The GOP Candidates' Valentine's Day Plans
Newt Gingrich, the most married candidate in the 2012 Republican primary, has the most explicit plans for Valentine's Day, but Ron Paul, the candidate with the most appeal to hormonal young people, is the candidate most happy to exploit the semi-fake holiday.
.Newt Gingrich, the most married candidate in the 2012 Republican primary, has the most explicit plans for Valentine's Day, but Ron Paul, the candidate with the most appeal to hormonal young people, is the candidate most happy to exploit the semi-fake holiday. Our guide to the romantic overtures of the presidential candidates, in descending order of romance.
Newt Gingrich
"All I can promise is that I believe she will be quite happy tomorrow night," Gingrich said in California Monday, Politico reports. "I think for the first time in a while we have a private dinner and hopefully [can] exchange gifts, and reconnect a little bit." Then he got all PG: "No more details."
But Gingrich's Valentine's Day isn't 100 percent sweet. His campaign also set up a site mocking Mitt Romney, LiberalsLoveRomney.com:
Ron Paul
In honor of the holiday, Paul's campaign is doing a "No One But Ron Paul" money bomb, which could be a slogan on a candy heart.
Meanwhile, you can buy Ron Paul chocolate bars at RonPaulbar.com. This isn't affiliated with the campaign: "A portion of your purchase (20.12% net proceeds) is currently funding 'The Ron Paul Super Brochure' project."
Paul himself has no public events today.
Mitt Romney
National Journal's Theresa Poulson notes that David Letterman had a very joked Monday night that Romney loves Valentine's Day so much "he sent a dozen long-stem roses to his money… that's right, his money." That's so mean! What is Romney really doing today? Oh. He's in New York raising money, the Associated Press' Kasie Hunt reports. Romney's only public utterance related to the holiday of love is in this Facebook post:
Someone else is making romantic gestures on Romney's behalf, however. Benjamin Sherman, of the New York-based company Say It With a Condom, spoke to the Village Voice's Victoria Bekiempis about his Romney condom. He said of coming up with a Romney condom slogan, "It was tough -- you'll find out that there's NOTHING funny about this man. So we went with 'never settle,' which is currently being talked about in the G.O.P. field."
Rick Santorum
Santorum, wife of Karen, father of seven kids, hasn't said anything publicly about his Valentine's Day plans. You really have to hunt for any romantic clues. The best one we found was the location of one of his campaign events Tuesday: Coeur D'Alene, Idaho. "Coeur" means "heart" in French, the language of love (and military surrender).