Wednesday, November 14, 2012

THE REAL ROMNEY? OR HIS NEXT MASK?

My first reaction to this was: Screw all of you who said we saw the real Romney in the debates, and he was a moderate. This is the real Romney -- the same guy who made the "47%" video.

Or is this just another Romney act? I'll explain below:
... In a conference call on Wednesday afternoon with his national finance committee, Mr. Romney said that the president had followed the "old playbook" of wooing specific interest groups -- "especially the African-American community, the Hispanic community and young people," Mr. Romney explained -- with targeted gifts and initiatives....

"With regards to the young people, for instance, a forgiveness of college loan interest, was a big gift," he said. "Free contraceptives were very big with young college-aged women. And then, finally, Obamacare also made a difference for them, because as you know, anybody now 26 years of age and younger was now going to be part of their parents' plan, and that was a big gift to young people. They turned out in large numbers, a larger share in this election even than in 2008."

The president's health care plan, he added, was also a useful tool in mobilizing African-American and Hispanic voters....

"You can imagine for somebody making $25,000 or $30,000 or $35,000 a year, being told you're now going to get free health care, particularly if you don't have it, getting free health care worth, what, $10,000 per family, in perpetuity, I mean, this is huge," he said. "Likewise with Hispanic voters, free health care was a big plus. But in addition with regards to Hispanic voters, the amnesty for children of illegals, the so-called Dream Act kids, was a huge plus for that voting group." ...
Is this the real Romney? It probably is -- Romney labors under the delusion that he's a self-made man who derived no benefits from his father's wealth.

But I think it's also possible that Romney is just doing what he always does: recalibrating his pronouncements about the state of the nation in order to curry favor with the people he needs to impress to get where he wants to go. In seeking and holding public office in Massachusetts, he became somewhat liberal. When he wanted to run for the Republican presidential nomination, he whipsawed to the right. He took a while Etch A Sketching his primary positions once he was running in the general election -- apparently he was afraid he'd alienate the billionaire wingnuts whose money he was still begging for -- but he eventually recast himself as a centrist.

And now this. Could he just be saying it in the hope that right-leaning corporate moguls will offer him more slots on more corporate boards, or that he'll get a Murdoch commenting gig, or a better book deal from a right-wing imprint?

However real or fake this version of Romney is, the contempt he's expressing for people who don't have a soft life like his puts him up there with the Limbaughs and Gingriches. I don't know which would be more contemptible: really being this guy while pretending not to be throughout the campaign, or faking it now in an after-the-fact attempt to win wingnut love.

But you know what's going to be fun? Hearing the righties tell us that if Romney had talked like this during the campaign, he'd have won the election. Don't laugh -- they really will say that.

8 comments:

Unknown said...

"With regards to the young people, for instance, a forgiveness of college loan interest, was a big gift," he said. "Free contraceptives were very big with young college-aged women. And then, finally, Obamacare also made a difference for them, because as you know, anybody now 26 years of age and younger was now going to be part of their parents' plan, and that was a big gift to young people. They turned out in large numbers, a larger share in this election even than in 2008."

So? Welcome to our Democracy.

Ten Bears said...

As I have observed before, I doubt rMoney was ever serious about the presidency. Ultimately the campaign succeeded in mainstreaming, in removing the "cult" status, the Mormon church, making it as "acceptable" as being Methodist, or Episcopalian. I think that was the whole point and we won't be seeing anymore of this bozo in the secular sector. It will, however, be interesting to watch his trajectory within the church hierarchy.

He wasn't running for President, he was running for Pope (pope, prophet, wtf-ever, they all bow down to the same damned dog).

H.K. Anders said...

Could he just be saying it in the hope that right-leaning corporate moguls will offer him more slots on more corporate boards, or that he'll get a Murdoch commenting gig, or a better book deal from a right-wing imprint?

No. Romney has a fortune of a quarter of a billion dollars. He doesn't need a book deal or a TV gig or a position on a corporate board.

He is not pretending right now. He really is a contemptuous and contemptible snob.

Victor said...

This is the real Romney.

The only people entitled to free stuff, are the rich.

Everyone else needs to pay.

Nefer said...

"Could he just be saying it in the hope that right-leaning corporate moguls will offer him more slots on more corporate boards, or that he'll get a Murdoch commenting gig, or a better book deal from a right-wing imprint?"

I think he is just throwing a tantrum. None of those positions equate to winning the White House.

He lost, he lost, he lost, all the money in the world didn't matter, he didn't get what he wanted and therefore was entitled to, and now it's wah, wah, wah, everybody else's fault, especially those lesser people thinking they were as good as him and thinking they actually had a say in the election! After all, hadn't Queen Ann herself told us that we had all we were going to get from them (and so we should essentially just shut up and stop interfering in her and Mitt's plans)?

Now drum your heels on the floor, Mitty, and maybe someone will call you a whambulance of your very own.

Matthew Russo said...

It's the real face of the majority of U.S. capitalist class. Romney's simply maintaining his particular class ties.

BH said...

I agree with what I take to be the consensus of comments: Mitty's non-mea-culpa is as close to whatever real thinking he does as we'll get. Using policy to buy the support of moneybags is just fine since the moneybags are his kind of people & the repositories of all that is good, true & productive; using policy to buy the support of non-moneybags is nasty since they're not his kind of people & are moral and economic bankrupts.

squatlo said...

This is what Thurston Howell III would look like if he and his billionaire buddies were real, and unable to buy the presidency despite voter suppression tactics that would have made Strom Thurmond proud.

He's no more delusional now than he was prior to the election, just less willing to accept defeat.