Matinee Mitt

ONE evening two summers ago, as the sun set and darkness spread over Lake Winnipesaukee, Mitt Romney noticed the lights from a boat drifting by. The governor of Massachusetts was vacationing at his home in New Hampshire. Suddenly, he heard screams coming from the water. Romney rushed to the shoreline, where one of his grown sons was squinting into the distance. “I think something’s going on out there,” he told his father. They hopped on WaveRunners and zipped to the scene of a sinking. “About a quarter of a mile out, we found maybe half a dozen people treading water,” says Romney. The governor ferried them in, two by two. When the story hit the Boston papers, Democrats jeered. “Mitt Romney only chooses to run for office from Massachusetts-he doesn’t vacation here,” grumbled a spokeswoman for the state party. Apparently the official position of Massachusetts Democrats is to oppose water rescues.

Whatever the case, the incident highlighted a brutal fact about Romney’s governorship: The man simply can’t catch a break from Democrats, who occupy virtually every statewide office except his own and control roughly 85 percent of the Massachusetts legislature. They have made his tenure in this bluest of blue states a frustrating one, but one that nevertheless has attracted the attention of Republicans thinking about 2008. Romney is clearly interested in running for president. He won’t say so, but Mike Murphy, a senior adviser to the governor, admits that Romney is “testing the waters.” Looking ahead, the question is no longer whether Romney can catch a break from Democrats, but whether he can catch one from conservatives who possess an instinctive wariness of anything emanating from the land of Kennedy, Dukakis, and Kerry. Their skepticism is well warranted-but Romney also deserves a fair hearing from them as they search for a successor to President Bush. They may come to like the guy.

About the Author

John J. Miller

John J. Miller, a former national correspondent for National Review, is the director of the Dow Journalism Program at Hillsdale College. He is the author of A Gift of Freedom: How the John M. Olin Foundation Changed America.

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Mitt Romney

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ONE evening two summers ago, as the sun set and darkness spread over Lake Winnipesaukee, Mitt Romney noticed the lights from a boat drifting by. The governor of Massachusetts was vacationing at his home in New Hampshire. Suddenly, he heard screams coming from the water. Romney rushed to the shoreline, where one of his grown sons was squinting into the distance. “I think something’s going on out there,” he told his father. They hopped on WaveRunners and zipped to the scene of a sinking. “About a quarter of a mile out, we found maybe half a dozen people treading water,” says Romney. The governor ferried them in, two by two. When the story hit the Boston papers, Democrats jeered. “Mitt Romney only chooses to run for office from Massachusetts-he doesn’t vacation here,” grumbled a spokeswoman for the state party. Apparently the official position of Massachusetts Democrats is to oppose water rescues.

Whatever the case, the incident highlighted a brutal fact about Romney’s governorship: The man simply can’t catch a break from Democrats, who occupy virtually every statewide office except his own and control roughly 85 percent of the Massachusetts legislature. They have made his tenure in this bluest of blue states a frustrating one, but one that nevertheless has attracted the attention of Republicans thinking about 2008. Romney is clearly interested in running for president. He won’t say so, but Mike Murphy, a senior adviser to the governor, admits that Romney is “testing the waters.” Looking ahead, the question is no longer whether Romney can catch a break from Democrats, but whether he can catch one from conservatives who possess an instinctive wariness of anything emanating from the land of Kennedy, Dukakis, and Kerry. Their skepticism is well warranted-but Romney also deserves a fair hearing from them as they search for a successor to President Bush. They may come to like the guy.

About the Author

John J. Miller

John J. Miller, a former national correspondent for National Review, is the director of the Dow Journalism Program at Hillsdale College. He is the author of A Gift of Freedom: How the John M. Olin Foundation Changed America.