Her self-portrayal is meant to counter suggestions that she has a slight record of accomplishment after 4-1/2 years as a US House member. Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who dropped out of the GOP presidential race Sunday, had suggested as much leading up to the straw poll, emphasizing his own experience as a chief executive – a credential shared by candidates Rick Perry, governor of Texas, and Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts, who are both very prominently still in the hunt.
Congresswoman Bachmann cited her position at “the tip of the spear” in conservatives’ fight against raising the national debt ceiling, President Obama’s health-care reform law, and legislation to regulate the banking industry in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. Though all were losing battles for her and her tea party allies, Bachmann said her determination to “fight the fights” and to stick with her principles are what qualify her to be president – not whether she has ever served as a governor.
“Ronald Reagan was a governor. But what made Ronald Reagan great wasn’t his governing experience as a governor. It was his core set of principles,” Bachmann said on ABC News’ “This Week.” “Jimmy Carter was also a governor. But I don’t think anyone would argue that America prospered and flourished under Jimmy Carter’s presidency. … It’s really, who is the person and what is their character?”
Bachmann also made clear that she will push for immediate changes to federal entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare in order to curtail government spending. During this summer’s Washington debate over raising the national debt ceiling, she was adamant that Congress should not do it.
Her plan? Assure the markets that the US will pay interest on its debt. Then pay members of the military. Then pay current recipients of Social Security. After that, she said, get down to the business of reforming entitlements.
“This isn’t some project for 10, 15 years down the road. Right now we’re going to reform entitlements,” Bachmann said on “This Week.” “We’re going to reform them for anyone who’s currently not on them. We’re going to change them so they’ll work. Medicare, Medicaid – they have to be changed.”
She did not specify how the programs for seniors and the poor would be changed, other than to seek “efficiencies” and to “modernize” them. President Obama, too, had indicated willingness to address entitlements, but as part of a “balanced approach” to shrinking the deficit and debt balance sheet that included some new revenue and, most definitely, a higher debt ceiling.
Bachmann supporters I spoke with were attracted to her religious rhetoric but also saw her as a champion for their hardcore economic concerns, and many told me they admired her stance (due to a "titanium spine," her campaign parlance repeated by supporters) against raising the debt ceiling. Dan Kahlstorf, at the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines, with his wife, Ren, on Friday, called Bachmann the "American Margaret Thatcher."
Paul's strong second-place finish is a result of his enthusiastic base, which was out in large and characteristically noisy force. Doug Wead, the long-time Bush adviser and confidant who devised the faith outreach strategy for both Bushes, is now advising the Paul campaign. At Paul's tent here in Ames, he declared, "This is the best campaign I've ever been a part of," adding that Paul isn't "phony."
Looming over the straw poll was Perry's announcement. While many voters I talked to shrugged it off, David Fisher, co-chair of Paul's state campaign, said, "Iowa Republicans believe he deliberately tried to steal the limelight."
Perry's announcement speech was shown on televisions in the tent organized by 501(c)(4) group Strong America Now, which hosted it for the 527 group, Americans for Rick Perry. Strong America Now executive director Peter O'Rourke, who said there was no formal affiliation between his group and Americans for Rick Perry, said Perry introduced legislation in Texas based on the organization's "Six Lean Sigma" cost-reduction program, which passed in the last legislative session. (The other major GOP candidates signed the group's debt reduction pledge in advance of the straw poll).
Newt Gingrich called the SAN program the "biggest idea of how to run government in 130 years, since the creation of the civil service." Gingrich claimed the program, if implemented on the national level, would save $5 trillion in federal spending over ten years. It "transcends presidential politics," he said, and will "shrink power in Washington, and grow citizens to fill the vacuum." Or at least it will give Gingrich, who finished eighth with just 385 votes in the straw poll, something to do.
But for Iowa voters, it appears that Bachmann's Christian rhetoric was the primary motivator. In her speech inside the coliseum this afternoon, she said, "God has mightily put his hand, a blessing upon this nation. We can never think we did this ourselves. It was an Almighty God that gave it to us.
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