The November 22nd National Security Debate for the Republican presidential nominees is one of many examples of internal strife within the party. The Washington Post assembled a brief clip, shown below, which demonstrates the differing viewpoints of the potential nominees. Granted, the starkest contrast was between Ron Paul – a man who is not very well trusted by other Republicans in the first place – and other debaters, including Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum especially. Although the brief clip does not lend itself to deep analysis of the issues, it is an effective measure of the varying stances taken by the candidates. If nothing else, the “sound bites” that have been assembled are useful because they serve as a representative sample of the main points of the overall discussion.
What was shocking about the debate as a whole is that the debaters referred to the Democratic president as the political enemy relatively few times; that is, on few occasions did the Republican candidates rally around President Obama’s perceived negligence because they were concerned with standing out from the crowd. Thus, the party itself is tending to lose solidarity as a result of the intense competition for GOP nominee. Michele Bachman, who interestingly enough is all but out of contention, referred to the sitting president’s negligence regarding national security and terrorism most frequently. Others were more concerned with debating each other. Rick Perry and Jon Huntsman, for instance, disagreed on the issue of Pakistan, whereas Ron Paul vigorously argued against both Rick Santorum and the newly-minted frontrunner, Newt Gingrich, on the topic of the Patriot Act.
With Newt Gingrich now acting as a credible, reasonably vetted frontrunner, the campaign for the only consistently strong contender – Mitt Romney – is contemplating making an attack on the candidate. The rivalry between two strong, intelligent and well-prepared Republican candidates has the potential for even further disunity within the party. According to Philip Rucker and Peter Wallsten in their Washington Post article “Mitt Romneystruggles to find a strategy to combat Newt Gingrich’s surge,” however, a political consultant of the Romney campaign has warned against any attacks on the new frontrunner. Every attack, claims the political professional, has the potential to harm the Romney campaign and, in turn, propel a third candidate.
Given the new dynamic in the race between Romney and Gingrich, the potential for additional attacks will likely remain, regardless of the warnings against them. The reason for this is, simply put, Romney did not expect to have to defend against a candidate that will not fall on his or her own; this philosophy is unlikely to work with Gingrich – a career politician with a Ph.D in History – as not only have his “skeletons in the closet” been revealed, but they are no more damaging than those of Romney. Gingrich may have a history of taking varying stances on certain issues, but this is no worse than Romney’s history. His marriage history may cause him trouble with the Evangelical electorate, but the recent opinion polls speak for themselves. Ultimately, Romney is beginning to realize Newt is a threat, and this is reflected in the following interview.
