Meanwhile, Mitt Still Can’t Win
October 31, 2011 / 5:39 pm • By Dr. Melissa Clouthier
In all of the Herman Cain hub-bub, George Will’s very thoughtful (and obvious) point that Mitt Romney can’t win the nomination gets lost.
For those who missed it, here’s what George Will said:
Romney, supposedly the Republican most electable next November, is a recidivist reviser of his principles who is not only becoming less electable; he might damage GOP chances of capturing the Senate. Republican successes down the ticket will depend on the energies of the Tea Party and other conservatives, who will be deflated by a nominee whose blurry profile in caution communicates only calculated trimming.
Republicans may have found their Michael Dukakis, a technocratic Massachusetts governor who takes his bearings from “data” (although there is precious little to support Romney’s idea that in-state college tuition for children of illegal immigrants is a powerful magnet for such immigrants) and who believes elections should be about (in Dukakis’s words) “competence,” not “ideology.” But what would President Romney competently do when not pondering ethanol subsidies that he forthrightly says should stop sometime before “forever”? Has conservatism come so far, surmounting so many obstacles, to settle, at a moment of economic crisis, for this?
No one wants to talk about this little detail.
Romney will do fine with some independents but 75% of his own party does not like him. This matters. This matters for volunteers, ground game and enthusiasm.
Anyway, I said this a month ago and I say it again, Mitt is a problematic candidate for Republicans and a dream for Democrats.
