Romney Speech Response

Romney is indeed suspending his campaign. This appears even more tragic to me after listening to his speech today to the CPAC. One of the best speeches on behalf of conservative values I've ever heard...on par with some that Reagan gave.

The explanation of his decision to withdraw was, in a nutshell, that despite disagreements with McCain on a number of issues, they fully agree on the importance of staying strong and on offense in the War on Terror. He believes that by withdrawing, it will allow the party to unite and therefore face the Democrats from a stronger position in the fall. Unsaid, but suggested, was the fact that McCain has established a lead such that it would be extremely unlikely for him to win the nomination, and therefore his continuing the campaign would not change the outcome but could well deepen divisions in the party and weaken us for this fall's elections.

I can understand his rationale here, and I respect his decision. It is also much more honorable an approach by a long shot than Mike Huckabee's.

There remains a number of very important questions in terms of how things go from here. What will John McCain say to conservatives later today in his speech, and how will he say it...what will be his tone? When he does secure the nomination, who will be his VP pick? And what will he announce as his priorities in the general election?

The answers to these and other questions will be very important to me. I would like to find a way to support the Republican nominee. There are many reasons this would be very important. But if John McCain chooses Mike Huckabee as his VP selection, that may simply be too much for me to handle. There's simply no place for religious bigotry in our national politics as far as I'm concerned. I want to have a conservative on the ticket, but someone who hasn't encouraged division based on religion. I can't vote for the Democrat, and I would certainly support Republicans running for the House and the Senate...but I don't know that I could pull the lever for that ticket. Above all right now, I hope it doesn't come to that.

Here is a video of the last part of his speech: