Romney's Challenge: A Penny Loafer for His Thoughts
It's a gloomy, unseasonably cool day in Palo Alto -- the very definition of June Gloom.
As I look west, to a gray sky that will soon deliver cold rain from the Gulf of Alaska, my thoughts turn to . . .
John Kerry's run for the White House.
Here's what I miss about Kerry: though perfectly aware that one of his great political liabilites was the impression of an over-privileged preppie (well, that and a kept man), he did his best to keep reinforcing the negative stereotype.
There was the snowboarding flap in Idaho, the windsurfing photo-op off Nantucket, and looking painfully out of place, as if about to break out in a rash from wearing blaze orange, during a goose-hunting trip in Ohio.
And my favorite: dropping into Pat's King of Steaks in Philadelphia and ordering a steak with swiss cheese, which is sorta like asking a Parisian waiter for a bottle of ketchup to go with your beef bourguignon.
I think of this after watching the recent trail coverage of Mitt Romney and noticing how the press keeps sneaking one little factoid into their dispatches:
Mr. Romney's propensity for wearing loafers.
National Public Radio did so yesterday, during its audio report on Romney's kickoff announcement at a New Hampshire farm. So too did the Washington Post, last week, in following the candidate on the backroads of Iowa. The Boston Globe couldn't resist while reporting on a Romney swing through Navada.
You can read/listen to each of these dispatches and determine if the intent is malicious.
My sense is the press isn't out to ridicule Romney so much as it wants to point out the candidate's effort to fashion himself as something more casual, more comfortable than the 2007-08 verson of Mitt.
When this happens -- the press can't resist reporting on style, at the cost of ignoring substance -- a candidate's in trouble.
It's one reason why I got out of journalism years ago. I was following then-Vice President Quayle on a campaign swing through the Midwest. Those few members of the Washington press corps who had come along for the ride on Air Force Two could not have cared less about Quayle's stump speech. The game was to follow the man until such a time that he committed a gaffe, thus reinforcing the dufus rap. Such was their bias against him.
I fear the same fate awaits Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann should they enter the race. The press will be lying in wait, ready to pounce the moment a slip-up reinforces the media stereotype of the two conservative ladies as certifiably outre.
But no so with Romney. The press doesn't deem him as extremist or frivolous. But it does view the candidate as opportunist and pliant -- in terms of core beliefs, a little light in the loafers.
Which brings us back to the candidate's choice in shoes. For the press, they serve as a convenient metaphor for a gentleman who, in their estimation, is trying too hard to fit in.
It's a problem a pair of Timberlands won't solve. Romney needs to show real fire -- which, to me, begins with firing back at those Republicans who mock him.
And it means deciding who he really is -- the technocratic moderate who showed up this week in New Hampshire trying to position himself toward the middle against big-name conservatives, or the rebranded social conservative who showed up in Michigan in 2007 trying to position himself to the right of big-name moderates?
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Comments :
May '11
Re: Romney's Challenge: A Penny Loafer for His Thoughts
Fred Thompson is still irritated that the press described him as wearing Gucci loafers at the Iowa State Fair when he has never owned any Gucci loafers.
Aug '10
Re: Romney's Challenge: A Penny Loafer for His Thoughts
Bill Whalen:
And my favorite: dropping into Pat's King of Steaks in Philadelphia and ordering a steak with swiss cheese, which is sorta like asking a Parisian waiter for a bottle of ketchup to go with your beef bourguignon.
I'll give him a pass on that one as Cheez Whiz(tm) is just disgusting.
Aug '10
Re: Romney's Challenge: A Penny Loafer for His Thoughts
I feel a game coming on ! Grab that gaffe . Look how they deconstructed macaca, and they started by not being able to spell macaque.
Most rumors, evil thoughts, and snark has a momentum unmatched by other means. What is the saying, a rumor will circle the globe before the truth steps out the door.” ...
Press is circling drain. It's why I'm here.
Mar '11
Re: Romney's Challenge: A Penny Loafer for His Thoughts
They won't dare go near Sarah's shoes. That lady does have taste.
May '10
Re: Romney's Challenge: A Penny Loafer for His Thoughts
Bill Whalen:
And it means deciding who he really is -- the technocratic moderate who showed up this week in New Hampshire trying to position himself toward the middle against big-name conservatives, or the rebranded social conservative who showed up in Michigan in 2007 trying to position himself to the right of big-name moderates? ·
But I think the real problem Bill is that the Republican electorate neither needs nor wants either of those figures. They want someone with core principles and that's the real trouble. Mitt Romney's biggest problem is that his style is a generation too late. He might have triumphed in the primaries over Bob Dole.
Nov '10
Re: Romney's Challenge: A Penny Loafer for His Thoughts
Trace Urdan
Mitt Romney's biggest problem is that his style is a generation too late. He might have triumphed in the primaries over Bob Dole.
I would never describe the "style" of a talented donut maker as too late for anything! And any comparison to Dole is irrelevant; Dole had impressive military credentials, but zero private sector gravitas.