Ken Schram: Isaac not the only storm threatening GOP convention
SEATTLE -- Isaac isn't the only storm that's threatening to play havoc with the Republican convention in Tampa, Florida.
This week's national GOP get-together is touted as Mitt Romney's big kick off into the fall campaign.
Factions within the party may dilute that anticipated celebratory boost.
Religious conservatives are already lining up for events featuring Michele Bachman and Rick Santorum.
Ron Paul loyalists are contentiously rallying behind him and threaten a delegate fight of one sort or another.
Match that up with polls showing Republicans are more motivated by a desire to kick President Obama to the curb than they are by any sort of genuine enthusiasm for their own presidential nominee.
And then there's the issue that won't go away: Todd Akin's incendiary remarks about "legitimate rape" and abortion.
Romney strategists have tried ever-so-hard to keep the political crosshairs on the economy and health care, but have had only little success with that strategy.
So, with dissension and rancor still playing out within the party, it's no wonder that heavy winds and drenching rains may be the least of the storms threatening the convention this week.
Have something to say to Ken? Login or signup below to post a comment. Just be sure to read the rules and keep things civil. You can also e-mail him at kenschram@komo4news.com. You can also connect with Ken on Facebook.
This week's national GOP get-together is touted as Mitt Romney's big kick off into the fall campaign.
Factions within the party may dilute that anticipated celebratory boost.
Religious conservatives are already lining up for events featuring Michele Bachman and Rick Santorum.
Ron Paul loyalists are contentiously rallying behind him and threaten a delegate fight of one sort or another.
Match that up with polls showing Republicans are more motivated by a desire to kick President Obama to the curb than they are by any sort of genuine enthusiasm for their own presidential nominee.
And then there's the issue that won't go away: Todd Akin's incendiary remarks about "legitimate rape" and abortion.
Romney strategists have tried ever-so-hard to keep the political crosshairs on the economy and health care, but have had only little success with that strategy.
So, with dissension and rancor still playing out within the party, it's no wonder that heavy winds and drenching rains may be the least of the storms threatening the convention this week.
Have something to say to Ken? Login or signup below to post a comment. Just be sure to read the rules and keep things civil. You can also e-mail him at kenschram@komo4news.com. You can also connect with Ken on Facebook.
The Dems remind me of the Wizard of Oz movie. Remember when Oz is behind the curtain basically saying don't pay any attention to the man behind the curtain...look over here? He was trying very hard to distract. The Dems are doing the same thing and have nothing to sell. I believe they are getting a whiff of a possible loss. I'm looking forward to watching every minute of the convention. I've heard enough from Obama and his spendocrats in the last four years and continue to hear the sucking sound of the U.S. going down the drain. Iâve also heard a lot of people who say they are not falling for this ticket again. Reality is setting in and it's time for a change.
I think you took too much acid while watching the Wizard of Oz.
This is what I call the Republican's John Kerry moment. Nobody really wants to get behind Romney, and I'm sure most Republicans wonder why the Republican party can't muster up better than that. The religious right doesn't like him because he's Morman, the Tea Party crowd hates him because he invented Obama Care and put it into law as governor, and the blue collar and middle class Republicans don't trust him because he's clearly a self-entitled tax-dodging, job outsourcing elitist jerk. So he's a hard guy to like. But he's not Obama. That's really the only thing that can be said for him.
Â
McCain passed him up for Sarah Palin, which I think says a lot.
Bellevue Scott.... the political climate in 2008 was much different. The ticket McCain was running against was very different. You can not say that McCain's passing on Romney for Palin was anything more than a political move. McCain has said that in the tax-returns he reviewed of Romney's, nothing was alarming. Romney's ambition in 2008 was NOT to be a vice-presidential candidate. He has for many years set his sites on being the POTUS, McCain knew that.  Unless you have insight into the inner-workings of McCain's decision making process, then your "thinking it says a lot" of Romney not getting the vice-presidential spot in 2008 is purely conjecture.Â
Can they convince voters that a Republican victory will NOT mean waking up the next day in Afghanistan West if you are a woman?Â
"waking up the next day in Afghanistan West if you are a woman" oh grow up. Buy you birth control at Target for $9.00 dollars a month and quite whining about your rights for gawdsake. Comparing yourself to an Afghani woman is taking the obsession with victimhood to new lows. As a chick myself, I can tell you to wipe that tear from your eye and cowboy up!
 @Citizen#3457899654Â
You should be ashamed of yourself to compare the possible reduction of taxpayer funded birth control and abortions is anything remotely close to what women suffer in Afghanistan. You are out of touch on a scale only measured by light years. Your demagogic and offensive post is an insult to the millions of women that truly suffer under harsh and oppressive governments. You and your propaganda disgust me.Â
I had no idea that change i voted for 4 years ago meant closing my family's business of 20years, losing my job, investments, savings and almost my home. So, unless Romney is Hitler reincarnated, i'll take my chances with him.
Maybe it wasn't that great of a business if you're blaming a singular politician for its demise.
 @Brokesince08 Your family's business was probably doomed in January 2008. As far as Hitler redivivus, well... how would we know? Point is, however, Romney is largely cut of the same cloth as Bush, and will do the same things to ingratiate his richest mega-millionaire buds at the expense of everyone making less than $250,000/year.
@JLS1950 @Brokesince08 If you hate the rich, go ahead and say it. Just remember - even if you take everything they have, it STILL won't be enough to fund the current level of government, because there are not enough of them. And then, what'll you do next year? Like it or not, they DO provide a lot of jobs, and you need them more than they need you. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=661pi6K-8WQ for a look at this (slightly dated, from 2011, but the numbers are still close enough to get the point across).
 @Brokesince08 I'm sorry to hear about your losses. But it seems kind of short sighted to forget so quickly that Bush got us into this mess, and then the Republicans have fought every single effort he's made to get us out. Bush strongly supported the banking deregulations that led to the Wall Street collapse. He was friends with and supported Enron, and got us into two major wars that have drained our economy.Â
Obama made it worse. No question about it. If that's what he meant by change he can keep it.
 @lin Oh, so you want to go back to Sept 2008, with major corporations dropping like flies, eh? Sounds like you thought that "better".
A big portion of the banking mess was created by Frank and Dodd. To place all of the blame on Bush is simply inaccurate.Â
Â
The wars have been a major drain on our economy, no doubt. But so has the Stimulus Package.Â
Â
Every president has businesses that it tends to favor. MIght I remind you of Solyndra.Â
Â
The fact remains, the ship is listing. I am hard-pressed to find anything that the current administration has done to right the ship.Â
Â
It was Obama that said if he could not turn the ecomony around in the first three years of his administration, then he deserved to be a one-term president.  So I ask, how's the economy?
@JLS1950. There were actually some times when Boehner has wanted to compromise but the tbagginâ tbilly tbaggers quickly put a stop to any of that.
 @SeattleJoe  @JCCBlvu Seems like you have forgotten John Boehner's foot-dragging and the Senate Republicans' filibustering. No, Obama did not get everything he wanted for two years, and the nation was in such bad shape financially that he could not have financed what he wanted anyway. Remember the howls when he proposed to close Gitmo? That was a campaign promise also, but Congress and the Senate would not permit it: Senate Rs threatened to filibuster every piece of legislation if he tried.
 @JLS1950  @JCCBlvu So for the first two years of his administration Obama had both the house and senate. How exactly did the republicans stop anything during this time? You conveniently dont mention that he got every damn thing he wanted rammed through congress and the Republicans had no say. Now they are trying to stop an incompetent idiot from driving the county off the cliff and you belly ache that they are obstructing him. Thank God they are putting the brakes on this madness and hopefully they will win in Nov and repeal everything Obama did and save this country.
You do know that Pelosi, Feinstein, Blumenthal, Lautenberg, and Kerry also have off-shore accounts. And here is the biggie... the Clinton's have money socked away in three accounts in the Cayman Islands Oh the horror!
 @JCCBlvu Actually, Bush "PROPHESIED" that we would go to war with Iraq in late 2000, right after SCOTUS handed him the presidency but more than a month before he took office. He also "prophesied" a recession at that time. Then he got into office and - like the good first officer that he was - he "made it so". Also, the Senate was not all that Democratic then as I recall.
Â
No, the NeoCons got their "New Pearl Harbor" and then they did just what they said they would do. And they darned near destroyed the country with it. If Romney gets in, he will try very hard to finish the job. You don't really imagine that a man who hides his wealth in the Cayman Islands really has strong loyalties to the U.S., do you? (sadly, you probably do...) Kinda like a guy who sits in the stands of one team and cheers for the other, don't you think?
@JCCBlvu I believe both republicans and democrats voted for BOTH wars. One of them was Hillary Clinton...
Oh yeah, and those wars.... those military actions that were presented to Congress ( Republican House and Democratic Senate at the time) and were overwhelming supported and the law was enacted.  Just as a President does not make laws, a president does not take us into war either. Congress does.Â
Firstly, the Congress is the bicameral legislature. It is not a "Republican Congress" as you have stated. The House of Representatives is today controlled by the Republicans, the Senate is today contolled by the Democrates. The two together make up Congress.  So to blame one party is simply inaccurate.
Â
No budget has been passed by the DEMOCRATIC Senate for FOUR years. The House of Reps has sent numerous economic bills to the Senate for consideration that have simply been ignored.   Â
Â
The last budget proposal presented to the Senate (D) by Obama did not receive one "Yay" vote. Not one democrat voted for his budget. The vote was 97-0. How is that the Republican's blocking Obama's attempts at recovery?Â
Â
 @JCCBlvu Frank and Dodd were not the problem, for it was not they who cut taxes to the bone (for the very rich only) and then started two costly wars - one with the WRONG ENEMY! You go count how many hundreds of billions were handed over to Halliburton in no-bid contracts, then how many trillions were looted from major corporations to create the 2008 meltdown that the REPUBLICAN administration insisted we just had to "bail out".
Â
Obama tried very hard to turn the economy around, but a bunch of people like YOU decided that he needed a Republican Congress to "help him do it". Remember, Obama DOES NOT get to make the laws: and the Republicans have been dragging everything from their feet to boat anchors to even their Boehner to keep Obama from doing ANYTHING if they could help it! If you elect dedicated (and openly admitted) saboteurs to Congress, don't expect to see economic recovery!
 @Brokesince08 I think the change you got was in the wind a long time before Obama took office. Take a look at WaMu, the local bank that became the largest failed bank in the US. It happened on Bush's watch you know. As did the other Wall Street meltdown that set up the failing economy that no financial wizard could fix in a matter of 3 or 4 years.Â
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/08/26/what-s-wrong-with-the-republican-party.html
 @HallandOates Same as was wrong with it in 1932, 1936, 1940... Like when Bush's grandpappy was selling tetra-ethyl lead technology and other such to the Nazis (while also serving as their international banker) so they could later fly over London to get rid of their "surplus explosives". Republicans are in love with money, and most would put their mothers out to work the street nights if it would bring in $1 million.
The GOP. The party that wraps themselves in the cloak of Christianity. In reality, it's a party far from Christianity. The whole party has gone to hell. Reagan and Goldwater are turning in their graves. Home of Akin, Rush, Beck, Ryan, Strom Thurmond, Michelle Bachman, Sarah Pailin, and nut after nut. Too funny or should I say sad! :(
 @HallandOates As a born-again evangelical, Pentecostal Christian myself, I quite agree with you. These people are not Christians: they are Pharisees!
 @HallandOates
@HallandOates Pelosi, Reid, Moore, O'donnel, Biden, Olberman, O'Brien,  Byrd, Mathews, Obama and nut after nut. Not funny at all.Â
 @Arctic Dodge Yes, a litany of educated people. I like it. It is a fact that those that subscribe to the Democratic Party are much more educated than those that call themselves republicans. A fact is a fact.Â
@JLS1950 Grasping for straws lately? I smell a whiff of desperation in the air.Â
@HallandOates Just because they have a degree or educated doesn't make them smart. By the way, that argument you've posted a few times and it's getting old.
 @SeattleJoe Â
Yep, the progressives and the willing media repeat the lies often enough that the useful idiots regurgitate the lies as truth.
@HallandOates @Arctic Dodge I'm afraid you forgat the "sarcasm" tag after calling Pelosi, Reid, etc., "educated,"Â because you cannot possibly be serious unless you are also clueless.
 @JCCBlvu  @HallandOates When Republicans call climate change a "myth" and tell us that "a woman's body has a way to shut that whole thing down". Might as well leave off science and start discerning "truth" from bat entrails...
 @JCCBlvu  @HallandOates JCCBlvu, its fact because HallandOates said so.... or so he would think. I've discussed issues with many on these forums and they present many things as fact simply because they believe it. Here's a classic current one: Nowhere ever has Romney indicated that he would raise taxes on the middle class but its a common liberal talking point that this is what he would do. It started out as a lie from the Obama supporters and now its just tossed around as though its factual. Gotta love politics.
@HallandOates OK now that I've stopped laughing.... how exactly is your opinion a "fact"?Â
Wishful thinking on your part, Schram. Santorum delegates will vote Romney. There are 177 Paul delegates and over 1500 Romney delegates so who cares who the Paul delegates vote for? Todd Akin's comments are only a big deal in the fevered brains of the left. It was one comment. I've lost count of the dopey comments from Biden, Pelosi, and the retarded guy running the senate.
This explains why people like Ken Schram are more likely to vote Democrat!
Â
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9426205/Cannabis-smoking-permanently-lowers-IQ.html
Yeah, the convention being the big storm was my feeling too.
Ken Schram is a petulant child that has no clue as to the real world, real jobs, or reality in general. He throws tantrums on the radio. He rants about things he knows nothing about. And, sadly, the left wing sheep believe everything he says.
Â
Obama is destroying this nation.
 @ButtercupSprinkles Obama? You mean Bush and the GOP? They're the party for and by the millionaires, billionaires, outsourcers, tax evaders, etc., etc. We'll never support a republican in this household.Â
 @HallandOates Â
Bush? You mean Obama and the Dems? They're the party by the millionaires (hollywood, Costco Jim, Microsoft executives), billionaires (Soros), outsourcers (Fisker autos) ,, tax evaders (Buffet, Gates, GE, Apple) etc., etc. We'll never support a democrat in this household.
 @HallandOates  @ButtercupSprinkles Yes! And Obama has absolutely been punishing big business right? if you think Obama is for the little guy then you my friend are out of your mind. Tell me one thing Obama has done to better our economy.Â
@KittySmasher. I would agree that especially GM made bad decisions but I guess you would have preferred a further drop into another even greater massive great depression instead of keeping a lot of smaller companies and many thousands of workers continuing to work. I.e. âhow many realize that most of the government loans made to the banks and auto industry have already been paid back, with interest. Or that the U.S. auto industry has bounced back dramatically. Global auto sales recovered sharply in 2011 and the U.S. led the way, with sales up 9.2%, topping even the 6% auto sales growth in China. Yesterday it was reported that General Motors has bounced back from its bankruptcy three years ago to a degree that it has regained its crown as the top-selling car-maker in the world.â 1/20/2012 Forbes. By the way. What are your feelings about the TARP and the bank bailouts?
 @flyskiwindsurf You mean the companies that made bad decisions like they were going out of style only to be bailed out by us at a loss so far?
@KittySmasher. Checked out the auto industry and their myriad of suppliers recently?
 @ButtercupSprinkles You are confusing Obama with Bush. Obama has done a lot to stop the destruction of America; but it has been difficult for him to do things to improve America considering that the Republicans have stood in his way. At least Democrats are trying to do something which is better than the Republicans record of nothing at all.
@albion @ButtercupSprinkles The Dems have been in control of Congress since Jan 2007...most people seem to have forgoten that. When did our economy start tanking...the beginning of 2007. You can blane Bush all you want but Congress makes the laws not the president.
 @Crimsonkid  @albion  @ButtercupSprinkles ...and name one law that Bush signed that came from the democratic congress...
Â
...just one...
@albion@ButtercupSprinkles
It was difficult for Bush to do things to improve America considering the Democrats stood in his way.
Â
See what I did thar?
Â
So tired of both sides using the other side as an excuse for their guy.
 @frapfreak  @albion  @ButtercupSprinkles Really? The Democrats cooperated with Bush far more than the Republicans are with Obama. The Democrats let him have his banking deregulations, his tax cuts for the wealthy, both his wars, the Patriot Act, Guantanamo, foreign renditions and CIA kidnappings and torture. In fact, the Dems cooperated too much with that nonsense. That's why we're in this mess.
 @albion Â
Exploded the debt - REAL unemployment around 15% - shrinking middle class - rapidly shrinking upper class - exploding lower class - destruction of wealth at every level - not one single budget passed.
Â
That's what you call "trying" ?? most would call it an EPIC FAIL!
 @Arctic Dodge  @albion $1 trillion dollar bailout that is...
 @Arctic Dodge  @albion As soon as Obama took office the very first thing he had to do was deal with a $1 bailout the Bush administration left him, and two foreign wars. I think there's a reason Bush decided not to go to the Republican convention - Gallop polls show that 81% of Americans still blame him for the mess we're in, and he has the lowest opinion polls of any living president in recent history.
Â
Yeah, blame Obama for the mess he's tried to clean up.
@Poisonous Giraffe @Arctic Dodge @albion As I hope most people know, the oficial FedGov "unemployment" number is essentially the percent receiving enemployment checks, and teh "real" unemployment number is the percentage who are out of work but want to and are able to, even if they are not receiving an unemployment check. That is the "real" unemployment number the media kep harping on during the Bush years, when the officil number looked to good for them, so they kept spinning how much worse it "really was." if you include under-employed, it closer to 20%.
 @Arctic Dodge  @albion I love how the right inflates numbers arbitrarily to prove a point. Stated unemployment is around 8.1% but the REAL unemployment is closer to 15%!
Â
Wait... what? "Real"? Where did you get that? Â Rush? Hannity? Beck? Probably because they are REAL journalists
Â
The debt did not "explode" under Obama as much as it "Exploded" under Bush... You might want to check the numbers with the Budgetary committee first.
Â
Or not...
Â
Probably not because the facts won't fit into your skewed perspective.