2012 Election, American Presidents, Minnick, Obama, Pete Seeger, Reapportionment, Romney, Truman

Mitt’s Real Problem

It’s Not Etch-a-Sketch, But Something More Serious

Typically in politics the most painful wounds are self-inflicted. Candidates shoot themselves in the foot and hobble around for days trying to change the subject, while the political media, the opposition and YouTube repeat the gaffe over and over again.

Rick Santorum had his shoot the foot moment with ill-considered remarks on college and contraception. Newt Gingrich went into the high weeds with his colony on the moon moment. Barack Obama had his “cling to God and guns” diversion in 2008. GOP front runner – and I say again, almost certain nominee – Mitt Romney’s gaffes have been so numerous it can be difficult to keep them straight. He likes to fire people, the wife has two (2) Cadillacs, he isn’t a NASCAR fan, but knows rich guys who own racing teams, etc.

Romney has a strange – and I’m sure to him mind boggling – ability to step on his own good news. He won the Florida primary and then had the CEO moment that resulted in the “firing people” language. He buried Santorum in Illinois, got the coveted endorsement of Jeb Bush and then one of his top people suggested that for the coming general election campaign Romney would just hit the reset button, shake the Etch-a-Sketch and present himself as a more acceptable candidate to moderates and independents. Ouch.

All of this is embarrassing and does reinforce the by now well established notion that Romney is a shape shifting, out of touch Richie Rich.

But here’s a novel theory for the real problem Romney faces as he finally wraps the GOP nomination with a ribbon and it’s not Etch-a-Sketch. Romney lacks a compelling rationale for his candidacy against an incumbent president. Let me explain.

Back last summer when Romney announced his candidacy it looked to the world – at least the political world – that not being Barack Obama and having a business heavy resume would be more than adequate against an unpopular president burdened by a high unemployment rate. Now, nearing the end of a bruising primary campaign it has become much more obvious that Romney’s calculation last July is faulty. Romney needs a program, a plan for the country, neither of which he has provided in any detail so far. What Romney has offered – a resume and a I’m not the other guy message – is not enough to excite either the GOP base or appeal to the Etch-a-Sketch-prone moderates.

Some might consider it an old school notion, but a candidate for president or the school board simply needs more than a resume. A friend of mine put it well, when the Obama troops really start unraveling Romney’s resume this fall he’ll find he has no rationale for his candidacy.

You can almost hear Romney’s campaign brain trust arguing to the candidate that he needs to present himself as the anti-Obama, the experienced business guy facing off against the community organizer turned law professor. In fact, Romney used that approach in his most recent election night speech. But the trouble is that its all resume and no policy.

Romney does have stump speech talking points about cutting government and taxes and repealing the health insurance reform, but his speeches sound more like cable news talking points than a program. The presumptive GOP nominee is playing the political equivalent of former North Carolina basketball coach Dean Smith’s four corner offense. He’s trying to run out the clock by doing nothing flashy, risky or interesting. Romney is holding the ball when he should be launching a few from beyond the three-point line.

Whether he knows it or not, Mitt Romney, and the people giving him bad advice, have adopted the same basic strategy that the Republican candidate in 1948 adopted against Harry Truman. In that election, a northeastern (dare I say it – moderate) governor ran on his resume. Thomas E. Dewey, a rather stiff, formal, but very intelligent man, calculated that he would take no risk, propose no real policy or program and beat Truman by just not being Truman.

That strategy helps explain why you’ve never studied about or read a book on first term of that great Republican President Thomas E. Dewey.

As the candidate weathers the Etch-a-Sketch moment, there is a little good news for the U.S. economy. Etch-a-Sketch sales have soared. Amazon lists the red plastic game as its biggest “mover and shaker” selling for $13.44. Romney ought to visit the Etch-a-Sketch plant in Ohio, a swing state, and announce a new initiative to return American toy manufacturing to world prominence. Really. This guy needs some policy to go with his resume.