Krugman on “The Internal Contradictions of Mitt Romney”

And by “internal”, I mean in the same paragraph:

“This week, President Obama will release a budget that won’t take any meaningful steps toward solving our entitlement crisis,” Romney said in a statement e-mailed to reporters. “The president has failed to offer a single serious idea to save Social Security and is the only president in modern history to cut Medicare benefits for seniors”.

HT Paul Krugman

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Stephen Hill
Stephen Hill
12 years ago

Maybe Romney should say he’ll stop the boats, I think it was Herman Cain who promised a moat with alligators to stop the border crossings. All is well in the Republican of Fredonia.

Heard David Frum on CNN, he said the Ryan plan and all the talk about contraceptives being covered by health insurance are both albatrosses around Romney’s neck, pointing out he has taken a big dive in his support from independents. Seems there is no room for a liberal Republican anymore, John Dewey, Wendell Wilkie, Ike, even Richard Nixon, they wouldn’t get out of the primary these days.

Dan
Dan
12 years ago

I’m inclined to agree, but maybe they would, on the grounds of not being as on-the-nose as Romney (hey, at least Nixon wasn’t a Mormon) as far as the GOP base is concerned, and their relative moderation (apparently a bad thing) offset by their electability.

Stephen Hill
Stephen Hill
12 years ago

Nixon ironically defeated Romney’s father, George Romney for the GOP nomination. Romney’s father had a similar ability for poor choice of words. He was leading Nixon – but his comments on Vietnam that he had “been brainwashed by the generals” (trying to position himself as the anti-Vietnam candidate) led to a big drop in his support in the primaries.

Peter Mariani
Peter Mariani
12 years ago

The point here is possibly that most politicians via their numerous speech writers, spin doctors and chorus line of “putters-of-words-in-mouth” no longer own or perhaps even care about their own words. The concern is more about how the words will be perceived, seen etc in the place they are spoken, by the crowd or the audience they are spoken too. The consistency, sense or truth of the words has become secondary. Hence “turning back the boats” is ok when we say to do it but not the same when somebody else suggests it much as is cutting back the spending on Social Security is fine when I suggest it but not fine when somebody else does it to a group who have a face and vote namely seniors. Perhaps what this shows is how similar politicians are so much so that all that left to split is “hairs” (or should I say words)…

jtfsoon
jtfsoon
12 years ago

Romney is a moderate who is merely taking Nixon’s advice that you ‘Run like hell to the right in the primaries, then run like hell to the center’.

True though that even Nixon would not be acceptable today. The man was a progressive by today’s standards – he set up the EPA and new civil rights agencies, promoted Native American self determination and ended conscription.

JB Cairns
JB Cairns
12 years ago

Jason has a point however his problem is how people in the republican party will wear a move to the centre?

I am looking forward to when he talks about how his health policy ( originally thought up by Heritage types) differs from Obamas.

What was right wing and sensible is now leftwing.

Heritage was obviously manned by manchurian candidates.

Dan
Dan
12 years ago

The health policy is in large part identical insofar as it mandates that people take out private insurance, then offers a subsidy; closer to Switzerland than to Canada. However, the ticking bomb buried in the ObamaCare legislation is the bit that says that from a certain date, 85% (IIRC) of revenues have to flow through to services. That’s why the US health insurance industry has astroturfed the issue – because the legislation aims to unstack the deck.

paul walter
paul walter
12 years ago

Romney is an ideas free zone, firmly rooted in a fairy tale life exempt from most facets of the human condition and experience.A waxworks dummy who is a good example of how out of touch and inward looking the US oligarchy actually is, apart from dodging tax and finding new ways for the socialisation of private debt.

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