The disappointment was nearly palpable from some people as this writer rode back to her hotel on Saturday night. It was around 1:30 pm EST when this writer learned the news of Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) announcing he would not run for the position of GOP presidential contender that had people upset. Governor Daniels had sent an email out at a little after midnight to followers to let them know he would not be running for the position.
At that time, this blogger had finished a long day of GOTV work in the Buffalo, NY area for Jane Corwin who is the GOP nominee in a special election for NY26. As the bus of DC Young Republicans pulled out of Niagara Falls that night, those in the group who favored Mitch talked about the news.
Daniels was an ideal candidate. He had fixed the state of Indiana according to one source when “the state was on the verge of collapse.” Indiana had a budget deficit when he took office in 2005, now the state has a surplus. Fiscal conservatives who worry about the current state of affairs for the country were very excited about a man like Daniels who could help the country recover, they believed.
So, the fact that he is not running, and the reasons why, are actually straight forward: he really was concerned about his wife and children’s public profiles. He really did not want to put them through the media scrutiny that 2008 GOP nominee for vice president Sarah Palin’s children and family endured. In essence, he felt, in addition to his wife’s second marriage and then remarriage to him, his children also had issues that the liberal media would no doubt exploit to harm his race.
In fact, he appears rather saint-like, but there is no doubt that his family would have been beaten to a pulp. It’s a situation which brings to mind Aaron Wildavsky’s book “Presidential Elections: Strategies and Structures of American Politics,” wherein Wildavsky explains that a strong percentage of Americans don’t care about the candidates personal life as long as they do a good job.
However, some parts of the socially conservative electorate are concerned with these issues and will hold them against a candidate. And since the Republican party is made up of social conservatives, fiscal conservatives and Tea Party people, it is an issue that Daniels had to confront in making a choice on whether or not to run.
Deborah Kay Corey is a writer in the Washington, DC area. She has been published in multiple publications. The Washington Times, Human Events and National Review Online. She is the Blog Director for GOP Rockstars and runs her own site www.deborahcorey.com.
