by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright Feb. 8, 2008
All Rights Reserved.

alling it quits in Washington, D.C. at the Conservative Political Action Conference, former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney ended his bid for the Republican nomination. “I feel I have to now stand aside, for our party and for our country,” Romney told a dispirited audience to audible boos. Romney follows fellow dropout former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani who ended his campaign Jan. 30, throwing support to GOP front-runner and presumptive nominee Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). Both Giuliani and Romney battled in vain, much to the delight of McCain who sat back and watched the two self-destruct for nearly a year. Last summer McCain's campaign was in shambles, with Rudy and Mitt vying for front-runner. Giuliani was torpedoed by unwanted revelations about his relationship with rogue New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik.

      Giuliani was also dogged by allegations of financial improprieties while mayor of New York City. Bypassing early primaries and putting all his eggs in Florida also didn't help matters, though his calculation was based of escaping adverse publicity. Romney has no bad events to blame his freefall, accounting for his sudden exit from the race. Super Tuesday was the last straw for Romney, losing 14 of 21 states with no chance of catching McCain. With his youthful good looks, smooth talk and presidential appearance, Romney had all the right stuff of a presidential candidate. While adjusting his views to sell himself as conservative, Romney held all the right positions. He became zealously pro-life, opposed amnesty for illegal aliens, fought stem cell research and favored a constitutional ban on gay marriage. He even supported ending Roe v. Wade and a constitutional ban on abortion.

      Romney's irreversible flaw was not his flip-flopping or perceived lack of authenticity: It was his Mormon religion. Romney tried, but failed, to change the minds of evangelicals with a much-ballyhooed speech Dec. 6, 2007, realizing that his campaign was falling apart. His speech paralleled John F. Kennedy's Sept. 12, 1960 where he laid to rest concerns about being Roman Catholic. While Romney was no JFK, his speech didn't specifically address the Christian right's problems with Mormons. “Jesus Christ is the son of God and the savior of Mankind,” said Romney, pleading with evangelicals to accept him. When Romney lost in Iowa to former Baptist preacher and Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, the handwriting was on the walls: Romney was never going to win over the Christian right. Iowa's evangelicals didn't buy Romney's pleas and handed him a stinging defeat.

      Racial and religious intolerance has been front-and-center in the 2008 presidential campaign. Former President Bill Clinton, known for his sympathies to African Americans, injected race on behalf of his wife Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), telling voters that Hillary might lose South Carolina because blacks would vote in strong numbers for Sen. Barack Obama (D-Il.). When he compared Barack to former 1984 Democratic presidential candidate Rev. Jesse Jackson that was the last straw. Voters handed Hillary a blistering defeat, losing South Carolina [55%-27%]. Jackson won only South Carolina in his presidential bid. Obama won 14 of 22 contests on Super Tuesday, upending Clinton's theory. While blacks have rallied around Barack, Hillary has won Hispanics and Asians by wide margins, proving, once again, that race plays a role in the primaries.

      Romney's campaign was clearly sabotaged by religious conservatives, unwilling to support a Mormon candidate. When Mitt tried to defuse the problem Dec. 6, he drew more attention to Huckabee, siphoning off more support. With Romney going down, the religious right now has to support maverick Sen. John McCain, whose previous opposition to Bush's tax cuts betrayed his conservative principles. Conservatives also didn't like McCain co-sponsoring with Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass) last year's failed immigration reform bill, granting Z-visas, or permanent residency, to millions of illegal aliens. Conservative also don't like McCain's support of embryonic stem cell research, utilizing fertilized embryos to grow new stem cell lines. Rock-ribbed conservatives, especially evangelicals, could follow a more liberal candidate over a conservative Mormon, like Mitt.

      No one could have imagined that the 2008 presidential campaign would bring out the worst of U.S. intolerance toward blacks and Mormons. Watching Latinos go for Hillary three-to-one over Obama shows that inter-group prejudice is more virulent than traditional White-minority bigotry. Asians and Latinos appear to have unfinished business with blacks, blaming Obama for years of racial tensions. Religious intolerance sacrificed the presidential hopes of Romney, unable to convince evangelicals to accept his Mormon faith. Even liberal preachers like Rev. Al Sharpton, a former Democratic presidential candidate in 2004, said the Mormon faith was not truly Christian. With Romney stepping down, McCain will come under more pressure to pick a conservative vice president. If he picks Romney, he'll once again alienate religious conservatives, unable to turn the other cheek.

About the Author

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He's editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.

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