presidential nomination in a field that included Richard Nixon and Nelson Rockefeller.

But in a TV interview in August 1967, Romney announced that after a visit to Vietnam, he had switched from supporting the war in to opposing it.  "When I came back from Viet Nam, I'd just had the greatest brainwashing that anybody can get."

The brainwashing comment became national news – in a time when candidates could say something to a Detroit TV affiliate and not assume it would be broadcast across the country. 

Robert Stafford, then a five-term Republican Congressman from Vermont (he had served as Governor and would later spend seventeen years in the U.S. Senate) emerged as one of the most vocal spinners against Romney.  "If you're running for the presidency, you are supposed to have too much on the ball to be brainwashed,” Stafford said in a line that appeared in newspapers and on TV and radio reports nationally.