Presidential Fathers and Sons

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Michael Medved, Presidential Fathers and Sons; For the seventh consecutive election, the next president will either be a privileged son or a man with no relationship with his biological father. Wall Street Journal, Feb 6, 2012 (op-ed).

Quote:

"Mitt Romney is a classic example of a candidate with a famous father. George Romney achieved distinction as an auto-company executive, serious presidential candidate, and secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

"Newt Gingrich, on the other hand, enjoyed no meaningful connection with his birth father. Newton Leroy McPherson was an abusive, hard-drinking auto mechanic who abandoned his 17-year-old wife within days of young Newt's birth. The boy later took the last name of his stepfather, Bob Gingrich, a career army officer who moved his family around the world with the demands of his service.

"No recent presidents can boast paternity that seems ordinary or normal, finding middle ground between the intense expectations of a powerful, prominent parent and disasters of badly broken families with absent birth fathers.

"In one sense, these extreme backgrounds now dominate the presidential process because the process itself has become so extreme.

"But despite a shared sense of determination and destiny, famous-father candidates tend to run dramatically different campaigns than do their no-father counterparts. sons of famous fathers work tirelessly to burnish family traditions and complete the unfinished business of prior generations. George W Bush focused on winning the second term cruelly denied to his father, and Mitt Romney still hopes to claim the Republican nomination that his father lost to Richard Nixon in 1968.

"when rage at the establishment prevails, Peasant Rebellions like Barack Obama's hope-and-change campaign enjoy an undeniable edge over restoration campaigns like Hillary Clinton's primary run. she promised a return to the glory days of her popular husband, but the public mood in 2008 favored something more daring.

"Barack Obama's challenge in 2012 involves the uncomfortable incongruity of an incumber president leading a Peasant Rebellion against the power-that-be. It's an embarrassing stretch to threten to upend the establishment when you're at the center of that very establishment. Nevertheless, the president seems determined to play out his role as born outsider * * * insistently blaming Republicans (who have controlled a single house of Congress for barely a yeart) for all dysfunctional government of the last three years.

Note: George W Romney
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Romney
(1907-1995; He joined Nash-Kelvinator in 1948, and became chairman and CEO of its successor, American Motors Corporation in 1954; Romney mocked the products of the "Big Three" automakers as "gas-guzzling dinosaurs")

Quote: "Romney was a candidate for the Republican nomination for President of the United States in 1968. While initially a front-runner, he proved an ineffective campaigner, and fell behind Richard Nixon in polls. Following a mid-1967 remark that his earlier support for the Vietnam War had been due to a 'brainwashing' by US military and diplomatic officials in Vietnam, his campaign faltered even more, and he withdrew from the contest in early 1968. Once elected president, Nixon appointed Romney Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.