Values Voter Summit

Ron Paul won the straw poll at the family research council’s Values Voter Summit. It’s the annual gathering of a few thousand conservatives in Washington. Paul had many supporters present when he spoke at the summit on Saturday morning. He took 37 percent in the informal poll, which is 732 votes from the 1,983 people who partook in the survey. Herman Cain was second at 23 percent (447 votes), Rick Santorum was third with 16 percent (323 votes), Rick Perry was fourth with 8 percent (167), Michelle Bachmann came in fifth with 8 percent (157), and Mitt Romney got sixth with only 88 votes at 4 percent.

Romney who spoke after Paul at the summit had some drama of his own going on. He had his Mormon religion called a cult by an evangelical leader, Robert Jeffress at the summit on Friday. The alarming remark took the spotlight from many of the candidates. Jeffress said that republicans shouldn’t vote for Romney because he is a Mormon. He did say that Romney was a “good, moral man” but that he thinks Christians should prefer to follow a Christian like Perry rather than a non-Christian like Romney. When asked about the controversial comment Perry said he did not think the Mormon religion is a cult.

Getting back to the results of the poll, Paul’s success in the poll is probably form all the young supporters as opposed to his popularity among the social conservatives at the conference. Most of them are Cain supporters. In fact, according to the president of the Family Research Council, Tony Perkins, when the results of the poll were announced on Saturday there was much chanting from the young enthusiasts and there was even a few boos from the crowd. Perkins said Cain “had people on their feet; Rick Santorum connected with the people.” However it’s still early to tell who will be the GOP nominee. The enthusiasm of the social conservatives for Cain was extremely high. Cain spoke to the summit on Friday. The Ohio state auditor David Yost was at the summit and said, “both [Cain’s] eloquence and the breadth of his vision” was refreshing to see. He said, “a lot of candidates come to a place like this, and their speeches almost sound like checklists of conservative issues” and that Cain “really had more of a narrative that reminded me of a Ronald Reagan.” I think that eloquence is a great word to use to describe Cain. Whenever I have seen him speak on TV he always articulately expresses himself well. He has a very calming manner, which I think will resonate well to the people.