Romney's Speech

I believe I've noted before that I like Mitt Romney. Like not just in a typical liberal "I want our guy to run against the Mormon" kind of way. I like him! I think he'd be a better president than John McCain. I voted for him in Massachusetts in 2002. And right now I think he's delivering a pretty damn good speech. Education policy expert Sara Mead says "this isn't a winning message for him" -- too negative -- but it taps into my anti-Beltway rage (anti-Beltway rage only gets worse when you move all the way into the District of Columbia and realize that the country is run by jerks who ride the Orange Line).

That said, I couldn't really get a handle on the feistiness of it. It's hard for me to see any way that he's not dead in the water. Given the number of delegates McCain's been able to wrack up in big winner-take-all states, he seems to me to have a nearly insurmountable lead.

Comments

You sound like a schmuck, Matt. Mitt Romney is a total fraud who has changed every one of his positions over the past few years. He has completely disowned the guy you voted for in Mass!

And he's finished. DOA.

He has won only two states, Utah which he could not lose, and Mass where he was governor.

The idea that you like a guy who thinks we should double Gitmo makes me wanna puke...

The fact that he has no integrity is painfully obvious to voters all over the country.

Jeez....

Posted by TheCarpetMuncher | February 5, 2008 10:51 PM

I thought Romney looked unhinged. I can picture his wife pleading with him not to go on but he won't give up the ghost. I don't buy her outward obedience. It's funny to watch but sometimes i just have to mute the tv because it's so painful to listen to this moron.

Posted by Tiznow | February 5, 2008 10:54 PM

I'm a supporter of his, but it was over in Florida. I thought he stayed in this week so that he could see how things turned out tonight just in the off-chance McCain screwed up big. It didn't happen. Also, I think maybe by staying and gaining more support and winning a few more states, he'll have a better record to run on in 2012.

Posted by Andrew | February 5, 2008 10:54 PM

I've never voted for a Republican. I doubt I ever would.

Posted by Linus | February 5, 2008 10:54 PM

Personally, I don't like Mitt Romney. Have you heard the policy positions he supports and the ones he opposes? His policy positions make him an asshole.

Why would you say you like an asshole?

Posted by The Fool | February 5, 2008 10:55 PM

Hey! I ride the Orange Line, but I don't run the government, I just work for it.

Posted by scott | February 5, 2008 10:55 PM

Terrible speech; Romney is yesterday's news. He's been outshined by even Mike Huckabee tonight, to say nothing of McCain (at least until we figure CA out).

Posted by Alexander | February 5, 2008 10:56 PM

this is the same speech he's given for a month. Only this time he was more rushed, as is he couldn't wait for it to get over. He didn't even wait for his audience to yell THEY HAVEN'T after each of his lines.

Posted by adam | February 5, 2008 10:57 PM

Uh, Romney sounded crazy.
They haven't! What's that about?

Posted by blindjoedeath | February 5, 2008 11:04 PM

Mitt Romney would make a good President in a George H.W. Bush kind of way. He would govern intelligently and responsibly, but I would never agree with his policy priorities.

Furthermore, like Shrub, he has felt the need to prove his manhood to GOP voters and has consequently campaigned irresponsibly. His double Gitmo comment was his, probably more damaging, version of George HW Bush's "Read My Lips No New Taxes" pledge.

Posted by Bob M | February 5, 2008 11:09 PM

Ignore the pans, stick to your ground on stuff like this. I like reading a blogger who's not a 100% party line propagandist and can see differences in the politicians from the other party.

Posted by artappraiser | February 5, 2008 11:19 PM

anti-Beltway rage only gets worse when you move all the way into the District of Columbia and realize that the country is run by jerks who ride the Orange Line

What makes you think these guys even get anywhere near public transportation? The Beltway powers all ride Limos and SUVs.

Posted by PaulW | February 5, 2008 11:27 PM

As a democratic, I must also admit, I like Mitt Romney too!!!

He would have been a great, possibly victorious, candidate for the GOP 10-20 years ago.

But the GOP has backed itself into a corner. While the conservatives love to rally against McCain and Huckabee, they can't stomach the thought of actively supporting Romney.

If your not a Christian evangelical from the south, there's no chance you can be victorious in the GOP for the next 10 years. Romney is too northeast/mormon.

it's all very disgusting.

Posted by thehova | February 5, 2008 11:54 PM

I voted for Specter for senate in 98. Sorry y'all.

Posted by David B. | February 6, 2008 12:25 AM

People on the Left that think Romney's rhetoric of "doubling GITMO" was more unspeakably evil as Obama saying he wanted to "double the coke he snorts" or McCain (seriously) saying he would have America in Iraq for 100 years or say as Huckabee did to the Jerusalem Post that all the Palestinians need to be moved by force to Syria and Egypt because it is clear the Bible didn't give them Israel ....... have to ask themselves something:

Where do they go?

And the 2200 foreign fighter terrorists and the 1800 or so we have in Afghanistan? Many were caught killing Americans, like many of the GITMO detainees, planning to kill foreigners, caught with bombs and torture implements, otherwise committing grave violations of law of war or just two dangerous to let go...Many of their native lands want nothing to do with them or will let them go with a wristslap or less if repatriated to their law enforcement (Yemenis, Sudanese. Lebs, connected Saudis, Indonesians, etc.)At least 4 Americans have been killed by releasees in Afghanistan.

Now, when America had some 400,000 captured enemy combatants in camps here, moved from Nazi or Fascist territory - there was not a single Jewish activist lawyer from the ACLU or Human Rights groups that put in a petition to the court to sue for habeas to get them released or "tried". Or any other Lefty faction. Why was that?

Would the Jews and other activists on the Left have sued if "Mother Communist Russia" had not been assailed and it was then clear that Nazis and Fascist menaced their favorite country with extinction?

Who knows?

But love of enemy rights is recent and the conservative Republicans are on the right side, while Obama, McCain, and Hillary! and their fellow enemy rights supporters are in a good pickle if they follow through and close down the facilities that hold thousands of hardcore terrorists.

Posted by chris ford | February 6, 2008 12:25 AM

Wasn't Matt's take on Romney that his policy positions were pretty much lies? Or such extreme pandering that it amounts to the same thing.

Posted by AlanC9 | February 6, 2008 12:35 AM

A good speech? Are you serious? It was a half-assed collection of non-sequitor cliches that amounted to a "I'm happy just to be playing!"

Posted by Nathan | February 6, 2008 12:42 AM

Hey, Chris Ford, you fascist, anti-Semitic, un-American SOB, how about a traditional American solution to the captured "terrorists"? If they were caught actually committing crimes against Americans (and I don't doubt some were, though some large number--possibly a majority--were merely in the wrong place at the wrong time or turned in for a bounty) how about (I know this is anathema to you) trying them in civil courts, or even in military courts that are governed by the UCMJ or a reasonable version thereof? Amazing how the Republicans have, in well under a decade, transformed the US from a beacon of liberty to the land of torture, secret indefinite detentions, and the star chamber.

Oh, and on the original point of this thread--Matt, as someone mentioned above, you sound like a fool. Or like Peter Beinart and other liberal hawks trying to justify their support of Iraq (you voted for Mitt for Mass governor). Romney is a transparently unprincipled fraud whose only lodestar is personal ambition. Although you seem to cling to your belief that, if elected, he would govern as the secret technocratic moderate you think he is, it is far more likely he would govern as the wingnut he is campaigning as, since he would need Republican political support, And you like him?

Posted by Marlowe | February 6, 2008 12:48 AM

I can see that whether you like Romney mainly seems to depend on whether his ultra-pandering campaign is insulting to you or whether it doesn't much matter to you. If it doesn't matter to you it's very easy to be impressed with the guy. He's smart, decent and competent (no, I don't think that a phony campaign means you have no decency or integrity). Unlike McCain and Bush Romney is the kind of person who thinks before he does things.

However. Myself, I'm not a Republican, but unlike Matt, the idea that Romney thinks so little of what appeals to the GOP voter (nativism, red meat on Gitmo, etc.) doesn't make him more appealing to me at all. He acts like campaigns are just about "marketing", just a joke. Even liberals should admit that Mitt's downfall is largely a result of underestimating the intelligence and decency of Republicans. He should have run as himself, and trusted the voters to buy it.

Posted by Colatina | February 6, 2008 1:12 AM

That's great that Matt can reach across the aisle to see the good in a Republican candidate but Romney is a caricature, a panderer of epic proportion and the most plastic guy in the campaigns. If that is to be liked Matt needs to look in the mirror. His "I wasn't in the military, but I wish I would have been" line from the Reagan library debates and today, his "I believe I contributed to Bob Dole's campaign. But if I didn't I should have!!" lines are truly pathetic. Get off your knees and stop trying to kiss the a** of every member of the base and talk radio. Be who you are, whoever that might be at this stage. The man has been downright pathetic in his pandering. And if he is the candidate that appeals the most to the lunatic fringe? Really, Matt, what are you listening to?

Posted by PaulE | February 6, 2008 1:39 AM

Mitt Romney has been creamed by the MSM. He's the smartest and most competent candidate, although I could pull the lever for Obama just on sheer charismatic skills. They're the only two decent candidates in the race---sadly, they may not even get Veep nods.

Posted by daveinboca | February 6, 2008 1:42 AM

I seem to remember a post by Glenn Greenwald quoated a reporter (Jim Risen) what asked all the candidates about GW's dictatorial approiation of power via patriot acts etc and Romney responded with the most dictariol inclinations of all including most/all democrats and republicans. How is it that you be aware of such a post and actually vote for romney? Seems out there to me. Who in the USA really wants to replace democracy with a dictatorship?

Do you see that?

Michael Canfield

Posted by mickster | February 6, 2008 1:45 AM

"The fact that he has no integrity is painfully obvious to voters all over the country."

Yeah, but remember - Matt is a wannabe pundit. That means he has no integrity either, so Romney is clearly his Main Man.

Once Matt gets offers to start seriously selling out, watch him pander for Hillary Clinton or even Jeb Bush! He won't be sitting at a table with Ross Douthat, he'll be sitting with Bill Kristol - and agreeing with him!

He'll be up there with Anne-Marie Slaughter as a "Truman liberal"! Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran!

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | February 6, 2008 2:07 AM

Mr. Yglesias:

What credentials does a "policy expert" need to have to be called so? And for non-beltway insiders, what is the Orange Line?

What is it about Romney that causes you to think he would be a better president than McCain? From what I have read (Glenn Greenwald specifically) his answers to question submitted by a reporter named James Riser seems to position him as the best suited to be a fascist dictator if elected. Which is pretty ominous given the authoritarian types now running the federal government. Can you be serious about your assertion? I am thinking you are supposed to be pretty smart but this post seems to position you to be pretty stupid? Is it possible that becoming an Atlantic blogger has sucked you irretrievably into the black hole that is the the beltway. For shame if true?

Please rsvp

Best Regards,

Michael Canfield

Posted by mickster | February 6, 2008 3:07 AM

"Please rsvp"

You must be new here.

Matt ignores virtually all posts. Once in a blue moon, he'll respond if he's done something HE thinks is really stupid (which isn't much, smug college kid that he is.)

And the Atlantic didn't "suck him in to the Beltway" - this is always where he wanted to be. Like I said above, in ten or fifteen years he'll be hobnobbing with Bill Kristol and recommending we attack China next week because it's in our "national interests" - meaning Rupert Murdoch paid him to say that.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | February 6, 2008 4:04 AM

I think Richard Steven Hack has it exactly right. Most of the prominent progressive bloggers (except, I think, Josh Marshall, who began as a more traditional print journalist) got into blogging as a sideline because of their passion for politics in one form or another. In contrast, Matt saw this as a career from the start (he probably has more passion for basketball than politics) and I don't think he has ever done a day's work except tap at his keyboard (and, unlike Marshall, I don't beleieve he has ever done anything that came anywhere near real reporting). He's a little pischer on the make (FOX anyone?)--think Richard Dreyfuss in The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, except a whole lot smugger,

Posted by Marlowe | February 6, 2008 4:20 AM

As has been mentioned before: Double Gitmo?!

Sometimes you make it really hard for people to like or even just stick by you, Matt.

Posted by novakant | February 6, 2008 5:09 AM

Wow, you people are batshit crazy ridiculous. LEAVE MATTHEW ALONE! Why are you impugning the guy's motives? He says one nice thing about a Republican and you people flip your shit. Deep breath, libtards.

Posted by Derrick | February 6, 2008 6:04 AM

LEAVE MATTHEW ALONE!

I'd pay good money to see this sentiment expressed in a tearful YouTube video. Maybe in the aftermath of Matthew's involuntary mental hospitalization, or in the midst of his divorce from a gold-digging back-up dancer, or after the paparazzi catch him--yet again--going clubbing without any underwear on.

Posted by JB | February 6, 2008 7:30 AM

He says one nice thing about a Republican and you people flip your shit. Deep breath, libtards.

You know, in normal times in a normal country you might have a point regarding bipartisanship, seeing both sides of the issue and so on. But I hate to break it to you - the US has gone BATSHIT CRAZY:

You have a candidate that wants to amend the constitution to reflect the teachings of the Bible.

You have a candidate that thinks "Bomb-bomb-bomb Iran" is funny, not to speak of the people who find it funny. And he wouldn't mind to staying in Iraq for 100 years.

You have a candidate who wants to Double Gitmo.

And on the supposedly "progressive" side of the aisle you have a candidate who is for the unrestricted use of CLUSTER BOMBS, or is at least not daring enough to support a rather timid amendment restricting their use out of fear that she would be regarded as soft on defense or something.

Posted by novakant | February 6, 2008 7:55 AM

Matt and Mitt have at least one thing in common - they both hate Massachusetts.

Posted by vanya | February 6, 2008 9:39 AM

I'd pay good money to see this sentiment expressed in a tearful YouTube video. Maybe in the aftermath of Matthew's involuntary mental hospitalization, or in the midst of his divorce from a gold-digging back-up dancer, or after the paparazzi catch him--yet again--going clubbing without any underwear on.

I just want to see him get backup dancers!

Posted by JK | February 6, 2008 10:29 AM

Romney is puzzling to me because he is so deeply and utterly unlikeable. Or in another dimension of likeableness - that dimension in which one has to make emotional decisions about robots and androids. For he does seem very much like an android - a completely plastic man. How unlikeable do you have to be to be rich, multi-aggressive, a suck up to conservatives, and still be disliked by Republicans?

Yet he was elected governor of Massachussetts, which means that he did overcome the hurdle of his visceral unlikeableness. Somehow, though, he forgot all the lessons that he brought to winning in Mass. Though it was merely symbolic, the dog story was, to my mind, Romney's campaign in a nutshell. It first made it into the press because, incredibly, Romney or someone around him thought it was heartwarming family fare: putting a dog atop one's car for a nice, roasty eight hour trip. And the dog shits over everything, so you - you stop the car, take a hose, and drench it. Wow! The encounter between Chris Wallace and Romney talking about Seamus should be studied by every politician who wants to know exactly how NOT to appear on tv. It made me wonder whether Romney was raised by humans, or had learned about them in some book.

It is a comment on how captive the Republicans are now to the loony tunes that Romney's strategy was apparently to double his rhetorical bets. He couldn't just say he didn't think Gitmo was a mistake - he'd double it! He didn't think McCain was wrong about spending the next century in Iraq - he never ever thought there should ever be a time limit on our commitment to Iraq! Etc. If you appear android like on tv, you shouldn't appear as a whacked out android. The american public could get used to Spock, but not Spock imitating Michael Savage. In the ruins of the Bush era, the Republicans have a problem that the press used to say the Dems had - they have to pander to a very very niche audience. That the rightwingers have trouble with McCain, of all people, shows how far down the GOP has gone.

Posted by roger | February 6, 2008 10:40 AM

"What credentials does a "policy expert" need to have to be called so?"

In the case of Sara Mead, she is Matt's girlfriend.

Posted by Juan | February 6, 2008 10:43 AM

"He has won only two states, Utah which he could not lose, and Mass where he was governor."

Actually, Romney won 7 states last night: AK, CO, MA, MN, MT, ND, UT, and he's winning the ME caucus. McCain still has him lapped on delegates, but much of that is from independents and Democrats voting for him in open primaries. Having to split the anti-McCain vote with Huckster and Paul isn't helping either.

Posted by Fred | February 6, 2008 10:54 AM

As a lot of people here seem to be wondering, Matt, how can you say you like Romney, when he has so thoroughly disowned many of his previous positions. Doesn't that make you loose your respect for him? Please answer.

Posted by evan500 | February 6, 2008 12:11 PM

Hey! I ride the Orange Line too, and I'll defend to the death my right to stand in the doorways and block up the hall.

Posted by Ygor | February 6, 2008 2:19 PM

Hey! I ride the Orange Line too, and I'll defend to the death my right to stand in the doorways and block up the hall.

Posted by Ygor | February 6, 2008 2:20 PM

And for non-beltway insiders, what is the Orange Line?

The orange line is one of the lines of the Washington Metrorail (the others are Blue, Yellow, Green, and Red). The Orange line runs roughly east to west from Near Fairfax, VA, through DC, to New Carrolton, MD.

anti-Beltway rage only gets worse when you move all the way into the District of Columbia and realize that the country is run by jerks who ride the Orange Line

I've only ever encountered the truly dickish on the Red line going towards Medical Center and sometimes on the Blue line in Springfield...

Posted by Gozer | February 6, 2008 11:05 PM

"'What credentials does a "policy expert" need to have to be called so?'"

"In the case of Sara Mead, she is Matt's girlfriend."

Since Matt probably won't, I'll say it. Try clicking the @#$%^& link. Being the resident ed guru at New America Foundation seems credential enough, but she's developed a pretty good resume.

Posted by David | February 7, 2008 6:26 PM