Sunday Spin: Does familiarity breed endorsement?
With presidential candidates making their quadrennial stops in the Inland Northwest ahead of the caucuses, Republican voters might be wondering how to pick among the four remaining candidates.
After all, none of the four has very strong connections to the region, or has spent much time in the area when not on the campaign trail. And some haven’t even made so much a pit stop here yet.
Spin Control decided to get some insight from one fairly well-known Republican who served with at least three of the four would-be nominees. Former Rep. George Nethercutt was elected to the House in the historic GOP takeover engineered by Newt Gingrich, and served with Rick Santorum and Ron Paul during his six years there.
So who’s he backing? . . .
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Mitt Romney, the guy he knows least. In an interview last week, Nethercutt was most emphatically not supporting Gingrich, who he described as smart but prickly, a poor administrator and not well-suited to the job of president.
"He’s just all over the place," Nethercutt said, recalling times when House Republicans would hear a Gingrich strategy in the morning caucus meeting, then call back in the afternoon to find out it had completely changed. "You can be all over the place as speaker of the House; as president, you can’t. You don’t have that luxury."
Nethercutt also doesn’t remember the Gingrich speakership in the same glowing terms that Gingrich describes it. "I remember Newt not having the support of his own team. People were ready for him to leave the stage."
Paul and Nethercutt served in the House for four years, and he remembers the Texas congressman as having some interesting ideas and some odd ones, but someone who voted no on most legislation. "I think his bad ideas cancel out his good ones," Nethercutt said.
Santorum was in the Senate when Nethercutt was in the House, and they only crossed paths a few times. But Nethercutt wonders if Santorum isn’t so rigid on some public policy issues that he won’t do well in the general elections.
He was pulling for Mitch Daniels until the Indiana governor said he wouldn’t run. So he’s backing Romney for his administrative and business experience. "I want to ride a horse that can go all the way."
Other well-known Republicans backing Romney include Nethercutt’s replacement, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, and former gubernatorial and senate candidate Dino Rossi.
