McCain's not flip-flopping, he's just being a "maverick".

Funny. Romney flip-flopped on abortion rights, running as pro-choice to get elected in MA in 2002. Now he says he has "evolved" on the issue. Good luck spinning that.

CParis wrote:
"McCain's not flip-flopping, he's just being a "maverick"."

Right! See, he's being a maverick against his own previous stands. That way he can be both traditional right wing and maverick right wing.

Its the "McCain Two-fer"...

New, and improved!

-Dave Adams-

Just what we need in this country...a Mormon lecturing everyone about the sanctity of traditional marriage...I find it amazing anyone takes this perma-press suit seriously. It was, after all, a Republican appointed Supreme Judicial Court in Massachusetts that made the ruling...Romney and his party have been in control for 16 years...Republicans made the appointments to the SJC...now Mr. Mitt "blowing with the wind" Romney is trying to make hay with it as if some foreign force swooped into Massachusetts and switched everything around.

Meanwhile, people have DIED during Mr. Mitt's on-again off-again administration of the Big Dig...his people reviewed it and approved it and when the tunnel collapsed he threw another Republican hack under the bus and pretended he had nothing to do with the project....that he was somehow "powerless" to make any changes. Another case of Republicans in Mr. Mitt's state (they were in charge for the entire Big Dig construction) completely flubbing their job, allowing Bechtel-Parsons to charge every change to the government without ever pursuing them for damages. And guess who received additional money AFTER the tunnel collapse??...until the local media found out. No other than Republican dominated Bechtel-Parsons, (the same people who can't build anything in Iraq... even with no-bid contracts and HUGE change orders). Once the media got wind of this deal, Mr. Mitt threw his DPW appointee under the bus, blaming him for an error in judgement...

Mr. Mitt needs a lecture on marriage...he needs to marry common sense with integrity...but that won't happen too soon.

I think some of the 7 SJC judges may have been appointed before the run of GOP governors began (who did Dukakis appoint?).

I especially love that flip-flop on torture. I'm waiting for the day someone finally confronts him with it (please? it's twice in a year now for McCave the Capitulator, for crying out loud).

Stephanopoulos actually didn't do a bad job with him this weekend; no torture talk, but a fair amount followup on McC's unresponsive repetition of talking points about his "plan" to increase troop levels in Iraq. I do detect an ever-so-slight fading of the media's adoration, just here and there -- Matthews used to virtually salivate over him, but now and then lately he's actually called him on his pandering. Just now and then; but it's a start...

Look, John McCain is a neocon viper. If the American public has any sense, they won't allow him within bomb-throwing distance of the presidency. Mitt has no more chance of getting to the right of McCain than he has of getting to the right of Goebbels. There is "crazier" than McCain (e.g. Robertson, Falwell, Cheney), but there is no such thing as "more conservative."

But for McCain to hold those two positions simultaneously requires no duplicitousness and no tortured logic. McCain is demonstrating his willingness to pander to bigotry in opposing the legalization and recognition of reality, but his stance on federalizing the decision is completely justified.

Mitt is demagoging. Imagine a conservative politician doing that!

If Republicans do twenty minutes of due diligence on Romney, he will be out of the running. Four years ago, he inherited a modestly successful Massachusetts Republican Party that had elected the two previous governors. That party is now in shambles largely due to Romney's inattention and self-absorption.

"The opposite of flip-flopper is bullheaded. Which would you prefer were president? The flip-flopper or bullhead?"

I agree that people should be able to change their minds as they gain new knowledge/wisdom.

Unfortunately I don't think that is the case with McCain. He has not changed his mind. He has changed his position on a number of issues,within a short period of time. And there is a pattern to the changes. His views have changed to align with the religious right.

My problem with it is that the press continues to portray him as a straight talker. Another politician would be portrayed as pandering.

The whole thing about Mitt "flip flopping" on abortion is to ignore the nuanced view that may be present. LDS/"Mormon" faith, while set against abortion on a whim is one of the few traditions on the conservative side to openly maintain the right to abortion in certain exceptions. Rape, incest or danger to the life of the mother being completely viable reasons for such naturally leave any adherent at the least the room to move in which Romney has moved. He's always claimed personal opposition to it in general and his agreement not to touch Mass. Law on the matter can easily be viewed in his desire to both keep it available and safe for exemptions seen in his paradigm AND to keep in line with the practicality and pragmatism as to what could be doable in the circumstances he was attempting to enter in to as a republican govenor in a state where the dem controlled legislature had veto overiding impunity.

Interesting thing about these judges, even though Republicans named all but one of them, they still summoned up the hypocrisy to trash them for activism when they made a judgement (gay marriage) they didn't like. In my mind, their definition of an activist judge is not someone who interprets the Constitution, but someone who makes a judgement that they just don't like. It all depends whose ox is being gored.

There's no hypocrisy in this. There's a fundamental difference between polygamist relationships and monogender arrangements. Any genuine Christian would hold the Mosaic Law to be true in doctrine, but that doesn't mean they would advocate the practicing of such, neither does it mean they would be totally adverse to laws to proscribe other's visions of sacrificing animals.

Not exactly. I can see a Catholic disavow the Inquisition on the grounds that it went against the doctrine and was sinfull by those who did it.

A better comparison would be the likes of either Mosaic Temple sacrificial rites as seen by Christians. They have to assert that they are doctrinally true because their God at one point commanded them, same with Moses's Divinely commanded genocide.

The doctrine of plural marriage is seen as a true and vital doctrine to the LDS population. We believe that it's a sin to practice it right now because it would be outside of the dictates of God's ordained living prophet today. Just as genocide is seen by Jews and Christians as being evil with the exception of when Moses executed it. We don't believe it proper or right, in fact it's seen as grave sin, to practice these things at present, to deny them as doctrinally true is not fundamentally possible.

President Young once said that any who denied the principle of polygamy was essentially headed for apostacy, or in it, because polygamy is a true doctrine and divine institution, it's simply not to be practiced at present. If practiced today it would be like trying to keep the daily sacrifices at the Temple i Jerusalem. It's simply not the time or place, nor has authorization been given at present, for the practicing of the principle.

Yikes, I'm starting to rethink my earlier conviction that Romney was going to convince the Evangelicals to vote for him after reading this post -- and this post is from a Romney supporter!

That's too sophisticated by half for the average GOP primary voter. You're going to have to keep working on it.

How do they balance that with ensouling? I thought you said Mormons were biblical literalists?

Hugh Hewitt (don't imagine he's referenced much here--being a right wing talk show host) made some interesting comments regarding Romney to a group of Christian theologians. I find it especially interesting in light of his seeming emnity towards our theology that I heard on an episode of his show I happened upon a while back. In that show he was allowing on a LA Times reporter who was, for some reason, was releasing rather old and already refuted accusations regarding the Book of Mormon and DNA studies. Now to have Hewitt evidently writting a book on Romney seems like a turn about and somewhat promissing. Here's the link to the article--

http://www.abpnews.com/1535.article