Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Mitts gonna Mitt
Mitt Romney started the year off with a Washington Post hit piece on the president, with this headline:
Mitt Romney: The president shapes the public character of the nation. Trump’s character falls short.
Even Trump-haters are noticing how this isn’t going the way he hoped:
Yet, completely predictable.
This is the standard that has been set by many on the left/media (furthered by a small set of grifters/unhinged cultists pretending to be on the right): conservatives must abandon all positions and principles for their criticism of Trump to count. https://t.co/RiMhrn53QD
— (((AG))) (@AG_Conservative) January 2, 2019
Romney’s op-ed earned praise from Morning Joe and Jeff Flake, and a tiny sliver of the tiny sliver that is NeverTrump.
It also earned the wrath, mockery and scorn of most of the left and right.
I know on a voting level what matters most is R or D.
But on a public discussion level, losing Orrin Hatch’s seat to Mitt hurts more than losing Flake’s seat to Sinema.
We trusted Romney with the 2012 nomination; admittedly because there were no good candidates. We voted for him in the general and Romney failed to win the election, and stuck us with four more lousy years of President Obama.
Romney should spend more time working humbly to reverse the damage he’s done, and less time grandstanding against the man who succeeded where he failed.
Published in Politics
Nonetheless, I also rolled my eyes when I saw this headline and read the oped, which was essentially a rehash of the same oped we’ve now read 100,000 times in the last two years. I’m actually delighted that a Senator is willing to actively stake a position which is completely independent of Trump – that’s what the legislature is for, after all – but Romney should do so by taking legislative initiatives, not just firing an unprovoked shot across Trump’s bow by copy/pasting a generic Mona Charen article.
But here’s my question to the people in this thread who are incensed at Romney: do you not agree that he’s the choice of the voters of Utah? After all, he won his election by a much greater margin than Trump won Utah. He doubled the number of votes his Democrat challenger received. It seems to me that Utahans have clearly shown that they like Romney more than Trump, despite (or because of?) the fact that Romney has been an unabashed Trump critic from day one.
So do you all think that Utah conservatives should just go pound sand, or what?
They’re small in number but they’re quite relevant because of the platform our opponents give them. They’re our Hanoi Jane.
Yes, I should engage more and mock less. Not as much fun though.
Here’s the thing. The President isn’t just a policy machine, he’s also the head of state. He’s the prime minister and the queen in one job.
“It’s Morning in America Again” wasn’t just about policy choices, it was cultural too. Contrast that with Carter’s malaise speech. The President sets the tone of our national politics in a lot of ways.
So… they’re traitors?
They’re people who our opponents use to show how evil we are. Not traitors. Hanoi Jane didn’t give up any military secrets or anything, she was just a prop, a useful idiot.
Maybe I should stop.
I’m being hyperbolic. They’re not Hanoi Jane.
Except that those opponents laugh at NeverTrumpers just as much as they criticize Trump supporters.
Have you actually read or heard anything that liberal outlets say about NeverTrumpers? It’s almost always about how feckless, out-of-touch, or equally complicit they are. For example, there have been numerous articles in magazines like the Atlantic or New Republic which argue that since NeverTrumpers support many of Trump’s policies (like judges and tax cuts), that they’re essentially just NTINOs who are faking their opposition to Trump in order to be invited onto MSNBC.
When TWS got canned, there were a string of articles from the left essentially saying that “yes, it’s sad that an anti-Trump voice on the right is being squelched, but don’t forget that these were the bagel-scarfing war mongers who brought us the Iraq quagmire”.
And of course, there are the endless left-wing criticisms of NeverTrumpers that if they really opposed Trump, they should start actively supporting Democrats – and that their inability to do so shows how spineless they really are.
So the reality is not that the left-wing media gives NeverTrumpers a platform to make the rest of the right look bad. They give NeverTrumpers a platform so that they can then say “see? Everyone to the right of us is an idiot, just each in their own special way”.
Yes, they do.
As I wrote
Yes, the left uses NeverTrumpers to mock all of us, including them.
Shrug. He has already red carded himself from humanity so…. he can go [redacted] himself.
This thread highlights my difficulty the past couple of years. I absolutely agree with Gil’s main point that criticism has gone way too far and isn’t constructive. I simply don’t see the point in an op-ed like this, especially at a time when both sides are trying to leverage the government shutdown. Why cause the president to be even more embattled than he already is? I think back to when 41 was on Firing Line when he was RNC Chairman. It was shortly before the Watergate tapes were ordered to be released. He certainly could have jumped ship at that point. He didn’t. He chose against “piling on” any more than what everyone else was already doing (I wonder if Gil uses that specific phrase intentionally). It was an honorable showing , in my opinion. I’d personally prefer a more unified party with people who have a whole lot more humility. I’m not seeing much humility from either wing.
With all that said, I’m a big fan of Mitt Romney. I wrote this post back in March: https://www.facebook.com/chrishutch13/posts/10154687667092946.
In it I said, “I believe we missed out on a great president by not supporting Mitt Romney more enthusiastically.” I believe he would have been one of our best presidents. It also brings up another point. I remember leading up to the 2012 election. I was incredibly disappointed that I was having to defend Romney just as much to fellow Republicans as I was to Democrats. Literally dozens of my friends on the Right told me they would never vote for Romney. Many of us complain about the Never Trump crowd now but the MAGA/Tea Party wing was cutting their nose to spite their face back then.
I also wrote this in that post, “Mr. Mitchell doesn’t seem to leave any middle ground in my party for someone like me.” I am no closer today to knowing where I fit in today’s Republican Party as I was then. All I know is that we seem to argue more amongst ourselves than debate the Left and promote Conservative ideas. I’m not happy with the op-ed. I’ve already had a friend send it to me with a message about even my guy not liking President Trump.
I disagree with the premise that the character of the nation is shaped by the president.
Do you think that the character of the nation is, or even should be, shaped by the president?
I would prefer a sense of the president that entails less of the “This is the moment the oceans stopped rising!” hyperbolic absurdity and a little more reality about how a president is chosen and what it means to be effective. Romney’s moral scolding is tiresome.
The nation chooses the president. As with Obama, we have exactly what we chose and deserve.
POTUS will never be my moral guidestar and never should be. “Place not your faith in princes…”
The #NotRomney crowd was pretty invisible to me (perhaps to Romney too, which was a problem). They were not people I saw, much less read & respected. So they never got under my skin.
I agree that there are a (small) number of hypocrites who decry the NeverTrump crowd now but were full-on NeverRomney in 2012, and the lack of self-introspection on the right on this point is glaring.
That being said, Romney did not lose primarily because of a lack of support among conservatives, he lost because he is a very weak retail politician who was up against a very strong retail politician. Romney’s demeanor also exudes “1950s throwback”, which wasn’t the best look against an opponent who represented the culmination of the civil rights movement.
I think Mitt would have made an excellent president, but he didn’t have a snowball’s chance of winning in 2012.
I think trying to force more party unity than what naturally exists is both counterproductive from a policy standpoint, takes elected officials away from their voters, and goes against the spirit of the Founders. The US is much too heterogeneous to be represented by only two standpoints. And competition is a good thing.
But the way for a Senator to exert his independence from his party and/or president is on the Senate floor, not in a cheap op-ed. And if Romney wants to distinguish his character from that of the president’s, the way to do so is to maintain his impeccable character while deflecting any gotcha questions from the media with a boilerplate “the president is the president, and I’m a Senator trying to do my job working on [topic X] for the people of
MassachusettsUtah.”Mitt, we already have one too many grandstanders in DC. Be the quiet, competent guy you’re good at.
Perhaps Paul Ryan is testing out his next career as a ghostwriter.
Moderator Note:
Personal attack on fellow Ricochet members.I was for Romney until the finial debate with Obama. I voted for him because Obama was worse. He allowed Candy Crowley of CNN and Obama to lie and made no comeback or protest of their lies. Same people at CNN who gave Clinton the questions up front of her debate with Trump. Romney proved himself a quisling little man. He is not the man you all think he is.
I belonged to the Mormon Church for 20 years, and all my “me too” moments were with bishops of the church. One who put the make on me when his wife and children were in SLC at a conference. “after all I wasn’t a virgin anymore.” Another who convince me to sell my house at about 1/2 market value, threw my belongings in a storage shed, but the people who bought the house stole half my furniture. When I complained about it his response? He did nothing but stated that “they would get their comeuppance after they died.” I married a man and the Bishop told me it was my responsibly he was a drunk. I had only known my husband for about 7 months before marriage and he had kept his drinking from me. That is 3 Mormon Bishops who were absolutely unethical. As I said in another piece, Mormons are no more ethical, and just as self serving as anybody else. And Romney has turned out to be one of the worse.
How about reading this piece by Sundance, and learning how President Trump is changing the world into more honest responsible nations: https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2019/01/01/big-optical-shift-unprecedented-new-year-speech-by-north-korean-chairman-kim-jong-un/
So big deal that our POTUS occasional misuses language, and I guarantee that if Ricochet didn’t have a COC, there would be a lot more on this blog. [Redacted.]
As important as what Romney said is where he chose to say it. By selecting the Washington Post, which openly proclaims its intent to strangle democracy in darkness and is totally committed to removing President Trump by any means necessary, Mitt is sending a message to his DC “friends” – “I’m with you”.
How Sad! It reminds me of John McCain, who never understood why his media “friends” turned on him in 2008, never realizing his only purpose to them was as a battering ram against other Republicans, and once he’d served that purpose was of no further use. Romney thinks his “friends” on the other side of the aisle yearn for a return to the unity he remembers, not realizing they will be happy to use him, until he, once again, is of no further use to them.
Mitt seems like a decent guy; I’d rather invite him to dinner at my house than Trump (for one thing, Mitt would help clean up afterwards). But he is a figure of the past, not someone for today, or tomorrow.
Glory be, Fred. I should think the Founding Fathers are rolling over in their respective graves. The President is not the Monarch.
That popular culture has descended to such a repulsively cheap and meretricious level that its admiration for, and obsession with, the size of whichever interchangeable Kardashian’s butt it is that can break the Internet, can be blamed on many things, but the “shaping of the nation’s character by the President” isn’t one of them.
The answer to that conundrum lies much closer to home, and requires looking into a mirror, and not through a telescope (for example, I’m pretty sure that the shaping of my ten-year old granddaughter’s character has absolutely nothing to do with who’s in The White House at any given time.)
This.
Do you think he’ll apply this to his colleagues in the legislative branch as well? Yea, that’s what I thought.
This was a weak piece of conspicuous pandering that ensured standing invitations for this twit to be on CNN or MSNBC any time he wants camera time. Even with that as the goal, it was extremely stupid to include the specific litany of buzz words tied to left wing talking points (and fantasies) in the passage above. Other than endearing him to the unseriousness wing of the nominal right and nostalgic semi-conservatives, this will, at best, be a well earned big brown stain on his nose for the duration of his time in the senate.
It would be fitting is someone would point out every tweet that is divisive, racist, sexist, anti-immigrant, dishonest or destructive to democratic institutions that comes from a senator or representative in the next four years with a “Hey Mitt, is this significant enough for you to speak out against?”
What a putz.
Maybe I should have said “publicly” unified. Do you believe the party should split into different factions and the US should morph into a multi-party system?
100% agreement there.
Wow. I’m sorry about all of your bad experiences. Wishing you the best.
I also found it strange that WaPo went with Democracy Dies in Darkness as their mission statement.
My bigger fear is that Mitt’s real goal is to start laying out the groundwork for a potential primary challenge to Trump in 2020 if he deems the conditions favorable.
And even though I like Mitt, dislike Trump, and might be open to a 2020 primary challenger under certain circumstances, a Romney challenge would rank among the all-time boneheaded moves in presidential election history. Mitt has simply burned way too many bridges with his own voters, and he would almost certainly drive the majority of voters who were ambivalent on Trump solidly back into Donald’s camp.
As much as I admire Romney, his obvious and undying ambition for higher electoral office is a major Achilles heel. The average person who got drummed out of the governership after just one term, then lost a Senate election, a presidential primary, and a general election would likely take the hint and realize the voters just aren’t that into him. The fact that Mitt looked at that track record and thought “I’ll just carpetbag it to Utah!” makes me think he wouldn’t hesitate to jump at another chance for a presidential nomination, however slim.
I think Fred just means that the president is both head of government and head of state, a point Churchill made.
This isn’t about Trump misusing language. Its about him being dangerously clueless and having very little chance at winning in 2020 against any Democrat without Hillary’s massive baggage. He’s at 39% approval today. If the economy follows stocks down, he’s headed for the mid 30’s. Time to plan for other options or face another election beatdown
I daresay Fred did. I think he’d made it though, when he said that the President is the head of state (which in no way implies monarchical equivalence). There is no monarchical equivalence. Which was my point.
Multi-party, no. The advantages wouldn’t outweigh the drawbacks, and in any case our electoral system seems to prevent third parties from thriving.
And I actually would like to see the government suppression of party power be reversed. Specifically, states shouldn’t legislate or convene party primary elections, and the federal government should not impose limits on donations to parties (or candidates for that matter).
But at the same time, we should realize that our system wasn’t designed for parties, and that the inevitable two-party system is not flexible enough to cover the incredibly wide range of ideological and interest groups among the electorate. Instead, I think parties themselves should return to their traditional roles of being more transactional than ideological in nature. Allowing more breathing room for ideological and personality differences within the coalition would make it easier to reach compromises within the party, instead of the constant intraparty gridlock that has characterized Republican federal officeholders for the last decade or so.
Agree, and I think this is what we have been witnessing within the Democrat Party, seeing a little of it on the current ‘shutdown’ issue regarding the ‘wall’, very hard to believe almost 300 Democrats in Congress all thinking one way. It hits on credibility for any group when they pretend.
With respect to Romney’s article, wrong subject title, wrong time, wrong place, bad start for a new Senator.
The Queen is the head of state. That was precisely my point. In many (probably a majority) of Republican systems, head of government and head of state are not embodied in one person. So in several countries you have a president and a PM.
But it would be confusing for me to say that on the US, the president is both PM and president. So I used a monarchical term to unambiguously explain my point.
Time and place here shows that Romney wanted to make a statement right before he assumed office, where everyone inside the Beltway would notice it — he could have done it after he had been in office for a few months, based on what Trump does over the next few months, or he could have penned the piece for the Salt Lake Tribune instead of the WaPo, but neither would have set down the marker Romney wanted key people in Washington to know he was setting down.
The question next will be does he simply note the differences, or follow the Jeff Flake route of December, where if he doesn’t like Issue A that Trump’s doing, he hinders him and other Republicans on Issue B, as Flake tried to do on judicial confirmations last month. Then Romney would go from being simply trying to be the GOP’s moral conscience to being the Democrats’ new favorite Republican.
That might be precisely it. I saw this and immediately thought that Romney was positioning himself to be the alternative to Trump in 2020.
Romney may try to play the role of the sober elder statesman figure that can swoop in and save the party from itself.