There was a debate in the 2008 cycle where all the candidates ganged up on Mitt Romney. John McCain, Rudy Guiliani, Mike Huckabee, etc., all took their shots at him, leaving Romney more than once during the debate to question why all the personal attacks. When the debate was over, and the candidates shake hands and smile for the camera, none of them would shake Romney's hand. Rachel Maddow said the other Republicans were acting like mean girls.
I remember that moment, and I remember the faith speech he gave prior to the Iowa caucus. He didn't want to address his religion so early in the campaign, but with staunch anti-Mormonism from the religious right, stoked by Huckabee's whisper campaign ("Don't they believe Jesus and Satan are brothers?") Romney gave his speech. He did it in a way that didn't put religious bigotry to rest, but it at least dampened it. Romney had other problems in 2008, like running as the "social conservative" in the group, but his camp believed the "Mormon question" had hurt him.
Four years later, it didn't matter so much. Romney had the money and experience to make him a stronger candidate. Even though the Republicans didn't want him as the nominee, always picking someone else with him as second choice, all the other candidates wilted under the spotlight. At different points, Michelle Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry and Rick Santorum led in the GOP polls. For all the hand-wringing now, does anyone really believe one of the those five would have done better?
The 2012 cycle took longer, partly due to some dissatisfaction with John McCain wrapping it up so early in 2008, a clearly flawed candidate. And so Mitt Romney had to play the games one plays in primary politics. He flanked Perry to the right on immigration. He had to defend RomneyCare against ObamaCare and explain why what was good for Massachusetts would be disastrous for the nation. His campaign took turns with attack ads on whoever was the frontrunner, but each and every frontrunner took their best shot on him and couldn't topple him. It took its toll though. Perry supporters didn't instantly switch to Romney supporters. Same with Santorum's or Gingrich's. Ron Paul supporters never switched to Romney, even if Paul was the one guy on stage he made a point not to attack.
While Romney was finishing them off, the Obama campaign was already planting the seeds. They followed the playbook of George W. Bush in 2004. Ironic much? The Bush team canvassed their states and identified their voters and got them out. It was about turnout of the base. They also had to weaken their opponent, so the Bush team went after John Kerry's Vietnam tour with the Swiftboat Veterans. Kerry never recovered.
The positive campaign the Obama team ran in 2008 wasn't going to work a second time around. They didn't have the luxury of the high ground. Plus with Super-PACs in play, neither candidate could keep control of their message. Who can forget the ad that implied Romney gave a woman cancer?
Romney's strength was his economic prowess, so that's what they went after. Romney was now Gordon Gekko, an evil corporate raider who destroyed companies and made millions. The image stuck for enough people.
So what could he have done differently?
1. Tell the truth. Romney has a certain cavalier attitude toward truth in politics. It's as though he believes everyone's going to lie, and he's here to play the game. Like Survivor. But it was too easy to look at how he ran for Senate in 1994, how he governed in 2002, how he campaigned in 2008, and how he campaigned in 2012 that made people wonder. "Who is the real Mitt Romney?" There were answers he'd give in the primary debates where I felt like he was telling the far-right what they wanted to hear but wouldn't really govern that way if elected.
2. Change the Convention order. It may have seemed like a coup to get Clint Eastwood to speak ("former Republican mayor"), but it shouldn't have been in primetime. There was a series of speakers who came to the podium one by one and shared brief
stories of acts of service or kindness they'd received from Romney. It not only humanized him but underlined how compassionate a man he could be. It was a side of him the electorate needed to see, and a side he'd never boast of. It was a side that few people saw, because it didn't happen in primetime. Instead his own speech wasn't that memorable, and all people could talk about was The Chair.
3. Pick a different Vice-President. Romney figured he needed a pick to excite the base, so he doubled-down on the economic question and picked Paul Ryan. Trouble is, Ryan had a budget the Obama team could criticize. It didn't matter that Obama hasn't had a budget in three years; Ryan's suggestions were full of those that would raise the tax burden on poor and middle-income families. And if Ryan was a such a fiscal conservative, why did he support Medicare Part-D and TARP and the bailouts? He was just another white male Republican.
4. Get out of the echo chamber. Romney was a numbers guy, but the team around him was giving him bad numbers. "Oh, don't worry about Nate Silver. He's biased. Look at Rasmussen! Look at our own internal polling." Romney believed with all his heart on Tuesday he was going to win. His consultants were charlatans.
5. Campaign for everyone. How many times did we hear "small business"? What about the people who don't own a small business? He needed better articulation on why his plans would help everyone, not just the rich and entrepreneurial.
6. Don't criticize the "other." The Obama team did a good job of "otherizing" Mitt Romney. He's not one of us. But Romney fell into the trap when speaking to some wealthy donors, telling them what they wanted to hear. There's a reason the "47%" comment was leaked in September even though he'd said it in May. He may or may not personally feel disdain for those who don't pay federal income tax, but hey Fox News portrays them as freeloaders, so let's follow that narrative. I make a decent living, but once I take my earned income tax credit, child tax credits, charitable deductions, mortgage deduction, and medical expenses deduction, I paid very little federal income tax last year. I imagine plenty of other families out there making $30, $40, $50, $60,000 a year find themselves in the same boat. It showed a disconnect.
7. Give a vision for the future. Obama kept talking about moving "forward." Romney's campaign was more about hearkening back to Reagan's America, a military superpower, a shining beacon on the hill of low taxes and low regulations. Each president is right or wrong for their time, and Reagan was right for his time. But fellas, that was thirty years ago. Nostalgia has never won a campaign. Maybe Grover Cleveland.
So now the dust has settled, and Romney, unfortunately, rather than fading into the sunset, made some more conference calls to donors and supporters, and had the "gifts" gaffe. The 2012 election was one of the smallest and shallowest in history, not to mention
the most negative. Big Bird, Binders of Women, "You Didn't Build That", etc. And the "gifts" comment is a postscript to it.
That one word has emboldened other Republican leaders to condemn him and push him aside, Gov. Bobby Jindal first and foremost. The fight for 2016 starts now, and the GOP would like a new leader.
Victory has a thousand fathers but defeat is an orphan. I don't see Romney settling into an elder statesman role for the party. Looks like most of the establishment guys are eager to get rid of him. A lot of "I told you so" columns being written.
Romney never had many friends in the Republican Party. His selling point was his management style. His electability. Now that he lost his election, that his team wasn't as well-managed as the other guy, they might come back to him for money, but that's about it. The Romney candidacy is going to be like the second term of George W. Bush: something the Republican Party would like to forget ever happened.
