UPDATE: Fredmentum is building in South Carolina.
After a rather lengthy decision process, I have decided that I will vote for and support Fred Thompson in the California primary election and the general election, if he is nominated. He started slowly, but there is reason to believe he is picking up momentum. Others are getting aboard.
Fred Thompson has had a long career, beginning with his position as minority counsel on the Watergate Committee at the age of 30. He has been twice elected to the Senate from Tennessee. He is 65 but has received some encouragement from his much younger wife to get involved. Being an almost 70-year-old father of a 17-year-old, I can identify.
The Republican nomination race is wide open. There is no favorite and, while I believed that Rudy Giuliani was the best candidate for a while, I think Thompson is more of a conventional conservative and has a pretty good chance to win. His career as a part-time actor has given him the Reagan-like ability to reach the public over the heads of the biased news media. This ability has been sorely lacking in President Bush and has hurt him badly.
So there it is; I’m with Fred. I’ll post more as the campaign goes on.
Dr. K., I think that Mr. Thompson is closest of all the potential candidates to the “small government” philosophy that you and I share. Sure, he may not have done all that much while in the Senate, but I seldom hear that criticism on the Left about Obama, Edwards, or Clinton.
I tend to trust him on defense, too.
I worry about his health, but darn it, no candidate is truly immune from that concern. You know about Thompson’s prognosis better than most.
We’ll see how South Carolina goes. That might be the tipping point (look at home McCain’s prospects changed after New Hampshire).
There’s at least one vote for the Fred sitting in the SD County registrar’s vote box. I opted for the mail-in ballot, and mailed in mine on Saturday.
I’m hearting Fred more than any of the others. He is my primary pick, and hopefully my general election choice as well. McCain is one demented screech away from losing his lead, I see him doing a Dean thing before long. I would love to have a candidate I was enthusiastic about supporting rather than the “Oh, no! We can’t have THAT moron in office!” for the past two elections. It was never that I was happy about Bush, always much more unhappy about Gore and Kerry.
Fred isn’t afraid of the MSM and that scores big but not even as big as being consistently and unabashedly conservative.
McCain and the Huckster are populists and wobbly conservatives (if even that)…. Rudy is a so-so, doable but not a first choice ….and Romney, well he has really nice hair…
I’m getting worried, friends, about President Obama. He is a nice fellow and all, but the world (and the economy) is a dangerous place.
On the other hand, some folks rise to the occasion.
But yet, Fred Thompson is more my style….at least in this group.
Remember that McCain and Rudy both have cancers in remission.
Another reason to support Fred. Gun owners are unhappy about that DoJ brief in the DC gun ban case