Up To This Point- Michele Bachmann has had a roller coaster of a campaign.  A year ago, people were really excited about the possibility of a Bachmann run for President.  When she officially announced her candidacy, there was an outpouring of campaign donations and enthusiastic support.  Her first few debates went reasonably well.  She managed to come off as being bold and assertive without sounding shrill.  And, although they are a big hit during her stump speeches, she wisely avoided using too many emotional catchphrases during the early debates.  It seemed as though she was going to be a force to be reckoned with.  But just as she was starting to emerge as a legitimate candidate, her campaign fell apart. Over the summer, she went from being the favorite challenger to Mitt Romney to poll numbers in the single digits. And even though most Republicans “like” her, she has shown no signs of recovering from her fall from the top.  So what went wrong?  Although many would say that Rick Perry’s announcement to run was the start of her decline, I think that’s only partly true.  If he was totally to blame, her numbers would have shot back up when his fell.  I think her biggest problem was not the arrival of Rick Perry, but the way that she handled his arrival.

During the brief time that Rick Perry was the front-runner, candidates like Michele Bachmann were under a lot of pressure to attack, especially because both of them were considered to be “tea party” candidates.  And there was plenty to attack.  From  in-state tuition rates for illegal immigrants to his opposition to an E-verify system, Rick Perry was shaky, at best, on the issue of immigration.  There were even some legitimate concerns about the letter he wrote that was/was not in support of TARP.  If Michele Bachmann wanted to take on the then front-runner, there was plenty of material for her to challenge him on.  But instead of pressing him on a substantive policy issue, she chose to focus her attacks on the grossly mischaracterized Gardasil debate.  The issue should have been relatively simple.  The HPV vaccine helps to prevent cervical cancer in women.  For maximum efficacy, the injection should be administered before adulthood.   With the CDC’s lowest estimate on HPV in adults at 50%, this is not about encouraging promiscuity.  Unlike campaigns to hand out condoms in middle school which are based on the faulty assumption that “all teenagers sleep around so we might as well help out,” this program is focused on young girls only because the vaccine works best at that age.  Because the virus is so common now, a woman could very easily marry a man who has carried the virus for 10,20, or 50 years without having a single symptom.  She could be assaulted by someone who is a carrier.  And once she contracts it, she has it for good.  There is no cure.  Rick Perry signed an executive order making the vaccine standard for adolescent girls, but gave parents the option of opting out. Now, there are some legitimate concerns here.  Should he have passed it trough the legislature instead of using an executive order? Yes, and he admitted that he was wrong.  Should it have been an opt-in instead of an opt-out for parents?  Sure, protecting parental rights is of the highest importance, especially when you’re dealing with this sort of treatment.  Parents must carefully weigh the advantage of vaccinating their daughter against the possibility that the child may see this as a nod of approval to behave inappropriately.  But as difficult and personal as this decision is, most parents are familiar with the list of standard vaccines that pediatricians offer for each age group.  Saying “yes” or “no” to one more shot at the yearly check up is not earth-shattering. Still, if Michele Bachmann had confined her criticism to the questions raised about abusing executive authority and eroding parental rights, she would have been fine.  In fact, she would have scored big points with conservatives. But instead of sticking to the facts, she spent her time trying to equate the HPV vaccine with hard-left policies like free abortions on demand and said that Rick Perry was trying to force “dangerous injections” on “innocent little girls.”  She said that she was “offended for all the little girls and parents that didn’t have a choice.” She even accused him of being bought off by the pharmaceutical companies.  It was the sort of distorted attack that conservatives often face from the liberal press.  It is infuriating when Democrats do it and it didn’t sit well with Republican voters when Michele Bachmann did it.  But if that had been the end of it, she could have recovered some ground. We understand that this is politics and sometimes candidates get bad advice from their staff or get caught up in the heat of the moment.  One misstep is easy to forgive.  Unfortunately for her, she just couldn’t let it go. In an interview with Greta Van Sustern, she made the monumental blunder of saying that the vaccine caused mental retardation.  Her basis for this claim was that some random woman approached her after a debate and told her so. You couldn’t help but to wonder why a person would say such a thing out loud without checking on it first, especially someone with an entire staff of people who were hired to do that very thing. On the Today show the following morning, she had an opportunity to walk her accusation back a bit, but instead she said it again! This was no longer a case of slightly distorting an issue to score political points, she took this discussion into the realm of the ridiculous and kept going full steam ahead (and are we supposed to believe that NO ONE tipped her off that these claims were baseless in the hours between the two interviews?). As Rush Limbaugh said, “she jumped the shark .” Not only did she sound ignorant and hysterical, she was irresponsible.  Someone who is running for President and plans to take on the liberal media needs to have better sense than that.  President Obama has plenty of areas that we can criticize him on, but a candidate who makes wild accusations about him without having the facts to back them up will be torn apart by the press. Just look at what happened to Sarah Palin after the “death panel” comments, and she was telling the truth! Furthermore, Michele Bachmann went into the primaries as the “character candidate,” with a reputation for being honest  and ethical. While many people agreed with her that the bill was an enormous overreach that diminished parental authority, her distortion of the facts surrounding the bill cost her big points in the voters’ perception of her integrity.  In an election where several of the candidates are considered to be relatively trustworthy conservatives, a blow to credibility is costly.  And, you can call it sexist if you want, but the fact remains that voters don’t want to nominate a candidate that may come off as a hysterical woman in the general election.  Despite her excellent congressional record and improved campaign performance in the last two months, the image of the ill-informed and emotional Michele Bachmann that we saw in late August and early September is burned into the minds of many voters. Although she’s said and done all the right things in the last two months, it may be too late to turn this campaign around.

Going Forward- I like Michele Bachmann, as a person, and I think the HPV controversy was probably out of character for her, just a one-time thing.  I think she does a great job in the position she has.  She serves as the “voice of the Tea Party” in Congress and she has made it her mission to keep the public informed of all of the behind-the-scenes dealings of our Representatives.  She has also shown skill in generating support in the form of petitions, donations, and media coverage for numerous conservative causes.  She has proven herself to be a valuable asset for our side, but she has not demonstrated the sort of leadership qualities needed to be elected President.  Her vast knowledge of the inner workings of our legislature (particularly showcased in the foreign policy debate) is often overshadowed by her heavy dependence on catchphrases and emotional “red meat.” The tiff with Rick Perry just amplified a concern that many conservatives already had.  Would she be able to tamper her rally-the-troops speaking style with enough calm and reasoned fact to be a viable candidate?  I think, that most Republican voters have decided that she can’t.

In the last two weeks, she has been making the rounds on talk radio and fox news.  Many are predicting that it is her turn, again, to be the “not Mitt Romney” candidate.  And maybe they are right.  But, I think that most people feel the way about Michele Bachmann that I do.  If she got the nomination, we would gladly support her without hesitation.  Not just because she’s better than Obama, but because we think she would do a great job.  However, when it comes to voting in a primary, I think most of us have a candidate that we like just a little bit more than her.  Someone that we think is slightly more reliable, or more of a leader, or better in a debate.  We like Michele Bachmann, but we aren’t sure she can hold it together in a national election.  The bottom line is this, I don’t see Michele Bachmann becoming the next President of the United States, but I also don’t see her leaving the spotlight anytime soon.  She is very good at the job she has and I hope she keeps it for some time to come.  She holds line on important issues in Congress when many of her fellow Republicans have long abandoned the cause.  She may not be cut-out for a run for President, but few people are.  She has remained a solid conservative in a town where everyone wants to be liked and few people can do that either.