I’ve always been ambivalent about this field. I’ve never been wildly anti-Newt nor pro-Romney, or vice versa. I have long thought that Romney would be the best candidate to beat Obama, and I still believe that — but just barely. His Al Gore like inability to break through his android shell is really grating on me. It’s unfair, of course. I think Romney’s an honest, smart and decent man who would probably make a fine president. As I’ve been writing for a very long time, Romney has an authentic inauthenticity problem. In other words, he seems like he’s faking things even when he’s not. He may take positions he doesn’t hold in his heart, but all politicians do that. The problem is that the vast majority of the time he’s no more passionate or convincing about the positions he almost surely does hold in his heart.
More to the point, fair doesn’t have anything to do with it. Politics is about persuasion and he’s simply not persuasive. I’m rapidly losing confidence that as a general election candidate he would be able to win over the crucial voters he would need to seal the deal. If he’s the nominee, I hope I’m wrong.
But this is the moment where Romney either rises to the occasion to prove he has what it takes to win in the fall or he doesn’t. I’m not talking about his willingness to “go negative.” That’s not his problem. He’s got the will. The question is whether he’s got the skill. We all cheer at the end of Rudy when he finally gets to play in a Notre Dame game. But there’s a reason why Rudy never started. He had the heart, he just didn’t have the natural talent. I’ve come to believe that all the talk about how Romney isn’t a “real conservative” (or a “real Christian”) is a symptom of that underlying shortcoming. If he was a better politician, most of the opposition to Romney would fall away. That he’s not a better politician probably speaks well of him as a human being, but what the hell does that have to do with anything?
Gingrich still strikes me as a vastly riskier proposition. We simply don’t know whether he’d be a better nominee or president. But he’s certainly proved he’s a better politician.
As Mark says “Mitt needs to get good real fast.”
This makes me recall a pundit of some years back suddenly realizing why young Richard Nixon was the champion poker player of Green Island: it's because he ALWAYS looks like he's bluffing.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRE: "Gingrich still strikes me as a vastly riskier proposition."
I can picture a gaggle of ninnies lined up at a balance beam - about 6 inches off the floor - quaking, chatting, and fighting over safety harnesses and goggles - when some impudent kid pushes past them, walks the beam forward and back and on his hands, and laughs.
Sure, this is a high stakes game. I may even buy "riskier" on some levels (RE: Newt), but not "risky" as an absolute state. Come on, now. This is BHO we're talking about.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJonah, for a long time I have greatly respected your voice (perhaps above all others) on the right side of the ledger.
But you are WILDLY understating the risks and likely damaged involved with a Gingrich nomination. I really wish the pundits would lay bear all of Newt's baggage whenever his name comes up; because it will be all over the news if Newt gets the nomination.
The GOP will, in all likelihood, lose the House with Gingrich at the top of the ticket. It will be an unmitigated disaster.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOMG, Jonah! You're obviously in the tank for Romney and Gingrich! Otherwise you wouldn't have written such a glowing endorsement of them, blind to all their faults!
-running around with hands in air, shrieking-
(You knew someone was going to say it about one or the other, so I beat them to the punch to take the sting out of it.)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI've always believed that the reason Conservatives excel in the talk radio market is because they are more logical and practical and the art of conversation works better for their ideas than other artistic expression like movies and music.
Movies, music and other similar art forms depend on emotion to sway people to their ideas and that's why Liberals have the upper hand in those markets and Conservatives never seem to persuade by using those mediums.
But not this primary season everyone wants Governor Romney to "inspire" them with passionate ideas and visions of "slaying" the big bad Obama who talks with fire and brimstone and teleprompters.
Barf is all I have to say to that.
If you want passion read a Danielle Steele novel. But if you want a decent man with a nice family who has proven record of success in the economy and private sector then go find passion in your own life and do the practical smart thing and vote for Romney.
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This column nails it. Romney simply comes across as a phony.
Now, even if he had an ability to connect with people, Romneycare would still be a huge problem, his politically convenient policy conversions would still be a source of doubt, and his record would still be fairly weak for a Presidential candidate. But the main argument for overlooking all those things is his supposed "electability," and I see him as actually pretty weak on that measure.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou *KNOW* Romney is in trouble when you start seeing posts like this at NRO (talking about the last two days or so, not so much picking on JG).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePeople often express the sentiment that we need fewer politicians and more good ordinary people to lead the country - and then they go and vote for the politician.
I have long been sympathetic to the view that we need more ordinary people and fewer politicians in politics. But I think I understand the reason politicians win elections. Ultimately, for better or for worse, holders of political office have to engage in politics, and they had better be good at it.
And one of the most critical skills for the holder of political office to have is to connect with the voters. Technocrats who are long on credentials and short on personal empathy do not fare well in American politics. While Romney's sincerity may be one issue, I think the larger issue is his connection with people - for as long as he has been campaigning, there is still a distinct feeling that he does not understand the lives that the rest of us live.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOr...maybe Romney really is lying whenever he looks like he's lying. When you hear hoof beats, don't look around for a zebra.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMitt isn't going to "get good real fast," not in the sense you mean that, Mr. Goldberg. You're right in the first place that he has shown little aptitude to be the kind of inspiring and authentic candidate who can connect to voters on that basis. Wishing for him to suddenly become Ronald Reagan is a waste of time and energy.
No, sir, Mitt's best hope is that Newt's next (and inevitable) self-destructive act is big, and that it comes soon. And negative campaigning won't guarantee that; I doubt it will even much influence its likelihood. The periodicity between Gingrich self-inflicted blow-ups is as random as the candidate himself. It's not like Gingrich had some plan, for example, to score points last April by labeling the House GOP budget "right-wing social engineering." That's just when that particular hand grenade happened to go off, and it wasn't set off by anything any other candidate did or didn't do.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHaving voted for Newt last Saturday, I feel vindicated when I followed the link from here and saw the Mitt's economic adviser is recommending a $2 a gallon tax on gasoline to fight "Climate Change" at least Newt is embarrassed about his seat with Nancy Pelosi
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Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRomney is way too comfortable going negative against his fellow republicans...not just negative, but straight for the jugular for me to buy the "probably speaks wells for him as a person..." nonsense. Going negative is precisely what comes across as unlikable to the base of conservatives.
There comes a point where you give up trying to like or even accept someone like Romney. That point has been reached.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRomney is the prototypical organization man. He’s spent the better part of the last four years putting together his organization and raising money. In this time he’s been mostly out of public view, and even where he has appeared, functioning as if he were the head of university advancement office.
He doesn’t appear to be comfortable in the role of retail politician and his political career has been tailored around this. He got his card punched for eligibility to run for the presidency by being elected governor of Massachusetts – he did as much as he thought necessary, and no more. Contrast that those he’s running against, but in particular, Gingrich.
For all his faults and failings, Gingrich nevertheless held office for 20 years and rose to become Speaker of the House. It’s harder to become Speaker than to be elected governor of a state and particularly when being elected governor is a one off: there have been something like 61 Speakers in the nation’s history. It requires an above average political IQ to achieve that office; that should be obvious. It’s not just a flaming personality that has allowed Gingrich to be left for dead only to rise again against the expectations of so many experts. Give the man his due: he’s a d*mn good retail politician. Anyone who ignores that in competition with him runs a great risk of having their head handed to them (see South Carolina).
This is not to say that Gingrich is the one the GOP should nominate. It is however to say, that by focusing on his all too glaring weaknesses, its easy to overlook the strengths that he has beyond being able to give a good speech, and to overlook Romney’s all too obvious weakness as a retail politician in what is after all a race for political office.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'm a bit flummoxed by the continual complaints about Romney's inability to connect.
There are lots of ways to connect with an audience. Kim Kardashian connects with her audience very well by exploiting the lowest common denominator.
Gingrich is very much like Kardashian in this way in that he exploits the low-hanging fruit that others have too much dignity and shame to go after.
When did it become this all-encompassing requirement for a politician to have this deep, visceral connection with an electorate? We are, after all, electing a head of government, not a religious leader.
I've read people who rip Romney as the GOP's John Kerry. Well, John Kerry was a few thousand votes in Ohio away from beating Bush in a time when 9/11 was still fresh in our minds and the economy was a whole lot better than it was today. How would Kerry have done in an economy with 9% unemployment? He'd be President, inability to connect or not.
Even though I am firmly on the Right, I still am amazed at how the so-called grown up side of the political spectrum refuses to act grown up. We'd all love a combination of Ronald Reagan and Abraham Lincoln to be our standard bearer. But we don't have that. But there is Romney, who could well be the most well-accomplished, intellectually grounded and tempermentally-suited candidate the GOP has offered since Eisenhower and the complaint is that he is a phony because he's not spewing fire or brimstone.
The first Bush wasn't Reagan and he didn't really connect, but that didn't stop him from winning. Say all you want about how he didn't govern as a conservative, but I'm sure that, looking back, he'd be much preferable to Obama to his detractors now.
The GOP would be making a huge mistake if it passed over Romney in favor of Gingrich. It'd be akin to picking Buchanan over Bush in '92. I have faith that, like then, it's not going to happen.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Politics is about persuasion and [Romney's] simply not persuasive."
I'm not sure you needed to write the other thousand words Jonah. If this is true, this says all that needs to be said.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"He may take positions he doesn’t hold in his heart, but all politicians do that."
"May"? As you accurately suggested, Romney is a pretty bland sort of guy, and in fact his most salient feature is that he *regularly* takes positions he doesn't hold in his heart, unless his heart changes as often as Lady Gaga's costumes.
This is seriously problematic because it means that we don't quite know who we're electing. We know to an extent--we know (though few people have pointed out) that Romney is likely to tack leftwards if he wins the nomination, but what happens if he's elected is anyone's guess.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOf course Newt’s a better politician; he’s been a politician and/or a Washington insider for close to half a century. Duh.
I think pundits like Jonah are reading way too much into South Carolina, a heavily evangelical state. It’s kind of a no-brainer that Mitt’s major obstacle was his faith and in the end they weren’t able to vote for a Mormon. Maybe Mormons won’t vote in the general for their chosen person then?
I remember hearing that kind of talk if Obama wasn’t elected into the general that black voters would just sit it out. I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of Mormons, a pretty loyal voting block for the GOP, expresses the same sentiment.
BTW Jonah, why didn’t people in Iowa or New Hampshire vote for your better politician Newt?
Newt did pretty lousy in those first two states. Was Newt’s superior political skill on a yacht somewhere taking a vacation? Why didn’t he summon it? Why go all Michael Moore/OWS attacking free enterprise as looters?
BTW the definition of looting would be more apt to describe what Newt did with Freddie since the money funding that enterprise, that paid him 1.8 million, was from the taxpayers’ not private money. People are hardly looters when people are freely paying them with their own money.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYour premise does not square with reality. Romney was leading in the polls for weeks. Are you telling me that all these people suddenly became religious bigots over night? Or they were always religious bigots who lied to pollsters on the phone but not in exit polls? Please think before you try to impugn the motivations of fellow GOPers.
Today, Romney's popularity in Florida has fallen off by double digits. Did all of those people just discover he is a Mormon?
Jonah's theory is sound- Romney needs to be persuasive and he isn't persuading people. That other politicians have had their ups and downs doesn't take away from the fact that Romney just cannot get people convinced. I've said this in other posts, but the debates hurt Romney bad because his evasive, wishy washy answers played right into his opponents' definition of him as an inauthentic blow-hole. His answer on why he didn't seek re-election was a perfect example. He just couldn't come out and say "Hey, it was a tough state, and things weren't going to go my way. I decided to wait for a better opportunity." Instead he gave self serving pap about calling to duty. Please.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Did all of those people just discover he is a Mormon?"
I don't know if you had the opportunity to catch John Ziegler's 2008 election documentary, but in it, he interviews an obscene amount of people who were voting for Barack Obama, but weren't really sold on his running-mate, Sarah Palin. That's right, people thought Sarah Palin was running with Barack Obama. Those interviews were conducted as people were standing in line to vote.
I'm sure almost all of Romney's vanishing support is based in large part do to the "lemming factor", but I think you might just be surprised how many people in SC found out that Romney was a Mormon just last week.
As Menken said, no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGeez, you Rombots will go to any lengths to avoid looking in a mirror when finding fault...
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