Eugene Robinson: The Danger of Mitt Being Mitt

[babylonsister]

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_danger_of_mitt_being_mitt_20120301/

The Danger of Mitt Being Mitt

Posted on Mar 1, 2012

By Eugene Robinson

snip//

Romney has been running for president for the better part of a decade, yet still hasn’t made a personal connection with the Republican base, let alone the wider electorate. The conventional advice, at this point, would be: Quit pretending. Don’t try to convince voters you’re a red-meat social conservative when your record on social issues screams “moderate.” And please, don’t pretend to be Average Joe if your proof of identity is that you keep American-made luxury cars at two of your mansions.

Romney took this kind of I-am-who-I-am stand earlier this week when he said that while “it’s very easy to excite the base with incendiary comments,” he was “not willing to light my hair on fire to try and get support.” He even joked later about his immaculate coif, saying that “it would be a big fire, I assure you.”

That was charmingly authentic. The problem is that the effect of Romney’s comment is to dismiss the Republican Party’s activist base as an unsophisticated rabble. Which is perhaps not the best attitude for a Republican candidate to display.

Romney’s “gaffes” look unmistakably like glimpses of the real Romney—not a bad person, but a man with no ability to see beyond the small, cosseted world of private equity and great wealth that he inhabits. He has to be reminded that most voters live in a world where people drive their Cadillacs one at a time.

From the Romney campaign’s point of view, it may be that while fake authenticity is bad, real authenticity is much worse. If I were an adviser, I’d send out a memo to all hands: Whatever you do, don’t let Mitt be Mitt.