{"id":27347,"date":"2011-03-17T21:05:46","date_gmt":"2011-03-18T03:05:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=27347"},"modified":"2011-03-17T21:05:48","modified_gmt":"2011-03-18T03:05:48","slug":"haley-barbour-and-mitch-daniels-its-one-or-the-other-for-2012","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/03\/haley-barbour-and-mitch-daniels-its-one-or-the-other-for-2012\/","title":{"rendered":"Haley Barbour and Mitch Daniels – it’s one or the other for 2012"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Haley Barbour<\/p><\/div>\n

It’s mid March and no one on the Republican side has officially announced. As such, there’s lots of speculation, so let’s continue with the who’s-running-and-who’s-not series.<\/p>\n

Let’s begin with the quiet word on the street, which is that Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels<\/a> and Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour<\/a> have a gentleman’s agreement.\u00a0Governor Daniels’ decision to run is contingent upon Governor Barbour’s. Mitch has promised Haley that he will only run for president in 2012\u00a0if and when<\/em> Haley officially declares that he is not seeking the GOP nomination. At this point, it’s any man’s guess.<\/p>\n

What we do know is that Haley Barbour is out there working hard, very hard, raising cash. This is not hard for Haley. He has a natural network as the current chairman of the National Governor’s Association and <\/em>as co-founder of the mega Washington-based lobbying shop, BGR Group. It’s no small fact that Fortune<\/a><\/em> crowned BGR as the second most powerful lobbying shop in\u00a0America in 1998.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Mitch Daniels<\/p><\/div>\n

Raising money is not going to be a problem, oh no. However, given that Americans are so overtly fed up with Washington, it’s mind boggling that Governor Barbour and his team\u00a0are\u00a0even entertaining the idea\u00a0that they can tip-toe around the enormous elephant in the room. But there you go.<\/p>\n

We also know that\u00a0Governor Barbour and his team are nervous and scared of something… I understand that\u00a0there is an\u00a0“oppo research” report coming on April 1 that will help\u00a0Governor Barbour\u00a0decide if he has any chance in the general if he gets in.\u00a0It’s all a mystery to me at this point. That said, Haley is sounding like he is running.\u00a0Just the other day he was (way) out there on the defense budget and Afghanistan. You can read his comments here<\/a> at Politico.<\/p>\n

As for Mitch Daniels, I’m just not convinced – even if Haley determines not to run – that he will want to air the family’s sordid laundry.\u00a0Recall that Mrs. Daniels took the dental train to California in 1994 (abandoning their\u00a0four young daughters to Mitch’s care)\u00a0to marry a dentist. She later\u00a0divorced the dentist to become Mrs. Daniels (again) by 1997. It was an odd marital hiatus that Americans are\u00a0going to want to know about.<\/p>\n

Again, the usual\u00a0disclaimer. These posts\u00a0are pure speculation on\u00a0who I believe is running for president in 2012 and who is not. They\u2019re based on what I\u2019ve read and\/or what\u00a0genius\u00a0has been imparted to me by trusted inside sources. I reserve the right to change my mind and correct my predictions, but I\u2019m trying to get it right the first time. In the case of Daniels and Barbour, it’s one or the other. If I had to answer today, I’d say it’s Governor Barbour.<\/p>\n

Sarah Lenti is the blogger behind NMPolitics.net\u2019s <\/em>The Savvy<\/em><\/a>. E-mail her at <\/em>sarah@nmpolitics.net<\/em><\/a>. For full disclosure, Lenti is a Republican strategist who works closely with potential\u00a0GOP\u00a0presidential candidate Mitt Romney\u2019s PAC.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Let’s begin with the quiet word on the street – which is that Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels and Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour have a gentleman’s agreement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192,181],"tags":[156,194,116],"class_list":["post-27347","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary","category-the-savvy","tag-2012-election","tag-republican-party","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27347\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}