The conventional wisdom would have one believe that there is way Michele Bachmann would run for President in 2012. It seems that the conventional wisdom, which I bought into, is being proven wrong.
Initially it seems that there was simply no room for her in the crowded field. She did not have a special niche. There is no room for her and Sarah Palin, and supporters of both would choose Palin.
All of this is now wrong. Michele Bachmann has clearly established herself as the GOP candidate best representing the Tea Party movement. With Sarah Palin now looking increasingly like she is not running, Bachmann is getting closer to formally declaring.
With other candidates already possessing large war chests (or the appearance of), Bachmann would not seem like the type to raise money. This is false as well. She recently raised $2 million in a weekend. Many people give her very small donations. Her support is grassroots, but very devoted.
(Full disclosure: I have given her $35 in the last two years for her congressional reelection. I have not given any money to any presidential campaign.)
The one major downside against Congresswoman Bachmann is that while she has people who love her, there are Americans who do not know her who absolutely hate her guts. Of all the candidates most likely to run, she is the one the left would like to destroy the most. She is a minority conservative, and the left despises minority conservatives. She is ardently pro-life, and liberal women froth at the mouth at the very existence of a pro-life woman. It is considered traitorous to the gender.
The proof that Bachmann is hated beyond rational reasoning is that while liberals make every conservative out to be evil or stupid, the precious few most hated are seen as both. The two forms of attack are contradictory, but both were leveled at George W. Bush. Sarah Palin was mostly attacked as stupid, while Dick Cheney was labeled evil. Michele Bachmann gets both labels slandered about.
With regards to her intelligence, Congresswoman Bachmann is a professional tax attorney. She knows tax law better than virtually everybody in congress. So when she points out the billions of dollars in corruption and waste in the Obama healthcare law, she knows what she is talking about. No amount of liberal hyperventilating will change the fact that on budgetary matters, she is every bit as hard working and analytical as Paul Ryan. His being a male who avoids talking about social issues is why she gets the grenades that are not lobbed at him.
Liberals will try to destroy her from an intelligence standpoint by pointing out to her gaffe about confusing Massachusetts with New Hampshire on a matter of American history. So what? She made a mistake. Barack Obama said that there were 57 states. It does not make him a dolt. Joe Biden gets a free pass from liberals for his many gaffes because he is liberal and from liberal women because he is pro-choice. Michele Bachmann is just fine in the brains department.
As for her human nature, she is one of the kindest people on Earth. Liberals claim that everything they do, from destroying education to wrecking businesses, is “for the children.” Congresswoman Bachmann actually has benefited real children in a tangible way. She and her husband have raised five children of their own. They have also taken in 23…yes 23…foster children. That is compassion. That is Michele Bachmann.
The feminists also hate her because like Palin, Congresswoman Bachmann is a physically beautiful woman who married a handsome man and raised happy children. Ms. Bachmann refuses to be an angry bra-burner. She is happy, and that drives her critics nuts. An entire political network dedicated their election night coverage across the nation to attacking her. She rates higher than they do on every category, from beauty to disposition to kindness to toughness to effectiveness.
So while she has been a very effective congresswoman, this usually does not make for a good spring board to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Usually governors get the job. Occasionally a senator gets it, and people regret it.
Yet the Tea Party movement is a powerful force, and Ms. Bachmann is the most visible politician associated with this leaderless movement. Like the people in the movement, she is ready to take a meat cleaver to the budget. She understands that spending is out of control and must be reined in fast and hard. Cuts must be wide and deep.
Republicans who throw her under the bus do so out of gutlessness, and liberals who attack her do so out of fear and jealousy.
There is nothing conventional about what is happening in America today. For this reason, an unconventional candidate like Michele Bachmann absolutely can and has become a serious force. The 2012 race would be better off for her entry.
eric
Good ol’ Jersey McJones can honetsly say, speaking for all liberals and progressives, we do not think Michelle Bacmann is either stupid or crazy. We have another word for her.
JMJ