Yepsen: Thompson Underwhelmed

The dean of the Iowa press corps:

Fred Thompson’s announcement speech Thursday in Des Moines was underwhelming.

The former U.S. Senator and movie actor formally announced his long-awaited candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination at the Des Moines Convention Complex. It wasn’t very impressive.

The crowd of a few hundred didn’t seem enthused. Thompson’s oratory didn’t soar but was somewhat rambling.

Comments

You should check out Ryan Sager's take.

It's pretty brutal.

Posted by Noah | September 6, 2007 6:25 PM

Like I said months ago, Fred Thompson is dead on arrival.

Republicans are grasping at straws. Fred Thompson was "GENERIC REPUBLICAN," and they were throwing all of their "hopes" onto him.

His candidacy has always been a joke.

He looks as old as McCain does.

His wife looking like his granddaughter probably won't go over too well with the "family values" crowd, any more than Giuliani's 3 wives and family problems do.

The reason he got in as late as he did is because they know he'll underwhelm. He probably got in too early to do himself any good.

Posted by OEST | September 6, 2007 11:41 PM

Sorry Thompson. We already have a true conservative to support.

Not only does Ron Paul want to abolish the Income Tax and replace it with nothing. He's put bills on the house floor numerous times to do just that. I.E., he practices what he preaches.

He also wants to end all the unconstitutional executive agencies and cabinet positions that conservatives use to promise to get rid of.

Thompson's just another 4 years of Bush and the Neo-Cons. (Indeed, much of his backing is comming from Cheny and his ilk.)

Not only that, Thompson has a spotty and even anti-conservative history on gun rights, immagration, and abortion in the past.
http://conservativesagainstfred.wordpress.com/

Tracy

Posted by Tracy Saboe | September 7, 2007 1:39 AM

Hours after Quinnipiac's Ohio poll, a new Keystone poll from Pennsylvania confirms that Democrats are doing great right now. But it also demonstrates how impossible it is to draw conclusions about electability. Obama and Clinton are winning all 8 matchups against the top 4 Republican candidates. Read more at Campaign Diaries.

Posted by Daniel | September 7, 2007 2:37 AM

FRAUd Thomson is just that.. fraud. He is just a corporate/foreign lobbyist and a trial lawyer. He has absolutely no message and he looks old and sick. And he is lazy too.

He got into this race just because his trophy wife who controls his campaign wanted him to get in.

Posted by olson | September 7, 2007 9:26 AM

I found his Council Bluffs event acceptable, but certainly not dazzling.
My highlight was probably the guy who introduced him--he suggested he was elected to the Senate in 1944 and then introduced him as "Senator Fred Roberts". Maybe he was nervous.
As for the speech, Fred has a Bush-like charm, but he doesn't really now how to give a stump speech yet (build momentum, keep the crowd involved, applause lines, etc). It was very introductory and any policy ideas he did mention were very general and could have been said by just about any Republican.
There were probably at least 300 in Council Bluffs, though many just curious voters, not serious Fred Heads. And many around me wanted to know why Fred was 40 minutes late--we don't like that in the Midwest.
All in all, it wasn't a perfect kickoff, but at least he has a nice campaign bus (or two).

Posted by Andy | September 7, 2007 10:39 AM

Checkout how popular the Corporate Lobbyist Fred is:

A handful of Utah "Fredheads" - political activists supporting the late entry of Republican Fred Thompson into the presidential sweepstakes - gathered Thursday in Salt Lake City to kick off their campaign for the oldest fresh face in the race.

Just four Thompson supporters showed up at Utah Republican Party headquarters for the event, leaving dozens of untouched cookies and vegetable snacks provided in hopes a much bigger crowd would materialize.

Posted by Fraud | September 7, 2007 5:34 PM

Not only that, Thompson has a spotty and even anti-conservative history on gun rights, immagration, and abortion in the past.

Posted by Tracy Saboe | September 7, 2007 1:39 AM

It's funny how Tracy talks about conservatism like it's supposed to be a good thing or something.

Conservatives have historically fought against every freedom that she now enjoys.

If they'd have had their way, she wouldn't even be able to vote.

And I'm talking about "conservatives," whether they were Federalists, Democrats, or Republicans, it doesn't matter.

Ideology, "conservatism" isn't a party, it's a worldview. And those who have had it, no matter the party, fought against things like the G.I. Bill of Rights, Social Security, women's suffrage, rural electrification, child labor laws, clean air and water laws, and so on.

But oooohhhhh, the "word," conservative just sounds so good, doesn't it?

Sounds like "conserve."

Ask yourself what they want to conserve. They don't want to conserve the freedoms you have enjoyed. They want to regress back to a time before many of the amendments to the Constitution were ratified. They want to regress back to a time when property rights were superior to personal rights (and doing a good job at that one).

But people love to thump their chests about "conservatism," because the word sounds so good.

"Liberal"? Humph, sounds too much like "ad lib," like you have no base, no foundation, no values, you just want to wing it...even though this country was founded on liberal values like, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," instead of "life, liberty, and property."

Go figure.

Posted by OEST | September 10, 2007 2:51 PM