The Economist isn't Sold on Romney Either

    This one has to hurt, after all, the Economist can always be counted on to at least be a pretty friendly audience to GOP ideas-too much for me. They can at least be counted on to give them a fair hearing and an open mind. However, they really do get to the nub of the matter here going into the Republican convention:

    "WHEN Mitt Romney was governor of liberal Massachusetts, he supported abortion, gun control, tackling climate change and a requirement that everyone should buy health insurance, backed up with generous subsidies for those who could not afford it. Now, as he prepares to fly to Tampa to accept the Republican Party’s nomination for president on August 30th, he opposes all those things. A year ago he favoured keeping income taxes at their current levels; now he wants to slash them for everybody, with the rate falling from 35% to 28% for the richest Americans."

    http://www.economist.com/node/21560864?frsc=dg%7Ca

     As they point out, politicians do flip-flop all the time-and that's not necessarily a vice I might add. We should be grateful to FDR that he "flip-flopped" on his 1932 election promise to balance the budget. The more charitable way to look at flip-flopping is that it means you're learning. But as you can see from this itemization of Romney's stands this is much more than just your run of the mill flip flops:

     "All politicians flip-flop from time to time; but Mr Romney could win an Olympic medal in it (see article). And that is a pity, because this newspaper finds much to like in the history of this uncharismatic but dogged man, from his obvious business acumen to the way he worked across the political aisle as governor to get health reform passed and the state budget deficit down. We share many of his views about the excessive growth of regulation and of the state in general in America, and the effect that this has on investment, productivity and growth. After four years of soaring oratory and intermittent reforms, why not bring in a more businesslike figure who might start fixing the problems with America’s finances?"

     "But competence is worthless without direction and, frankly, character. Would that Candidate Romney had indeed presented himself as a solid chief executive who got things done. Instead he has appeared as a fawning PR man, apparently willing to do or say just about anything to get elected. In some areas, notably social policy and foreign affairs, the result is that he is now committed to needlessly extreme or dangerous courses that he may not actually believe in but will find hard to drop; in others, especially to do with the economy, the lack of details means that some attractive-sounding headline policies prove meaningless (and possibly dangerous) on closer inspection. Behind all this sits the worrying idea of a man who does not really know his own mind. America won’t vote for that man; nor would this newspaper. The convention offers Mr Romney his best chance to say what he really believes."

     What I've noticed is that Republicans are mostly conceding that Americans don't get Mitt Romney, they don't like him, but that he'll win because they "respect" him. In my lifetime at least, I've never seen this happen. I've never seen Americans elect the guy they don't like. Al Gore was respected.

     The Economist makes the crucial point that Romney really hasn't given us any heft in terms of policy details. We have the campaign conceding that this is basically a Trust Me campaign. The Economist does not see this working. They are very clear that Playing dumb is not an option. Uh oh:

     "Mr Romney may calculate that it is best to keep quiet: the faltering economy will drive voters towards him. It is more likely, however, that his evasiveness will erode his main competitive advantage. A businessman without a credible plan to fix a problem stops being a credible businessman. So does a businessman who tells you one thing at breakfast and the opposite at supper. Indeed, all this underlines the main doubt: nobody knows who this strange man really is. It is half a decade since he ran something. Why won’t he talk about his business career openly? Why has he been so reluctant to disclose his tax returns? How can a leader change tack so often? Where does he really want to take the world’s most powerful country?"

    The Economist nails it. At the end of the day we just don't know who Mitt Romney is and he is strange man.  I notice that the WSJ piece about the hard sell for Romney kind of tried to make this failure to connect some kind of virtue.

    "Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney strides into a hotel suite in Columbus, Ohio, where a couch awaits. He waves at it and quips: "People would like me to lie down and let it all out."
As he soon makes clear, Mr. Romney sees no reason to do that in the campaign's final stretch, which begins with his party's nominating convention next week."

      "To the contrary, the former businessman and governor, who gets more respect than adoration from voters, vows in an interview that he won't be part of the celebrity-style culture often favored by politicians. Despite pressure to be more revealing, he says he won't use his campaign as "a way to personalize me like I'm a piece of meat."

     "People today look for celebrity, but Dad is being his authentic self," says his oldest son, Tagg. "If this is an 'American Idol' election of who can ham it up with the judges the best, it's an election Dad's not going to win. But if voters want someone who won't just feel their pain but do something about it, Dad should be their president."

     http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2012/08/mitt-romney-is-tough-guy-to-like.html

      The Economist's point is that Romney hasn't shown he's the guy to do anything about it either-he won't tell us what he will do.

       I think Romney's own words tell us a lot-though he eschews "the couch" he's actually already given us plenty to work with.

      He finds the democratic process demeaning. He thinks he's above it. He shouldn't have to play by the same rules everyone else who runs for office does. Think about it. He refuses to release his tax returns as other candidates have always done. He won't tell us what his policy is in any detail.

     But this comment about refusing to be 'personalized like a piece of meat' says it all. That's the tell by itself, in and of itself, that this man thinks he's above this whole process. He and his wife come from a standpoint, a mindset of "noblese oblige."

    We'll give "you people" what we decide you need to know and that's it. Romney acts like a man who anticipates being coronated not elected.

    What fascinates me about this complaint against being a piece of meat is that he reminds me here of no one so much than the first Bush-George Herbert Walker Bush. Bush as well wasn't into the "vision thing."

     I came across a conservative this morning who claims that Romney is less the anti-Obama than the anti-Clinton. Right. However, he seems to forget that Bill Clinton creamed Bush.