Cross posted at my personal blog....
Yesterday Mitt Romney came to Bradley University in Peoria, IL and then Rick Santorum came to a Pizza restaurant (parking lot). I decided to take in both rallies. More below the fold.
Interestingly enough, though Santorum was the more extreme candidate, Romney got under my skin a lot more...a whole lot more.
Well, today was a political day for me. I went to two campaign events: one for Mitt Romney at Bradley University, and one for Rick Santorum in East Peoria. I'll comment a bit on each but I'll make one general observation that surprises me.
Of course, if I were forced at gun point to vote for one or the other to be the President of the United States, I'd vote for Willard Mitt Romney. He is far smarter, IMHO and in touch with reality.
But, at today's rallies, Mitt Romney, while not as extreme as Rick Santorum, got under my skin more.....FAR more. I was livid when I left the Romney rally but not so livid when I left the Santorum one.
I'll post some of my own photos, but professional quality photos can be found at the Peoria Journal Star website (here).
http://blogs.pjstar.com/...
In the above photo (click on the link), I am to Mr. Romney's left (right hand side of the photo), near the stage, sitting down. I was in row 2.
I posted a video in an early post that shows some highlights. Though Mr. Romney said that he'd repeal "Obamacare" and return this issue to the states, he mostly focused on "economic freedom" and droned on about excessive regulations, not enough energy development, stagnant wages, cutting spending, etc. He also talked about being a "Friend of Israel".
He basically cherry picked facts (e. g., mentioned that the Obama team underestimated the depth of the recession that they inherited) and failed to mention:
1. Jobs are still up under President Obama and unemployment is falling
2. We are now producing more domestic oil than during the previous 8 years.
But it was mostly "economic freedom", etc.
I got to shake his hand afterward and then walked away; I found Barbara and told her "it isn't every day that you get to shake the hand of the person who will finish second in the general election"; that infuriated some Republican who blurted out: "you want 4 more years of this" and I said "I like 200,000 + jobs a month" as the bitter old woman walked away. I called her an "idiot" under my breath.
Some reality:
Yes, it was packed:
This was taken about 90 minutes prior to the start of the event; you can see that they didn't have many chairs set up. It helps to start with low expectations, no?
Some of the crowd.
"Lying while "almost" remaining factual".
Yes, Mr. Romney mentioned GM....as an example of....a failure? Never mind that the auto bailout was a President Bush plan...that worked.
Rick Santorum
Now I ventured to East Peoria where a Rick Santorum rally was held in the parking lot of a pizza place.
Whereas Mitt Romney was preceded by the President of the Bradley College Republicans, Bradley President Glasser and Representative Aaron Schock, Rick Santorum was preceded by an entertainer, a priest, a singer (National Anthem), the Illinois Campaign chair and his wife (Al and Kathy Salvi....my goodness she was terrible!).
The operation was shoestring; they actually passed around a can and....a MILK JUG for donations!!!!! No kidding.
The talk itself: roughly and hour. It was mostly generalities; Barack Obama doesn't have the same vision OF America as the conservatives do, and while people can talk about "the issues", you are electing "a person".
What issues: well, he went on and on and on and on about how terrible Obamacare was. Oh, no solutions of his own.
He went on and on and on about how terrible Iran is (and yes, I hate their government) and how HE would not let them have "the bomb".
He said that America really (I mean "really") was better than any other country (and other countries really are of a different class) and he, of course, mentioned God, etc. At times, people said "God help us" and some even raised their hands, prayer style.
He mentioned oil (not that domestic production has gone UP) and of course, all of the standard conservative social values (abortion, gay marriage, etc.)
He had a strange version of US history too: he correctly pointed out that at the start of the United States, life expectancy was about 40 years and that we had an agricultural based society. He mentioned that both had changed rapidly over the past 250 years or so .....and....implied that the United States was the cause of ALL of that.
Someone didn't pay attention to the Industrial Revolution portion of their history class...nor did they understand the history of science either. This is shocking since science and improved sanitation (something done by the government) lead directly to this increased longevity...oh what the heck. :)
He also talked about how when immigrants came, there were no government entitlement plans (so, these land grants and homestead acts weren't government programs?); it almost appeared as if he longed for the pre social security era...and the pre Medicare era.
Oh yes, he took a shot at "the CEO presidential candidate" and the "moderate" from Massachusetts (and once called him "liberal") and the imposer of Romneycare.
Oh yes: Mr. Santorum bemoaned high gas prices...and yet continued to rattle the saber at Iran???? (and a few shouted "bomb Iran"). I wonder if he noted the irony when he complained about the "religious extremists" who are hurting Iran).
The Santorum crowd.
More of the crowd.
The priest.
Kathy Salvi
Rick Santorum
Notes: Al Salvi kept saying "there is an upset in the air" and mentioned that some of Newt Gingrich's delegates have defected to Rick Santorum. Also, he told the people how to vote (to vote for Rick...and then also vote for the delegates that had Rick's name after them).
I managed to talk to a pleasant young man; as far as the rest of the crowd: let's just say that this was not an educated group.
Note: someone was passing around white hats that had "pro coal" sayings on them and there were a few hecklers from the Ron Paul camp there.
But yes, this pretty much sums it up.
Here is the Peoria Journal Star's story and link to professional quality photos.
To summarize Mr. Romney played to the more affluent, Mr. Santorum stroked the ego of a class of people who have a huge inferiority complex.