Romney image via Shutterstock Maria Dryfhout / Shutterstock.com

As the 2012 presidential election approaches, a debate has broken out among Democratic-leaning pundits about the wisdom of President Obama’s campaign strategy. Writing in the New York Times, Matt Bai thinks Obama may have made a big mistake by listening to Bill Clinton.

Up until he won the Republican nomination, the Obama campaign appeared set to characterize Mitt Romney, in the immortal words of GOP rival Jon Huntsman Jr., as “well-oiled weathervane” — a political opportunist who would pretend to believe anything in order to win.

Advertisement

If there’s a “hot button” issue on which Romney hasn’t done a complete 180 since his days as a Massachusetts pol, it’s hard to think what it is: abortion, gay rights, immigration reform, and most of all, health care.

You name it, and Mitt’s been on both sides of it. It’s a wonder his campaign posters don’t depict him like the Roman god Janus, with two faces looking in opposite directions.

Advertisement

Clinton supposedly argued otherwise. “The best way to go after Mr. Romney, the former president said, was to publicly grant that he was the ‘severe conservative’ he claimed to be, and then hang that unpopular ideology around his neck.” The thinking was that independent voters might forgive the candidate for sounding like a Republican during Republican debates, “but they would be far more reluctant to vote for him if they thought they were getting the third term of George W. Bush.”

Actually, I quite doubt that Bill Clinton gave such simplistic advice. Regardless, this strategy must have looked particularly wise after Romney’s selection of Rep. Paul Ryan as his running mate. Polled separately, the individual elements of the so-called “Ryan budget” passed last spring by the House Republican majority are terribly unpopular: more tax cuts for the rich, converting Medicare to a voucher program, along with sharp cuts to social safety-net programs like Medicaid, food stamps, Pell grants, etc.

Advertisement

“In recent weeks,” however, Bai continues “starting with the first debate, the challenger has made a brazen and frantic dash to the center, and Mr. Obama has often seemed off-balance, as if stunned that Mr. Romney thinks he can get away with such an obvious change of course so late in the race. Which, apparently, he can.”

Indeed polls showing Obama comfortably in the lead shifted markedly in the challenger’s favor after the first debate. Possibly the president was overconfident, disdainful of Romney’s high-pressure-salesman-like approach, perhaps also disdainful of the TV game show aspect of the debates.

Advertisement

Whatever the reasons, Obama’s phlegmatic, disinterested performance ended up making him appear older, less energetic, and — always important in an American political context, less optimistic than Romney, who at age 65, is actually 14 years his senior.

Awakening to the danger, Obama dominated the next two debates. On the defensive, Romney spent the Long Island town hall debate arguing that his promised 20 percent across-the-board tax cuts won’t really cut taxes, which begs the question of then why bother? He devoted the foreign policy debate to endorsing Obama administration policies on Syria, Iran and Afghanistan that he’d previously condemned. No warmonger, Mitt.

Advertisement

Nevertheless, although state-by-state polls have shown President Obama rebounding and very likely to score an electoral college win, nervous Democrats fear that permanent damage was done. Hence the return of what Obama calls “Romnesia” as a theme, with the president having a big time on the campaign trail mocking his opponent’s multiple positions to laughing audiences of loyal supporters.

“Romnesia’s” definitely funny, but it misses the mark. Mitt’s less a flip-flopper than a particularly shameless opportunist. Writing in The New Republic, Alec MacGillis argues that the whole business of “framing” political opponents can be overdone anyway. “Ninety-nine times out of 100, the line of attack that works best is the one that really rings true.”

Advertisement

A while back I observed, “how anybody purports to know what the GOP candidate actually thinks about any issue other than the size of his own offshore bank accounts beggars my poor imagination.”

But the real point is that it hardly matters what Romney REALLY thinks. His is a Trojan horse candidacy. Obama needs to make that clear in the campaign’s closing days. Make no mistake: elect Moderate Mitt and you get the whole right-wing GOP agenda, Ryan budget and all. Anybody who thinks a President Romney would restrain the Tea Party and stand up to the Bush era neoconservatives on his foreign policy team can’t have been paying attention.

However, there may be good news for Obama in all the bad news. Amid the catastrophic destruction of Hurricane Sandy, Romney’s pronouncement that it’d be a good idea to turn the responsibilities of the Federal Emergency Management Administration over to private enterprise makes him look like a crank — and a heartless one at that.

This time, I doubt Mitt has enough time to talk his way out of it.

Advertisement

Be a part of something bigger

As a reader of the Arkansas Times, you know we’re dedicated to bringing you tough, determined, and feisty journalism that holds the powerful accountable. For 50 years, we've been fighting the good fight in Little Rock and beyond – with your support, we can do even more. By becoming a subscriber or donating as little as $1 to our efforts, you'll not only have access to all of our articles, but you'll also be helping us hire more writers to expand our coverage and continue to bring important stories to light. With over 63,000 Facebook followers, 58,000 Twitter followers, 35,000 Arkansas blog followers, and 70,000 daily email blasts, it's clear that our readers value our great journalism. Join us in the fight for truth.

Previous article Internal poll offers glimmer of hope for Herb Rule in 2nd District Next article White County vote tally to be delayed